How do you keep track of prayer requests?

[glorifyinggodinwv]

Hi All,

I've been wondering how some of the brothers and sisters on the PB keep track of prayer requests. As a pastor in a small town, I am constantly being asked to pray for individuals and situations by both people in the church and, increasingly, people outside the church. I think Elder Brown's advice to pray on the spot in this thread was wonderful, but sometimes the situation is not conducive to this approach. I confess that I occasionally forget to pray for someone in my prayer time after I told them I would pray for them. This weighs heavily on my heart at times. I have to repent and throw myself on the mercy of God's grace not to become dejected at my worthiness to be a shepherd. I stopped participating in the prayer forums on the PB for this very reason, although now I have a system in place which I hope makes me more consistent in this area.

I use Evernote and opened a simple text document which is synced between my ipod, home computer, and the web. All of it is password protected. My ipod is always on my belt, which allows me to add requests instantly to my prayer list. (For awhile I tried using a paper notebook, but discovered that I often would not have it with me when someone requested prayer.) I also have all of my congregants at the bottom of my list, although I don't pray for all of them daily, more likely weekly. I also have a list of people at the top of my list that I always pray for during my prayer time, like my wife, my children, parents, the church I pastor as a whole, that my denomination will be turned from their broad path and embrace a more biblical Christianity, the community, etc.

When I get a prayer request, I usually put the person's name, the nature of the request (if it is private or personal I put unspecified), and the date of request. Sometimes, it is obvious when it is time to remove a person from the list, but others need ongoing prayer, and I am designating a special section for those folks who I would pray for on a weekly, or maybe even monthly basis.

I try to be aware of not making this a legalistic process or letting it degrade into a purely mechanical approach to prayer. My approach may seem compulsive, but I tend to be much more consistent when I have a system, as I do with my Bible reading.

I think it would be edifying and inspiring to know how others keep track of prayer requests, and how they use it on a daily or ongoing basis. I am not as interested in How to Pray responses, especially since a recent thread addressed this issue.

In Christ,

 

[SolaScriptura]

Well, fortunately for me, in the Army I'm considered "out of uniform" if I don't have a pen and a small notepad in my pocket. (Our uniform even has special pen holders.)

So I just write the requests in my pad.

 

[coramdeo]

I understand you desire to never miss a promised prayer because it is something we all probably have done. I had a wonderful older friend/mentor in the faith who was one who always, always prayed on the spot. He was instant in his prayers. I well remember one day when we were coming out of the downtown post office when we were approached by a brother with a request.
Old brother Don bowed his head right there on the steps and prayed away.
I think this practice worth of emulation.
FYI our church has a prayer chain that goes out via email to those who are a part of the prayer ministry chain. Sometimes it is quite long but you can always revisit it if you are in a rush.

 

[lynnie]

It is wonderful that you are a praying pastor. May God bless you!!!!

I believe I am called to intercession, I like to pray, and I think I spend more time in prayer than most folks I know. That said, you made this comment:

I am constantly being asked to pray for individuals and situations by both people in the church and, increasingly, people outside the church.

This may sound harsh, but I no longer do what you are doing and I think it is often wrong to. Galatians speaks of bearing one anothers burdens, but also it says let each carry his own load. People in my experience consistently want to dump the work of prayer on those they think are praying people. Prayer is work. Petitioning is work. And I no longer repeatedly do others people's work for them. I call it the welfare prayer mentality.

It is hard to know the difference between what is for the corporate group or for a friend and what is for individual prayer, so I almost always without fail lift something up on the spot once- if I can pray with the person right then, so much the better. But I no longer feel responsible to pray for their neighbor they are talking to, or their nephew or their car or their kids school teacher. That is their own load. It isn't mine. This may sound uncompassionate, but I can't hand out money to every single need and I can't pray with concern for everybody's list either. At some point people have to do their own work.

I try to say straight out to the person that God loves them, all it takes is one person to pray like Elijah (refer to James) and they don't need 100 or 1000 people praying. People seem to warm to this.....instead of saying I will pray, they thank me for encouraging them that maybe God will hear if they pray. So I don't ignore them, but I try and direct them to their own prayer closet instead of dragging their burden into mine.

When people come to midweek small group I'll join in 100%...they are making an effort to come to a meeting where there is corporate prayer. And when they just are so upset they can't trust God, hey, I'll step in. Nobody has perfect faith. And when I pray about something for a while but it is hard to bear alone I ask others to pray with me. But I try hard to bear my own load, and I no longer bear the weight of dozens of other people's burdens.

Ironically I pray more, and I think more in line with the word, and with a greater focus on my local church, family and prayer for revival. I am less distracted by guilt and pressure of a long list.

Hey, you are a pastor so your calling might be harder than mine...but be careful not be be made into a RCC priest who they think on some level has access to God they don't have. Reformed people turn pastors into priests all the time with prayer requests, like the pastor has special favor with God. And the more loving and caring the pastor is the easier it is for the pastor to be that without realizing it, since they want to help. But the best help is to encourage each person to go into prayer themself. We are all priests now. We all have access to the holy of holies.

By the way my pastor lists things on index cards and divides them up into days, and uses the church directory divided up by alphabet listings to pray for the church members on different days.