• Commit to a specific time each day to devote to prayer. Find a place where you can be free of distractions and be alone with God.
• Use the prayer points and Scripture in this guide to focus and fuel your praying. Write the Scripture and prayer point on a card and carry it with you, post it on your social media, make it the screensaver on your phone—whatever you can think of to keep these prompts in front of you. Use them throughout the day and invite others to join you in praying.
• You can take it a step further by journaling your prayers each day, simply writing out your prayers to God. It’s a great opportunity to hide God’s Word in your heart, working to memorize the verses as you meditate and pray.
• In addition, you may consider ways to pray with others during this season. Set up a Zoom call with friends or members of your small group. Pray together as a family. Invite others to join you on this journey.
• Memorize- if you choose to memorize Colossians, here are a few options in how you could do that:
  • Memorize 1-2 verses each week- Choose verses that are particularly meaningful to you from the book of Colossians. You could choose from our focus passages from each week. Week One - chapter 1, Week Two - chapter 2, and Week Three - chapters 3-4. Here are a few suggestions to choose from: Colossians 1:15-16, Colossians 2:13-14, 3:1-2, Colossians 3:12-13, Colossians 4:5-6
  • Memorize Colossians 1:15-20 - this is such an incredible revelation of the supremacy of Christ, so you could focus your memorization on this part.
  • Memorize additional passages - some may feel led to memorize more sections of Colossians. There are certainly some very rich passages. Consider these possibilities - Colossians 2:8-15, Colossians 3:1-11, Colossians 3:12-17, Colossians 4:2-6. If you do this, break the passages down into smaller chunks and memorize a verse at a time. Pace yourself. Continue to review each day as you add more verses to your memory.

Fasting

Why do we fast? Fasting is a way to deepen our hunger for God and to grow in holiness and hunger for God. More than any other discipline, fasting reveals the things that control us.(Richard Foster) And so it confronts us with our need to surrender to God. It is not a way to manipulate God or coerce him to hear and answer our prayers, but rather it acknowledges our complete dependence on him. It humbles us and awakens us to our great need for and reliance on God. As you consider fasting, we want to encourage you to listen to the Holy Spirit. Ask God to lead you in this time of seeking his face. Whether you choose to fast for one day, several days, or the entire 21 days, the point is to humble yourself in a new way and draw near to God. Here are some ideas of what you could choose.

• You might choose a selective fast, eliminating certain things from your diet. Eating only fruits and vegetables, what some might call a “Daniel fast,” is an example of this type of fasting.
• Another option is a partial fast, which is refraining from eating for a set period of time each day. You could choose to fast from a single meal or from sunup to sundown.
• Some of you may feel led to engage in a complete fast, refraining from eating and only drinking liquids for particular days or even an extended period of time.
• If, for some reason, fasting from food is not possible for you, you may want to consider other ways to capture time in this season to focus and pray. While abstaining from things like social media and television are not the same as fasting from food, they might allow you some dedicated time to pray. 

Additional Resources

• If you would like more information and help on fasting, read these articles from cru.org: Seven Basic Steps to Successful Fasting and Prayer and Six Ingredients That Will Help You Fast From Technology
• This sermon by John Mark Comer might be helpful in your understanding and practice of fasting and prayer.