Nashville Residents Accuse Area Churches of Violating...
Mar 25, 2019 11:10:54 GMT -5
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Post by Daniel on Mar 25, 2019 11:10:54 GMT -5
Nashville Residents Accuse Area Churches of Violating Their Privacy by Praying for Them
By John Ellis March 21, 2019
Led by Ethos Church, a group of Nashville churches spent 30 days praying for their city. That's not unusual, because many churches around the world pray for their cities. What sets the group in Nashville apart is that they took it a step further and decided to pray for every single resident of the city. In fact, the participants of Awaken Nashville were encouraged to send postcards letting people know they prayed for them. Some Nashvillians, however, took umbrage at the prayer and postcards, deeming the whole enterprise intrusive and a violation of their privacy.
Speaking to Religion News Service, Ethos Church's pastor Dave Clayton said, "I love this city, and it’s a great time to be here, but we just had this conviction that despite all the good things that were going on, there’s still a lot of pain. We started wrestling with how we could love and care for the city. I think there are a lot of answers to that, but for us the starting place was prayer."
From there, it didn't take long for Clayton and the members of Ethos Church to arrive at the idea of praying for every single resident. A daunting task, but encouraged by their belief in the power of prayer Awaken Nashville was born. Over 350 churches embraced the idea and committed to spending a month fasting and praying for Nashville's residents by name. It was the encouragement to send postcards to the people they prayed for that sparked the ire of some Nashvillians.
Speaking to RNS, Cory Johnson protested, "I just couldn’t believe that some creepy guy I don’t even know was taking time out of his day to tell me how to live my life. I genuinely believe the project is a form of trespassing and a huge invasion of privacy."
Speaking to Religion News Service, Ethos Church's pastor Dave Clayton said, "I love this city, and it’s a great time to be here, but we just had this conviction that despite all the good things that were going on, there’s still a lot of pain. We started wrestling with how we could love and care for the city. I think there are a lot of answers to that, but for us the starting place was prayer."
From there, it didn't take long for Clayton and the members of Ethos Church to arrive at the idea of praying for every single resident. A daunting task, but encouraged by their belief in the power of prayer Awaken Nashville was born. Over 350 churches embraced the idea and committed to spending a month fasting and praying for Nashville's residents by name. It was the encouragement to send postcards to the people they prayed for that sparked the ire of some Nashvillians.
Speaking to RNS, Cory Johnson protested, "I just couldn’t believe that some creepy guy I don’t even know was taking time out of his day to tell me how to live my life. I genuinely believe the project is a form of trespassing and a huge invasion of privacy."
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