Love Came Down Under: Australia’s Prayer Movement for Justice
I had a long trip ahead of me as I traveled all the way home to Melbourne, Australia from D.C. after the 10-year celebration of Justice House of Prayer D.C. and Bound4LIFE. My spirit was excited with the possibility of nations coming alive, awakening to the high calling of prayer. I wondered, “Could I see it happen in my nation, in my day, in my time?”
As my heart searched and hoped, I opened an email which—to my amazement—confirmed what was stirring in my heart. The email explained that when Australia’s new Parliament House was opened in 1988, 50,000 Christians responded with a national gathering to surround it in prayer. I was filled with a fresh fire of faith!
For most of my adult years I have been praying with others and in secret for God to woo my nation—to draw us to Himself. I’ve been praying for waves of prayer and governmental intercession to emerge from the bride of Christ in Australia. I’ve been crying out that Jesus’ bride would love what He loves and join Him in protecting the voiceless and vulnerable.
Could it be that my prayers were an extension of the very same prayers of more than 50,000 others who had gone before me? I had to know more about this national gathering. The Australian Christian History Research Institute describes the event.
“Back in May 1988, as part of Australia’s Bicentennial Celebrations, a new Parliament House was to be opened in Canberra. A leak from Canberra suggested that there would be no prayers said at the opening ceremony. This prompted the largest prayer meeting in our country’s history.
Christians came from the furthest reaches of Australia, by any means they could, until 50,000 had gathered. They carried the written prayers of another 65,000 Australians who couldn’t be there themselves.
They came because they felt that the opening of the new Parliament House was the beginning of a new phase in Australia’s history, one that should not begin without prayer. They represented all states, all denominations, all ethnic backgrounds standing together and praying as one church with a common love for Jesus, together doing the one thing that unites all Christians: praying.
Those 50,000 Christians marched around the new Parliament House until they formed a complete circle 3.5 km around, 20 deep in places. They joined hands and prayed as one voice. The celebration continued into the night, under a sparkling Southern Cross, with singing, speakers and much more prayer—in fact, 20 hours of constant prayer.”
At the time of this national response to gather in prayer, I may have only been 6 years old—but this event, the largest gathering of praying Christians in Australian history, happened in my time! I am standing on the prayers of the 50,000 who gathered and another 65,000 who wrote out their prayers unto the Lord.
I didn’t grow up knowing Jesus, and I sometimes think about the day I will celebrate and honor the people who prayed for me to encounter His deep and jealous love—the love which brought me into an abundant life. I can’t help but wonder at the kindness of God who delighted to answer the united prayers of many who have gone before me. I can’t help but wonder how many other lives God has raised up from the ashes and into His beauty all because someone prayed.
As I entered adulthood I would never have thought I’d delight in pleading the blood of Jesus and crying out that my people would be set free. I never thought the courts of heaven would be my home. I certainly never thought my heart would be arrested with dreams for the ending of abortion and revival in my nation—but here I am.
We have a Father who cannot resist our cries, a Father who is ravished by a glimpse from our eyes and whose ears are set towards us. More and more as I pray for those I love, the testimony of His goodness in and through my life has brought me to this place of understanding and trusting who He is. I can never look upon the ashes of someone else’s life and count them out, because God makes beauty from ashes—He loves setting captives free! He did it for me, and He loves answering my prayers for the person next to, in front of, and behind me.
Why am I praying? Because prayer is effective! It strips back the junk that has hidden our true DNA and suffocates who we were created to be as we were carefully knitted together in the womb. I pray for others because I know that, like me, they might just find they are so much more than they thought they were!
Whether I am praying a quick prayer at home in the midst of doing dishes, in the car, on the way to work, or standing at the steps of Parliament House wearing LIFE tape. I celebrate that strongholds and ideologies are shaken, that people meet Jesus when I pray in Silent Siege.
My heart leaps with a fresh passion and awareness that God is raising up prayer furnaces around the globe. He is gathering those who burn for His voice, those who will pray in the day and in the night. Oh how He loves prayer, even when you can sometimes barely whisper it.Every prayer matters! The supremacy of this man Jesus who hears us and makes intercession for us has caused powers and principalities to fall!
No longer do I say, “What if God united His sons and daughters in my nation to petition, pray, intercede and give thanksgiving for all people—for kings and all those in authority, to believe for righteous leadership and seek revival in my day and in my time?” Now I say, “He has and He will continue!”
“For from the rising of the sun to its setting, My name will be great among the nations, and in every place incense will be offered to My name, and a pure offering. For My name will be great among the nations, says the Lord of Hosts”
(Mal. 1:11)
While I was in D.C., I read a quote by Arthur Wallis on one of the JHOP handouts. “If you would do the best with your life, find out what God is doing in your generation and throw yourself wholly into it.”
