Colorado Ministry Mobilizes Prayer ‘Watchmen’

A Colorado ministry is mobilizing “watchmen” to pray 24/7 for the completion of the Great Commission through a state-of-the-art prayer center that is being dedicated this weekend.

As part of its effort to reach the world’s least evangelized regions with the gospel, Every Home for Christ (EHC) is unveiling its Watchman Training Center, an 8,000-square-foot facility housed at the ministry’s headquarters in Colorado Springs.

(Photo: Dick Eastman standing beside the Wall of Prayer. Image by Erick Todd.)

International House of Prayer (IHOP) founder Mike Bickle is keynote speaker at the dedication service Saturday. An event marking the international Day of Prayer for the Peace of Jerusalem will be held at the facility Sunday.

EHC President Dick Eastman said the center was inspired by Isaiah 62, in which the prophet describes “watchmen” who continually stand guard and pray over Jerusalem.

“Our goal is to help encourage and mobilize believers around the world—in every time zone, nation and even provinces within nations—to sustain continuous prayer in their areas,” said Eastman, who has written several books on intercession, worship and missions.

Completed in June, the $2.3 million facility includes a two-story Wall of Prayer that is patterned after the Wailing Wall in Jerusalem and comprises 50 tons of Jerusalem stone. Eastman said people are putting prayers into the Wall of Prayer, which are collected every few months and sent to contacts in Israel, who place them into the Wailing Wall.

The facility also houses a 450-seat auditorium and 13 prayer rooms, called “grottos,” outfitted with touch-screen computers that allow users to bring up worship music or Bible teaching. The touch screens soon will include a database offering demographic information and prayer points for each nation.

There will also be live streams of worship from IHOP. Two adjacent rooms, dubbed the Harp and Bowl rooms, will facilitate ongoing intercessory worship.

Eastman said the training center, particularly the Wall of Prayer, symbolizes the ministry’s new outreach to develop walls of prayer in every nation. He said a “wall” is established when Christians in an area organize continuous intercession for all 168 hours of a week. EHC currently has 50 walls established in China, with more emerging in other parts of the world, he said.

Eastman, whose ministry helped found the Praying Through the Window movement in the 1990s to mobilize intercession for the 10/40 Window, believes prayer is critical to bringing in an end-time harvest.

“The more we raise up prayer the greater the harvest,” he said. “This is why we really want to see these walls of prayer in every nation and every province. All you have to do is have a way of infrastructure and vision.”

Founded in 1946, EHC distributes gospel booklets door-to-door in more than 200 nations. Eastman said the ministry has seen a significant rise in responses to its evangelism efforts since the emergence of 24/7 prayer ministries in the last several years.

In 2000, Eastman said EHC distributed roughly 536,000 Bible courses to follow up with people who reported decisions for Christ. Last year, he said the ministry distributed more than 10 million courses.

The number of “Christ groups,” or Bible study fellowships, also increased. In 2007, Eastman said EHC planted 3,920 new Christ groups. In 2008, the number rose to more than 8,100. Within the first six months of 2009, more than 8,200 groups had formed.

“As this prayer increases dramatically, we’re starting to see these results increase,” Eastman said. “It’s absolutely hand-in-hand. … Since we’ve seen all this prayer beginning to rise up, it’s been astounding to see the harvest rise up.”