‘Ask and you will receive’ said Jesus.  This Lent the vocations team took these words to heart and put them into action, writes Rev Nick McKee, Director of Vocations, pictured.

In April I called a ‘day of fasting and prayer’ for all the members of the vocations teams in the Diocese. 

The team fasted from 6am through to 6pm and took the opportunity to devote themselves to simply asking God to release more vocations to lay and ordained ministry within our Diocese.

The results were immediate and wonderful!

Lent is a great time to fast and pray, to refocus on God’s plans and purposes. For the vocations teams this includes remembering that it is the Lord that calls and not our processes or procedures.

The team took Luke 10:2 as our inspiration: “Jesus told them, ‘The harvest is plentiful, but the workers are few. Ask the Lord of the harvest, therefore, to send out workers into his harvest field’.”

This verse inspires a prayer I pray each day, that the Lord would release men and women into all kinds of vocations within his Church and I simply asked the vocations team members to join me in that prayer for our day of fasting and prayer.

We prayed wherever we were, in the midst of our daily lives, that God would raise up the lay and ordained leaders we all know His Church needs.

And the results? Within 48 hours of the prayer day we received five new vocational leads!

I was thrilled by the immediate answers to our prayers and I’m encouraged to continue to ask for more!

The days of prayer and fasting will continue on a regular basis at fixed points in the year.

Look out for more information, on the Diocesan website and in our e-bulletins sent to parishes, about the next one – and why not join the team in fasting yourself?