By Lloyd Mackey

WHEN a group of Victoria churches get together this spring to facilitate a Good Friday-to-Pentecost 24/7 prayer cycle, they will be emulating a practice begin by the Moravians in the 1700s.

That European Christian group  – widely viewed as a precursor to the Wesleyan-Methodist movement and the development of modern Christian global missions – were also known for the century-long prayer meeting, in which unbroken prayer cycles fed the Moravian spiritual vitality.

The Victoria churches intent on doing a 2008 52-day unbroken prayer cycle, running from Easter to Pentecost, are inspired in part by a book called Red Moon Rising: How 24/7 Prayer is Awakening a Generation, by Peter Greig and David Roberts.

A description of the book on Amazon calls it “an extraordinary story about the adventure of faith and the power of persevering prayer.”

It goes on to outline the inspiration for  the book: “On a summer’s day in 1727 a community of Moravians started praying – and didn’t stop for more than 100 years. Throughout history God has mobilized such movements and moments of 24/7 prayer – from the Upper Room of Pentecost to Azusa Street in Los Angeles, through ancient Celtic saints and extraordinary characters like Alexander the Sleepless.

“This is the story of a movement of the Spirit in our time, a move as ancient as it is modern. As young people desert the church and AIDS orphans Africa, a new generation is learning to pray and obey like never before. From communist China to Washington DC and from the ranks of the Salvation Army to anarchic German punks, the 24-7 Prayer movement has been interceding continually, night and day, since 1999 in more than 50 countries.”

Continue article >>

Co-author Greig, an independent church pastor in the south of England, provided a summary of the Moravian/Methodist historic connection recently at Asbury Theological Seminary in Louisville, Kentucky, a school connected with the Free Methodist denomination and other Holiness movements, such as the Nazarenes and the Salvation Army.

The Victoria area prayer effort is formally known as ‘52 Days of Prayer Emphasis.’ The plan, simply put, calls for several churches to play host to prayer sessions. The idea would be that anyone who wants to pray, any hour, day or night, would be able to access at least one church, during the Good Friday/Pentecost period.

The reference to the red moon, as it happens, is linked loosely to the biblical connections to the eclipses of the moon – one of which occurred February 20 over North America.

But local organizers are careful to explain that this is not a movement which requires belief in some divine connection to natural events involving the sun or moon.

An interview with Greig can be found online at: www.asburyseminary.edu/chapel/greig.php

Churches involved in the Victoria initiative include: New Life Community Fellowship, First Church of the Nazarene, Gateway Baptist Church, Esquimalt Church of the Nazarene, Victoria Foursquare Church, Victoria Chinese Alliance Church, Westshore Alliance Church, Harbourview Alliance Church, Lion of Judah, Providence Community Church, Victoria Miracle Centre, Glad Tidings Pentecostal Assembly, Chinese Pentecostal Church, Salvation Army Downtown Chapel, St. Paul’s Anglican Church, Victoria Christian Fellowship, Christ Community Church, and Western Community Baptist Church.

March 2008