Spend an hour in prayer with these couples each week, no matter the distance that separates you. – Jeff Williams

In this you greatly rejoice, though now for a little while, if need be, you have been grieved by various trials, that the genuineness of your faith, being much more precious than gold that perishes, though it is tested by fire, may be found to praise, honor, and glory at the revelation of Jesus Christ (1 Peter 1:6-7)

Do you intentionally and faithfully pray on a weekly basis with other couples?
How might this bless you, your family, and your impact?

For more than a year, I’ve wanted to resume weekly get togethers for couples in my home to minister with my wife to bless marriages and families. On November 23, we finally got this off the ground. Then on November 29, I received a spiritual warning from Jeff Williams through his daily devotional in a message titled “Teams of Two.” My message today is an excerpt from that.

We want to use our marriage to help other couples! Really? Great. Giving to others from what you have received is a beautiful, meaningful and worthwhile way to live, but be careful.
 
When a husband and wife decide to serve God as a “team of two” the fury of hell will be unleashed at them in both direct and subtle ways. Satan knows that a synergistically united couple, dedicated to God’s purpose for their marriage, is a very potent vessel through which He can pour His power and grace to evangelize, disciple, teach and heal other couples. It is in the Enemy’s interest to knock you down before you get started. If you don’t mind having the strength and health of your marriage tested, announce that you are going to minister to other couples out of what you yourselves have experienced in marriage; then minister from the grace, instruction and healing received from God.
 
Jill and I have experienced this and have seen it happen to couple after couple in relationship ministry. Satan’s tactics are numerous; frontal assaults on the couple, attacks through children, and withdrawal of support from previously trusted friends.

To read the rest of Jeff’s message, visit today’s Link of the Day.

Prayer Power
Lord, thank You for the gift of prayer and all the good that happens in us when we pray. Thank You for committed friends to which we can give, and from whom we can receive. Thank You for showing us the importance of bathing our lives and all activities done in Your name in prayer; petitions to You on behalf of others, confessions of sin and shortcomings in our lives, and praise of You as God Almighty, King of Creation, Ruler of Heaven and Earth, Prince of Peace, and on go Your names to infinity. In Jesus’ name. Amen.

Link of the Day
Teams of Two – entire message by Jeff Williams, including “Prayer Document” – see below

Blessings to intentionally and faithfully pray with other couples on a weekly basis!

From: Jeff Williams [mailto:jeff@graceandtruthrelationship.com]
Sent: Thursday, November 29, 2007 4:30 AM
To: randypeck@gmail.com
Subject: Daily Grace & Truth: Teams of Two [spiritual warning re couples praying together]We use freeconference.com to hold our prayer times on Friday mornings. You will find it fast to set up and easy to use.
 
These [trials] have come so that your faith-of greater worth than gold,  which perishes even though refined by fire-may be proved genuine and may result in praise, glory and honor when Jesus Christ is revealed.
~ 1 Peter 1:7
 
We want to use our marriage to help other couples! Really? Great. Giving to others from what you have received is a beautiful, meaningful and worthwhile way to live, but be careful.
 
When a husband and wife decide to serve God as a “team of two” the fury of hell will be unleashed at them in both direct and subtle ways. Satan knows that a synergistically united couple, dedicated to God’s purpose for their marriage, is a very potent vessel through which He can pour His power and grace to evangelize, disciple, teach and heal other couples. It is in the Enemy’s interest to knock you down before you get started. If you don’t mind having the strength and health of your marriage tested, announce that you are going to minister to other couples out of what you yourselves have experienced in marriage; then minister from the grace, instruction and healing received from God.
 
Jill and I have experienced this and have seen it happen to couple after couple in relationship ministry. Satan’s tactics are numerous; frontal assaults on the couple, attacks through children, and withdrawal of support from previously trusted friends.
 
“We’re thinking about doing marriage ministry,” the inspired couple announces excitedly. You are? Watch out. We have started to respond like my grandmother did each time Jill or my sister told her that they were pregnant (Out of love or concern she would say, “Oh, Honey, I’m so sorry.”). Grandma’s response was definitely disappointing, but also sobering. What does she know about pregnancy or raising children that we don’t know?
 
Quickly we exhort hopeful marriage ministry couples to pray together and to surround themselves with other couples to pray with them and for them and their marriages. Often they gaze at us with suspicious stares, “Why are they so hyper about this?”  We are vigilant for others because we’ve been there and done that.
 
Hell takes notice whenever Christians aspire to magnify Christ through their life. Satan has a radar screen that notifies him when previously complacent or uninvolved couples “get it” regarding the possibility of magnifying God’s gracious healing of pain in their life, and he sends demons to ignite enmity between them.
 
So, after all this gloom and doom, what can be done?
 
If you are serious about multiplying the messages of grace and healing that God has worked in your life, get very serious about living out this calling in community. Regularly pray with and for other couples called to relationship ministry. Get real with each other. Spend an hour in prayer with these couples each week, no matter the distance that separates you.
 
Fourteen months ago God inspired me to write a vision for such a prayer group and to ask several couples living in different parts of the country to serve each other by praying together on a tele-conference call every week. So, Friday mornings from 7 to 8 a.m. is where you will find us. Jill and I pace the house, or curl up on couches with coffee mugs in one hand and cordless phones in the other, connecting at a heart level with other committed couples. This has become a significant fellowship of the heart and is supplemented with encouraging emails, collateral phone calls, and even some in-person meetings when we travel (two couples are in Maryland, one in Indiana, and the fourth in Florida).
 
What is the value of this? Authentic fellowship in a “go-to” group. When the chips are down, you have confidential, prayer-serious, compassionate and committed friends, and that is priceless. Better than that, you have a magnified voice to God to move Heaven on your behalf. After all, prayer is the real work of ministry.
 
The resources to create such a group are provided in today’s devotional. Would you ask God if He would have you do this? And who He would have you invite? Contact us for help to get started.
 
Prayer
Lord, thank You for the gift of prayer and all the good that happens in us when we pray. Thank You for committed friends to which we can give, and from whom we can receive. Thank You for showing us the importance of bathing our lives and all activities done in Your name in prayer; petitions to You on behalf of others, confessions of sin and shortcomings in our lives, and praise of You as God Almighty, King of Creation, Ruler of Heaven and Earth, Prince of Peace, and on go Your names to infinity. In Jesus’ name. Amen.———————Our Prayer Document ~
Prayer Ministry with and for Couples Called to Relationship Ministry
 
Compelled by God to pray with and for each other, the founders of GTRE [1] have made a covenant to do “real work of ministry” (A.W. Tozer) by being in prayer with and for those who serve as vessels of grace, truth, hope, healing, and abundance for relationships.  Prompted by God, we intend to encourage and facilitate unceasing prayer with and for couples and individuals ministering in the area of relationships. 
 
Why? “If we call upon the Lord, he has promised in his Word to answer, to bring the unsaved to himself, to pour out his Spirit among us.” [2]  We celebrate salvation in Jesus Christ and proclaim His Lordship in our lives. We submit to His plan and purposes for our lives and the organizations that He has given us to serve and steward as servant-leaders.  Our confidence is in Him, not ourselves, and it is His Dominion that we are extending into relationships. We are but vessels of clay through which He pours his grace, truth, power and healing. We are not the creators of the “truth” we proclaim, and we take no credit for the results of the ministries entrusted to us. [3] All praise, glory and honor is due Him, and Him alone.
 
We want to be in the middle of what God is doing to “reconcile all men [and women] to Himself” and to each other. We want abundance in relationship with Jesus Christ, and with each other, across the multitude of relationships with which He has blessed us.What? Scheduled and impromptu meetings for prayer. “The format of a prayer meeting is not nearly as important as its essence – touching the Almighty, crying out with one’s whole being . . . . . The atmosphere of the meeting may vary; what matters most is that we encounter the God of the universe, not just each other.” [4] 

How? In person, by phone, phone conference, chat or messenger online, emailed prayers, etc. However the Lord prompts you into a meeting of two or more where you gather in His name and for His purposes. Get creative. Just do it.

When? See above. Whenever. 

[2] Fresh Wind, Fresh Fire: What Happens When God’s Spirit Invades the Hearts of His People, Jim Cymbala, Pastor of the Brooklyn Tabernacle.  Zondervan, 1997, p.27
[3] ‘It’s not the one who plants or the one who waters who is at the center of this process but God, who makes things grow.’  I Corinthians 3:7, The Message, Eugene Peterson.
[4] Ibid, p