Middle East Prayer Lapbook

I confess.  

Up until very recently, I just couldn't bring myself to pray for the Middle East.

It seemed very abstract and foreign to me; boring at best, downright terrifying at worst.

It was a topic best left untouched by my mind, heart, and spirit, I reasoned.

I'll just leave that prayer topic to my pastors, I thought.  The professional pray-ers in the church.

Well, as I shared recently, the Holy Spirit has been nudging my heart to think more about the people of the Middle East.  

I say "nudging," but it has felt more like a "holy hijacking" of my thought and prayer life.

I am a creative person at my core, and I often need to process things through folding paper, writing, and drawing.

Last week, I broke out our homeschool supplies--colored file folders, cardstock, markers, and adhesive--and got busy putting together an interactive Middle East prayer lapbook.**  

Now before I give you a little tour, I want to be very clear.  The purpose of this book is to gather my thoughts about the Middle East, using words and pictures, and to provide a forum for me to interact with them visually.  There is no "right" way to put together a lapbook, and it doesn't need to be pretty or perfect.  For my lapbook, I posted personal pictures of my travels, adhered bookmarks, coins, maps, lists of prayer points (gleaned from books such as this one and this one), and interesting facts about the region to spark further thoughts and prayers.

Now, allow me to give you a short tour (not everything is shown, due to the sensitive or personal nature of some of the material)...

The lap book opens (cover not shown) to an outline map of the Middle East.  In my research, I was surprised to find that there is a lot of disagreement about which countries people consider to be included in the official "Middle East," so I went with what I thought best.  I hand wrote in the country names on the map, which I touch and work through as I pray for these countries and people groups.

Map, as well as people groups, are highlighted

Another thing I was surprised to discover in my reading is how many people groups cannot be accounted for using a geopolitical map.  Groups such as refugees, IDPs (internally displaced people), Kurds, Yazidis, and many more do not have their own country on a map.  So I placed them below, writing thoughts and prayers around them.

I love when little "bits and baubles" show up when I craft. This map of Turkey and the verse reference were discovered on the packaging of the woven bookmark I used (featured on another flap).

As you make your way through the book, various flaps fold over and uncover pictures, facts, and Scripture verses to prompt me to pray for the healing of this land and its people.

Here's that woven bookmark I bought while away on my church's women's retreat...which happened to be made in Turkey!

A zoom-out view of a few flaps and pages

On other flaps, I list out prayer points to cover, so I can anchor my mind on something while I pray for abstract things such as God's provision, health, peace, freedom, protection, and God's presence to be felt by these hurting people.

A few prayer points I found in the book Love in the Face of ISIS

Some flaps are a bit nostalgic, revealing ticket stubs and coins from my personal travels to the Middle East areas of Istanbul and Dubai.

Ticket stubs and a coin from my trip to Istanbul in 2009

I adhered copies of book titles and photos which remind me of books I have read about the area and people there who inspire us all to take courage and stand up for what's right (like Malala Yousafzai).

I love color-copying book covers and teaching materials to cut and paste into my lap books!

A beautiful prayer for MY heart as I pray for the Middle East, taken from Love in the Face of ISIS

And so through the use of this lap book, I plan to pray more consistently about the Middle East--in a way that better connects my head with my heart.

Now, I realize in sharing this prayer book with you that lapbooking may NOT be your thing!  And that is OK!  But I'd still like to challenge you to connect your heart and your head as you pray in fresh ways for the world.  That could look a million different ways!  This is just one such example.

But, perhaps you are kinda like me, or perhaps you want to just give this a try.  Perhaps there are regions of the world, or current events, or topics of prayer that you have heard about and you are not sure how to pray for them or even where to start.  Perhaps these topics, these people groups, are just too abstract and overwhelming for your mind to consider, like how I viewed the Middle East.

Would you consider a fresh way to interact with this prayer topic, dear friend?  A new way to see your prayer life and your prayer list through lapbooking?

Oh, I hope that you do, dear friend!  And I'd LOVE to be the first to hear all about it!

**(If you are new to lapbooking, you might want to check out this previous post where I made one about church history.  To construct the book, I fold two file folders in a "staple configuration," place them side by side, and adhere the touching flaps together.  Then I decorate all the flaps that result with colored paper and goodies.)