Eurasia: Anticipation For God

Spring time has come and we are once again in full preparation for another one of our annual 50 Hours prayer meeting here in Eurasia. There is bustling anticipation around what God will do this year during and after the meeting; enthusiasm is building among believers here. The anticipation isn’t unmerited- and for good reason. Despite being the most unreached and unengaged majority Islamic nation in the world, the Eurasian Church is experiencing historic growth; more than has been experienced in centuries in this ancient land. The numbers are still small because of the dramatically low threshold from which we are starting (numerically, if the indigenous church in Eurasia was a species of animal, they would be considered a critically endangered species- representing only 0.001% of the Eurasian population) but the growth is felt in every fellowship from the Caucasus to the Aegean. The nascent indigenous Church can trace its own rebirth and expansion to a tangible connection with increased prayer and worship across the country. It should be noted that this correlation isn’t overlooked by the indigenous believers. They are aware of the consequences of another 50 Hours meeting: Greater activity of the Holy Spirit, more conversions, more baptisms, further ground taken for the Kingdom of God. We are grateful beneficiaries of these 50 Hours meetings.

The benefits of prayer meetings like these are hard to put into words; they outstrip the short-term costs of production, organization, and execution of the events themselves. Although there is much to be said about why we facilitate these prayer meetings every year I want to emphasize the dynamic impact they bear upon the spiritual climate of the unreached world and more particularly: the profound transformative effect they have upon the Church in Eurasia. Corporate prayer and worship positions the Church- even the smallest Muslim background believing house fellowship- to uniquely experience the manifest presence of God. We experience a certain dimension of the presence of God when we are gathered corporately that we simply do not- and cannot- experience when we are alone. Jesus’ statement that “where two or more have gathered in My name, I am there in their midst” does not mean that He is only found in the community of the faithful, but rather that He manifests Himself in a unique way in corporate settings.

Corporate times of prayer and worship are immensely transformative, first for the Church and secondarily for the region in which the Church lives, moves, and has its being. This should not come as a surprise to us. These are times when Christ is “in their midst” as the incarnate, sanctifying, anointing, sending, and transfiguring God. These are times when the Church turns her attention away from the endless demands of the unreached harvest fields and turns into Herself, as it were, to commune with the True Vine, the Head from which She is connected and transformed “from glory to glory” by the working of the Holy Spirit. These are times when the Church is most Herself, fundamental to what it means to be ekklesia.

Importantly, this course of action is never without consequences to the surrounding world. The Church must be connected to the Vine to be fruitful, weak to be strong, humiliated to be glorified, and crucified to be resurrected. The voluntary embrace of the semblance of the weakness of corporate prayer and worship is one of the most effective, catalytic, and society-changing actions that can be accomplished in this world. The place of corporate worship, singing, and intercession is the seedbed of revival. Revival is that which belongs uniquely to the Church. From a revived Church comes times of reformation in the hearts and souls of Her members and from a reformed Church comes bold proclamation of the gospel which results invariably in a renaissance in the societies in which She lives- a harvest among the lost. In this sense the Church functions exothermically: She withdraws into Herself to commune with the Lord and in that place is strengthened, but when She reemerges she releases more power than she brought in at the start. It is a revived and rejuvenated Church, saturated in the glory of God from the face of Christ Jesus that transforms societies. 

It is a revived Church filled with the power of the Spirit that is the key to closing the 10/40 Window forever, freeing billions of lost human beings from sin and banishing the spirit of Islam permanently from memory. It is of a revived Church that Paul spoke of when he said, “so that the manifold wisdom of God might now be made known through the Church to the rulers and the authorities in the heavenly places”. These “rulers” are not human enterprises, economic systems, or ideologies, but rather personal, hostile, wicked, cosmic demonic spirits that are enslaving much of the human race in darkness and anguish. The Church makes known God’s wisdom to these rebellious powers in two ways: Through corporate worship and prayer and through corporate proclamation of the gospel. The former begetting the latter. In corporate prayer, she stands as the living icon on earth of the unseen perpetual assembly before God’s throne in the heavens. In corporate proclamation, she makes known the defeat of the powers at the cross and their terminal end at Christ’s appearing.

In light of these truths, we are full of faith and excitement for the 50 Hours prayer meeting. Despite coming from different congregations we will gather together as one. We will turn our hearts and faces to Christ and will be made radiant. Christ will be glorified and loved and we will be revived, reformed, and sent out in the centrifugal force of the power of the Holy Spirit. We will preach the eternal gospel to all flesh. We will see a great harvest and a great renaissance in Eurasia. The 50 Hours is a prophetic clarion call to the powers of this age who are passing away. It heralds a new era and a new reign of the first and last King. It is in the place of sustained corporate prayer and worship in the unity of the Spirit in the bond of peace that the “kingdom of heaven suffers violence and the violent take it by force”.