Running a Prayer Experience with Your City Group

Running a Prayer Experience is a great way to help equip people with prayer. Learning to pray, and then actually praying will help build confidence and comfortability in talking and hearing from God, especially in group settings with other Christians.

Simply put, the best way to grow in prayer is to pray!

To run a Prayer Experience, we recommend 1 of 2 options:

Option 1: Journal Your Prayers

Have a time of silent prayer, journaling your prayers. We have put together a slideshow of different prayer prompts. This method helps teach people about the different kinds of prayer. Each slide guides them with Scripture and instructions to then pray in those specific ways.

Click here for the prayer slideshow.

A few ways to get the most out of this experience:

1. We recommend having someone screen cast or Airplay the slideshow onto a TV from their device (phone or laptop) so people can see the slides clearly

2. You’ll also need someone who will change to the next slide every 5 min and kindly let people know the next slide is on the screen

3. It’s a nice touch to have some worship music playing lightly in the background during the time of prayer

Option 2: Pray The Scriptures

1. As the leader, select a chapter of Scripture to pray through. (ex: Ephesians, Galatians, Psalms, Philippians, Colossians, James, 1 Peter, 2 Peter)

2. Begin by reading until you feel there’s a good break to stop. (ex: If you choose Ephesians chapter 1 to pray through, Whoever begins may just feel led to read the first couple of verses.)

3. Pray in response to the verse(s) using one of the topics above using “TACOS” prayer prompts

   (Thanksgiving, Adoration, Confession, Others, Self)

   THANKSGIVING

   “Father, thank you for…”

   ADORATION

   “God, I love you because…”

   CONFESSION

   “Father, please forgive me for…”

   OTHERS

   “Father, I pray for [name] that you would…”

   SELF

   “Father, please help me…”

   (Let’s say someone feels led to just read the first couple of verses in this example. The text is Ephesians 1:1-2: “Paul, an apostle of Christ Jesus by the will of God, To the saints who are in Ephesus, and are faithful in Christ Jesus: Grace to you and peace from God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ.”

   Using the Ephesians 1:1-2 example, your prayer could sound like this: “Father, thank you that through Jesus, you give us grace and peace. God, I love you because you call me a saint even though I fail you”)

4. Wait. Let the room experience silence. Give permission to everyone in the room to pray in response to those verses using the TACOS topics above. 1, 2, or even 5 other people may feel drawn to pray the same couple of verses. This is good! Allow the Holy Spirit to stir people to pray in the group as you wait.

5. When the person sitting clockwise has counted 7 seconds with no further prayer, it’s safe to move on. Pick up where the last reader left off (verse 3 for this Ephesians example) and do this until everyone in the circle has had the opportunity to read and pray. End your time as the Holy Spirit leads you to feel is good and natural.