Prayer Journals

Every Livextreme Ladies' Night Out is different.  Our chatting sometimes is focused on our lives and how things are going.  Other times the core of the conversation is on prayer requests.  Some nights we pick apart The Shack through our discussion.

The one thing that I feel God wants our group of ladies to focus on is prayer.  Each of them always has at least one thing that is weighing on them.  Throughout the night, we keep up with a list of prayer requests.  At the end, before we leave McDonald's, one lady prays over the list of requests.

Tomorrow night, I would like for us to focus on prayer.  Some of the ladies have a journal they use to keep up with their prayers.  We will have a time to share how we keep up with our prayers.  Each lady will bring their prayer journal and tell how it is used in their daily quiet time.

Recently I changed from a spiral notebook to a three ring binder with dividers.  To begin the "show and tell" time, I will share my prayer journal and explain how I use it daily to see God is at work in my life and the lives of others.

The picture above shows the front cover of my prayer journal.  This prayer journal idea came from Monica's blog and can be found at DailyDwelling.  This is a white 1/2" three ring binder with a clear pocket in the front and back.  The binder design is better for me than a spiral notebook because clean paper, additional sections, and other resources can easily be added or taken away.  A journal with room to grow is more conducive to my personal quiet time.

There are ten tabbed sections of topics for prayer in this version of the prayer journal.  Those sections include: 
1. Scripture
2. Praise
3. Self
4. Husband
5. Children
6. Friends
7. Family
8. Church
9. Neighbors
10. Reaching Beyond   

Five of the sections seemed more relevant to my life: scripture, praise, friends, family, and church.  Narrowing the sections to five seemed to allow for more quality prayer time.  The section titles were each printed onto card stock and placed into a clear page protector sleeve with a color tab.  Then, I used my label maker to print a label for each section so it can be easily found.

Between each tabbed section I inserted loose leaf college lined paper.  The date and my prayers for each section are written on the paper in different colored ink.  A time to review my previous prayers to make note of the date that the prayers were answered has allowed my prayer time to be more active and encouraging. A highlighter could be used to put a spotlight on answered prayers so this time will be more engaging.   

In my personal experience, using this method of journaling prayers has made me more aware of God's work in my life and the lives of others.  Here is a brief description of how I use this journal during my quiet time with God.  

• The scripture section is full of printables that help me to organize the scriptures I am memorizing and also my personal Bible study notes.  In the future, I intend to add notes from sermons, quotes from book and magazines, and pictures that relate to scriptures I am studying. 
• Instead of using the self section, I write prayers of praise.  This is where I use words of praise to pray about personal matters.  This has helped me to have a more positive look on my daily life.  One of the first things I do in the morning is praise God for who He is and thank Him for the blessings he has bestowed upon me.  
• Prayers for each of my friends and the things that are heavy on their hearts as well as things that God leads me to pray for them are kept up to date in this section.  It has become a great joy to see how the prayers are answered in God's way which is always better than what I prayed.
• The family section is a prayer topic that I must trust God with wholeheartedly.  A two days journey separates me from my family but I know God is taking care of them even though I do not always know what is going on down south.  I pray for their general well being and the things they have asked me to pray about.  It is difficult not being there but I know He has His eyes on them.
• Church is a huge part of my life.  Let me rephrase that.  Church is my life.  All of the ministry activities and situations are listed in this section.  It helps to keep up with prayer needs of the ministry including physical, mental, emotional, and spiritual topics.  Ministry is run on faith and there is no need for us to get discouraged because we are blind to God's provision or the work of the Holy Spirit.

Please be in prayer for our Livextreme Ladies Night Out every Thursday at 7:00PM.  If you have any ideas about how you keep up with prayer requests and how God has answered them, please comment.  I would love to hear fresh ideas.