In 2008, Trey and Mary Anne Kent began a prayer walk in their Austin, Texas neighborhood. Surrounded by darkness and illuminated by the light pole above them, God spoke clearly to them, setting them on a path that would change their lives—and their city.”
Trey recalls how “it landed with undeniable fire. It was a simple idea: 31 churches covering the city in 24/7 prayer, with each church adopting one 24-hour day of prayer every month of the year.” Later, in an upper room in Jerusalem, God confirmed His desire for the city Trey and Mary Anne called home.
Since then, a prayer movement has swept through Austin, incorporating churches big and small from different denominations, ethnicities, and economic backgrounds. Around 100 churches in the greater Austin area have adopted their monthly day of prayer for the city. Hundreds or even thousands attend quarterly prayer meetings to unite churches through worship and prayer.
In a city once divided, churches are uniting in prayer like never before. Trey describes it this way: “Our city is more unified and transformed than I’ve seen it in the 25 years I’ve lived and pastored in Austin.”
Awakening on the Horizon?
A decade into the movement, Trey and fellow pastor Kie Bowman wrote City of Prayer: Transforming Your Community through Praying Churches (PrayerShop Publishing: 2019). The book tells how God moved in Austin and how a 24/7 prayer movement can happen anywhere when God’s people are desperate enough to pray.
Prayer is like fire—it ignites everything it touches and continues spreading. Revival and spiritual awakening are like an earthquake that shifts and shakes the culture because of unceasing, desperate prayer. The days of business as usual for the Church are gone. It’s time to pray as the early Church prayed and expect our cities to be epicenters of awakening!
We don’t know where the next revival and spiritual awakening will occur. But we know God likes to work in unlikely and unexpected places. Kie writes, “If a city looks too far gone or a culture seems too distant from God for an awakening, you may be surprised.”
Our culture’s moral and spiritual decline is evident. Some might say we’re “too far gone.” But what if God sees things differently? What if the prayers of His people usher in something that Kie says “points to something on the horizon sent from heaven, the likes of which we’ve never seen before”?
Prayer Movements in History
If you study the history of spiritual awakenings, you will see patterns emerge. The most common pattern is prayer. In City of Prayer, Kie traces how prayer has preceded and fueled spiritual awakenings from the first-century Church to today.
The Church began with an unceasing prayer movement. Fifty days after Jesus’ resurrection, during a 10-day prayer meeting in Jerusalem, the Holy Spirit descended upon the disciples. This event filled them with divine power and led to the baptism of 3,000 new believers in a single day.
The First and Second Great Awakenings in America resulted from prayer movements like the Moravians, who dedicated themselves to 24/7 unbroken prayer for 100 years. The Moravians deeply influenced George Whitfield and John Wesley, critical figures in these awakenings.
The noontime prayer meetings in 1857 led by Jeremiah Lanphier in New York City quickly grew, attracting thousands to pray daily for the nation. Within six months, as many as 50,000 people attended prayer meetings across New York City, and the revival spread nationwide. The Welsh Revival of 1904-1905 was remarkable for its widespread impact, resulting in 100,000 conversions within five months.
In the 1960s and early 1970s, revival among hippies in California spread from San Francisco to other parts of the country, notably Asbury College. Later, in 1994, Bill Bright, founder of Campus Crusade for Christ (now Cru), gathered 600 Christian leaders across denominations to pray and fast for spiritual awakening in America. Bright’s vision that “if two million believers in America would fast for 40 days, praying for revival, the year 2000 would be the beginning of spiritual awakening” brings us to where we are today.
Looking back, Kie believes we are at the dawn of a great revival in our country. “It seemed to me as if every minister I knew was burdened for revival. The 20th century was coming to a close. People everywhere were fasting and praying. What we didn’t know was that the prayer movement was just getting started. We were only drops in a stream. The rivers would flow in the 21st century. Spiritual awakening is coming.”
Pastors are Key
The Unceasing Prayer Movement led by Trey and Kie is spreading across the United States and the globe. Trey attributes the movement’s success to its simplicity: “It is so simple and attainable. If your church sees Jesus as the answer to your city’s problems, prayer can bring real and effective change.”
Pastors are critical to the success of 24/7 prayer movements in these cities. “…this movement of prayer begins and ends with local church pastors who are the key to raising up and maintaining praying churches that will literally transform our cities. Right now, in your city, there are pastors who are prepared to lead their churches in 24/7 prayer for spiritual awakening.”
Jesus called us to be a house of prayer for all nations (Mark 11:14). Becoming a house of prayer means creating a culture of prayer in our churches. According to Ronnie Floyd, former President of the Southern Baptist Executive Committee, that starts with pastors. “As the pastor goes, so goes the church. Stop delegating prayer to others. Lead your church to be a praying church.”
Launching 24/7 Prayer in Your Church
Establishing a culture of prayer in your church is easier than you might think. At his church, Kie discovered that “the key is to invite people to pray together weekly in small prayer meetings. This gives them the opportunity to both catch prayer and to begin crying out to God in their own words and way.”
From there, the next logical step is “adopting a day of prayer every month to pray for your city is the most effective way to begin and maintain a culture of prayer in your local church. After this is established and growing, other steps can be taken.” Other steps include prayerwalking neighborhoods, overnight prayer meetings, or quarterly prayer gatherings. Every church is different, so each will have a unique expression of prayer, which we should celebrate.
Once your church has established a culture of prayer and adopted its day of prayer, it’s time to get other churches involved and launch 24/7 prayer in your city. To do that, Kie says you simply “bring together pastors in the city and invite them to adopt a day of prayer in their churches.” With more churches united in prayer, “we see a growing hunger in cities across the earth to unite in 24/7 prayer for spiritual awakening. Desperation is increasing as human solutions prove ineffective for long-term transformation.”
Prayer is the key to the Church’s influence and change in the city. Kie writes, “The praying Church carries the most influence in your city—more than the city council, mayor, or school system. The praying Church is the key to a transformed city.”
“I will pour water on the thirsty land…”
In 2014, the crisis in Austin was undeniable. “We were experiencing the worst drought in Austin’s history, and the demand for water had never been greater due to an unprecedented lack of rainfall and the taxing needs of a rapidly expanding population,” Kie recalls. There was virtually no rain for months, and daily temperatures soared above 100 degrees, creating an economic and human disaster with no viable solutions in sight.
One day, a group of pastors and intercessors gathered at 6 a.m. at Hyde Park Baptist Church, as they usually did. After their time in prayer, one intercessor felt an impression from the Lord. A month later, 1,000 believers came together to pray and worship. For nearly two hours, they prayed for rain. Lake Travis, typically full at 681 feet, had dropped to less than 618 feet, requiring over 20 million gallons to refill. What they needed was a legit miracle.
Then, it happened. “The next weekend, torrential rains and flash floods covered Austin. It was only the beginning. Ignoring every computer model predicting more drought, the rains fell regularly and relentlessly.” Reflecting on these events, Kie writes, “We watched God answer prayer with a modern-day nature miracle. In less than two years, the millions of gallons of water needed to fill Lake Travis pushed the levels back to 681 feet. God answered our prayers in one of the most conspicuous ways imaginable.”
Covering Arkansas in Unceasing Prayer
The Austin story shows us what can happen when God’s people are desperate enough to pray. When churches unite in prayer, we can expect God to produce extraordinary results.
If you’re thinking, “I would love to see that happen in Arkansas,” I have good news. It already is! Arkansas Prays is a simple, church-based statewide prayer movement with churches working together throughout the state to cover Arkansas in 24/7 prayer.
CityChurch Network is excited to champion Arkansas Prays and the nationwide movement America Prays, uniting 40,000 churches in unceasing prayer. Imagine Arkansas being the next epicenter of awakening in our country. Imagine the floods of spiritual refreshment and renewal a united and praying Church would bring to the thirsty and weary in our state.
It will happen when we are desperate enough to pray. Or, as Kie tells us: “When we recapture the New Testament vision of prayer meetings, spiritual awakening won’t be far behind. Prayer meetings change the world!”
We echo Trey’s belief that “the future is as bright as the promises of God.” Let us step forward, praying that God promises to do more than we could ever hope or imagine in our state. You and I might witness the greatest thing since the Church launched 2,000 years ago.
Let us pray with one voice that we will see it.
Today, the tectonic plates of culture are shifting beneath our feet. We are so familiar with the major changes occurring in American culture that it’s almost unnecessary to list the moral decline, the hostility and polarization in our political process, the spike in the depression and suicide rates among teens and children, the opioid crisis, racial divisions, and the growth of atheism and secularism.
Fortunately, God is active, and the Church is sensing a desperation that leads to prayer. There is a prayer movement rising with the potential to usher in the most widespread spiritual awakening in American history. Perhaps the most significant event since Pentecost is on the way.
Kie Bowman
Visit Arkansas Prays to learn more about signing up your church for a half or full day of unceasing prayer for Arkansas.
Chris Loux, Communications Director – CityChurch Network
