Haggai 1:12 Then Zerubbabel the son of Shealtiel, and Joshua the son of Jehozadak, the high priest, with all the remnant of the people, obeyed the voice of the LORD their God, and the words of Haggai the prophet, as the LORD their God had sent him. And the people feared the LORD.

13 Then Haggai, the messenger of the LORD, spoke to the people with the LORD's message, I am with you, declares the LORD.

14 And the LORD stirred up the spirit of Zerubbabel the son of Shealtiel, governor of Judah, and the spirit of Joshua the son of Jehozadak, the high priest, and the spirit of all the remnant of the people. And they came and worked on the house of the LORD of hosts, their God, 15 on the twenty-fourth day of the month, in the sixth month, in the second year of Darius the king.

O LORD our God, our only hope is for You to stir up the spirits of all the remnant of the people so they might come & work on Your house.

Holy Father, Your Church is ruins and needs to be rebuilt, just as the temple needed to be rebuilt in the time of Haggai. We know You will never totally forsake us, for You have birthed us into Your Kingdom family, but we ask You, Lord for Jesus' sake to look upon us with mercy and forgive our sins. You always have a remnant. We know we are wholly unworthy and we can only come into Your presence through Jesus' precious blood shed for us. We acknowledge we have so often not acted like Your people and have brought reproach to Your holy Name. Forgive us, O Lord, for not acting like Your children. Stir up our spirits, Lord God, so we see the ruins, hear Your voice and walk in trusting and complete obedience to Your voice. We acknowledge these are serious times, we acknowledge there is no hope for Your Church, or the world apart from You. We acknowledge there can be no true and genuine rebuilding of the Church apart from Your Spirit stirring our spirits. Send Your wind, Your fire, Your rain upon us, so we might be bold and have Your authority to preach Your Gospel, so we might be salt and light in this tasteless and dark world.

O LORD our God, our only hope is for You to stir up the spirits of all the remnant of the people so they might come & work on Your house.

There are the Zerubbabels, the Joshuas, the Haggais You are sending ahead to prepare the way. You have been stirring spirits already. Thank You, LORD God for the work You have been doing. O LORD God, we are humbled because You have been stirring our spirits, by Your gracious sovereign Spirit. We were not looking to be stirred, or expecting to be stirred. We had no interest whatsoever and yet Your Spirit was hovering and then suddenly moved when we least expected Him. And here we are. We admit we do not know what we are doing all the time, but walking in faith to Your commandments. We also admit this has not been easy for us at times, our flesh fights the working of Your Spirit, but in the end we cannot resist You, for You are the Lord our God. You turn the hearts of Your children to turn toward You and to desire and delight in Your will for us. You keep calling us back to intercede for Your Church. We cannot keep away. You circumcise our uncircumcised hearts. You soften our hard hearts. O, Lord, we have felt Your constraining love and Holy Spirit pulling us and holding us in Your wonderful yoke for us, this yoke of prayer, the same wonderful ministry to which Your Son has been called to continue in so we might be saved to the uttermost. Jesus Christ our great high priest ever lives to intercede for us. His priesthood is permanent and certainly His very life is indwelling us by faith and is giving us a greater desire and strength to persevere in prayer. We have no desire apart from that which You give us. But yet we know our desire is not as great as the Lord Jesus, who ever lives to make intercession for us. He never ceases to pray for us. What a wonderful Savior we have! O, our spirits are willing but our flesh is weak, o, so weak. May You strengthen us and help us to persevere in prayer so we will not faint, so Your Church might be revived again, so Your house might be a praise in the earth as You have intended. Help us to remain as watchmen on the wall, ever vigilant, not ever holding our peace, but coming to Your throne continually since our need is constant, o, we must come to You at all times for mercy and grace for all times are times of need for Your Church.

O LORD our God, our only hope is for You to stir up the spirits of all the remnant of the people so they might come & work on Your house.

We know it is Your Spirit Who has been at work in us giving us a greater love and passion and desire for You and Your glory. You have been giving us a greater love for Your people, Your Church. You have given us a deeper burden and desire to pray for the Church. You have taken us and shown us Your holiness in greater measure and shown us that You are the God who is holy, holy, holy and how we are so falling short of that today. We have been humbled. Our hearts have been made contrite. We bow before You, Lord God. You have shown us our insufficiency and inability.  You have shown us that You are the God who sits enthroned high and lifted up above the earth. You are Lord and King, we are not. But thanks be to God, You are near to and come to dwell with those who have humble and contrite hearts. O, sovereign Lord, You are also our Father, we are Your children, we are the sheep of Your pasture, we are helpless and hopeless here and apart from You we are poor and needy. Look on us with compassion and mercy and favor. How we need You to move in a way we have not yet seen, to stir our hearts even further. We know our devotion to pray must be increased even more now. We ask these things for the sake of Your Name. Your Church has become a reproach to Your holy Name. You have shown us the ruins Your house is in. We confess we have not been devoted wholeheartedly to You in our practice and in our doctrine. We confess we have so often made a mockery of the name Christian and therefore we have shown contempt for Your blessed Son, our Savior, the Lamb who was willingly slain in our place, Who became sin so we might become the righteousness of God. O, forgive us, Lord God, for Jesus' sake. We come and ask for Your to be merciful to us. We can only pleading His blood. We have no other plea. We are wholly unworthy. Have mercy on us, Lord, we are sinners through and through. We are totally undeserving but we ask You to be gracious to us.

O LORD our God, our only hope is for You to stir up the spirits of all the remnant of the people so they might come & work on Your house.

May we not grieve, quench or limit Your stirring in our lives. Make us willing and obedient to do all Your will for us, never to hold back or to doubt Your will for us, even when it is hard, even when it makes no sense, even when it may be daunting, even when men may mock us, even when we may be tempted to be afraid, even when we may be fatigued, even when we may doubt. Increase our faith. We love You and want to do Your will. Have Your way with us. With You we know we can do all things You stir our hearts to do. Your commandments are not burdensome. You have stirred our spirits with Your Spirit and we know now You will not leave us on our own, but You will provide all we need to fulfill the work You have called us to do. You will continue the work You have begun in us and through us. You will equip us with all we need to do the work on Your house, O Lord. You have not left us as orphans. We can trust You to send daily manna for us. We can trust You will be there just at the break of dawn. We can trust You will never leave us or forsake us. We can trust You will complete the work You have begun in us and give us all we need to help us to walk in the works You have ordained for us.

O LORD our God, our only hope is for You to stir up the spirits of all the remnant of the people so they might come & work on Your house.

O, Lord God, we so long to have Your temple, Your Church, rebuilt by Your Spirit's power and life. We have tried and tried earthly means, but earthly means can never accomplish Your work. We are dealing with the supernatural realm, with powers and principalities for which we are no match. Your work can never be done with and through human means alone. Yes, You work through us, but we so often work and try and spin our wheels to no avail because we are not availing ourselves of Your power and Your resources. Most of us are tyros in these matters, but we know we have experienced the opposition of the evil one. Whenever we make even a small move toward seeking Your face and Your Kingdom, whenever we seek to pray more, whenever we seek to mortify sin and put on Christ, we feel the tug of the devil and the opposition arise against us. Strengthen us. Stir our spirits so we might persevere and stand strong in the grace You provide. Help us to remember to put on Your whole armor so we might be able to stand. We can do all things through Christ who strengthens us but let us not become prideful or presumptuous. Let us be ever mindful that apart from Him we can do nothing. Help us to encourage one another so we might persevere and provoke one another unto love and good deeds.

O LORD our God, our only hope is for You to stir up the spirits of all the remnant of the people so they might come & work on Your house.

Forgive us, O LORD God, how often we have been stirred to work on our own houses but not so often on Your own house. We have not been zealous for You and Your house as we ought to. Give us a holy passion and an flaming zeal to build Your house through Your eternal Spirit, for that is the work that will endure and never be burned up. Give us a greater love for You, Your Gospel and Your Church. May we seek first Your Kingdom and Your righteousness and step out in faith to Your commandments to us and then trust You to provide all we need as we do so.

O LORD our God, our only hope is for You to stir up the spirits of all the remnant of the people so they might come & work on Your house.

Almighty God, use our words, our prayers and our lives to stir up the remnant for Your Kingdom & for Your glory. The city, the temple, the walls, O LORD, we see them, we see the ruins, we see these things and we are grieved and burdened. We are weeping. We know there is no hope for us, for Your Church, for Your people, for Your temple, for Your city, for the walls, apart from You. You alone can restore, renew & revive us. Have mercy on us. We are Your people. Do not forsake the work of Your hands. Amen. Stir up more of Your children to come and work on the house of the LORD of hosts, so You might be glorified in and through Your Church once again, that Your glory might be seen in us throughout the earth and You and Your Son the Lord Jesus Christ might receive all the praise, honor and glory due Your holy Name. Amen.

O LORD our God, our only hope is for You to stir up the spirits of all the remnant of the people so they might come & work on Your house.

From "Sketch of Samuel Rutherford" by Andrew A. Bonar:

He [Rutherford] dealt with individual parishioners so closely and so personally as to be able to appeal to them regarding his faithfulness in this matter.  He addresses one of them, Jean McMillan: "I did what I could to put you within the grips of Christ; I told you Christ's testament and latter-will plainly."  He so carried them on his heart (like the priest with the twelve tribes on his breastplate), that he could declare to Gordon of Cardoness, "Thoughts of your soul depart not from me in my sleep." "My soul was taken up when others were sleeping, how to have Christ betrothed with a bride in that part of the land," vix. Anwoth [his pastorate]. He so prayed over them and for them, that he fears not to say, "There I wrestled with the angel and prevailed. Woods, trees, meadows, and hills, are my witnesses that I drew on a fair match betwixt Christ and Anwoth."

O, Lord God, Great Shepherd of the sheep,

We are Your people, the sheep of Your pasture. We confess we are nothing and we have nothing apart from Your sovereign grace and love set on us. We were sheep all gone astray and You laid our iniquity on Jesus Christ, the Lamb, so we might be reconciled to You.

We come to You in Jesus' blessed and holy Name alone. We have no other appeal and can make no other appeal to You but through Him and through His body and His blood given for us. Be gracious to us for Jesus' sake. We come empty handed and ask You to strengthen us for the work You have called us to do, the work of shepherding and interceding for Your people. We know we are not sufficient for these things. O, Lord God, be our sufficiency and our strength and our portion.

We come before you because You have given us a heart for You and for Your Gospel and for Your Church, Your flock. You have given us a strong desire and passionate heart to see Your people (and ourselves) renewed and set aflame once again. We know there is no hope for ourselves or for Your Church as a whole apart from Your Spirit coming down afresh on us and reviving us again.

Yet now we confess that our love for You and for the flock is often lukewarm or even cold. Our love is not steady and sure and bright and shining constantly as Your love is for us. We confess we do not walk steadfastly in the calling You have called us to. We know this grieves You.

Forgive us, O Lord God.

Lord, have mercy on us.
Make us shepherds & intercessors after Your own heart.

O, Lord, our Good Shepherd, strengthen us, by Your Spirit. O, stir up our hearts and minds and wills. O, we confess we are in need of endurance. Empower us, fill us up with You, so we might be faithful to those you have entrusted to us, as You are ever faithful to us. Impart to us a love for the flock like You have for us. Help us to know the breadth and length and height and depth of Your love for us.

Lord, have mercy on us.
Make us shepherds & intercessors after Your own heart.

O, Lord, our Good Shepherd, strengthen us by Your Spirit. O, may we serve others in love through our prayers, our words and our deeds, so we might not faint, so we might persevere in all we can to put others within the grips of Christ. We so long to see them in your grip, even as we know we are needing to be continuing to place ourselves one again in your grip and at your whole disposal to do with us as You will. We confess how we so often chafe at Your easy yoke. Forgive us, O Lord.

Lord, have mercy on us.
Make us shepherds & intercessors after Your own heart.

O, Lord, our Good Shepherd, strengthen us by Your Spirit. We confess we have no message of our own, You alone have the words of eternal life. Supply the words we need and speak through us, to tell others of Christ's testament and latter-will plainly. Let us not shrink back from speaking Your Word. Your Word is truth. Your Church is sanctified as Your truth is proclaimed. May we never be fearful of men but fear You alone. Fill us with Your Holy Spirit so we might proclaim Your Word with boldness, assurance and power, so many lives would be arrested with Your glory and Your grace and brought into Your Kingdom light and freedom.

Lord, have mercy on us.
Make us shepherds & intercessors after Your own heart.

O, Lord, our Good Shepherd, strengthen us by Your Spirit. O, how we need You to carry us, we have no strength in and of ourselves. You alone are our strength. Strengthen us with Your resurrection power to carry on our hearts (like the priest with the twelve tribes on his breastplate) the sheep you have entrusted to us. We confess we need You to carry us so we might carry the dear lambs. Give us a greater love for the sheep; give us an increased burden for Your people, so we cannot come to Your throne without bringing them with us, but we will feel unclothed and naked before You apart from bringing them with us there.

Lord, have mercy on us.
Make us shepherds & intercessors after Your own heart.

O, Lord, our Good Shepherd, strengthen us by Your Spirit. You are the one who never sleeps or slumbers. You are the One who ever lives to interecede at the throne of grace, O grant that our hearts might be knit with Yours at the right hand of the Father so we might be in continuing intercession for the sheep of our flocks, Your sheep, Your flock, purchased with the precious blood of Jesus Christ. Our spirits are willing but our flesh is weak. O strengthen us, eternal and everlasting God with Your Holy Spirit to endure to the end, to continue steadfast in prayer for Your Church.

Lord, have mercy on us.
Make us shepherds & intercessors after Your own heart.

O, Lord, our Good Shepherd, strengthen us by Your Spirit. O, we so long to see Christ exalted and given His proper place, to have Christ betrothed with a bride in our various towns and cities. We have seen how Your Church continues to balk at Your headship. We confess we ourselves have continued to balk at Your headship. Forgive us, O Lord. Until You are given Your rightful place, given the preeminence, we cannot expect You to bless us. Help us to bend our necks and bow our knees to Your sovereign Lordship, for You alone are our King and Lord.

Lord, have mercy on us.
Make us shepherds & intercessors after Your own heart.

O, Lord, our Good Shepherd, strengthen us by Your Spirit. O, strengthen us to wrestle with the angel until You bless us. Let us persevere. Let us not faint. We know You have called us to this ministry of prayer and are trusting You to keep us on the watchtower, to keep us approaching Your throne of grace, to keep us prostrating before You, O Lord. Keep us marching around the walls that must come down. Keep us building the walls that must be erected. God forbid that we fail to pray for Your flock. Forgive us for the times we have left off in prayer. You never fail to intercede for us. Impart to us by Your Spirit all we need to continue wrestling and seeking Your face in prayer. We are asking these things for the sake of and the honor of Your blessed Name. O, come again and bless Your people, so we might bless You in this world, so we might reflect You and show the world You and Your glory, so we might be a praise in the earth.

Lord, have mercy on us.
Make us shepherds & intercessors after Your own heart.

Over the past several months, because God had been giving me a burden to pray for revival I started tent of meeting, this blog dedicated to prayer for revival in Christ's Church.

This is my mission statement:

You can find more information about tent of meeting here.

Since beginning to pray here, we've been praying through the Lord's Prayer. We are at the section, "Forgive us our sins," and have been focusing on and praying over Jesus' words to the seven churches in Revelation 2-3.

Earlier this week I asked some of the friends and subscribers of tent of meeting to pray about writing a prayer related to Revelation 2-3 that I might post here. I have been excited to see how God is giving His people a heart to pray for revival. I consider it a privilege to be able to include the prayers of many of my brothers and sisters here at tent of meeting. As my brothers and sisters in the Lord submit their prayers I plan to post them here. May the Lord continue to help us to persevere in prayer for we know that the effectual fervent prayers of righteous men and women and boys and girls do avail much! May this blog bring glory to Him for He alone is worthy! Though we come from many different denominations and backgrounds, I believe as I post the prayers of many here we will be reminded the Body of Christ is bigger than our congregations and transcends our denominations – that tent of meeting would serve as a visible demonstration of the unity we have in Christ. In Ephesians 4, the apostle Paul reminds us:

There is one body and one Spirit—just as you were called to the one hope that belongs to your call— 5 one Lord, one faith, one baptism, 6 one God and Father of all, who is over all and through all and in all. 7 But grace was given to each one of us according to the measure of Christ's gift.

and in Psalm 133 we read:

As we see the many prayers here may we continue to be encouraged that this is God's work, that He is raising up people to pray from all corners of the Church. I know we do not agree on all things, but we do agree on the essentials of our faith and we do agree that Jesus Christ must be exalted and given the preeminence once more in His Church. For too long He has not been given His rightful place. We agree that the Church is in a sad and sorry state and apart from His Holy Spirit falling fresh on us, apart from reviving breath and apart from His purifying and igniting fire, we can do nothing.

Isaiah wrote:

God has been raising up some dedicated intercessors who so love Him and love His Bride and are grieved over the current state of the Church:

O, Lord God, how good and pleasant it is for us to dwell in unity. How good and pleasant it is when we come together to seek You in prayer. How good and pleasant it is that You are setting watchmen on our walls from all across Your Body. Even as You raised up and led Moses and many of the children of Israel to seek You in the tent of meeting outside the camp, You are raising up Your people to seek Your face and to pray to You now. You are filling us with a zeal for Your house. We want Your house to be a house of prayer, not a house of idolatry. We want Your Church to be a praise in the earth. We have seen that the golden calves we have fashioned and have bowed down to are of no help. Forgive us for bowing down to our golden calves of human ingenuity. Forgive us for not giving Jesus Christ the preeminent place. He alone is worthy of all praise, honor and glory. We confess we have grieved and quenched the Spirit of God and have limited You, O holy One of Israel. Forgive us, O Lord. We confess we tried to do Your work apart from Your power. We have cut ourselves off from the true Vine. Forgive us, O Lord. May You continue to turn us from seeking help in our golden calves of human ingenuity and seek You alone, for there is no true help and there is no real hope for us apart from You. May we never be silent but continue in prayer at Your throne. May we give You no rest until You establish Your Church and You make us a praise in the earth. The effectual fervent prayers of righteous men and women and boys and girls avail much. Keep us boiling in the Spirit and fervent in prayer. As we unite in prayer before Your throne may You rain down blessing on Your Church and renew us with Your life so blessing and life might flow like precious oil into the world. Lord of the harvest, continue to raise up laborers for the harvest, both intercessors who pray for the harvest behind the scenes and laborers who go out to reap the harvest. And we will rejoice and shout together with singing as You give the increase for we know You are ready to do great things! Amen.