A Reminder for All of Us

As we celebrate this beautiful season with our friends and families, we ask that you would take some time to pray for the young women across Canada that are struggling this Christmas.

For many, this can be a difficult season of painful experiences or memories.  But we know that God has a plan and a purpose for each precious life.

Let’s commit together to supporting the young women of Canada in prayer. And to loving those girls that God brings across each of our paths, particularly over this Christmas season. You never know the eternal impact of loving the girls that are right there in your community, church or home. Invite them over for a cup of coffee, give a gift or a meaningful letter, take time to speak words of encouragement and pray for those that are right before you.

Our God is mighty to save! As the prophet wrote in Zephaniah 3:17, “The Lord your God is with you. He is a hero who saves you. He happily rejoices over you, renews you with His love and celebrates over you with shouts of joy.”

Can you imagine the impact of it? Can you imagine if each of us were just to reach out to one hurting young woman in our circle to tell her that she is worthy of love, that she is a daughter of the Most High, that she has a future and hope? And then to love her in tangible ways – clothing, meals, words of encouragement, even encouraging them to apply for Mercy or supporting Mercy on her behalf. Wow! We hear stories like this every day and it gives us such hope. The Body of Christ is alive and active, in large and small ways, all across Canada. Thank you for everything that you are already doing to love those that God has placed in your world.

May each of us experience such wondrous love this Christmas!

Our Prayer Guide

Nancy Alcorn with graduates

Are you a man or woman of prayer? Do you feel called to spiritually support our residents?

Please consider joining our Prayer Team! It’s an excellent way to support and help out at Mercy, particularly for those of you that aren’t in the local area of the home. We think it’s incredibly important and place great priority on prayer as a team and a home. We would be honoured by your prayers!

You can also download and print our Prayer Guide here.

Mercy Ministries of Canada Prayer Guide

 

The earnest prayer of a righteous person has great power and produces wonderful results. (James 5:16b)

 

Note: Please feel free to pray as you are lead by the Holy Spirit. This is simply a guide of our ongoing prayer requests as a home.

 

Pray for the 50+ young women in our Intake process that need to see their lives transformed and their hope restored. Pray that they will find freedom and hope in Jesus as well as support and protection from evil while they wait.

 

But how can they call on him to save them unless they believe in him? And how can they believe in him if they have never heard about him? And how can they hear about him unless someone tells them? Romans 10:16

 

The Spirit of the Sovereign Lord is upon me, for the Lord has anointed me to bring good news to the poor. He has sent me to comfort the broken-hearted and to proclaim that captives will be released and prisoners will be freed. Isaiah 61:1

 

Pray for our current residents. Pray for their spiritual growth and development. Pray for their counselling sessions to bring real breakthrough, for their sleep to be peaceful and for their hearts to be made whole.

 

“For I know the plans I have for you, declares the Lord. Plans to prosper you and not to harm you. Plans to give you a future and a hope.” Jeremiah 29:1

 

Pray for the spiritual well-being of our staff particularly our Night/Weekend team, our Counsellors, our Intake department and Household staff that works on a daily basis to help heal these young women.

 

Pray for all of our “heroes” – the graduates all over the world who are daily walking out their healing and greatly affecting the lives of everyone they come in contact with.

 

Don’t copy the behaviour and customs of this world, but let God transform you into a new person by changing the way you think. Then you will learn to know God’s will for you, which is good and pleasing and perfect. Romans 12:2

 

She is clothed with strength and dignity, and she laughs without fear of the future. When she speaks, her words are wise, and she gives instructions with kindness. Proverbs 31:25-26

 

Pray for the supporters of the ministry. Without their support, the work of Mercy would not be possible.  Pray for more Treasure Builders to be added to the ministry and for our financial sustainability.

 

Give, and you will receive. Your gift will return to you in full—pressed down, shaken together to make room for more, running over, and poured into your lap. The amount you give will determine the amount you get back. Luke 6:38

 

For I was hungry, and you fed me. I was thirsty, and you gave me a drink. I was a stranger, and you invited me into your home. I was naked, and you gave me clothing. I was sick, and you cared for me. I was in prison, and you visited me.’ Then these righteous ones will reply, ‘Lord, when did we ever see you hungry and feed you? Or thirsty and give you something to drink? Or a stranger and show you hospitality? Or naked and give you clothing? When did we ever see you sick or in prison and visit you?’ And the King will say, ‘I tell you the truth, when you did it to one of the least of these my brothers and sisters, you were doing it to me!’ Matthew 25:35-40

 

Give praise and glory to Jesus – all honour and praise to Him, He is the life changer!

 

All praise to God, the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ. God is our merciful Father and the source of all comfort. He comforts us in all our troubles so that we can comfort others. When they are troubled, we will be able to give them the same comfort God has given us. 2 Corinthians 1:3-4

 

Ask God what he would have you do.

On behalf of the young women across Canada who need Mercy, thank you for joining us to pray for Mercy Ministries of Canada.

Isaiah 55

Isaiah 55

Invitation to the Thirsty

¹ “Come, all you who are thirsty,
come to the waters;
and you who have no money,
come, buy and eat!
Come, buy wine and milk
without money and without cost.

² Why spend money on what is not bread,
and your labor on what does not satisfy?
Listen, listen to me, and eat what is good,
and your soul will delight in the richest of fare.

³ Give ear and come to me;
hear me, that your soul may live.
I will make an everlasting covenant with you,
my faithful love promised to David.

⁴ See, I have made him a witness to the peoples,
a leader and commander of the peoples.

⁵ Surely you will summon nations you know not,
and nations that do not know you will hasten to you,
because of the LORD your God,
the Holy One of Israel,
for he has endowed you with splendor.”

⁶ Seek the LORD while he may be found;
call on him while he is near.

⁷ Let the wicked forsake his way
and the evil man his thoughts.
Let him turn to the LORD, and he will have mercy on him,
and to our God, for he will freely pardon.

⁸ “For my thoughts are not your thoughts,
neither are your ways my ways,”
declares the LORD.

⁹ “As the heavens are higher than the earth,
so are my ways higher than your ways
and my thoughts than your thoughts.

¹⁰ As the rain and the snow
come down from heaven,
and do not return to it
without watering the earth
and making it bud and flourish,
so that it yields seed for the sower and bread for the eater,

¹¹ so is my word that goes out from my mouth:
It will not return to me empty,
but will accomplish what I desire
and achieve the purpose for which I sent it.

¹² You will go out in joy
and be led forth in peace;
the mountains and hills
will burst into song before you,
and all the trees of the field
will clap their hands.

¹³ Instead of the thornbush will grow the pine tree,
and instead of briers the myrtle will grow.
This will be for the LORD’s renown,
for an everlasting sign,
which will not be destroyed.”

A note from Helen Burns

Note: Helen Burns is head of the Mercy Ministries of Canada Board. She and her husband, John, initiated the vision of Mercy in Canada. Together, they also pastor Relate Church.

Dear Mercy family:

Several weeks ago, I walked into the Mercy House and I genuinely felt like I had just walked into a dream…I was overwhelmed at what had finally come to pass. What I had envisioned in my heart and mind and had seen in drawings and pictures had come to life. As I walked from room to room, tears filled my eyes and my heart was about to burst with awe and gratitude to God and an amazing company of people who had made this dream come to pass.

Each room has been beautifully decorated with a touch that will appeal to the heart of every young woman who walks through the doors…there is a peaceful tranquility that is expressed through the beauty of the natural surroundings as well as the house. It says, ‘welcome home.’ I heard a staff member who was working at the home say, “I can’t believe that I get to come and work in this beautiful home every day – I feel so blessed.” That thrilled my heart, as we want it to be a home that blesses all who enter it.

To every single person who has carried a part of the load to get us to this place, I say ‘thank you’ from the very depths of my being. The journey that has brought us this far has seemed l-o-n-g, but it has been sure. Every single step has brought us here…to this amazing time in the journey and history of Mercy Canada.

Ecclesiastes 5:3 (Amp) says, ‘For a dream comes with much business and painful effort’. I know we have been very busy and for a number of people, there has been much painful effort.

This Mercy journey has at times reminded me of my first pregnancy – at first the wonderful discovery that I was going to have a baby! O happy day!!!! Then came the stage of knowing I was pregnant, but nothing was showing. Then finally the day came where people could actually see that there was evidence that a baby was growing inside of me, and then a period of being extremely uncomfortable and it was keeping me up at night…. And then having go almost 3 weeks past my due date! And finally the day came to deliver my child and, well you know that isn’t the most fun part. (I remember at this stage, I asked my mother to please tell me the honest truth about what labour and delivery was actually going to be like. She answered me in the calmest voice ever, “Oh Helen, don’t worry at all – God put that baby in you, and He will get it out.”) And then the day came and my beautiful baby girl was born. Every moment of every day was worth it beyond my wildest dreams.

God put a dream in our hearts – and He got it out!

I feel like this has been a 7 year pregnancy and now the time has come…the home is stunning, the staff of Mercy is brilliant, the team of workers and laborers are exceptional, the community of churches, businesses and individuals that have made this possible are amazing. I am overwhelmed by what can happen when a company of people will gather themselves to a dream to build something that is bigger than themselves because they truly care about the broken heart and life of young women who have been waiting for this day, this time, this moment.

And now the true purpose of this worthy dream will be realized as the first young Mercy girl enters the door of the house that love built.

I thank you, they thank you….God thanks you.

With a grateful heart,
Helen Burns
On behalf of the Mercy Ministries of Canada Board

We are building the walls with prayer

About 30 women gathered at the new Mercy Canada house last night.

We lit candles, prayed together, opened our Bibles and then began to write prayers and scriptures of hope all over every wall in that house.

I have to confess – I cried like a baby.

It was a powerful thing. All of the women there had their own story.

I spoke with one precious mother whose own daughter has struggled with self-harm, cutting and anorexia for years. She was there, as a mother, standing in the gap for all of those mothers whose daughters fight that battle. She wrote Scripture after Scripture on the walls, praying each one in a whisper.

In the bathrooms, there are now words about beauty and wholeness, about the glory of a woman fully surrendered to Jesus.

In the bedrooms, words of peace and rest, sleep and quiet. Whispers of love, shouts of joy.

In the dining rooms and gathering places, words of power, healing, strength and freedom.

We are speaking the words of life over them already. We are building this house with the prayers of many, the tears of the waiting and words of life. These words will be written again on the studs and frame of the house itself, carved into the foundation and then written in our hearts.

It’s been a long road to get here. We do everything debt-free and so we never take another step until we can pay for it in full. We bought the land (a beautiful 4.3 acres in south Surrey) and now we are about to renovate the house. And we’ll be open next year after the renovation.

You know what the means? In less than a year, she’ll be living there. Surrounded by love, compassion, wholeness. Receiving the help she so desperately needs.

She’ll be set free. Hope will be restored. And her life will be transformed.

Oh, my heart is grateful for all of our supporters. Look at what the Lord has done!

- Sarah