What is a gospel movement?
A church planting movement (CPM) or disciple making movement (DMM) can be defined as “the multiplication of disciples making disciples and leaders developing leaders, resulting in indigenous churches planting churches which begin to spread rapidly through a people group or population segment.” Click here to read more about gospel movements.
Declare a Promise
Rev 15:3 “”And they sing the song of Moses, the servant of God, and the song of the Lamb, saying, ’Great and amazing are your deeds, O Lord God the Almighty! Just and true are your ways, O King of the Lebanese!’”
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Father, this scripture speaks truth: one day, the Lebanese will sing the song of Moses, the song of Myriam, and they shall dance before the Lord as a once-captive people now walking across a dry sea, a once-imprisoned people now liberated from the brutality of Pharaoh. The truth is that all the Lebanese shall sing: great and marvelous are your deeds, Lord God Almighty; just and true are your ways, O Lord, King of Ages!
Today’s Movement Theme: TARGETED PRAYER
Today, we will continue to intercede for Lebanon during this historic inflection point. Yesterday, we prayed for a spirit of peace over against a spirit of sectarianism and violence. Today, we will pray for liberation from captive attention.
If you haven’t prayed the past few days, a brief context might serve you: Lebanon has faced a series of compound traumas that has left it reeling: civil war from 1975-1990; ongoing sectarian violence culminating in clashes and assassinations; the 2006 war between Hezbollah and Israel; and more recently, the absolute collapse of Lebanon’s economy, hyperinflation, a socio-political revolution against the ruling elite, a massive port explosion that left 300,000 homeless, and the social stresses of dealing with the Covid pandemic.
To say that Lebanon is ‘on the brink’ is something of an understatement; it has already fallen off the proverbial cliff.
Therefore, we will pray.
Captive Attention
Because of the complex and compound traumas Lebanon has endured–acutely, now, for the past 45 years–a great deal of damage has been done to the mental and emotional wellness of the beautiful peoples living here. As a way of coping with instability and parents who couldn’t (or wouldn’t) be present and attuned, generations of Lebanese began dealing with their interior worlds in the best ways they knew how: staying constantly busy and, when not busy, escaping to cope.
Today, we will pray for a spirit of deliverance for God’s children, whose time, attention, and energy have been captured by–or nailed to–myriad escapes, addictions, and busyness.
Scriptures to Pray
Jer 2:11, 13
“Has any nation ever traded its gods for new ones,
even though they are not gods at all?
Yet my people have exchanged their glorious God
for worthless idols!
“For my people have done two evil things:
They have abandoned me—
the fountain of living water.
And they have dug for themselves cracked cisterns
that can hold no water at all!”
- Repent on behalf of the Lebanese for abandoning their glorious God, the source of true rest
- Pray that God would expose the worthlessness of their idols: workaholism, busyness, vanity, screen addictions of all kinds (ie Instagram, social media, gaming, pornography, etc), and drug and alcohol abuse
- Ask that God would powerfully break cycles of escape, acting out, and addiction
- Pray for a divine return to the fountain of living water, who is Christ
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Gal 6:7-8 “Do not be deceived: God is not mocked, for whatever one sows, that will he also reap. For the one who sows to his own flesh will from the flesh reap corruption, but the one who sows to the Spirit will from the Spirit reap eternal life.”
- Intercede that the veil of deception would be removed, that people would see the destructiveness of sin and living for the ego
- Pray for a spirit of deliverance to work mightily in the Lebanese to enable them to sow to the Spirit
- Ask that the reward for sowing to the Spirit would be gratifying and convincing, especially for our new believing brothers and sisters
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John 4:13,14 “Jesus said to her, ‘Everyone who drinks of this water will be thirsty again, but whoever drinks of the water that I will give him will never be thirsty again. The water that I will give him will become in him a spring of water welling up to eternal life.’”
- Pray for divine satisfaction in Christ to be released over all peoples in Lebanon
- Pray that God, in his mercy, would liberate the time, attention, and energy of the Lebanese people for His purposes in His Kingdom
No Place Left
Each day, we pray for various regions of Lebanon, believing in faith that a disciple making movement will touch each and every community throughout the nation.
Today, pray by name for the following election zones: North I, II, and III
North I (Sunnis majority): Akkar
North II (Sunnis majority): Tripoli, Minyeh-Dinnieh
North III (Christian majority): Batroun, Koura, Bcharre, Zgharta
Prayer
Lord of compassion, would you rise and deliver your imprisoned people. Have mercy on those whose attention is captured by distractions and cheap thrills; have mercy on those whose time is consumed by workaholism and mindless activity; have mercy on those whose energy is sapped by the toxic effects of addiction, over-consumption, and escapism. Lord, have mercy; Christ, have mercy.
Would you lead Lebanon back to its true Source of Life–the fountain of living water, the light by which we see, the One true Christ. In You, O Lord, may we never thirst again.
Amen