Prayer for the World

In praying for the world's issues we are likely to be joining with countless other Christians across many different countries, with our prayers fusing together in a ceaseless round of petition to Father God.

One of the issues is knowing what to pray for, since there are so many topics dominating the headlines. Rather than flit from topic to topic, praying "Lord, I pray for the situation in so and so, the war in somewhere else, and the terrible flooding in another place," it is probably better to focus a little more on the needs of a particular situation.

Remember too, the needs of your country, your town and your neighbourhood. Praying for the world can too often be restricted to the headline news on our televisions. This allows Christians from all over the world to pray for these issues, but only a limited subset of people will be praying for your neighbourhood. Your local paper, school needs, the conversations with local people, the projects of your church can be great places to start.

i. Keeping ourselves aware of the latest news, researching the background to a situation, and taking opportunities to discuss the situation with informed people can give us important background knowledge. This in turn, informs our prayers, helping us direct our prayers to the particular and specific needs of the situation we are praying for.

ii. In general, prayer tends to focus more on people rather than things, and so take a moment to consider the people involved in a situation. Those in authority, those on the ground, those affected by it, and their families, those who are trying to remedy a particular issue and so on. Again, it is good to pray specifically, and hearing people speak on news broadcasts or reading quotes in our newspapers gives us a focus for prayer.

iii. Prayer cycles such as those produced by mission agencies, or by church dioceses can provide a mechanism to focus our prayer for the world on particular topics each day so that over the course of a month or a year or so, our prayers will cover the complete range of needs.