Throughout the month of March, we will be providing daily prayer prompts for each day of the week, Monday through Saturday. Each Sunday, as you gather with the fellowship of believers in your local church, we are asking you to pray for all the new believers that we have seen come to know the Lord within that week. For the first three weeks, we’ll focus on the prayer needs of one of our ministry partners. We then will share Doulos-specific prayer requests as we finish out the month.
Week of March 16—21: New Generations
New Generations has indicated with regard to its mission that “We work with God to launch Disciple Making Movements.” Its self-described “passion is to mobilize disciples that make disciples, resulting in churches that plant churches.” The organization previously was known as “Cityteam International,” an affiliate of Cityteam, until becoming a separate entity, entirely focused on international discipleship and church planting. Since 2005, New Generations has been a catalyst for over 60,000 new churches and 1.5 million disciples around the world.
Monday, March 16: Persecution. Where the Lord has assigned New Generations makes persecution a serious and constant problem for church planters and new disciples. Pray for God’s protection from evil and that He would take what the enemy intended for evil and turn it to good. As an example in 2019, there were 12 churches burned and 70 disciples attacked, with some suffering permanent damage. However, due in part to the loving response of the victims, 16 of the perpetrators have become followers of Jesus! Genesis 50:20.
Tuesday, March 17: Leadership Development. New Generations has concluded that “movements” are chain reactions of disciples making disciples that result in cascades of churches planting churches. (New Generations defines a “movement” as at least 100 new churches that have multiplied to the fourth generation or beyond. New Generations is tracking over 115 such movements that the Lord has formed through the group’s team of indigenous leaders.) Every link in the chain needs a quality leader, or the chain will be broken and the movement will cease. Pray that God will raise up the leaders necessary to keep up with rapidly expanding movements and that New Generations will continue to devise better and better leadership development processes. 1 Timothy 4:9-16.
Wednesday, March 18: New Regions. In 2019, New Generations officially began work in two more regions, North Africa and North America. The group has been training in both regions for many years, but now there are regional leaders and teams, as well as a strategy and a budget. Both regions present difficult challenges. Pray that God will provide breakthroughs in catalyzing disciple-making movements in these two regions, as He already has done in the other nine regions where New Generations operates. Romans 1:8-17.
Thursday, March 19: Business Development. New Generations is committed to the concept that over the long-term, indigenous movements need to be supported by indigenous money. The group is working on business development strategies to make this goal achievable. Pray that the Lord will grant the insights necessary to make indigenous business development successful and widespread. 2 Corinthians 9:6-15.
Friday, March 20: Quality Assessment. New Generations is now undertaking its first ever quality assessment of movements. Its purpose is to establish ongoing evaluation of lifestyles of prayer, obedience, replication, service, etc. as a fundamental part of catalyzing movements and to create an equal emphasis between measuring quantity and quality. Pray that God will use these assessments to encourage a lifestyle of radical obedience that will be found pleasing to Him. 2 Corinthians 13: 5-9.
Saturday, March 21: Abiding in the Lord. New Generations has stated that it is “deeply aware of the reality of what Jesus said in John 15:5, that “Apart from Me, you can do nothing.” Pray that all of the group’s team members will continue to be committed to abiding in the Lord and seeking his guidance and direction for all their work. John 15:1-8.
