Pray Your Way To Evangelism

Keeping an Evangelistic Prayer List is a great way to keep yourself praying and keep yourself evangelizing.  Simply put together a list of the top ten individuals you strongly desire to see come to Christ and pray for each of them a few times each week.

Keep It A Dynamic List

These should be individuals with whom you have regular contact and can easily engage in conversation.  Usually, these should be people you truly care about; but sometimes God may give you an unusual burden for some particular individual.  

As you learn about their lives and get into spiritual conversations with them, you want to be praying for these people with intentionality.  Jot down a few notes, keep the list handy on your phone or in your Bible, and pray away!

Your EPL should be a dynamic list where people move up and down the list, even on and off the list, as you observe the work of God upon their lives and in their minds and hearts.  Are they asking more or fewer questions?  Do they seem softer or harder toward the Gospel?  Are they thinking deeply or have they pushed the message aside?  How are their relationships going?  How is their life going?  Review the list weekly and keep it accurate in reflecting your top ten.  

Keep It A Hot List

We all have those relatives and close friends whom we love dearly and want to see come to faith in Christ, and so we pray for them and their salvation often.  But, don’t put them on your EPL, unless you observe strong and serious movement toward true faith in Christ.  

Maybe it would be best to keep all relatives on a separate list, otherwise this list will be filled up quickly with people who are not interested in Christ at the moment.  And this list needs to be a hot list, something kept current and a list that is exciting to pray through.

And just because you will be moving people up and down and on and off the list doesn’t mean you will be friending and un-friending people constantly.  It simply keeps you focused where God is clearly working and praying and talking with these people more clearly about the Gospel.

Watch God Make His Moves

What you will find is that God is mightily at work in people all around you.  By praying you will see this.  You will become more sensitive to the Spirit’s working in their lives.  You will see God answer your prayers and change people.

You will even see people become hostile because they know you are praying for them, and they are encountering God because of this.  They are wrestling with the claims of Christ, and are scared.  And many other amazing things!

You will naturally speak into their lives the truth and love of the Gospel of Jesus Christ.  In other words, you will find yourself becoming a natural evangelist when you thought you could never do it!  And quite likely, God will start bringing people into His Kingdom through you, His “faithful coworker in the Gospel of Christ.” (1 Thessalonians 3:2)