World Weekend of Prayer for Children at Risk

Join us for this year's World Weekend of Prayer for Children at Risk.

Every year, on the first weekend of June, people from across the globe join together in prayer for the needs of children worldwide.

Hundreds of thousands of adults and children take time to pray as part of their church service, organize specific prayer events in their communities, make the most of a family prayer time, or simply take a few minutes by themselves to quietly reflect and pray.

We’d love YOU to join us this year! We have some great resources to help you get involved: videos to watch, activities to do, information to guide your prayers and photos to encourage you about who you’re praying for and with.

We all know the stories. The seven-year-old girl sold into prostitution by her own parents; the teenage boy sleeping on the street, already an addict; the 10-year-old girl left to care for her three siblings after her parents died of AIDS.

Why do we pray for children like these? We don’t know them. Some may live close to us, but many are thousands of miles away. We will probably never hear about them again, so we will never know the outcome of our prayers.

And if we do pray, what should our prayers be like? It can be hard to pray for children we have never met, in situations we don’t understand. What should we ask God to provide for them, when we don’t know what they need; how should we thank him, when we don’t know what to thank him for?

At some point in our lives, haven’t we all asked: “What is the point in praying? Will it really make a difference?”

Well, Jesus actually offers us an answer to these questions, in Matthew 6 v 9-13 and Luke 11 v 2-4 – verses more commonly known now as ‘the Lord’s prayer’. This prayer is a guideline for why and how we can pray; not only for ourselves, but also for others, including children at risk. It covers thanksgiving, provision, forgiveness, resisting temptation – all things that are relevant and important to every single one of us.

Prayer is a two-way thing. It is not just about us asking for what we need – as we speak to God, put our trust in him and allow our lives to be shaped by him, he also gives us wisdom so that we can know him better, and the strength to go out and do his will in the world.

So why pray for children at risk? Because prayer is powerful. Because God does listen and respond. And because the more time God’s people spend with him the more like him we become, and the more we know how to live out his love for children at risk.