Ministry Update: Launching NIGHT WATCH!

On September 1, 2019February 18, 2022 By CaitlynIn Ministry Life

Hey, friends! It has been too long since I’ve written… tbh, I was swamped for a while with our summer programs and I didn’t fight like I should have to make Fragrance Arise a priority. But in all our discussions and prayers about building the house of prayer and strengthening the prayer movement, I’ve been freshly aware of the potential of this blog, and I’ve been convicted that I can’t afford to let it sit on the back burner.

So I am coming back after my unnofficial hiatus with the best news ever: Today, September 1, The Prayer Room Missions Base is extending our hours into the night! For 6 years, we’ve been 18/7 with live prayer and worship 5am-11pm every single day. We’re expanding that that to 1am every night, making us officially 20/7 and one step closer to our goal of being 24/7! We call this addition the “Night Watch”, and eventually, the whole overnight portion of our schedule will be the Night Watch.

This is incredible. We are so thrilled and grateful to the Lord that He has given us the strength to be able to give Him this offering. Tonight at 11pm, instead of praying a closing prayer and turning off the lights, a fresh worship leader (me!) will come on stage and we’ll keep going another two hours until 1am. And then we’ll do it again the next night, and the next, until we’re able to go longer and never turn off the lights at all.

Since our early days of starting as a one hour 5am daily prayer meeting in our director’s living room in 2005, we’ve known that The Prayer Room was called to a 24/7 house of prayer for our region. Over the years, we’ve added slowly, very careful that if we added a set to our schedule, it would be on every day of the week, and we would be able to sustain it. We don’t experiment with adding hours for a season; if something gets added to our schedule, it’s there till Jesus comes back.

We’ve been faithful to that model since day 1, but that means that every step is very slow and strategic. We’ve been 18/7 for 6 years, knowing that whenever we took our next step forward into the night, it would be a big deal.

The plan has always been to add one set at a time into the night: first 11pm-1am, then 1-3am, and finally 3-5am to make us 24/7. Our strategy to shore up these new sets would be to launch an internship at the same time, and fill that prayer room with young adults with passion for worship in the night. After the internship, some would stay on the night watch, and we could start another internship and go get more.

This is what we’re doing this semester. Today, in conjuction with launching our new Night Watch hours, we’re also launching our first-ever Fire in the Night internship! This is a part-time 14 week program for young adults centered around those night hours. Here’s the schedule:

Class 8-9pm Tues/Wed/Thurs
Class 3-7pm Sat (including an hour for dinner, food provided)
Encounter service 7-9pm Sat
Prayer room 9pm-1am Thurs/Fri/Sat (we chose weekend hours because these are mostly people with jobs!)

While they’re in the prayer room, they’ll be serving on three sets each, which will be a mix of worship leading, ushering, and prayer leading. For more info, including class content, see our website at tprdfw.com.

As of today, we’re launching with 5 interns! (I’m a little leery of putting that number out there, because it ALWAYS fluctuates the first few weeks–ask me at the end of the semester how many we ended with!) I’m so excited to see these hungry ones encounter Jesus in the night.

To get this internship off on the right foot, I put together a short playlist of songs from that specifically talk about the night watch. They’re all from the International House of Prayer in Kansas City, where they’ve been doing 24/7 live prayer and worship since 1999 – so they know a thing or two about worship in the night! The songs from the “Simple Devotion” album were actually all written and recorded by the night watch worship teams.

If you don’t see it below, here’s the direct Spotify link.

There is one other song that is deeply precious to the night watch in Kansas City (written by Chris Tofilon) but it was never released on an album so it’s not on Spotify. I pulled a live recording from youtube and edited it down to six minutes from an hour-long set. This one is called “Psalm 134 (Bless the Lord)” and the Psalm it’s based on is literally ALL about the night watch – the priests who stand and bless the Lord in the house of prayer through the night.

“Come, bless the LORD, all you servants of the LORD,
who stand by night in the house of the LORD!
Lift up your hands to the holy place
and bless the LORD!
May the LORD bless you from Zion,
he who made heaven and earth!”
(Psalm 134:1-3)

Attached below is the live recording of Psalm 134 (6 min) and also the longer worship time it came from (23 minutes). If you have time, listen to the longer one. It goes into a powerful spontaneous time of what I call throne room worship, centered on the holiness of God. You can also right click to download.

Psalm 134 (Bless the Lord)

Psalm 134 (Bless the Lord) & spontaneous

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What I’m Praying: Build His House

On January 30, 2019February 19, 2022 By CaitlynIn What I'm Praying2 Comments

Build His House

“Unless the LORD builds the house, those who build it labor in vain. Unless the LORD watches over the city, the watchman stays awake in vain.”
(Psalm 127:1)

Continuing my What I’m Praying series, recently I’ve had it on my heart to pray for God to build specific houses of prayer.

A few weeks ago, a friend from Kansas City who now serves at a house of prayer in another state reached out to me to ask a few questions about how to logistically strengthen their house of prayer and how to impart vision for it. As we’ve been talking, I’ve begun carrying a prayer for that ministry to be strengthened and be renewed in fresh vision, with supernatural grace to move forward stronger than ever.

Yesterday, I heard from my director, Brad Stroup at The Prayer Room, who was leading a house of prayer leadership gathering in Orlando, that he met the directors of that house of prayer – the very one my friend and I have been praying for – and that they were so encouraged by the gathering and felt strengthened with fresh fire and vision! It looks like Brad might even travel there on a consulting trip to offer his expertise in the administrative logistics of building the house.

When I heard all this in our team meeting, and then heard the name of the house of prayer and realized it was the one my friend was at, I freaked out and started crying.

GOD IS BUILDING THE HOUSE. In one weekend, He broke in, sent fresh wind, and loudly affirmed His commitment to see that house of prayer thrive and be a beacon of His glory in that region.

Ever since I launched Fragrance Arise a few weeks ago, I’ve been privileged to connect with houses of prayer and Burn 24/7 groups all over the world (mostly on Instagram — follow me if you’re not!). I’ve loved praying for these houses of prayer, keeping in mind Psalm 127:1 – “Unless the Lord builds the house…”

It has to be Him. This whole movement is supernatural from beginning to end. The fuel in our tanks is completely Holy Spirit. We need Him to break in and give us grace to keep going, divine ideas to grow, and supernatural provision to sustain us. And every moment, we need more of His presence to move among us.

If you’re part of a house of prayer or a praying community, please leave a prayer request for it in the comments, and take a moment to pray for the other ministries represented. Leave comments encouraging and praying for others. Let’s lift each other up and ask the Lord to build His house all over the earth.

God, build Your house of prayer all over the earth! Impart vision, provide resources, and give grace to keep going. Let Jesus have His inheritance in us.

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2017 Highlight Video

On January 24, 2018January 6, 2019 By CaitlynIn Ministry Life2 Comments

Happy 2018, friends! It’s been quite the busy holiday season… and when I got home from California and Kansas City, I was immediately hit with preparations for The Prayer Room’s School of Supernatural Ministry! Now that it has officially launched on January 20, I can catch my breath and catch up on some blog posts.

The first thing I want to share with you is my highlight video from 2017! When I went home for Christmas, I hosted an open house for some of my friends and partners, and I shared with them this video. I’m delighted to be able to finally share it with you!

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Keeping the Fire on the Altar in DFW

On November 25, 2014January 5, 2019 By CaitlynIn Ministry Life2 Comments

Over the weekend of November 7-9, I drove down to Arlington, TX (Dallas-Ft. Worth area) to visit a ministry called The Prayer Room (TPR). TPR is a small house of prayer compared to IHOPKC, but reportedly it’s the fourth largest in the US. They operate with mostly volunteer staff, though some are full-time missionary staff, and have live worship and prayer 18 hours a day (5 am – 11 pm) 7 days a week. Like IHOPKC, they have a vision for the prayer movement being strategic in God’s plan of global preparation for Jesus’ return.
I first encountered TPR in the spring when their director Brad Stroup and a few of their staff came to IHOPU to speak at our externship expo. I fell in love with their heart immediately. As Brad was sharing their vision, he passionately emphasised the fact that Jesus is worthy of night and day adoration, and shared the story of a word he received from God a number of years ago: “Start a daily prayer meeting tomorrow morning at 5:00 a.m. and don’t stop until I come back.” And thus daily 5:00 a.m. prayer meetings began, and hours have only ever increased since.

They came back in the fall for our next externship expo, and this time I was able to have a late meeting with them after Friday evening EGS service. We planned to go to a coffee shop, but it closed at nine so we met instead at a Burger King! We had a great talk getting to know each other over milkshakes and it seemed they connected with me as strongly as I connected with them.

TPR offers preview weekends to groups of IHOPU students who want to come down and experience their ministry for a few days. I went with eight other IHOPU students and they hosted us splendidly! The entire community was so gracious. They paid for most of our gas, put us up in host homes, fed us deliciously, took us hiking, and really expended effort to know us and to allow us to know them.

TPR externs and staff with visiting IHOPU students on a giant Texas-shaped Texas flag. (I'm fourth from the left.) — TPR externs and staff with visiting IHOPU students on a giant Texas-shaped Texas flag. (I’m fourth from the left.)

The Prayer Room — Saturday morning in the prayer room

Since I am used to the 2000+ community of IHOPKC, TPR felt small indeed. Most of their worship sets have just one person playing and singing, and often there are only a few people in the room. On Saturday morning, I was sitting in the room while one girl played and sang to Jesus on piano, and it was forcing me to ask whether I really believe in this enough to do it when I don’t have the full support structure of IHOPKC around me.

As I sat in the orange pews, I watched the small candle suspended over the altar in the front of the room. The flame was small, but it was steady and it was real. I felt God saying to me, “Yes, it’s small, but they’re doing it. They’re keeping the fire on the altar. (Leviticus 6:13) My heart is so moved by this.”

The answer is YES. I believe in this. I didn’t say yes to the prayer movement for IHOPKC; I said yes for Jesus. This is real, whether it’s in a huge globally broadcast 24/7 prayer room in Kansas City, or in a small rented sanctuary with just a faithful few in orange pews in Arlington, Texas.

I decided that weekend that this is where I’m going to spend my fall semester next year serving on my externship. I even told Brad that I’m hoping to be able to lead worship! (Gulp.) I felt so at home there, and I can’t imagine a better place to spend three months learning how to take ownership of a small house of prayer and even how to plant one in the future! God is doing big things in Texas, and I want to be part of the story God is telling there.

If you’re an IHOPU student interested in visiting The Prayer Room DFW for a preview weekend, please talk to me, or contact TPR directly via their website: theprayerroomdfw.com

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