Before coming on the Race, I didn’t really practice praying with the intention of hearing back from God. I mainly made requests or thanked him. Then I showed up at training camp and was introduced to listening prayer. It was one of those “ah-ha” moments. It’s not a new thing, but I hadn’t realized the need to slow down, sit still, and listen to hear a response from God. It changed a lot for me.
Now, as we are out doing ATL, listening prayer is something I do daily. ATL, Ask The Lord, is a cool concept that many people do back home without having the specific name for it. Basically, it’s being sensitive to the Lord’s leading in all situations and then being obedient to His leading.
Listening prayer can be hard. It’s like exercising a muscle. It is difficult at first, but through consistency and discipline it gets easier. When I first started practicing this kind of prayer, I asked other people how they knew the difference between God’s voice, our own thoughts, or influence from the enemy or outside factors. There’s not an easy answer, but I look for truth and for what I hear to line up with God’s characteristics and His word. If I hear something that goes against scripture or God then I know it’s not from Him since He never changes or contradicts. If my team is praying for something together, we look to see where God is confirming direction through multiple people.
When we know we are doing ATL for our ministry in a country, we will gather as a team before we travel and begin to pray into what God wants for us in that country. We individually ask God for direction, then we make a list of what we each received. We do this several times before we make a plan.
As we prayed for our time in Armenia, we heard things like: a red hat, focus on unity, spiritual disciplines, southern region of the country, stay in one place for the month, an old man with a staff, rolling green hills, etc. Then we spend more time in prayer with these things and ask God to bring all of us to unity in our direction. Through our different times of prayer, God did give us very similar things. Multiple of us felt God leading us to the southern region of Armenia, as well as focusing on unity and spiritual disciplines as a team. Since what we were hearing from the Lord aligned, we moved forward.
Our initial plan was to head to a city in the south called Ararat. We felt God confirm it with all of us, so we started to move forward with finding housing and transportation to that city. Then our leadership came to us and said that Ararat is in an area of the country experiencing unrest and is potentially dangerous for tourists, and that they wanted us to stay to the western side of the country. This brought us to a redirection point. We prayed and weren’t completely sure where to end up, but we continued heading south.
We took an overnight train from Tbilisi, Georgia to Yerevan, Armenia, the capital city. At first we were going to check out a different small city a half hour away, but God kept us in the city and reminded us of what He had revealed to us in our listening prayers. The capital is in the southern region, it is where we stopped so it’s where He wants us to stay for the month, and it is a great place to focus on disciplines and unity. There are also many opportunities to interact with locals like becoming regulars at a coffee shop or restaurant (which we’ve already done in the few days we’ve been in town).
Even though Yerevan wasn’t our initial plan, God brought us here and planted us. I am reminded that ATL is about obedience and sensitivity. It would have been easy to keep pushing for Ararat or another town, but my team felt God leading us to stay here. An important part of ATL is taking a step forward. God can’t redirect us if we aren’t moving, so sometimes we have to take a step in faith and know God will guide us as we move forward. Our job isn’t to question God, but to obey and follow Him faithfully. His plan was to have us here, so here we are.
The beauty of living this way is that it isn’t just something I’ll do on my Race; it’s something I can do anywhere God has me. God wants me to be ready to move when He directs me. If I let the noise and distraction of the world fill my mind, it will make it harder to hear the still small voice and leading of the Lord. I need to be focused on Him by being consistently in His word and praying to Him. And when I’m in tune with God, I will be readily obedient when He prompts me to move, pray, or speak to someone specific.
You can do this, too! This is for all believers, no matter your ministry location. Plus, I know God is working back in the States just like He is out here in Armenia.
