"Pray-Read" Prayer Priority for Thursday, June 30, 2005
THE WORD, help us to create a commercially successful inspirational book every year. Use Bill Bray to write perennials and Dr. Sam to co-author vision-casting books that define the mission for a new generation. Guide us in the selection of a co-author for the Tsunami victory book. AMEN

"Pray-Read" Prayer Priority for Wednesday, June 29, 2005
GOD OUR FOUNDATION, help us to be great foundation layers as we build up this ministry. May whatever we do or say be representative of the Lord Jesus and help us to always minister in harmony, love and peace. May we enable all those around us to be good stewards of your gifts and the grace that you have poured out upon them. Especially help Dr. Sam, Dr. Bill and all those in leadership to follow in Bishop M.A. Thomas' steps, always encouraging and releasing the best in others and giving you the glory as we keep the mission on message and target. AMEN.

"Pray-Read" Prayer Priority for Tuesday, June 28, 2005
LORD GOD THE RESTORER, help us to rebuild the lives of Tsunami orphans and all the Hopegiver staff on the field who are devoted to this work. Use us to help call out a student communications team to go on a Media Mission to India in December and guide in the selection of who should go. Help Tina and Barnabas as they help locate a co-author to work with Dr. Sam on his Tsunami survivors book and bless in the preparations for the August survey team that is going from Barnabas to plan the anniversary coverage. Make us instruments of your peace, AMEN.

"Pray-Read" Prayer Priority for Monday, June 27, 2005
BRIDEGROOM, thank you for inviting us all to become one as your spotless bride and help us to live and work together in harmony as we serve you in this world. Bless our long-time successful partnerships with many local churches, schools and missions including AIM, the Bible Society, Bible Pathways, Christian Aid, Gospel for Asia, Liberty University, North Greenville College, EPA, Missionary Network News and so many others too numerous to name. Help us to develop successful new partnerships with groups like Voice of the Martyrs which Dr. Sam and Dr. Bill are planning to meet with tonight and tomorrow. Inspire us to craft Memos of Understanding to guide our partnerships in your service. AMEN.

"Pray-Read" Prayer Priority for Saturday & Sunday, June 25-26, 2005
RESTORER and HE THAT FILLETH ALL IN ALL, shine through us to enlarge and renew our personal support teams and use us to call out media and communications students to join us in our Tsunami Anniversary Reporting Team in December. Shine Jesus shine! Where there is darkness, let us bring light. And as we shine for you, let us not seek to be loved but to love. AMEN

"Pray-Read" Prayer Priority for Friday, June 24, 2005
LORD GOD THE BUILDER, we thank you for the wonderful local churches and donors who are extending such a warm Georgia welcome to the Bray Family, the Thomas family, and the new Hopegivers who come here. We pray for ever-increasing favor. Lord, through your Holy Spirit create good will for Hopegivers among local donors and supporters. We especially ask that you help executive leadership to relate effectively to local church leaders, hourly employees, missionary staff, vendors and volunteers. May charity, understanding, and unity always rule. In Jesus' Name, AMEN.

"Pray-Read" Prayer Priority for Thursday, June 23, 2005
POTTER we are your clay. Inspire our creative people as they go into a month of intensive copy writing and design for the new Web Ministry, Hopegivers Journal, the Annual Report and a host of other communications efforts. By name we unite in prayer for Dr. Bill Bray, Mary Edwards, Tina Jacobson and the Barnabas Team, Brian Fujito, John Lindner, John Linder, Jr., Michael Schafer and the Silas Partners Team, Rick O'Neal and the LA Communications Team, and the staff at the Word for You Today. May all the creative people have wisdom and insight and power from your Holy Spirit to renew the face of the earth through compelling communications. In the Name of Jesus Christ our Lord we pray, AMEN.

"Pray-Read" Prayer Priority for Tuesday & Wednesday, June 21-22, 2005
REWARDER AND REFUGE FROM THE STORM, protect from harm and prosper every Emmanuel Seminary and Bible School graduate who is out in the harvest fields of India serving you this day. Give them favor, wisdom and fruit. May they become fragrant aromas of Christ and grant them to be real Light Bearers who glow with your presence. Help Dr. Sam, missionary Juanito Sanchez and all of us all to become more in love with your Word and to be living epistles read by all who come in contact with us. This we plead in the name of Jesus, AMEN.

"Pray-Read" Prayer Priority for Monday, June 20, 2005
DIADEM OF BEAUTY AND SAVIOR OF THE WORLD, give us all that knowledge and wisdom which you said is needed to build a house and furnish its rooms with all sorts of precious riches and valuables. We ask this for all our building projects here and abroad, including the development of our spiritual houses and missions. And we especially ask you to use our oldest son Billy Bray to manage the Charlottesville home and office profitably. Bless his stewardship and efforts. Protect him and give him the heart and mind needed to budget, earn, study, and work successfully. Especially help him to head up the household of room mates who have joined him and Jon Bray to share the costs of living while they finish college. AMEN

THIS is definitely my best Father's Day ever. The highlight this year was not gifts or cards or dining in a fine restaurant. My joy was in the grateful emails and calls from my children. They all are thanking me for loving and guiding them through the years - and I could sense their genuine respect and trust. I couldn't have asked for more if they had given me a million dollars.

It feels good. Very good. Especially because I often blame myself for not having been stricter on them growing up - or being able to do more for them. However, courageous guidance and provision are only parts of parenthood. The example we live before our children is still the most important way we pass along a heritage of good behavior - and that includes the love I show to my wife as their mother.

At any rate, they gave me a good list of times they remember when I was there for them. Ironically, most of them were things I did unconsciously at the time. That's the way it is in the real world of fatherhood.

"Pray-Read" Prayer Priority for Father's Day, June 19, 2005
AWESOME GOD AND FATHER, we ask you to make the husbands and fathers in our families like the man of God in Psalm 112, especially Dr. Samuel Thomas as he prepares to celebrate his wedding anniversary tomorrow in Maine with Shelley and his family. May Dr. Sam always fear only you and be blessed with mighty descendants on the earth. May every man and boy under his leadership share the same awe of You Lord, always blessing the poor and being blessed by the Almighty. AMEN and AMEN forever!

IVY and I are really empty nesters now. We're living like newlyweds, still without a fridge or washer/dryer ? sitting on the floors and waiting for God to provide key pieces of furniture! This is the first Father's Day weekend I can remember when I haven't celebrated with at least one or all of my children.

We're feeling much older.

So Ivy and I spent most of the Father's Day weekend hanging pictures and decorating our new house, unpacking books and having our weekly accountability session together. The bedroom and chapel were the first rooms that are ready to occupy so we spend most of our time there. The house is beginning to feel like a home for the first time.

A volunteer from the church came over today and helped us hang pictures for seven hours - meticulously measuring and centering each one. The result is amazing.

"The walls are speaking to us again" - now hung with familiar Bible texts, paintings and icons that are like old friends come back from the dead! Some of the art has been in boxes for months or even years. Just seeing them again evokes memories of past glories, triumphs and lessons learned the hard way.

"Pray-Read" Prayer Priority for Friday, June 17, 2005
UPHOLDER OF ALL THINGS, use Barnabas Ministries and Silas Partners to help us establish our new Web Outreach Ministry to reach millions around the world for years to come and to develop new bestselling books, good media relations and positive publicity support in the news for our leaders as they travel and represent the ministry. AMEN

"Pray-Read" Prayer Priority for Thursday, June 16, 2005
MY SHIELD, protect the hungry and unsponsored children of India that need to be admitted into our Hope Homes and Hope Centers by blessing our efforts to raise up 10,000 Hopegivers in the year ahead. We especially pray for Dr. Sam's interim appeals to provide food and total care for the children already in our orphanages. Lord supply the $10,000 a day needed to care for them. In particular we ask you to bless the production and delivery of Dr. Sam's July feeding appeal that will be arriving in the homes of our American donors around the July 4th Weekend -- and Brother Mike Randal's appeal to the pastors and mission committees. Lord, help us feed your children just as you feed the sparrows. AMEN and AMEN!

"Pray-Read" Prayer Priority for Wednesday, June 15, 2005
CHIEF SHEPHERD, we recognize that we are the sheep of your pasture and that you lead us to the places where we feed alongside the rest of your flock. Therefore, we are bold to ask you to arrange new and extended relationships for cooperation in missions between Christian Aid and Emmanuel Ministries throughout India and all of South Asia. Also, we pray for special grace to enable the communications team to miraculously complete and speed out the next newsletter before the July 4 holiday. AMEN

"Pray-Read" Prayer Priority for Tuesday, June 14, 2005
ALL IN ALL, we pray that you will help us to reach out to millions of hearts through Dan Reber and "Mail America" and to the European lands of Germany, France, Italy and the UK through Dr. Joseph Lam and his team. Lord, may the result of all these millions of appeals be an outpouring of love that will result in the rescue of one million abandoned children. AMEN and AMEN!

"Pray-Read" Prayer Priority for Monday, June 13, 2005
WORD OF LIFE, we thank you for all our donors both small and great but especially pray today for our major donors to continue to increase their support and for their numbers to multiply. We pray that you will lead us to men and women of success who now want to add greater significance to their lives by using their fortunes to rescue the next generation. At this time, we pray especially for the Brays that they will find matching partners to support the development programs of the Hopegivers mission which presently needs large capitalization for future growth. In Jesus Name we pray, AMEN.

"Pray-Read" Prayer Priority for Saturday & Sunday, June 11-12, 2005
HEAD OVER ALL THINGS and BISHOP OF SOULS, we pray for you to open new doors for us to find Hope Home indigenous leaders in Africa, China, India, Malawi, Middle East, Philippines, Sri Lanka and Thailand who will start new Hopegivers outreaches plus open doors for the next Hopegivers Asha "Sound of India" Children's Choir tour in the USA by providing a booking agent, choir master, chaperones, drivers, financial sponsors and logistical people. Lord in each situation above, you know which doors need to be opened and what key to use so we cry out to you for help. AMEN.

"Prayer Priority" Request for Friday, June 10, 2005
DIADEM OF BEAUTY we pray today for Brother Mike Randall and the entire church relations department that we might find favor with pastors and mission committees that now support us and that doors might be opened to get into new churches that will include our efforts as line items in their missions outreach budgets. May churches and pastors encourage their members to become Hopegivers. Give Brother Mike great faith and guide his steps as he follows your call on his life. AMEN

"Prayer Priority" Request for Thursday, June 9, 2005
LIGHT OF MEN grant each of us the grace to love our families and serve them as God-fearing fathers, mothers, uncles, aunts, sons and daughters. May we serve out our gender roles as husbands or wives demonstrating the relationship of Christ and His bride the true church. Especially give Bill and Ivy the extra finances and wisdom as they plan the annual July 4th weekend Bray Family Reunion in Williamsburg, Virginia. AMEN

WEDNESDAY must be another day of miracles. Our Lord said we should pray that He will give us this day our daily needs - and we need some unusually hefty items today.

Ivy and I are believing God for all kinds of items needed to furnish the new house. The most pressing ones are a tool box and tools, a fridge and storage freezer (with an ice-maker please, Lord!), a washer/dryer and a vacuum cleaner, plus window treatments and blinds. Besides those urgent needs, we less urgently need living room furniture, gardening tools and lawn mower, a hideaway bed in the guest room and an audio-visual center.

By the way, we are working on zero budget. I can't wait to see what the Lord does.

"Prayer Priority" Request for Wednesday, June 8, 2005
OUR HIDING PLACE, we pray that you will bless those who bless us! Open their eyes to see the blessings that you have given and will give them in the future for being a Hopegiver and joining the monthly support team. Especiaily bless those who give for the Bray's immediate needs in Georgia. Lord, you taught us to pray in order that we might receive our daily needs from you! Those daily needs include a fridge, a washer/dryer, and various items to complete the furnishing of the new Georgia quarters -- and $10,000 a day to feed our orphans in India. We pray you to raise up faithful supporters for all those missionary staff who need additional support today both in India and in the USA offices. AMEN

TUESDAY was amazing to me. We finally dragged into Columbus after midnight, but not before hearing by cell phone that the big, strong folks we expected to help us move couldn't be there in the morning! I hid my disappointment and put on my brave, "man of faith" face, but during the night I tossed and turned in prayer and sinful worry.

I was especially afraid about the big office credenza and desk that I knew would take at least 2-3 strong men to handle. I prayed half-heartedly, "Lord, tomorrow, bring us someone to lift that thing." Meanwhile, I fretted on! It had taken us 1-1/2 days to pack the van in Charlottesville. I started to fear the worst. How could we ever do it alone!

I tossed and turned in my fitful sleep. I didn't know what to expect when I got to the office in the morning. However, soon after I got there, two teenagers, two children, and one housewife showed up to help us! The boys looked plenty strong and smart. So we got right to work. After forming a big prayer circle we rushed to the unloading. Things went well. Just as we got to that big credenza-and couldn't move it through the window-a strong, powerfully-built black man walked up and welcomed us to the neighborhood.

He was there to sell security systems (which we declined) but as he was leaving he hesitated a bit. Just then the Holy Spirit had me look at him and at that big credenza in one unified glance. I get the picture Lord!

"Hallelujah!" I shouted to him, "Can you help us move something? You're an answer to prayer. Praise the Lord."

He looked at me as if I was crazy but replied with the single work "sure" as I indicated the end of that 500-pound piece of furniture. Then, with one big bear hug he lifted his end. It took four of us to lift the other. In 30 seconds, we shoved it right through the window. In another two minutes it was in place where I hope it stays for many years to come! (Please Lord, let us finish up our ministry here in Columbus but always; Your will be done, Your Kingdom come. Amen!)

"Prayer Priority" Request for Tuesday, June 7, 2005
LORD OF ALL, create strong impact and powerful communications from our whole team in broadcasting, print media and on the web -- and particularly today for Dr. Sam as he is interviewed on the Terri Lowry Show in Houston. As he articulates the apostolic vision of Hopegivers, may we magnify it through every forum available. Meanwhile we pray for the Bray Family and the local volunteers today as they help move them into their new quarters in Georgia. We give you all the glory Lord because our hope is in you. AMEN

"Prayer Priority" Request for Monday, June 6, 2005
PRINCE OF LIFE, protect Bill and Ivy as they travel with a loaded moving van from Charlottesville to Columbus to establish their new quarters and ministry base. Lord, answer all of our united prayers with Dr. Sam for new churches to fellowship and support us in the USA. May our work last into eternity and therefore give us wisdom to invest in the things that really matter. AMEN.

SUNDAY I wake bone-tired and barely able to move, sleeping on the floor where our bed used to be in our former Charlottesville home! Renting and loading the truck is hard work, even with three young men helping us. We have a few more hours of loading today and then we are on our way to Columbus. Though we are not rich in this world's goods, I am surprised at how much we have -- and how much cost, time and energy is involved in just living! Jesus said that unless we forsake all, we cannot follow him. Moving sure makes me wish I had obeyed Him more literally in this regard! One way or the other, we will eventually have to give up everything we acquire in this world. I hope I can spend more time in the future days doing spiritual things that will last into eternity -- and find ways to spend less energy on the things of this life! So the pain I'm feeling today is not just aching muscles, but nostalgia mixed with an aching heart for the energy spent building up the home and offices for the ministry base here in Charlottesville, Virginia. Taking it apart today and trashing what is no longer relevant is a kind of judgment day preview. And it makes me look ahead to that day when all our works and writings will be judged by God. Now, as I must reinvest again in building the new base in Columbus, Georgia, I pray that I will be wiser in the days ahead. Lord, help me to build for eternity!

FRIDAY during lift off from the Columbus airfield, it suddenly all made sense. Ivy said she felt the same way when she left yesterday. A weight seemed to lift off my shoulders. I instantly understood what this nameless malaise was - what the heaviness and struggle was all about. We are indeed under demonic attack in Columbus.

I was sure. Once I was airborne, I felt free of the oppression. Why? Because the demons didn't fly with me! They stayed on their assignment, harassing the team in Columbus. The weight was gone and I almost instantly returned to my normal levels of spiritual victory and joy.

Obviously, Satan knows now that Hopegivers is about to experience another leap forward and he is furious. We are attacking the gates of hell and he knows that his fortifications cannot stand against us. Victory is coming. God is answering prayer.

This kind of spiritual counter-attack from the demon world always happens when Christ's body goes on the offensive in prayer. This sometimes results in great emotional and physical danger, pain and suffering. It is like labor pains before birth. It is violent and stressful, but it passes usually without much permanent damage.

But I don't want to underestimate the danger. It is in times like this that the Christian cannot and must not let discouragement, ingratitude or self-pity find a place in his or her heart. Instead, we must flee to the Lord in fasting, prayer, praise, thanksgiving and worship. We must continue to praise Him seven times a day.

In short, we must put on the whole Ephesians 6 armor of God; we must fight.

This is not a time to escape into depression, fantasy or our all-too-comfortable favorite addictions or secret sins. We must remain holy. Even "harmless entertainment" and reasonable amounts of normal "comfort foods" or chaste sexual activity might be out of bounds. I am not an ascetic or advocating ascetism. However, in wartime one must not live life as normal.

And of course, in times like these, we must be extra gentle and considerate of others - careful not to transfer our anguish or pain to others through anger, emotional tantrums, irritability or panic and worry.

"Prayer Priority" Request for June 3-5, 2005
CROWN OF GLORY be with the Bray Family, volunteers, and movers who are joining them in Charlottesville, Virginia this weekend to pack up their household goods and truck them down to their new home in Columbus, Georgia. LORD OF HOSTS, we also pray with Dr. Sam for a strong, loving team spirit to grow between the staff in Georgia and that God will use the whole staff to help Hopegivers become a household name that donors trust with child rescue and missions in general. AMEN

THURSDAY things are picking up a bit. I drive Ivy to the bus station at 3:30 a.m. to catch ground transportation to the Atlanta airport. From there, she flies "home" to our Charlottesville house to pack up the furniture for our move. On Wednesday night, we meet with Roy Tidwell from Grace Communications to get his expert counsel on important changes needed in our donor data base code. Ivy can't stay for his consultation with the rest of the staff and she is very disappointed.

Roy is here because before we can do more mass mailings and network to raise up 10,000 Hopegivers for the orphans this year, we have to have the capacity to handle them! Both Ivy's Donor Services Team and the computer files need a major makeover.

After a working breakfast with Roy, we meet with Kelly and Brandy to go over the existing code from 10 to 12 noon. Then we have a working lunch with Janie and Joi from the Fund E-Z to map out the kinds of reports and changes we will have to make to add cost accounting to the efforts. We can't improve what we can't measure. Nor can we be good stewards if we are not able to gauge the costs and results. We pause frequently throughout the day, working around interruptions and communications challenges. Why is progress so hard?

From 2 to 3 p.m. we visit the proposed Donor Services Suite and sketch out the floor plans for the new offices, work stations and mailroom. Roy and Kelly keep working while I rush off at three to a dental appointment. (It is my third visit to finish up a broken tooth and crown costing $1200 - enough to feed 40 orphans for a month in India.)

Thank God that the mail went out by 5 p.m. and my June "Call to Prayer" was soon in the mailstream loaded with the same requests that Dr. Sam is fasting about; the same requests which he issued in the June Hope Alert e-blast on Tuesday last.

At 5:30 p.m. I begin an hour and a half conference call with Silas Partners to review plans for our new Web Ministry. Again, lots of positive results and it looks like we will have a "temporary fix" and be able to take online donations early this month! This is something Hopegivers has wanted for several years.

Despite the victories, I feel like a wet dish rag. No dinner as I am joining Dr. Sam in his fast tonight. Breaking for an hour of exercise instead of dinner at 9 PM, I plod on working "half-step" and fighting off demons, discouragement and baseless attacks of discouragement. Not sure what all I am getting done but I answered a lot of emails! Finally, exhausted and tense, I knock off at 11:30 PM and sleep fitfully. At 4:30 I roll out and by 5 AM I check into the Columbus Airport for my commuter flight to Atlanta and onto Charlottesville. Today, I must get ready for the moving truck on Saturday.

"Prayer Priority" Request for Thursday, June 2, 2005
MY FORTRESS, give wisdom and empower Ivy Bray, all the Columbus staff, and the computer software consultants to make the changes recommended by Roy Tidwell of Grace Communications today. Guide in the hiring and training of new Donor Service Center staff and the implementation of the protocols needed to care for 10,000 new Hopegiver sponsors in the next year. AMEN.

WEDNESDAY the rain just won't stop. Since Memorial Day, the soaking storms continue as I sense a dark spiritual power hovering over the Columbus staff and office. We are all still slogging ahead but it takes real effort to rejoice.

Like the constant sheets of wind and rain that sweep across the clearing outside my window, this dark spiritual force cuts through the woods and soaks everything. It is a heaviness hanging over our work for the orphans.

Dr. Sam has begun a 40-day fast to pray for spiritual breakthroughs and I vaguely sense that somehow this is some kind of evil force striking back against the whole ministry in malicious anger.

For the first time since I started work on the Hopegivers abandoned child rescue campaign last January 15, I feel the relentless pressure of daily deadlines and meetings is wearing me down.

I am so tired - we're all so tired - even though we shouldn't be. In fact, we just had a weekend off! Yet for the first time since the Good Shepherd led us here, I am starting to feel under the pile instead of on top. And I'm not alone. All the staff are grimly working, hunched "heads down" at their computers - overwhelmed at the endless emails. The "to do" lists never seem to get done.

I find myself resenting the interruptions from the very people I am here to serve. I know this is wrong but I seem unable to control these feelings. The clutter on my desk is out of control. A growing forest of yellow sticky notes is spreading across the frame around my computer screen, clinging to me like leeches.

Is it my imagination or at times is it really hard to breathe in here?

"Prayer Priority" Request for Wednesday, June 1, 2005
LORD JESUS CHRIST, we join Dr. Sam today in praying for a flood of new funds for the Hopegivers mission and for the Bray Family as they move to Georgia this weekend. Especially use the June newsletters to raise up new Hopegivers to support both the orphans and the staff that cares for them. AMEN