Turning Us Back To God's Ways

Editor's Note: In the midst of a successful career at IBM, Jim Weidmann made what he jokingly calls a “big mistake”: He asked God to teach him what it really means to pray. Within months he had left his position with IBM in Denver and began commuting to Colorado Springs as the executive director of Heritage Builders, a Focus on the Family ministry. Today, he is the vice chairman of the National Day of Prayer Task Force. Charlotte World publisher was recently in Colorado Springs meeting with senior Focus on the Family staff, and he asked Weidmann to talk about what is different about this year's observance of this national event, and what he hopes will happen to America as a result of the National Day of Prayer.

Warren Smith: How did you get involved with the National Day of Prayer?

Jim Weidmann: In January of 1997, I said a simple prayer. I said, “Lord, teach me to pray.” I was working at IBM at the time, and my world was turned upside down as a result of that prayer. The next thing I knew I was taking a position with Shirley Dobson and calling this nation to prayer through this National Day of Prayer.

WS: The National Day of Prayer has been around for 50 years. Yet, Focus on the Family hasn't been around for 50 years. At some point you guys had to become involved in this event, and then step up to a leadership role in the event. How did that happen, and why did you consider this to be such an important activity?

JW: The National Day of Prayer Task Force, which I'm a part of and of which Shirley Dobson is the chairman, is a separate non-profit organization. Separate from Focus on the Family. We're housed here, obviously, because Shirley is married to the president of Focus on the Family! But we're separate.

How the organization came to be goes back to 1988. Vonette Bright, the wife of Campus Crusade founder Bill Bright, and a group from the National Prayer Committee, wanted to pin the National Day of Prayer to a day that would allow the country to come together and celebrate together and lift the country up in prayer together.

In 1952 the National Day of Prayer proclamation was signed by President Truman, but it wasn't really identified as an annual event until 1988, when President Reagan amended the original to pin the event to the first Thursday in May. So Vonette Bright led the event for several years, and in 1991 she asked Shirley Dobson to take this on as a ministry and chair the event. Our main objective is to help people understand that this day exists, and why it is important to the nation, and to call the nation to prayer.

WS: Why is it important to have a day and an organization to do that?

JW: It is important for several reasons. First of all, God commands us to pray for our nation. I Timothy 2 says, “I urge, first of all, that requests, prayers, intercessions, and thanksgiving be made for everyone, kings and all those in authority, that we may live peaceful and quiet lives, in all godliness and holiness. This is good and pleases God our savior who wants all men to be saved and come to the knowledge of the truth.” So we're instructed that we should pray for our nation.

But the other thing that becomes important is that the National Day of Prayer, because it is a day sanctioned by the government, provides the Christian community an opportunity to be a light within our communities. Our task force is the Christian expression of the National Day of Prayer. So what we see happening is communities coming together and hosting prayer events in city parks. Last year here in Colorado Springs they had one in which over 10,000 people attended. This year it will be even bigger. In Denver, it will be in a hangar at the former Lowry Air Force Base. So we're seeing citywide events and movements. When you have 10,000 people come together to pray, it cannot be hidden. Matthew says we should be a light on a hill that cannot be hidden. That's another important aspect of the National Day of Prayer.

Another thing we see happening is unity within the church. We're seeing churches working together in unity in prayer, for the common purpose of holding this country up before the Lord. We're seeing churches coming together, and pastors coming together. So the event is a real call to unity.

It also allows the church to highlight the importance, power, and pleasure within their congregations. So we see churches using this time to teach on prayer, to preach on prayer.

Finally, because it is a Christian expression, we see people coming to Christ. In one of the prayer observances last year, a man here in Colorado Springs was walking along near the site of one of the prayer events, and he asked someone going to the event, “What is this all about?” The participant said, “It's a prayer event. We're getting together to pray.” The man said, “Would you pray for me and my family?” So they prayed together on the street and developed a relationship, and eventually this man brought his family to church and the entire family came to know Christ. So it's a great outreach as well.

WS: That's a great story, and of course most or all Christians would affirm the power of prayer, but after 50 years of holding these events, we see a country that seems to be in continuing decline.

JW: Here's the way I look at it. I believe that when God moves, he burdens his people and he calls them to prayer, and then he moves through those prayers. One of the things I've had the honor of witnessing as the vice chairman of the National Day of Prayer is to see an incredible rise of the prayer movement in this country. In fact, I'm having conversations on the phone where we have conflicts in cities because people don't know which prayer observance to go to. What a nice problem to have!

So what we're seeing in recent years is God bringing his church together, burdening them for unity, he's burdening them for prayer, and we believe he's going to move through that prayer. In 1988 there was a handful of leaders. Now, in that same national leadership committee, there are over sixty national prayer ministries rising up.

Just the other day I heard of a ministry in which a guy has over 9,000 people committed to pray and fast for President Bush and his administration, every day. So they're taking turns to cover President Bush every day. I've never heard that before.

So I see God bringing his people together in unity before Him. That comes out of II Chronicles, which says, “If my people, who are called by my name, will humble themselves and pray and turn from their wicked ways, and seek my face, then will I hear from heaven, and I will forgive their sin and heal their land.” So what we see happening is God's people coming together, we see God's people becoming aware of the immorality that has existed on our watch, and we see people finally looking to God.

WS: Is there anything different about this year's National Day of Prayer?

JW: This year's theme is “One Nation Under God.” It comes, of course, from our Pledge of Allegiance. We based this year's event on Psalm 33:12. “Blessed is the nation whose Lord is God.” So one of the things we're trying to do is bring the nation together as one nation under God. So we asked Billy Graham to write a prayer for the nation. We're asking radio stations to play that prayer when Shirley reads it at the national observance. We're putting it in newspapers, on television – so everyone will have that prayer on the National Day of Prayer. A unifying prayer, one nation under God, before God.

The other thing that makes this National Day of Prayer different than the past several years is the fact that we have a new administration. One of the things we want to do is make sure people understand that we need to be lifting them up in prayer.

I like to remind people of the story of Moses when Joshua was fighting the battle. As long as Moses had his hands raised toward the Lord, Joshua was winning the battle. But as soon as his hands came down, they started to lose the battle. So Aaron and Ur came along side to hold up Moses' hands. I use that analogy to help people understand that God calls us to lift up our leaders before Him. This is really not about a day; it's about an ongoing discipline. The day is used to create the awareness that we need to be doing this on a regular basis.

WS: I know you have some major events going on in Washington, DC. Has your experience this year, since we do have a new administration, been different?

JW: The energy seems to be a lot higher. The excitement and the interest at the Cannon Office Building for the event there has almost been overwhelming. In fact, we're in the process of trying to figure out crowd control. The Cannon Office Building event will hold only 400 people. We expect we'll have standing room only all day long, with lines going down to the street. That's a normal year, and we're getting a lot more feedback than we have in the past.

WS: I know you're focusing on national events, but you have guys like Joe Wirtz, the North Carolina state coordinator, in every state. What do you consider to be a standard or hoped-for level of activity at the state and local level?

JW: We hope that there will be an event at the capitol, where leaders will be asked to come forward and share issues that can be lifted up in prayer. So we hope that there will be an event on every capitol step, or within the capitol, on that day.

The other thing we hope will happen is a citywide event in cities all across America. We think these events have real power. In fact, I have this great excerpt from The Denver Post, dated January 20, 1905, which talks about the city closing down so the citizens could come together for prayer. They just shut down, pausing for prayer. That is our hope for where this event is going.

WS: It's been said that early gatherings of our founding fathers were bathed in prayer. These men who modern historians tell us were agnostics, Deists, and Enlightenment thinkers in fact got on their knees for hours at a time as a group to pray for their efforts to bring this country together. Not just prayer, but teaching and prayer. How could we have departed so far from the tradition of men like John Witherspoon, a staunch, Bible-believing Presbyterian and signer of the Declaration of Independence?

JW: A lot of people now accept that the source of much of this discussion came from that one letter in which Jefferson talked about the separation of church and state. People do not understand that what he meant was that government should not establish a religion, but would rather provide for religious freedom. Government should not influence religion, but there's nothing in the constitution or in Jefferson's letter that says religion should not influence government.

If the government is indeed “off the people, by the people, and for the people,” then religion will be a major force in government one way or the other, because 84 percent of Americans claim to be Catholic or Protestant. If that's true, then the government should be a reflection of this belief.

WS: If you could look ten years into the future and describe what the National Day of Prayer, and the prayer movement, would look like, what would that be?

JW: In my mind, it would be that the National Day of Prayer would bring together Christians to pray for our country and its leaders. And in so doing, it points people to God. If we point people to God and to the truths he has given us in his word, then we take those truth and imbed them in our government.

I have four children, and I am raising my children in what I call a culture of deception. What's legal is not moral, and what's moral is sometimes not legal. The other day I read something that struck me: “When immorality masquerades as authority, sin escalates.” I would suggest to you that this is where we are today. So what I hope to see through the National Day of Prayer is a turn back to morality that is defined in the truths of God's word.