HOUSTON—Christians across the Houston area will join together at Discovery Green on Nov. 1 to seek the face of God to bring spiritual and physical healing to Houston during the City Reach Houston Prayer Gathering for Transformation.
“The gathering will be providing a way across denominational lines to pray for the city,” said Rickie Bradshaw, church consultant for the Union Baptist Association. “We are praying for forgiveness for the separation we have had among believers.”
Organizers of the event include the Baptist General Convention of Texas, Union Baptist Association, Houston Prays, Soulcheck and various churches in the area. The group is inviting more than 4,000 congregations in the area to join together as believers in Christ to ask for the healing of the city, Bradshaw said. More than 5,000 people are expected at the event.
The gathering also will promote City Reach, a series of outreach and evangelistic events that will take place in the two-week period prior to the BGCT annual meeting at the George R. Brown Convention Center in Houston on Nov. 16-17. Ministries will include a multicultural festival, prison outreach, block parties and a youth extreme sports event.
“When we go into the city with a convention of Christians, we need to leave the city better than we found it,” said Jon Randles, Texas Baptist director of evangelism. “One way we do that is to go in and help reach the community for Christ. We basically are trying to help all our churches and leaders realize that if they will be intentional about evangelism, build trusting relationships with the community, then hold a variety of events and bath it in prayer, they will see results.”
Leaders from key churches in the area met with Houston Prays leadership during October to plan the program for the evening. The program will include guided prayers and readings, speakers from several churches in the area and music led by Christian Praise Church and Soulcheck.
“We want to make a declaration to the church and community that it is now time to seek the face of God for the healing of our city, both physically and spiritually,” Bradshaw said. “We will focus on praying for healing in our city as it relates to the swine flu, the drug cartel and the economy because many people have lost jobs in the city. We will seek the face of God for the transformation of our city, for the healing of lives and brokenness in our city.”
Bradshaw also said prayers will be focused on ways to reach the more than 140 language groups in the Houston area.
“We hope to see the compassion of the church expressed throughout the city in meeting the needs of the broken and to see Luke 4:16-18 lived out in the life of the church, which is the preaching to the poor, the setting of the captives free and declaring the jubilee of the Lord,” he said.
Organizers are asking participants to bring canned goods and non-perishable food items to the prayer gathering to help stock food pantries at the Mission Center of Houston and other ministries in the area.
The event will be held from 3 to 6 p.m. Nov. 1 at Discovery Green located at 1500 McKinney, near Minute Made Park in downtown Houston. Admission is free, and participants are encouraged to bring lawn chairs or blankets to sit on during the event.
For more information, call Rickie Bradshaw at (713) 957-2000, ext. 216, or visit www.cityreachhouston.org .
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