Pray For Wirral

Here the organisers will try to answer any questions, comments and concerns that you have. First you will see some answers to some common questions and then there is a space to ask your questions below. We respond to all questions privately and may also add some to the public Q&A list with your permission.

[DDET (Click to hide/show answer)] As the famous Christian leader Charles Spurgeon wrote in December 1866 “The word ”revival’ is as familiar in our mouths as a household word. We are constantly speaking about and praying for a ‘revival’; would it not be as well to know what we mean by it?” When we talk of ‘Revival’ in this case we are referring to a number of different things:

• We are referring to Social Revival which has become something of a political buzz word of late. David Cameron famously stated in his keynote speech to the Conservatives’ spring conference in Nottingham that the Party must “have faith” and then went on to reveal plans to rebrand the Tories as the party of “social revival”, one that understood “there is more to life than money. “The big argument in politics today is not about a free enterprise economy” he said but is “about our society… Because it’s not economic breakdown that Britain now faces but social breakdown. Not businesses that aren’t delivering, but public services. Not irresponsible unions; it’s irresponsible parents. We’re becoming the sick family of Europe.”

Few would disagree that we are experiencing  a breakdown of community and the knock on effects in terms of our ethical and moral values, our relationships, our local economy and our levels of happiness and satisfaction have been well proven by sociologists and psychologists alike.

• When it comes to Economic Revival the stark inequalities that exist in health, education and employment opportunities, and life expectancy immediately come to mind. The Wirral is home to both some of the most affluent people in Western Europe and some of the poorest. A staggering +86% of people living in Birkenhead live in abject poverty. On the mainly prosperous Dee side of Wirral people can expect to live, on average, 11.6 years longer than those on the mainly poor Mersey side. In response Bishop Keith Sinclair  told delegates at the recent Life Expectancy Summit  of his Joseph like experience where “in the Psalms there is a place where it says ‘the iron entered his soul… When I heard about this inequality I was shocked and convicted. I went away and thought if the churches across the Wirral can’t do anything about this how can we look the Lord in the face and say ‘we are church’!”

We believe that through prayer and through God’s moulding and shaping of individuals and churches who pray our communities can be rebuilt, relationships can be restored and kingdom values can be upheld. As it says in 2 Chronicles 7.14 “if my people, who are called by my name, will humble themselves and pray and seek my face and turn from their wicked ways, then will I hear from heaven and will forgive their sin and I will heal their land.“

• We also place great emphasis on Spiritual Revival. For Spurgeon it was clear that spiritual revival could only ever refer to a Revival of the Church, through the revival of those who were already Christians; it was a case of God restoring the vitality of the individual and by implication the church. As   Spurgeon wrote, “the, term “revival” can only be applied to a living soul, or to that which once lived. To be revived is a blessing which can only be enjoyed by those who have some degree of life. Those who have no spiritual life are not, and cannot be, in the strictest sense of the term, the subjects of a revival.” Spurgeon is quite right that in the strictest sense one must have life in the first place for it to be revived; and the revitalisation of the church in Wirral through the revitalisation of local Christians if very much on our hearts and definitely a matter for prayer.

There is however another dimension to Spiritual Revival – when God moves in a revival, ‘vive’ is as much a feature, re being the latin prefix for the French vive, to live. When we use the term Spiritual Revival we mean both the revival of the Church and to coin a phrase, the ‘Neovival’ (new life) for our friends, family, work colleagues and neighbours. Our prayer is that God would revitalise the church, bring home the prodigals, and bring many others home with them.

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[DDET (Click to hide/show answer)]Yes, it can be but only if the vision is owned and shaped by all participants. The great thing about this proposal is that the only ‘buy in’ for ownership is a belief that prayer has an effect on those praying, and those being prayed for. We must of course acknowledge that people pray in different ways and that their prayers, and desired outcomes, are informed by their theologies, traditions and personal preferences. These variations are something to be celebrated as an integral design feature of a faith which shapes the lives of millions of uniquely created individuals. It is equally important to highlight our similarities and to celebrate these as well. That God hears our prayers is one such example of a theology which unites us; this is to be celebrated and what better way to do this than to pray together.

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[DDET (Click to hide/show answer)]Different people will answer this in different ways. Some will highlight the spiritual significance in a focused week of prayer were many people are praying in to the same issues; they might quote passages from Joel and Jeremiah in favour of this. Others may prefer to focus more on the ‘catalytic’ effects which the preparation and delivery of such a focused week can have. Our hope is that prayer triplets will form in advance of the week and continue afterwards, inter-church relationships could be further enhanced locally in the preparation of local prayer services. On a more personal level, will hope the week will encourage some people to spend some time with God perhaps for the first time in a long time.

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[DDET (Click to hide/show answer)]Prayer initiatives in other areas of the country have reported the massively positive effect their prayers have had on their local communities; of course first and foremost they place this success firmly in God’s hands but they have also been quick to point our how important it has been to let the community know that they are being prayed for by people who care for them. If we let just 40,000 homes in Wirral (just 200 homes per Christian church in Wirral) know we are praying for them during the week and just 1% remember this when they need help in the future then that’s at least 400 more people who might look to us, or prayer, for the support they need.

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[DDET (Click to hide/show answer)]We totally support the Week of Prayer for Christian Unity and have no desire to replace it; indeed the Pontifical Council for the Promotion of Christian Unity and the World Council of Churches who organise WPFCU are in support of initiatives like ‘Pray for Wirral’. The purpose of WPFCU is to unite Christians all over the world in prayer on a unity specific theme (You are witnesses to these things, Luke 24:48 in 2010) and we would like to encourage you to be part of WPFCU in the future. ‘Pray for Wirral’  is of course concerned with the unity of believers but this is just one of a number of hopes and kingdom dreams we have for the Wirral. The simple answer is that we cannot pray to much; lets do both!

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