Carol Stream | More than 50 pray-ers gathered in January to stretch their understanding of the discipline of prayer, and to learn some new skills they can put into practice in their personal prayer lives and their churches.
The Chicago Metro Baptist Association held its fourth-annual prayer conference at Crossroads Community Church in Carol Stream. Claude King, a discipleship specialist for LifeWay Christian Resources, took the participants through a Prayer Boot Camp based on “ACTS”—adoration, confession, thanksgiving, and supplication.
The training taught prayer skills, said Phil Miglioratti, which are sometimes overlooked in the life of a Christian. “With prayer, it seems everyone says you just bow your head, close your eyes, and pray. And I think sometimes that’s what keeps prayer at the remedial level,” said Miglioratti, IBSA’s prayer ministries consultant. He added that the boot camp helped sharpen some skills some churches may not know they have for prayer.
The day-long seminar also included many times of actual prayer, something that’s important to event organizer Cheryl Dorsey. “I don’t like prayer seminars where—and sometimes I’m even guilty of it—you don’t get to pray,” said Dorsey, the Chicago Association’s prayer coordinator and a pastor’s wife from Beacon Hill Missionary Baptist Church. At the boot camp, she said, “People felt like they were engaged in prayer for most of the day.”