My Adventures with God: ch 32 - A Prayer Group for Growth

Chapter 32 ... A Prayer Group for Growth

I had from my researches a good general idea of what was needed to revive a country parish in terms of sociology. From having run a religious revival soon after we arrived all those years ago I was confident about how to do it in spiritual terms. But I saw clearly that I did not know what God wanted us to do at this particular time in this particular place.

Oh yes. I had read lots of the books on “church growth” with their slick patter about what worked for them. I had enough sense to see that these could not be transplanted into a different setting a different social structure or a different time and place in God’s purposes. No, I had researched the principles, but I knew the actual plan had to be both home grown and God directed.

So we started a prayer group. I advertised it as open to anyone who wanted to participate in working out things we could do to build up the church. I think there were about seven of us who agreed to met each week.

We prayed in general for our parish and its people, we prayed about particular things the church thought it needed, we kept a book of these requests and we logged in the book what happened after we prayed for particular things. We also prayed for God to show us what he wanted us to do. Oh, and we included some bible study and discussion, because that seemed a good idea.

We kept a book of our prayer requests. Without the actual book I can’t give many examples, just the fact that when we wrote down what we had asked God for we were very frequently soon writing down that God had provided. This, seen in black and white was a tremendous encouragement for all the members of that prayer group – and also the things God provided in response to our prayers were a great boost to the church.

This prayer group continued for the rest of our time at Lang Lang, and was I think central to the rebuilding. But it is better, having stated its existence if I leave that and go on to the results God produced in so many ways. Since this chapter is otherwise a bit short, let me tell you about one man who joined our group, Bob Egan.

I met Bob while I was visiting his wife in our little Kooweerup hospital. They were new to the district. Bob had retired as state sales managed of a major oil company. They had bought a “hobby farm” out of Lang Lang. Bob’s wife was now dying of cancer. I visited her each week, Bob left the room so that she and I could talk “religion” as he was an atheist. (He gone to WWII as an 18 year old and after his wartime experiences decided God could not exist).

Bob's wife died. I took the funeral. Next Sunday who should I see in church but Bob. He said straight out that he had gone home and thought: “What if Christianity is true? What if my wife is in Heaven and I miss out and never see her again” So he said he was still an atheist but he had come to check it out.

We invited him to the prayer group. He was a very quiet gentle man (I know that does not sound right for a sales manager, but it was true). He was very sharp, many times in the bible study part he saw straight out things in the text which I had only got from commentaries! One meeting he said in his mild way that he had an announcement he wished to make. We listened. He said almost inaudibly “I have just become a Christian”. We were all delighted.

Bob was a tremendous help. For a start he had great natural talent, and huge experience. For another he won the hearts of the ladies like Jan and Vera: They still hated change, but if Mr Egan thought it was a good idea, well then they would support it too! Our whole family loved Bob dearly, and he was indeed a very dear man.

As I said earlier, the group of men who had opposed us from the Masonic Lodge were as good as their word to be supportive. Here is an example. Doug, who was the third most senior Mason in the state at that time and had earlier said to me "I've got rid of more ministers than you've had hot dinners - and you're next" had a son who was advancing in the corporate world. He arranged for his son to come and sit down with me and analyse the church in the town as far as our strengths, the needs of the town and the possibilities for building up the church were concerned. It was in one sense a secular business approach so not everything was applicable but many of the principles involved were, and it was genuinely helpful. It was also a much appreciated and fine action on Doug's part.

The diocese belatedly started to try to be useful. They had employed a very keen and pleasant young man to go around and try to encourage parishes. He called on me several times and we had long discussions. Unfortunately a lot of his ideas fell into the “already tried that” category. But it was a positive attempt.