Written by Kim Kokernot
Before the sound of club chants filled campus Monday, soft voices of a prayer circle broke through the quiet slumber of morning. In a unified circle, they gave thanks to God for the day and asked for the safety and health of those joining social clubs.
Every Monday morning at 7 a.m., students gather on the Benson steps to pray for their peers and professors and ask God to make them into agents of encouragement and change on campus.
Junior Jane Messina decided to start the prayer group after returning from Harding University in Greece, where students prayed together every night. Messina said that those who prayed during the program encountered God and were changed.
“God touched every single person that was there,” Messina said. “If people came to pray, they left different. It made noticeable changes within people.”
Inspired by this experience and Luke 18:7, which talks about crying out to God day and night, she decided to start a prayer group that could impact students here.
During this semester’s early morning prayers, Messina said they have seen people be healed from struggles with homosexuality and addictions, and that in their circle of prayer, there is no judgment — only support and encouragement.
“You can come to us about the worst thing you’ve ever done, and it won’t leave the prayer,” Messina said. “And we’ll support you and love you all the way through because that’s what Christ has called us to do.”
The group is open to all who wish to attend and is led by Messina, who comes to each meeting with a topic to pray about. Those present take turns praying one at a time about personal struggles and campuswide issues.
“To hear someone else pray about something that has also been on my heart is really encouraging because it unifies us and draws us together,” junior Eric Giboney said. “It reminds us that we are all running this race after God together. And when we spend time praying with people, I feel a lot closer to them than if I was just to always hang out with somebody.”
By joining together, Messina said she has formed connections with people that extend past Monday mornings and help her in her walk with Christ.
“God has called us to unify,” Messina said. “We’re all brothers and sisters. I don’t want to get to the end and not know who I’m fighting with. You’re never a good soldier if you don’t know your other soldiers. That’s really important for me.”
As prayer allows people to grow closer to one another, Giboney said it is also essential for Christians to move toward God.
“Without spending time with God through prayer, we’re not going to draw closer to God,” Giboney said. “We can learn all of the book knowledge, do all sorts of service projects and help people out, but if we’re not talking to God and listening, we’re never going to draw closer to him.”
Messina said she has seen God do miraculous things through the group’s prayers, and she said it is because the group believes in the power of presenting requests to God.
“We believe God is really going to work,” Messina said. “When we pray for healing for someone who has a headache, we believe it’s going to be healed. That’s very different than lots of people on campus because they just weren’t raised to pray that way.”
As people take part in this kind of prayer, Messina said that they are drawn in and choose to keep waking up early to pray with the group.
“It’s really promising to me because the people who do come, continually come almost every Monday,” Messina said. “They touch and taste and see God, and have an encounter with him through this prayer. They feel the difference than prayers that they’ve been praying their whole life.”
Giboney said that though it was hard to sacrifice sleep at first, he is now excited to wake up early to pray.
“God has just made us more and more alive, and I’ve drawn closer to God,” Giboney said. “It makes it worth getting up at 7 o’clock in the morning once a week.”
An 8 o’clock prayer group recently started meeting for students without 8 a.m. classes, and all are invited to attend. When weather is bad, the groups meet in the McInteer Rotunda.
