Last week, IFA staff and intercessors who were part of our Capital Prayer Encounter were blessed to hear Andrew and Norine Brunson share the story of his imprisonment and release at two National Day of Prayer events in Washington, DC. (Tracey DeBlank, Judy McDonough, and Kris Kubal are pictured with Pastor Brunson.)

Although Pastor Brunson anticipated praising God and experiencing spiritual highs during his two-year imprisonment, the reality was very different. He shared that he struggled throughout the time he was imprisoned. He said that he would work to accept his situation and something worse would happen, over and over.

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He emphasized his dependence on our prayers. Norine was permitted to visit him once each week. They would speak on a phone with a thick glass separating them. The first question he asked her, week after week, was “Are people still praying for me?” He said that he knew that people tend to move on to the next crisis and he worried about when Christians would move on to pray for someone else. He was visibly overcome when most of the crowd of several hundred raised their hands when asked, “Have you prayed for Andrew?”

It is so important to pray for the persecuted church! Pray in agreement with the millions who took part in the National Observance of the National Day of Prayer:

“Father, in the silence, in many prisons in dark and damp places, there are those in the quietness of their soul crying out to you tonight. Lord, may we become their voices. May we stand with them in solidarity and love. May we see our brothers and sisters. Though we may not be able to touch them, may we be touched by them. Father, we thank you that you hear our prayers, and Lord, even tonight we rejoice that when we pray in agreement — and we reach heaven with our voices — that Lord you… always hear. Often you’ll give us the request we want, like Andrew being returned home. But Father, I pray that none — none — would believe or feel or think they are forgotten. May we never, ever forget our brothers and sisters.”

“And Father, where we cannot reach and where we cannot see, I pray the Holy Spirit would go and stir within them, as Paul said, ‘But we have this treasure in earthen vessels — that the excellence of the power may be of God and not of us. We are hard pressed on every side, yet not crushed; we are perplexed, but not in despair; persecuted, but not forsaken; struck down, but not destroyed — always carrying out in the body the dying of the Lord Jesus. That the life of Jesus also may be manifested in our body. Father, tonight, may the persecuted — in places near and far away — know that they are not forsaken, nor forgotten. Burden our hearts that we would continually lift them up before you and equip our hands to courageously help them. In Jesus’s name, Amen.” (Prayer offered by Tony Perkins, Family Research Council.)

For continued intercession, Pastor Brunson asked us to pray that God would direct him and Norine about what’s next for them. Please pray for guidance and direction for the Brunsons.