Connect09 executive director Andrew Nixon has urged churches to spend ‘a significant amount of time’ on Sunday praying for their communities, as part of the second prayer day leading up to next year’s campaign.

“I’m surprised by the number of people who find it difficult to pray for those around them. We often pray for church programmes, for our own groups, even for Connect09, but not for the people in our regions. The focus should be on praying for them.” says Mr Nixon.

The first Connect09 prayer day was run at the start of June and the second is on Sunday November 2nd.

Mr Nixon says “I hope that this Sunday is a chance to pray for the people who will be touched by the campaign in the next year. We must pray that God will give us connections with those around us and that He will speak to their hearts.”

Archbishop Jensen, in his Presidential Address to Synod, talked about the central place of prayer in Connect09.

“This is a spiritual campaign” said Dr Jensen “Our weapons are the word of God and prayer. The key point is prayer for our nation, our community.  We pray that there may be a spiritual awakening, a desire for God, so that
when we make contact there may be many people prepared by God himself for the message which we bring. I believe that God will go before us, and we will experience answers that will surprise us.”

Prayer points are available from the Connect09 website for individual or church use.

Meantime, the FEVA ministry team is putting the finishing touches to the Connect09-sponsored Create conference.

Run by Outreach Media (part of the FEVA ministry) , CREATE will feature leading professionals in the fields of media, graphics, advertising, architecture, web design, theory of communication and more.

Clergy are being urged to attend, along with interested congregation members, to lift the standard of church communication in every from promotional flyers to websites.

The conference is on November 15th at King’s School, Parramatta.

All attendees will be given a free ‘CopyWrong’ DVD that will help their church do the right thing in the area of copyright.

Lunch will be provided on site and workshops will run hourly so people can visit several sessions across the day.

Popular sessions from previous conferences such as “Arriving and Staying on the Web’ and ‘Death by Powerpoint’ will be on again.

The conference has a website here.