We decided to name our experience for deeper worship and intercession “Encounter.”

On Friday, June 3, we will have our first “Encounter” gathering at Noon in the CIL sanctuary. For those of you available in the Hendesonville area, come by during your lunch hour to experience God’s presence together. Penny Simms will lead worship, and I will lead us in intercession this day. On June 3, we will concentrate on prayer for the teenagers, as they will be at youth camp on that Friday. It will be great to have parents of teenagers join us this special rime of prayer.

We exist to “Know His Love, Share His Love”. Encounter is an opportunity to deepen the “know his love” part of that mission.

Back to last Thursday’s “National Day of Prayer Service”, you won’t believe the crowd we had.  Are you ready for this?  It was unbelievable!    We have a whopping 23 people – :).

Despite this small turn out, it was an extremely significant night.  In fact, as only a handful of people were there, I felt God say, “This night will be a window into the soul of the church.”  The people who came, WANTED to be there and they WANTED God’s Presence.

The hour went like this:

– Immediate, deep worship.   It could be described as “inner court” worship.

– Singing the Word of God.  Penny Simms was leading worship, and she led us in a melody to II Chronicles 7:14 – “if my people, who are called by my name, will humble themselves and pray and seek my face and turn from their wicked ways, then I will hear from heaven, and I will forgive their sin and will heal their land.”

– Bold prayers.  As we moved back and forth from worship to intercession, the boldness and authority in our prayers increased.

We are going to have more times like this in the future.

Why?
– To create a culture of worship and intercession for our deeper believers
– To model and train those who need to be mentored in deep worship and intercession.
– To keep our Sunday morning service a “front door” entry place for newcomers.  Not that we avoid spiritual things, but we give a balanced experience of worship, teaching, communion, announcements and ministry.

I’ve been calling this concept of additional worship and intercession services the “Prayer Room”, but I am going to come up with new terminology that fits our church better.

Beth just made two great suggestions: “Inner Court” and “Secret Place.”

Do you have a suggestion for this?  Go easy on the sarcasm.