The Opportunity
We are forming a network of volunteers to provide internet access and training for patients and their families.
Hospitals are so strapped for funding and staff that it is difficult for them to provide access to the Internet on a wide spread basis. If the equipment is available, staffing, training, and maintenanace are all expenses that need to be covered.
The Prayer Surfers organization will provide the necessary equipment, internet accounts, volunteer staff to train patients on Internet basics and on-going support. In the future, patient web sites will be developed to allow communication with family and friends.
The Prayer Surfers web site will provide patients the opportunity to make prayer requests. It will then provide the opportunity for caring people from our church community to respond to those requests with prayer and notes of encouragement.
Churches and Schools
Churches have a primary responsibility to reach out beyond their walls to hurting people. The Prayer Surfers Ministry gives churches and their: schools, prayer chains, clubs and groups, and individual members the tools to connect with people in need right in their community or anywhere in the world!
Individuals
Many individual volunteers are needed to make regular visits to the hospitals to train new patients on Internet use, answer questions, or just be there to listen or pray. These people need not have any computer training or background. We'll provide that! What we need are people who love people and are ready to make a commitment to those who desperately need their help. The opportunity to demonstrate God's caring love for people and to witness their faith makes this one of the most rewarding and important aspects of the Prayer Surfers Ministry.
Magnifying Prayer
An important part of the Prayer Surfers concept is when we pray for others we want to magnify the power of that prayer by sending a note to the person being prayed for encouraging them and letting them know we have prayed on their behalf.
These contacts, made possible via the Prayer Surfers web site, will promote dialog and hopefully even more meaningful exchanges between the Prayer partners and people in need.
The Future
As the Prayer Surfers Ministry develops, we would like to see it made available on a wide spread basis. This will take staff, equipment, volunteers, funding, and many prayers. We are confident if we focus on reaching out to hurting people, and keep their needs and the role that our service and prayers may play in supporting them foremost in our minds, that the Lord will bless this ministry with growth and all the supply necessary for it to succeed.
To request a prayer or offer to pray for someone else...click here...Prayer Page
When a life threatening illness strikes a family, many things that you and I take for granted every day are suddenly changed dramatically.
The loss of freedom, control and contact is as devastating to a person as is the diagnosis of the illness itself.
In my case, that diagnosis came in January of 1998 when I learned that I had Leukemia. Over the next three months I battled complications and the cancer itself, nearly losing that battle many times, but by the grace of God and the power of prayer I was healed and entered remission.
For the next nine months I was in and out of the hospital for chemo-therapy treatments, etc. Some of the stays in the hospital lasted 4-5 weeks.
During those hospital stays you go through many ups and downs both physically and emotionally. You most definitely feel trapped, alone, cut off from the world. When you are feeling well, boredom and anxiety are ever present.
As I looked back on my experience, I started to think about what could be done to help others who are going through similar ordeals.
Trapped? Alone? Cut off from the world? No freedom? No control? Bored? Anxious?
Then it occurred to me...The Internet!...News, Entertainment, Information, Contact with family and friends.
And so the Prayer Surfers concept was born. It is my prayer that providing access to the Internet will be a tremendous outreach to hurting people everywhere!
Kevin Rather, Oconomowoc, WI
Prayer Surfers Founding Executive Director
Read on to learn how it all works....click here....
