God’s willingness to hear and answer our pleas will be the theme of this semester’s Day of Prayer on Tuesday, Sept. 30. The theme comes from Psalm 34:15b, which says, “His ears are open unto their cry.”
All students will start the day in the FMA at 9 a.m. with guest speaker Rev. Colin Mercer of Faith Free Presbyterian Church in Greenville. This past summer, BJU president Dr. Steve Pettit visited Mercer’s church and was especially moved by his message on prayer, which will be the subject of his message Tuesday as well.
Following the service, two morning prayer sessions will divide students into smaller groups according to academic classification and then residence. For the residence session, day students will divide up by ZIP code and residence hall students will divide up by floor.
After a picnic lunch at the Activity Center, the University family will gather back in the FMA for a final praise service at 1:30 p.m. In addition to congregational singing, several students and faculty members will give testimonies of answered prayer.
Dr. Royce Short, dean of the School of Religion, said Christians ought to share testimonies of answered prayer for the purpose of edification and worship. “It is also a way to praise God because we publicly acknowledge so many attributes of God simply by sharing His answer,” Short said.
In light of the theme, Dr. Samuel Saldivar, a member of the Bible faculty, said God not only invites us to come to Him but also commands us to do so. “God’s incredible eagerness for the prayers of His people should compel us to come daily,” Saldivar said. “He alone is able to answer our requests.”
Emyly Bradley, a sophomore journalism and mass communication major, said she experienced an incredible answer to prayer this summer while working at The Center for Women, a pregnancy crisis center located in Jackson, Michigan. For many years this center has been burdened with a mortgage of $52,000. Bradley spent the summer praying for this burden and, just a few weeks ago, she received a piece of awe-inspiring news: the center had received a letter from the bank saying the entire mortgage had been paid off by an anonymous donor.
Kyle Wilcox, executive assistant to the president, said this year’s theme relates to his personal testimony over the past few months. “I may not always have someone to run to physically and unburden my heart, but He is always there with an open ear,” Wilcox said. “He’s ready to listen.”
