What is a "Concert of Prayer"?

What Is A "Concert of Prayer?" by Darren Huckey

The term "Concerts of Prayer" comes from the early 1700s, and has been used in subsequent generations to describe major prayer movements preceding new global advances of Christ's Kingdom. In The Eager Feet, Dr. J. Edwin Orr writes: "The Concert of Prayer for revival in the 1780s in Great Britain and in the 1790s in the United States, and the renewed Concert of Prayer in both countries…was clearly demonstrated to be the prime factor in motivating and equipping Christians for service in a world-wide movement which totally eclipsed the military might of the nations at the battle of Waterloo. As in the first half of the century (the early 1800s), practically every missionary vision (from 1858 onward) was launched by men revived in the awakenings in the sending churches."

Here's one example. A praying businessman, Jeremiah Lamphier started a noontime prayer meeting in 1857 in the Dutch Reformed Church consistory in Manhatten, New York. In response to his advertisement, only six people out of a population of one million showed up. But they weren't discouraged. The next week there were fourteen and then twenty-three. In a few months there were concerts of prayer in scores of U.S. cities. This was the beginning of a God-given prayer movement that became the sustaining foundation for the Great Awakening of the mid-1800's, reviving the Church and resulting in a worldwide missionary advance lasting over 100 years.

Today, God has convinced many that the body of Christ worldwide is on the verge of a wonderful new work of God that will transform their cities, as well as bring the Gospel to some of earth's unreached peoples. Thus, they can do nothing else but pray and call others to join them!
Historically speaking, the primary focus of Concerts has been on two major agendas: Christians prayed for Christ's fullness to be revealed in His Church to empower them to accomplish the task that was before them. They also prayed for the fulfillment of His saving purposes among the nations through an awakened, consecrated Church. The same two-fold agenda prevails today.

And so "Concerts of Prayer" helps describe Christians united on a regular basis to seek fullness and fulfillment. Extraordinary united prayer is not determined so much by how long one prays or how often but rather that Christians do pray, that they pray for those things most on God's heart, and that they do so together - "in concert." MORE

Need more motivation for corporate prayer? Check out this video from session one of Jim Cymbala's When God's People Pray.