If you’re looking for a Bible verse about group prayer, James 5:16 isn’t a bad choice:
Therefore, confess your sins to one another and pray for one another, that you may be healed.
The prayer of a righteous person has great power as it is working.
By God’s grace, praying with and for one another is powerful. I’ve experienced this in countless ways in the men’s group I lead. I often arrive at our group struggling in faith, motivation, or a particular life challenge, and leave with confidence in God and my burdens lifted. I wouldn’t trade our weekly prayer time for anything.
And yet I know such a time of prayer isn’t a guarantee. It might feel awkward or forced. You might fail to gain momentum if people don’t speak up or if their prayers are too short or superficial. You might be so into your conversation that you run out of time to pray. Or maybe some in the group use prayer request time as a personal soapbox to overshare about every detail of their life.
I hope the ten ideas I share in this article for Open the Bible will help you foster small group prayer that brings God glory and blesses His people, while remaining engaging to the group as whole.