A Corporate Prayer Plan for the Church Using Prayer Stations

Bringing the Church Together for Focused Prayer

Jesus tells us there is power available when the people in our church gather and pray together.

Many of you have Wednesday Night prayer meetings. In my first church, we did, as well. I really enjoyed the time together with the church, but I grew frustrated with the “prayer” part.

I don’t know how you do Wednesday Nights, but we would open up the floor for prayer requests. Sometimes the requests were for serious needs. But, often they would become “not so serious” requests.

Now, I certainly don’t want to make light of prayer and a person’s need for prayer. I don’t believe there is anything too large or too small to petition the Lord for. But praying for Aunt Mildred’s cat’s fur ball problem may not make the most of our corporate prayer time.

Anyway, after we spent a great deal of time taking prayer requests, I’d open the floor for anyone who felt led to pray to start. The usual four to five people would pray. Some prayers were short while others were looooong. When I sensed no one else would be praying, I’d close out the session with my own prayer. We would then move into either a short message or a Bible Study.

That was our “prayer meeting.” This may be yours, too.

In my second church, we didn’t have the traditional Wednesday night prayer meetings. We had small groups that met throughout the week, where these groups prayed together. Additionally, we had small groups that met at the church building on Wednesday nights.

The prayer time in these groups pretty much went just like the prayer meetings at my first church, only on a smaller scale. There was more openness in the groups but the prayer time usually just got tacked on somewhere near the end of the group meetings.

Both models had their positives and negatives. But, as far as prayer was concerned, both models were severely lacking.

The Missing Element in Corporate Prayer

What was missing in our prayer and small group meetings and what may be missing in yours can most likely be summed up in one word.

Focus.

Prayer was not a focus. The problems, needs, and praises shared were the focus. Or the Bible study. Or the food at the group gathering. What was leading up to a minute of prayer was the 15-30 minutes of talk and discussion BEFORE prayer. That was the focus.

How could I shift the focus to spending time together seeking God’s face about specific needs and concerns? How could I lead people to concentrate on our Lord of mercy and grace for an extended period of time?

I began to brainstorm ways for focusing our church on specific prayer concerns. I read books and researched the internet for suggestions and directions for authentic corporate prayer. I took all these sources and developed my own plan for focused corporate prayer. That plan is what the remainder of this post will outline.

A Corporate Prayer Plan for the Church

Focusing on prayer means removing anything that competes with our prayer time. So there should be nothing else occurring, at least leading up to, and during the time of prayer. I could either have a time of prayer on a different day than our regular Wednesday Night Prayer Meeting, or replace our prayer meeting format entirely.

Getting people to come to a church event on Wednesday night, let alone another night of the week is a feat in itself. So I went with the option of replacing our prayer meeting format entirely. But not every Wednesday night.

We set aside one Wednesday night per quarter for focused prayer time. I put in a lot of time preparing for that night so that when people did come, they had a night free of distractions.

I prepared an agenda so there was guided direction for our prayer time. This agenda contained specific prayer points to lead our people to pray.

Rooms were set aside and designated as prayer stations. Each prayer station was focused on one primary area, one prayer point.

Our people were separated into groups and each group rotated through each prayer station. Their prayers were directed by the focus prayer point at that station.

So there’s an explanation of what led me to this plan. And a very brief overview of the plan. Now I want to show you how this plan practically played out.

The Prayer Plan in Action

I’m going to lay out the plan as bullet-points. This can serve as a “to-do list” should you decide to give this plan a try.

Prepare the Agenda

• Ask yourself the questions, “Where do we most need to see God’s guidance and intervention at this moment? What are the needs our church has, both individually and corporately? What are the needs outside the church?” Narrow your answers down to just three or four focused areas.
• We always had three prayer stations. So I would prepare three separate prayer guides. Each guide was focused on one of those focused areas. (You will find some examples of our agendas below)

Prepare the Rooms

• Select three rooms according to their sizes and proximity to each other. There needs to be enough room for everyone but not so big there is no intimacy.
• Place enough copies of the agenda in each room so that everyone will have a copy. Encourage everyone to take their copies home for guidance in their own personal prayer times.
• No tables. Arrange chairs in a circle so everyone can see each other and hear each other.
• Here are a few suggestions I never did myself, but you might want to consider. Print out Bible verses dealing with the prayer station topic and put them on the walls. Maybe set up some candles for setting an intimate worshipful mood. Use whatever you think might enhance the time of prayer.
• Have a large room set up for everyone to gather in before starting. This can be your sanctuary, fellowship hall, or some other room large enough to accommodate everyone when you begin.

Prepare the People

• Have everyone first meet in the larger room. Welcome them and explain to them what is about to take place.
• Remind them it’s all about coming before the Lord seeking His face, grace, mercy, and intervention.
• Explain to them the process. Let them know how everything is planned to go.

Explain the Process

• There are three prayer stations. Each prayer station is for praying for a specific topic.
• You will be at each prayer station for 20 minutes.
• Take the first 5 minutes to read over the agenda and discuss the topic.
• Decide on an order of who will be praying.
• You do not have to pray aloud if you’re uncomfortable. But we do ask that you pray silently while everyone is praying.
• Have someone watching the clock and let everyone know when the 5 minutes are up.
• The remainder of the time you will be praying for that prayer station topic. Pray according to the order you decided on.
• After 20 minutes, someone will knock on your door. At that time you will rotate to the next prayer station.

Dividing into Groups

• Divide your people into the same number of groups as prayer stations. With three prayer stations, I divided our people into three groups.
• It is a really good idea to have at least one person who is comfortable praying publicly in each group. You may even want to talk to them before the prayer meeting, asking them to help lead their group through each prayer station.
• Go through the group and designate them 1, 2, or 3, according to the order they were sitting in. If they are 1s, they are in group 1, 2s in group 2, and 3s in group 3.
• Tell them group 1 begins at station 1, group 2 at station 2, and group 3 at station 3. At the first rotation, group 1 will rotate to station 2, group 2 will rotate to station 3, and group 3 to station 1. At the second rotation, group 1 will rotate to station 3, group 2 will rotate to station 1, and group 3 to station 2.

Begin the Prayer Time

• Designate someone to be the timekeeper. Anyone in any group can serve this purpose. Let them set a timer on their phone for 20 minutes.
• Send everyone to their beginning designated stations and started the clock. It’s important to give a set amount of time and stick to that time.
• It’s important that you, as the pastor, be part of one of the groups. Your example will go a long way in enhancing the importance of praying on specific topics and participating with your people.

Finishing

• With three prayer stations and 20-minute blocks, the prayer meeting should be over in an hour.
• You can use any time frame you like, but I found that one hour is the sweet spot.

Of course, being Baptist, we always had some food or snacks afterward! But you may really want to consider a short time of fellowship after the time of prayer. It gives people time to decompress and share their prayer experiences. I always found this “after” time exhilarating as people basked in the warmth of being before the Lord. There was always much joy in the room.

Example Prayer Station Agendas

What follows are some examples of the prayer points I’ve used during our prayer meetings. I hope these will give you more direction and explanation about what we were praying for.

There are examples from three different prayer meetings. I refer to them as sessions.

I’ve put these sample prayer points into PDF files. There are buttons at the bottom of this post for downloading them.

I’ve added a bit of commentary on each session to give a little detail to each one.

Session 1

Each prayer station agenda in this session centered around a specific point in our church vision statement.

Session 2

This prayer meeting was held shortly before Easter.

Session 3

This prayer meeting was held as the new school year was starting in the fall.

If you would like to download these session agendas, you can click the button below for a PDF of all 9 prayer stations.

What do you think about this Corporate Prayer Plan?

I’ve found this plan to be an excellent way of getting the church involved in focused corporate prayer time. This plan also enhances the importance of prayer in the life of the church. It would fit nicely into a sermon series on prayer, such as my 40 Days of Prayer series.

Is this something you might try?

What are some ways you’ve found that lead to more focused corporate prayer?

Please share any questions, suggestions, or your own plans in the comments below. I look forward to your participation.