Starting January 1st, Heartland, as a church family, will be embarking on a prayer journey for 40 days. Prayer is not a work of a Christian, prayer is the work. One of the times Jesus talked about prayer with his disciples was when He stated in Matthew 9 that the harvest is plentiful, but the laborers are few; therefore pray earnestly to the Lord of the harvest to send out laborers into his harvest." The 40 Days of Prayer is about praying first before accomplishing what God wants for our church.

Prayer is something that is both taught and caught. We also know that for many people, it takes consistently doing something 30 times to make it a habit. The reason for "40 days" is to help built a habit of prayer in your life and the life of Heartland. 40 is a number often seen in the Bible from wandering to victory. Jesus was lead in the desert for 40 days to be tempted and He was victorious. Moses trained for 40 years and then was sent to deliver Israel from bondage. Israel wandered in the desert for 40 years and then conquered the promise land. We pray and listen to God, and then accomplish the victory He gives to us.

Each week in our communication card there will be a prayer focus to help guide us through the 40 days of prayer. We are also giving families a copy of a book called "Pray First" to help teach or remind us of how to pray effectively. Throughout the 40 days there will be prayer meetings for us to gather and prayer.

Revival, repentance, and victory require that prayer be a significant part of our church's DNA. I hope you grow deeper and closer to God these next 40 days of prayer. I hope we as a church grow stronger as one church family as well. That we would be a church that gets excited when someone says "let us pray..."