1. Call to Prayer II Chronicles 7:14
P. Douglas Small
Alive Ministries: PROJECT PRAY

2. Two Perspective Issues that confuse us today:
First, we have lost the concept of ‘corporate sin’ – the idea that nations and families, cities and entities sin – and God judges. So pervasive is individualism, even in the church, that sin has become a completely privatized concept.
Second, holiness as a Christian ideal has now been so pervasively eroded by an aberrant view of grace – what Bonheoffer called ‘cheap grace,’ grace without a connection to discipleship – that sin is tacitly accepted, not treated as a serious affront to God; and more specifically, we fail to differentiate between sins.
While it is true that ‘one’ sin, no matter how deceptively innocent or innocuous it appears, is toxic and deadly; yet, all sins are not the same. Some are so egregious, so strategically destructive, that like an aggressive cancer, radical action is necessary to save the whole.
P. Douglas Small, President Alive Ministries: PROECTPRAY Kannapolis, NC

3. The Five Things that Defile the Land
The shedding of innocent blood.
Treating the dead (death) with disrespect. Even the despised criminal was to be properly buried (Implication: The sacredness of the body).
The breakdown of the family through the proliferation of divorce. With it sexual infidelity.
Sexual deviation, specifically homosexuality (Identity confusion that brings social disorder.)
Idolatry, idolatrous altars and worship sites, paganism and its priests (Pluralism; Rejection of the exclusive covenant with YHWH).
P. Douglas Small, President Alive Ministries: PROECTPRAY Kannapolis, NC

4. A Solemn Assembly
P. Douglas Small, President Alive Ministries: PROECTPRAY Kannapolis, NC

5. Israel Had Specially Called Solemn Assemblies:
Priest
King
Prophet
II Chronicles 12: Rehoboam King
II Chronicles 15: Asa King
II Chronicles 20: Jehoshaphat King
II Chronicles Hezekiah King
II Chronicles Josiah King
Ezra 10: Ezra Priest
Nehemiah Nehemiah-Civil Leader
Joel Joel Prophet
Historians cite 8 – 12 Solemn Assemblies in the Old Testament.
Called, to right the nation with God, by a national leader.
Some see Acts 1-2 as a Solemn Assembly, a response by the Church, to the crucifixion of Jesus.
P. Douglas Small, President Alive Ministries: PROECTPRAY Kannapolis, NC

6. WHY hold a solemn assembly?
Because -
Of a sense that the city/ nation is reaping what it has sown. Judgment is looming over the land, and we must fulfill our mission to stand in the gap.
Of a sense that judgment is imminent or already present; the crisis might deepen. And even among God’s people, there is compromise and it is critical that they redirect their lives.
Of fresh revelation. Truth from His word has been ignored. Now rediscovered, we must change.
Of the sense that our change, will make a difference far beyond us.
P. Douglas Small, President Alive Ministries: PROECTPRAY Kannapolis, NC

7. What is a Solemn Assembly?
The urgent call to all the people to come together:
to repent – something has gone wrong and change begins with us.
to humble themselves, to be broken.
to seek God's face – not merely his hand (In the openness/ transparency, we see ourselves – and God more clearly. Moved to our face.)
to fast and pray, to demonstrate that our greatest hunger is spiritual.
to turn from wicked ways, to change our lifestyle.
P. Douglas Small, President Alive Ministries: PROECTPRAY Kannapolis, NC

8. What is a Solemn Assembly?
to go back to the pattern of Scripture – often meant hearing God's Word read aloud to the group.
to remove all things and practices from lives that might be displeasing to God and frustrating his purposes in our lives, our homes, our church, our nation.
to worship God with all their hearts.
All - to renew the solemn covenant with God that has in some way been broken.
To facilitate the group’s desire to be a more effective instrument in God’s hand;
And to fulfill their specific institutional mission.
P. Douglas Small, President Alive Ministries: PROECTPRAY Kannapolis, NC

9. Here is the call to Solemn Assembly by the Prophet Joel:
"Blow the trumpet in Zion, sanctify a fast, call a solemn assembly: Gather the people, sanctify the congregation, assemble the elders, gather the children, and those that still nurse … the bridegroom … out of his chamber, and the bride out of her closet. Let the priests, the ministers … weep between the porch and the altar … Let them say, Spare your people, O Lord, give not your heritage to reproach that the nations should rule over them: saying … Where is their God?" (Joel 2:15-17).
P. Douglas Small, President Alive Ministries: PROECTPRAY Kannapolis, NC

10. 7 Critical Elements PRECIPITATING EVENT ...
Common Calamity: Drought, Fire, Storm, Crop Failure.
Uncommon Calamity: Andrew, Katrina, Earthquake.
Financial Crisis: Haggai – Earn Money only to put it into a bag with holes. Bank collapse precipitated the 3rd Great Awakening.
Human Caused Calamity: 9-11, War (Threat to our National Security)
Moral Crisis: Cali, Columbia.
Health Pandemic: Plague, AIDS.
Political: Death of Uzziah. Uganda.
The Event is an interruption to life as normal (localized or national). Some encounter that proves overwhelming and instinctively moves our eyes toward heaven.
P. Douglas Small, President Alive Ministries: PROECTPRAY Kannapolis, NC

11. If my people … called by my name!
Which are called by my name …
Will …
Humble themselves (Repent).
And pray (palal) … to represent, stand before in behalf of …
And seek My face … (not merely my hand).
And turn from their wicked ways… demonstrate a love for truth and holiness.
Then …
I will hear from heaven (Answer them).
And will forgive their sin (justify, reconcile, restore).
And heal their land (their nation, living places).
P. Douglas Small, President Alive Ministries: PROECTPRAY Kannapolis, NC

12. If my people … called by my name!
Lord, to whatever extent, I have failed to openly identify with you, that I have withdrawn the bolder edge of my witness, that I have been silent – for fear that my Christian faith might cost me a promotion, or even popularity, I repent.
To whatever degree, I have failed to acknowledge the redemptive and kingly dimension of ‘the Name – Jesus’ – I repent.
I say now, “There is no other name!”
May I say it publically; may I wear it as an adornment, as your bride-partner. May I come to understand its power and privilege. “There is no other name!”
P. Douglas Small, President Alive Ministries: PROECTPRAY Kannapolis, NC

13. We pray – manifest yourself as alive – in this nation.
That we would live as representatives of the name – not side-stepping the culture war, in which the name is permitted in a profane manner, but forbidden when used in a sacred way.
We pray – manifest yourself as alive – in this nation.
Let kings and nations acknowledge it. Let sinners and saints cling to it.
I will boldly, more consistently, more openly declare, “I am a follower of Jesus; I am one of his children. I am a disciple – and I am not ashamed of the gospel.
Lord, may we, your Church, be bolder in our witness.
May we, your people, not be silent.
We pray, in view of the war against the name of Jesus – that you would intervene.
That you would perform signs and wonders around ‘the Name!’ – for your glory, to demonstrate that Jesus is not dead, but alive.
P. Douglas Small, President Alive Ministries: PROECTPRAY Kannapolis, NC

14. If my people … will humble themselves …
The Hebrew text says, “humble” but the Greek Septuagint says, “Repent!” What if it is both?
Humility is the disposition of the heart …
Repentance is the action …
PRAYER:
Lord, first, we bow our hearts. We recognize who we are standing before, and we are purposely reverent, intentionally bent before you.
We bow. We bend. We demonstrate our subordination and your supremacy; our sin, and your holiness; our frailty, and your transcendence.
P. Douglas Small, President Alive Ministries: PROECTPRAY Kannapolis, NC

15. We repent for our complicity – by silence. For quietly going along.
We weep, that our culture – including the church culture – has lost appropriate reverence of you.
We fear the deadly consequences of such disdain for You, especially in view of our national sins.
We know there are consequences to nations for sin, and we fear for the nation, for our sons and daughters and the generations to come … And we repent …
We are so sorry that we have allowed the escalation of such scandalous sins in our nation, in our churches, even in our families with so few tears, so little prophetic outcry.
We repent for our complicity – by silence. For quietly going along.
For feeling that our little voice, our little candle was no match for the darkness – and hiding it.
P. Douglas Small, President Alive Ministries: PROECTPRAY Kannapolis, NC

16. We repent for renaming sin.
We repent for allowing love, confused love that did not want to offend, to muzzle truth …
Give us tough love, a truer love, so profound and like you, so laser-like, that it loves the sinner without affirming the sin.
We repent for times when we ourselves have not lived truth – for living in a era in which the church is so compromised that there is little difference between us and the world – and more sadly, that such differences are no longer expected.
We are a ‘cheap grace’ culture content with superficial conversion, and deeply resistant to discipleship.
We repent … to whatever extent our soldiering spirit has grown flabby, our capacity to mobilize compromised, our depth of resolve lacking …
P. Douglas Small, President Alive Ministries: PROECTPRAY Kannapolis, NC

17. We know your grace not only empowers repentance, but also transforms
We know your grace not only empowers repentance, but also transforms. It makes weak men strong, removes intimidation, emboldens. That grace took a rag-tag band of wimpy disciples and made them fearless, at Pentecost . Do it again, God.
Forgive us. Make us credible witnesses – proof, examples, of your sin-breaking, liberating power of grace.
Let others see our hunger for holiness, our tender hearts, our openness about our own frailty, our deep dependence on you – and may they follow our examples.
Cleanse us. Unshackle us from any debilitating habit. Free us from the ‘weights’ that beset us. Break covenants that bind us in any way to evil. Light our fire again. Let there come over us – a pristine, purity that ushers in a new spiritual springtime.
P. Douglas Small, President Alive Ministries: PROECTPRAY Kannapolis, NC

18. If my people … And pray!
Will pray … (Palal) … to represent, stand before in behalf of …
Having humbled ourselves, and repented – we now are more capable of standing ‘between’ God and others …
We stand as advocates, extensions of heaven, reaching to others; and as priestly intercessors, in behalf of those who do not know you – for some, who may not want to know you. For leaders. For cultural influencers.
As intercessors, we plead for the nation. We pray for those who are the blind purveyors of darkness, themselves victims.
We take a position in your behalf God, in behalf of righteousness, in behalf of godliness,
P. Douglas Small, President Alive Ministries: PROECTPRAY Kannapolis, NC

19. We take a position in behalf of the wounded, the children who have never held a Bible, never heard the story – right here in America.
We take a position through prayer, at places where sin is openly celebrated, in behalf of homes where your name is not honored, toward churches where revival fires have gone out, in the homes of seniors lacking care, singles lacking companionship, youth lacking fathers, latch-key kids whose moms, despite their best efforts, will run short of food this month.
We reach out – to the homeless, to the addicted, to the abused, to the kid who today will take his initiation in a gang … we weep for this nation.
We take a position in courtrooms where you name is on the wall, but your principles, the very foundation of our laws, are not allowed. In Congress and the White house, in state houses and Governor’s mansions – have mercy on us.
We intercede. We ask you to come to America. Save us. Turn the nation back to You – for your glory.
P. Douglas Small, President Alive Ministries: PROECTPRAY Kannapolis, NC

20. If my people … Will Seek My Face!
God, we know it is so easy, to seek your hand. So easy to plea for intervention. So easy, for us to ask you to fix this or that – and all the while, ignore you.
We seek your face.
God, we genuinely ask for grace to seek a renewed relationship with you – not merely your hand of intervention – but your face.
Put in us, in this nation, a desire to again know you. To want a vital intimate connection with you. One that is personal. Authentic, and not merely utilitarian.
Help us to want You, not for what You can do for us; but for who You are, and what You stand for …
And transform us, beholding Your face, into your likeness.
P. Douglas Small, President Alive Ministries: PROECTPRAY Kannapolis, NC

21. If my people … turn from their wicked ways!
Lord, we have repented with our lips. Now, give us grace to repent with our lives – with hands and feet, deeds and habits. Let our ways please you.
Let others see the change in our attitudes and action – and take note. Let our lives demonstrate a deep work you are doing in our hearts.
Change us – Oh, God.
Break our sinful chains. Make us more saints, than sinners.
We renounce wicked ways …
Help us demonstrate our love for righteousness and holiness …
We turn … not only from sin, but unto you.
Help us to run to you, to openly love you, to loudly praise you, to boldly proclaim our allegiance to you.
It is not enough for us to be ‘free from’ sin; we must also be ‘free to’ follow, free to worship, free to witness, free to pray fervently … free … and even now, wherever, in our inner man we are not free – liberate us.
P. Douglas Small, President Alive Ministries: PROECTPRAY Kannapolis, NC

22. If my people … I will hear ….
We thank you that you hear us …
We thank you that you answer prayer. …
We thank you that we can depend on your word.
We thank you that you are faithful, and just, to forgive our sin …
We thank you that the weakest among, the frailest of the faithful, can pray – and you will answer.
Your mercy endures forever.
Your faithfulness is like the never-ending waves of the ocean.
You are a good, and dependable God – the same yesterday, today and forever.
You have changed our nation before – do it again.
P. Douglas Small, President Alive Ministries: PROECTPRAY Kannapolis, NC

23. If my people … And forgive!
May we live as dead men who cannot be offended. Who will not be baited. Who do not react to the darkness.
We have prayed … We have asked for forgiveness … We have prayed for the grace to live an overcoming life, one that is evidentiary of great grace.
Now, based on your word, we receive your promised forgiveness. We revel in it. We savor its sweetness.
Thank you Lord for forgiving us.
As freely as we have received it; may we give it.
We pray for grace to forgive our trespassers. Even those who offend you, oppose your kingdom, seek to harm us.
May we return good for evil. May we not come under the power of their awful orbit, absorbed in a dislike of them as deep as their hatred of the godly – forgive us, free us, keep us free.
P. Douglas Small, President Alive Ministries: PROECTPRAY Kannapolis, NC

24. If my people … And heal our land!
Heal our living places – our homes, churches, cities and nation.
Heal our schools and neighborhoods, our work and play places. We are so broken.
Heal our social and cultural systems, so bent against godliness. Our appetites for social entertainment.
Heal our bodies, so many racked by cancers and other deadly maladies. So many sick – heal us.
Heal our souls, new psychological illnesses emerge with regularity – heal us.
Heal our environment. No one seems to believe that godliness and ecology are connected – but there is a synergy, a spiritual connection between the land and the spiritual nature of its inhabitants.
P. Douglas Small, President Alive Ministries: PROECTPRAY Kannapolis, NC

25. 7 Critical Elements PRECIPITATING EVENT ...
2. Discovery of Limitations –
Eternal Realities break into time- space dimensions.
Human frailty is again in view.
3. Shared Sense of Desperation –
Not exasperation, but a deep yearning for God’s intervention, renewal, something lost.
P. Douglas Small, President Alive Ministries: PROECTPRAY Kannapolis, NC

26. 7 Critical Elements 4. Discerning Process – Deep Contrition –
What went wrong?
Why did this happen?
Analytical search process, including, the personal, the internal.
What does the Bible say? Find ourselves coming up short.
Willingness to accept responsibility.
Deep Contrition –
Not only over the calamity, but any personal contribution to it. And especially over sin.
There is brokenness. Tears. Reverence for God. Respect for his moral laws.
Acceptance of our share of responsibility with repentance and change.
P. Douglas Small, President Alive Ministries: PROECTPRAY Kannapolis, NC

27. 7 Elements Direction – Destiny –
This is the watchword of the prophets: “Turn”. We must change.
Symbolic action - fasting, acts of obedience, sacrifice, sackcloth and ashes, vows, rededications, reconciliation – is all aimed at renewing the damaged relationship with God.
Destiny –
Clear sense of mission. God has a purpose for us. We are on the edge of missing destiny, purpose for us and our children unless we purify ourselves.
Sincerity deepens. Passion returns. Ownership of mission becomes personal. The renewed relationship with God is as important as the mission.
P. Douglas Small, President Alive Ministries: PROECTPRAY Kannapolis, NC

28. The Movement Deep Contrition (Attitude) Destiny PRECIPITATING EVENT
Created to be: Image (Relational)
Deep Contrition (Attitude)
Destiny
PRECIPITATING EVENT
Discovery of Limitations
Shared Desperation
Direction/Do (Action)?
Discerning Process
Called to do: (Vocational)
At any point, the process can break down!

29. TWO: Discovery
God, we stand in a moment in which we realize that we are no match for our present dilemma.
We have been far to self-reliant, and too little dependent upon you.
We need you, not merely your hand.
We confess, that without you, we are empty believers, woefully inadequate for the task in the present moment:
We cannot do what you have called us to do, alone. We cannot be what you want us to be without renewing our relationship with you at the altar of sacrifice.
P. Douglas Small, President Alive Ministries: PROECTPRAY Kannapolis, NC

30. TWO: Discovery
We are fighting against unseen forces that no mere human can subdue.
Our solutions fail us. Our formulas will no longer work. Our programs are inadequate. Our cisterns are dry. We need resources, particularly, spiritual power, wisdom and discernment.
We have tried to do divine work with human skill. We have tried to carry on a holy mission with soiled hands. We have failed – not merely the nations around us. It is us, O God, in need of your grace.
P. Douglas Small, President Alive Ministries: PROECTPRAY Kannapolis, NC

31. THREE: Desperation God we ask you to break our hearts.
Bring us to a place of deep dependence upon you.
We confess our inadequacy for the task.
We acknowledge our frailty.
We submit to your sovereignty.
We ask not to be brought to a place of exasperation, but a place of deep yearning for you. Not just for your help, but for you!
We repent of being casual over eternal issues. We repent of dry eyes. Of prayer that is more talk than tears.
Give us the grace to move beyond prayer – to cry out to you.
P. Douglas Small, President Alive Ministries: PROECTPRAY Kannapolis, NC

32. FOUR: Discernment We cautiously ask you, to show us our condition.
Why are we failing at the task – at least here in America? What has gone wrong with the harvest?
Why is the church lukewarm?
Before you, with the help of the Holy Spirit, lead us into honest self-examination – in the light of the Scripture.
Let the prophets speak again. Bring a cultural change to us, to the church, to the nation.
Help us see again, a clear vision for what you want us to be – your representative people, holy. And what you want us to do – reach the world with the gospel.
P. Douglas Small, President Alive Ministries: PROECTPRAY Kannapolis, NC

33. We Ask You For the Grace to Weep:
We weep for the murdered babies.
We weep for 40 years of public school education without a Bible.
We weep in the face of rising teen suicide, pregnancies, and drug addiction.
We weep over our increasingly hostile and violent society.
We weep over our shamelessness, the loss of our ability to blush at sin.
We weep over the plague of pornography, a symbol of our national search for satisfying love.
P. Douglas Small, President Alive Ministries: PROECTPRAY Kannapolis, NC

34. WE WEEP:
We weep over the hollowness of commitment and displaced children, wounded by the divorce of their parents.
We weep over the absence of fathers - godly men who would dare to be boldly Christ-like.
We weep over the moral vacuum of our nation, the silence, if not the absence, of godly leaders in government who have the moral courage to call us back to our roots.
We weep over the rewriting of history, to script out the existence of Christ and the influence of God and the Bible in our early American history. We weep over the lie.
P. Douglas Small, President Alive Ministries: PROECTPRAY Kannapolis, NC

35. WE WEEP:
We weep over the loss of a Creator God, and the replacement of a godless philosophy called evolution that reduces our value by making us a product of chance, when we are a special creation of God.
We weep over the banning of the Bible and the repression of Christian speech.
We weep over the rise of cultists and astrologists, over the concept of pluralism, when Christ himself proclaimed that he was the only way.
We weep over the spirit of deception that grows more powerful each day, whose tentacles seem to threaten the church itself.
P. Douglas Small, President Alive Ministries: PROECTPRAY Kannapolis, NC

36. We weep over the demise of the traditional family.
We weep over homosexuals and lesbians, whose pain is manifest in anger at those who remind them that the scripture calls homosexual behavior sin.
We weep over those who have innocently, and not so innocently, contracted AIDS.
We weep ... over what might been, over what was at one time, over what is threatened, unless God sends a powerful national revival.
We weep over America, many nations, divided and bitterly torn, without a shared consensus of values, no longer under obedience to God and his word.
We weep!
P. Douglas Small, President Alive Ministries: PROECTPRAY Kannapolis, NC

37. AND WE PRAY ... And, we pray - "Spare thy people!"
We are the salt and the light. If there is decay and darkness, we must accept the blame. We have failed.
We have not been the people of God that we need to be. Judgment must begin in the house of the Lord. It is the church that must repent for the condition of the nation.
We pray, that we will not be a reproach and the nations will not reign over us. We pray that they will not say, "Where is their God?"
We pray for a church in danger of becoming a reproach. We pray for a Christian people, more influenced than we are influencers.
P. Douglas Small, President Alive Ministries: PROECTPRAY Kannapolis, NC

38. FIVE: Deep Contrition Break our hearts.
First, with the recognition that we have sinned. Second, that we have failed you.
May we not cover – and conceal.
May we deal ruthlessly with our own sin.
May we be deeply aware that we have fallen short of God’s glory.
Change us. Change the Church. Change the Nation.
Rend our hearts.
P. Douglas Small, President Alive Ministries: PROECTPRAY Kannapolis, NC

39. SIX: New Direction Redirect us.
Renew us. Fill us with the Holy Spirit.
Help us to redefine our relationship with you as the representative people of God.
Make us hungry for private, personal encounters with you.
Help us to rekindle our passion for the lost.
Make holiness more than buzz word. Bring integrity, authenticity back to your people.
P. Douglas Small, President Alive Ministries: PROECTPRAY Kannapolis, NC

40. SEVEN: Destiny You created us to be with you.
PERSONAL ...
You called me ... Let me fulfill my destiny. Don’t let me die with promise in me. Let me have something to lay at your feet.
Let the character of my life be as important as the practical work in my life.
Let me glorify you with my life itself.
You created us to be with you.
You called us to work for you.
Let my relationship with you be as important as my vocation for you.
P. Douglas Small, President Alive Ministries: PROECTPRAY Kannapolis, NC

41. SEVEN: Destiny CORPORATE ...
You founded our church. You birthed it. Let us see it as more than a building to which we come for worship.
Let us fulfill our destiny.
Renew our movement. Restore our vision. Fill our pastor and his peers with the Holy Spirit. March through your Church around the world with a mighty revival that renews the missional DNA of your Body.
P. Douglas Small, President Alive Ministries: PROECTPRAY Kannapolis, NC

42. The Movement Discovery of Limitations Deep Contrition (Attitude)
Created to be: Image (Relational)
Discovery of Limitations
Deep Contrition (Attitude)
Destiny
PRECIPITATING EVENT
Shared Desperation
Direction/Do? (Action)
Discerning Process
Called to do: (Vocational)
At any point, the process can break down!

43. CRITICAL ELEMENTS IN A SOLEMN ASSEMBLY
P. Douglas Small
Project Pray
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P. Douglas Small, President Alive Ministries: PROECTPRAY Kannapolis, NC

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P. Douglas Small, President Alive Ministries: PROECTPRAY Kannapolis, NC