ALPHARETTA, Ga. (BP)–This year’s Sept. 15 See You at the Pole observance on secondary school campuses will be accompanied by another prayer event the night before. But this time it is the adults who will be doing the praying.
At 7 p.m. Sept. 14, parents and other concerned adults are being urged to gather at public school campuses across the country for Campus Prayer Journeys, an organized prayer effort directed toward students, teachers and administrators.
“Combined with See You at the Pole, this effort will get the entire church praying that God will make a difference in the campuses of our land. And that’s important,” said Robert E. “Bob” Reccord, president of the North American Mission Board, in a promotional video for the effort.
Campus Prayer Journey began as a project of the Arkansas Baptist State Convention in response to the rise of school violence, drawing more than 10,000 parents to campuses across the state. This year it is being promoted nationally through the North American Mission Board.
“For us in student evangelism, it directs the attention and focus of parents, grandparents and other adults toward the campus and praying for the salvation of lost students,” said Chad Childress, student evangelism associate for the NAMB.
During the event, organized through local churches with coordinators assigned for each school, participants will walk, ride or drive seven times around the school, the campus or possibly the school track. Each lap will be focused on a different need as participants work through a prayer guide developed for the event.
Mike Huckabee, the governor of Arkansas who has been instrumental in promoting the concept since its inception, noted in the promotional video the many problems plaguing public schools. But he also said the only lasting solution is spiritual.
“No government, no matter how efficient and well-intentioned it may be, can change the hearts of its citizens simply by passing more laws,” Huckabee said. “This is a job for the church. If the church today seems to be powerless in combating the sin and darkness of our culture, I believe this is because we fail to comprehend the necessity and power of prayer by God’s people for our nation.”
See You at the Pole, in which students gather around school flagpoles before school for prayer, began in 1990 as an emphasis of the Baptist General Convention of Texas and has since become an interdenominational movement. It is held annually on the third Wednesday of September.
