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Evangelistic Prayer Walking
- Mark Pulliam
- Apr 14
- 6 min read
How can we have spiritual conversations with people who are disconnected from Jesus and the church?
One of the best methods we’ve discovered is evangelistic prayer walking.
Spiritual conversations can be difficult to begin, even with people who are already Christians. However, for those who seek to participate in Jesus’ mission of making disciples, these conversations are important and necessary. So how do we begin a spiritual conversation with someone who has never been to church, or hasn’t attended in a long time? I believe that the answer is prayer.
Prayer is powerful because it connects us to the God who makes things happen. And through prayer, God will either change our circumstances or change us. Further, I believe that prayer is one of the most under-utilized yet most effective methods for engaging disconnected people in spiritual conversations. At Lazarus Lutheran Church, we practice evangelistic prayer walking.
Before I describe an evangelistic prayer walk, it’s helpful to understand why we use this method. Lazarus Church is in an area where there is a high presence of Mormons and Jehovah’s Witnesses. Consequently, the people in our community are already wary of door-to-door visitors. Attempts at door-to-door evangelism are typically met with resistance. So since 2018, we have used an alternative that the Apostle Paul used in Athens - “So he reasoned in the synagogue with the Jews and the devout persons, and in the marketplace every day with those who happened to be there.” [Acts 17:17 ESV, emphasis mine]
Preparation is important. In the early days of starting Lazarus Church, I divided our mission focus area into four segments on the map with approximately the same number of businesses in each section. By devoting one morning a week, I could visit every business within a three mile radius of the center of our mission focus area for the purpose of connecting with people in our community. Since that time, our area has grown significantly, and today there are longer periods of time between my visits to each business.
In addition to location, timing and a method for keeping organized were also taken into consideration. Because I wanted the opportunity to connect more deeply with people, I usually would visit during non-peak business hours, such as within the first several hours of opening on a weekday early in the week. I also kept an online journal of my conversations in a mobile-access spreadsheet so I would be able to continue to pray for the prayer requests that people mentioned. Additionally, this record keeping helped me to remember with whom I spoke and ask follow up questions about previous prayer requests.
What does evangelistic prayer walking actually look like, then? The method I have used is simple and reproducible. When I walk into a store, I engage with the person who greets me. Most businesses in our area train their employees to acknowledge visitors, so this is a natural beginning to the conversation. Additionally, when Jesus sent out his disciples in Luke 10, he encouraged them to greet people with a greeting of peace, and engage more fully if that peace was received. This model is worthy of contextual emulation.
As soon as the conversation starts, I want to keep the main thing the main thing. So rather than pretending to be interested in the businesses’ goods and services, I usually patiently wait for my turn to speak to the person who greeted me. When I have the chance to talk, I’ll introduce myself and explain why I am visiting. I’ll explain that I’m actually a local pastor of Lazarus Church in the neighborhood and that I’m doing a prayer walk in the community today. I wanted to drop in and ask them two questions:
1) How is business going?
2) Is there anything I could be praying about for them today?
I’ve used this method over 1000 times, and the vast majority of the time it is received well. On a rare occasion someone has been offended by my offer of prayer, but this represents >0.5% of the times I’ve offered to pray for someone. That means that this method has been successful in engaging people in conversation >99.5% of the time.
If the business does not have additional customers present, after prayer requests have been shared, I will ask if I can pray with the person I am speaking with right now. The vast majority of people I’ve engaged are willing to receive prayer, with the exception of businesses that have policies against overt religious expression.
When I have the opportunity to pray, I will certainly include the person’s prayer requests. However, this is also a key moment for evangelism. The person with whom I am speaking has already conveyed a willingness to converse and share prayer requests. They have also expressed a willingness to receive prayer, so they are poised to receive the Gospel. I will typically express the Gospel through my prayer, by including expressions of adoration that declare the name of Jesus, express His identity as the Son of God, convey gratitude for His work of salvation by the forgiveness of sins, confess our need for His forgiveness and intervention, and finally incorporate the prayer request that was mentioned.
After engaging in conversation and - if the opportunity presents itself - prayer, I will thank the person I’ve been talking with for their time, and often leave my business card for them to keep or pass along to someone they think could use prayer. If someone is prayer-walking with me, we will walk a brief distance away and pray for the prayer requests that were mentioned and ask that God would use our visit to draw people closer to Himself. I will also make notes in my spreadsheet of the business name, the name of the person with whom I talked, and any prayer requests that were mentioned, so that when I return later I can ask follow up questions (example below).
Date: | Business: | Person: | Prayer Requests: |
|---|---|---|---|
Jan 17 | Smoothie King | Ryan | For the success of the business, and for Jason’s sobriety |
In the early days of starting Lazarus Church, if an interaction was going particularly well and people were open to prayer and further conversation, I would ask them if they had time for me to ask them a few questions about the community. I gleaned some incredibly helpful insights from these informal interviews that helped shape the kind of church that Lazarus Church has become. I’ve modified these questions from the ones I originally received from Pastor Kyle Blake.
Community Interview Questions |
|---|
1. What do you love about this area? |
2. What do the people who live and work in this area need? How might a church in the area help with those needs? |
3. If you were starting a church here in the area, what would it look like and/or do in this community? |
4. What is something that you really wish someone like me would ask you, and how would you answer? |
5. Who would you recommend I meet next? |
Finally, there is one last important reason to consider evangelistic prayer walking in your area. In the Parable of the Sower from Mark 4, Jesus tells His disciples what the seed is: “The sower sows the word.” (Mk 4:14) One of the ways the Word of God is being sown in our community is through evangelistic prayer walking. God is glorified when I can return to a person I had prayed with previously, and we celebrate an answer to prayer. A small handful of people have even engaged more deeply by visiting Lazarus, or by responding to opportunities for participating in a devotion, and one person has begun a discipleship relationship with me as he seeks spiritual guidance for living out his Christian faith at his business. The primary benefit I have experienced, though, is the Lord turning my heart to the needs of the community.
Anyone who has spent time in ministry knows that the demands of ministry will always outweigh the draw of engaging disconnected people in the community.
However, through evangelistic prayer walking, God continues to pull my time and attention toward seeing the Great Commission become lived out in our community. In prayer, God changes our circumstance or changes us, and I trust that the seeds of the Gospel that are sown here will lead to disconnected people becoming connected to Christ and His Church.
So, what's your next step?
If you’re in the Houston area, let’s schedule a time to prayer-walk with me!
Evangelistic prayer walking is also a major piece of our church planting immersion. Find out more below.
Resources:
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