{"id":3862,"date":"2013-03-05T11:37:29","date_gmt":"2013-03-05T11:37:29","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/blog.beliefnet.com\/fellowshipofsaintsandsinners\/?p=3862"},"modified":"2013-03-07T12:07:22","modified_gmt":"2013-03-07T12:07:22","slug":"how-prayer-is-transforming-nations","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/fellowshipofsaintsandsinners\/2013\/03\/how-prayer-is-transforming-nations.html","title":{"rendered":"&#8220;How Prayer is Transforming Nations&#8221;"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><em><iframe loading=\"lazy\" title=\"John Robb: How Prayer is Transforming Nations\" width=\"500\" height=\"375\" src=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/embed\/aGTUcQLPhuk?feature=oembed\" frameborder=\"0\" allow=\"accelerometer; autoplay; clipboard-write; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture; web-share\" referrerpolicy=\"strict-origin-when-cross-origin\" allowfullscreen><\/iframe>Are you doing a program for the Lord or welcoming the presence of the Lord?<\/em><\/p>\n<p>That was the question put before an audience\u00a0by a guest speaker at World Vision years ago, at a time when our family was living in Southern California and Dad was by then\u00a0in charge of at least a couple such &#8220;programs&#8221; with the Christian humanitarian organization.\u00a0 The question marked a turning point in my father&#8217;s life: it catapulted him down the path of a life dedicated to &#8220;transformational prayer.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p>In the years to come, the joke in\u00a0our immediate\u00a0family would be that Dad picked for his destinations the countries at the top of the State Department&#8217;s travel warning list.\u00a0Bosnia and Sierra Leone in the height of war there- the latter of which required\u00a0a last-minute airlift out of trouble.\u00a0 Pakistan.\u00a0 Afghanistan.\u00a0 (Usually the countries ending in &#8220;stan&#8221;&#8216; tend to be on that list.)\u00a0Just weeks ago, Dad was in Egypt, where an unhappy electorate&#8217;s\u00a0clashes with President Mohamed Morsi&#8217;s\u00a0government were sending shock waves around the world.<\/p>\n<p>Funny thing is, as a kid growing up, I never really knew how to explain my dad&#8217;s job.\u00a0 It was just plain <em>weird<\/em>.\u00a0 Whereas other\u00a0friends&#8217; dads worked in real estate, fixed cars, or managed investment portfolios, Dad was off in some strange, exotic part of the world organizing prayer initiatives to bring warring peoples together to pray.\u00a0 I mean, how <em>do<\/em> you explain that, really, even when you&#8217;re not a teenager with mild acne and\u00a0a fierce desire to fit in?<\/p>\n<p>The other day, Dad sent on the above video to us kids, which was recently recorded at the &#8220;Testify Conference&#8221; in Albuquerque, New Mexico and is an eye-opening glimpse of what Dad has been doing with his time all these years.\u00a0 The next fifteen minutes will, I suspect, provoke and maybe even inspire you to think more deeply about\u00a0the church, God&#8217;s mission and how prayer fits in. I&#8217;m curious to hear your thoughts!<\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Are you doing a program for the Lord or welcoming the presence of the Lord? That was the question put before an audience\u00a0by a guest speaker at World Vision years ago, at a time when our family was living in Southern California and Dad was by then\u00a0in charge of at least a couple such &#8220;programs&#8221;&hellip;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":461,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[119,43,15,233],"tags":[1596,1597,1598,1599,178,613,363,1595,1004],"class_list":["post-3862","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-church","category-humor","category-mission","category-prayer","tag-church-and-god","tag-church-and-gods-mission","tag-evangelicals-and-prayer","tag-global-church","tag-missional-church","tag-prayer-2","tag-prayers-for-strength","tag-public-theology","tag-transformational-prayer"],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO plugin v23.9 - https:\/\/yoast.com\/wordpress\/plugins\/seo\/ -->\n<title>&quot;How Prayer is Transforming Nations&quot; - Fellowship of Saints and Sinners<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/fellowshipofsaintsandsinners\/2013\/03\/how-prayer-is-transforming-nations.html\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"&quot;How Prayer is Transforming Nations&quot; - Fellowship of Saints and Sinners\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"Are you doing a program for the Lord or welcoming the presence of the Lord? That was the question put before an audience\u00a0by a guest speaker at World Vision years ago, at a time when our family was living in Southern California and Dad was by then\u00a0in charge of at least a couple such &#8220;programs&#8221;&hellip;\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:url\" content=\"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/fellowshipofsaintsandsinners\/2013\/03\/how-prayer-is-transforming-nations.html\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:site_name\" content=\"Fellowship of Saints and Sinners\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:publisher\" content=\"https:\/\/www.facebook.com\/kristina.robbdover\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:published_time\" content=\"2013-03-05T11:37:29+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:modified_time\" content=\"2013-03-07T12:07:22+00:00\" \/>\n<meta name=\"author\" content=\"Kristina Robb-Dover\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:card\" content=\"summary_large_image\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:creator\" content=\"@saintplussinner\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:site\" content=\"@saintplussinner\" \/>\n<!-- \/ Yoast SEO plugin. -->","yoast_head_json":{"title":"\"How Prayer is Transforming Nations\" - Fellowship of Saints and Sinners","robots":{"index":"index","follow":"follow","max-snippet":"max-snippet:-1","max-image-preview":"max-image-preview:large","max-video-preview":"max-video-preview:-1"},"canonical":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/fellowshipofsaintsandsinners\/2013\/03\/how-prayer-is-transforming-nations.html","og_locale":"en_US","og_type":"article","og_title":"\"How Prayer is Transforming Nations\" - Fellowship of Saints and Sinners","og_description":"Are you doing a program for the Lord or welcoming the presence of the Lord? That was the question put before an audience\u00a0by a guest speaker at World Vision years ago, at a time when our family was living in Southern California and Dad was by then\u00a0in charge of at least a couple such &#8220;programs&#8221;&hellip;","og_url":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/fellowshipofsaintsandsinners\/2013\/03\/how-prayer-is-transforming-nations.html","og_site_name":"Fellowship of Saints and Sinners","article_publisher":"https:\/\/www.facebook.com\/kristina.robbdover","article_published_time":"2013-03-05T11:37:29+00:00","article_modified_time":"2013-03-07T12:07:22+00:00","author":"Kristina Robb-Dover","twitter_card":"summary_large_image","twitter_creator":"@saintplussinner","twitter_site":"@saintplussinner","schema":{"@context":"https:\/\/schema.org","@graph":[{"@type":"WebPage","@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/fellowshipofsaintsandsinners\/2013\/03\/how-prayer-is-transforming-nations.html","url":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/fellowshipofsaintsandsinners\/2013\/03\/how-prayer-is-transforming-nations.html","name":"\"How Prayer is Transforming Nations\" - 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