Praying Teens

This week I had a room full of teen girls at my house - some in high school, some entering college. All came for prayer time. One thing I love is the variety. Schools represented were OSU, Victory, Metro, Lincoln Christian, ORU and Union. At last month prayer meeting we also had Broken Arrow, Jenks and OU girls.

A friend of mine who helped pray spoke of how a "safe place" has been created for girls to come. I told her that spoke volumes to me because that was the original goal! Seven years ago, I wrote down my goals, one of them being "to create a community of friends, moms, and mentors who can guide girls safely through adolescence." That is just one thing that has happened in these few years.

Girls who have to be a certain "way" at school or who may be perceived in a particular fashion at school, can have a place to come where that is laid aside, and we are all just girls, working through life.

Our prayer team is comprised of women from their late twenties to early seventies. Prayer teams privately pray for each girl individually. Many times the prayer team has never met the girls, other times we know them quite well. Standard procedure is to pray and remain quiet until God shows us what to pray for. We don't ask questions or needs from the girls until later. It's always an adventure to see what God has to say to each girl.

It's common for girls to kinda be freaked out or scared of prayer meeting. For some reason many are afraid they are going to get a list of what's wrong with them. It's unfortunate that our church culture has often fed that fear, because that is not God's heart. What always happens is God tells them what He loves about them, or He brings up some secret awesome thing that is really meaningful, that the prayer team could not have known. So then God is seen as really personal and that He cares about those hidden things in her heart. He also often highlights the girls' gifts and confirms plans He has for them. He may say there are things to get rid of, but only in light of something so much better He has for them instead.

In a culture that constantly tells girls they aren't good enough, it is a privilege to offer an atmosphere where girls can come hear straight from their Heavenly Father what He loves about them. They leave lighter, freer, filled with hope, stronger.

(Women, if you need a night of prayer like this, I urge you to check out my friend Sheryl Kloehr's ministry at www.irefresh.net. See her facebook page called iRefresh Ministries. How we pray is modeled after iRefresh. Monthly meetings for women are offered in the Tulsa community.)