{"id":5543,"date":"2023-08-14T12:00:00","date_gmt":"2023-08-14T18:00:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.navigators.org\/?p=5543"},"modified":"2023-07-28T15:04:14","modified_gmt":"2023-07-28T21:04:14","slug":"power-of-prayer-deepening-relationships-in-seattles-multicultural-community","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.navigators.org\/blog\/power-of-prayer-deepening-relationships-in-seattles-multicultural-community\/","title":{"rendered":"Power of Prayer: Deepening Relationships in Seattle\u2019s Multicultural Community"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<p>Alex* wears bracelets that serve as a reminder to pray for the people and cultures he connected with while part of an <a href=\"https:\/\/iedge.org\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">iEDGE<\/a> team in Asia. (iEDGE is a Navigators international internship program for young adults.) These prayers are bearing fruit in relationships with people from these countries in the Seattle area, where Alex and his wife, Mary*, serve with <a href=\"https:\/\/nationswithin.org\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">Navigators Nations Within<\/a>.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Alex and Mary met Zoey* during their years in Asia. Now Zoey, along with her husband, Chaz*, live in the Seattle area. Alex and Mary have prayed for opportunities to deepen their relationship with this family.<\/p>\n\n\n<div class=\"wp-block-image\">\n<figure class=\"aligncenter\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" width=\"1024\" height=\"614\" src=\"https:\/\/www.navigators.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/07\/08.15.23-Article-Web-1024x614.jpg\" alt=\"A man and woman sitting across the table from each other praying together and holding hands with their Bibles open on the table.\" class=\"wp-image-261130\" srcset=\"https:\/\/www.navigators.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/07\/08.15.23-Article-Web-1024x614.jpg 1024w, https:\/\/www.navigators.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/07\/08.15.23-Article-Web-300x180.jpg 300w, https:\/\/www.navigators.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/07\/08.15.23-Article-Web-768x461.jpg 768w, https:\/\/www.navigators.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/07\/08.15.23-Article-Web.jpg 1500w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 1024px) 100vw, 1024px\" \/><\/figure>\n<\/div>\n\n\n<p>The first opportunity came as Alex and Mary stayed with Chaz and Zoey&#8217;s older son while Zoey was giving birth to their second child. Their availability to serve provided a foundation of trust, particularly with Chaz, whom they had just met.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Then Mary started a Bible study with Zoey (who is a follower of Jesus) and another woman. Chaz was a follower of another religion but was supportive of Zoey&#8217;s Bible study.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Another opportunity to connect was for a family birthday party. The family had planned a large party with many friends in a park, but the weather forecast was unfavorable, so Alex and Mary opened their home. Afterward, Zoey shared that their friends had felt warmly welcomed. This was significant because some of these immigrants from Asia have felt barriers in their interactions with other Americans.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>As Alex, Mary, their team, and ministry partners continued to pray\u2014the relationship and trust grew. One day, Chaz asked Alex if they could read the Bible together. Of course, Alex said yes!<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Very soon, Chaz shared that he had taken down the spiritual objects related to his former religion in his home. He has started following Jesus, and even told his family who still live in his home country about this significant step. Now Chaz wants to learn how to pray and know God better\u2014this openness has given Alex the opportunity to disciple him and build a solid faith foundation.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><em>*Names changed.<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n<blockquote class=\"wp-block-quote is-layout-flow wp-block-quote-is-layout-flow\">\n<p>Discipleship Tip:<\/p>\n<cite>Think about someone who has yet to have a relationship with Jesus. Create a reminder on your phone, wear something on your wrist, or put their initials in a place you look every day as a reminder to pray for their salvation.<\/cite><\/blockquote>\n\n\n\n<div class=\"wp-block-group ticss-63dda377 has-cool-gray-background-color has-background\" style=\"margin-top:0;margin-bottom:0\"><div class=\"wp-block-group__inner-container is-layout-flow wp-block-group-is-layout-flow\">\n<h3 class=\"wp-block-heading has-text-align-center\" id=\"h-free-resource-praying-against-spiritual-resistance\"><strong>Free Resource: Praying Against Spiritual Resistance<\/strong><\/h3>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-text-align-left\">Are you praying for someone to receive Christ, but the gospel isn\u2019t reaching them? In 2 Corinthians 4:4 it says the enemy wants to keep people from understanding the gospel. In our <em>Praying Against Spiritual Resistance <\/em>resource, you receive prayer prompts and passages of Scripture to help you effectively share the gospel with others. Download your free resource and watch God move through your prayers.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<div class=\"wp-block-columns is-layout-flex wp-container-core-columns-is-layout-9d6595d7 wp-block-columns-is-layout-flex\">\n<div class=\"wp-block-column is-layout-flow wp-block-column-is-layout-flow\" style=\"flex-basis:100%\">\n<div class=\"wp-block-buttons alignwide is-horizontal is-content-justification-center is-layout-flex wp-container-core-buttons-is-layout-499968f5 wp-block-buttons-is-layout-flex\">\n<div class=\"wp-block-button\"><a class=\"wp-block-button__link has-white-color has-orange-background-color has-text-color has-background wp-element-button\" href=\"https:\/\/www.navigators.org\/resource\/praying-against-spiritual-resistance\/?sf_ac=w07\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\"><strong>Download your free resource!<\/strong><\/a><\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div><\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>&#8220;We prayed for opportunities to deepen this relationship.&#8221;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":261130,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"_helpful_pro_status":1,"_relevanssi_hide_post":"","_relevanssi_hide_content":"","_relevanssi_pin_for_all":"","_relevanssi_pin_keywords":"","_relevanssi_unpin_keywords":"","_relevanssi_related_keywords":"","_relevanssi_related_include_ids":"","_relevanssi_related_exclude_ids":"","_relevanssi_related_no_append":"","_relevanssi_related_not_related":"","_relevanssi_related_posts":"","_relevanssi_noindex_reason":"","inline_featured_image":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[6337,261],"tags":[1483],"mission":[57,58],"topic":[45],"class_list":["post-5543","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-ministry-impact-stories","category-prayer","tag-disciple","mission-navigators-edge-corps","mission-navigators-world-missions","topic-prayer"],"featured_image_src":"https:\/\/www.navigators.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/07\/08.15.23-Article-Web.jpg","author_info":{"display_name":"The Navigators","author_link":"https:\/\/www.navigators.org\/staff\/thenavigators\/"},"acf":[],"aioseo_notices":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.navigators.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5543","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.navigators.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.navigators.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.navigators.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.navigators.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=5543"}],"version-history":[{"count":5,"href":"https:\/\/www.navigators.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5543\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":261214,"href":"https:\/\/www.navigators.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5543\/revisions\/261214"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.navigators.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/261130"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.navigators.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=5543"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.navigators.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=5543"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.navigators.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=5543"},{"taxonomy":"mission","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.navigators.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/mission?post=5543"},{"taxonomy":"topic","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.navigators.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/topic?post=5543"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}