Additional National Prayer Needs
Pray for America’s Military
President Trump confirmed that the U.S. conducted strikes on a Venezuelan facility that had been used to transfer narcotics to boats to be distributed internationally. “We just knocked out, I don’t know if you read or you saw, they have a big plant or a big facility… where the ships come from,” President Trump said. “There was a major explosion in the dock area where they load up the boats with drugs.”
Pray for President Trump and Secretary Hegseth as they oversee military operations in the Caribbean and around Venezuela to counter narcotics trafficking.
PRAY FOR AN END TO THE WAR IN UKRAINE
A drone attack was reportedly conducted early this week against President Vladimir Putin’s residence. While the Russian president claimed that Ukraine was behind the attack, President Volodymyr Zelensky denied that his nation targeted the residence and that the allegation was an attempt to derail peace talks. Russia then launched a drone attack against a residential area in the Ukrainian port of Odessa on Wednesday, killing at least six people, including 3 children.
Pray for President Trump to seek the Lord’s wisdom as he continues to work for a ceasefire between Russia and Ukraine.
Pray for AMERICA’S RELATIONSHIP WITH ISRAEL
Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said that his nation will award the Israel Prize to President Donald Trump. The Israeli prime minister made the announcement at the U.S. president’s resort home, Mar-a-Lago, in Florida. It will be the first time that the annual prize will be given to a non-Israeli in the 72-year history of that nation’s highest civilian honor.
Pray for President Trump and U.S. officials as they continue to craft the second phase of the Gaza ceasefire.
Pray for AMERICA’S HEALTH AND WELL-BEING
The White House announced funding awards through the Rural Health Transformation Program authorized by the Working Families Tax Cuts legislation. The total of $50 billion over five fiscal years, $10 billion per year, is the largest investment the U.S. has ever made in rural health care. The White House stated, “Access to quality care should not be determined by your zip code,” and highlighted “the Trump Administration’s commitment to strengthening the rural health workforce, modernizing facilities and technology, and deploying innovative care models that bring high-quality health services to rural communities nationwide.”
Pray for the president and U.S. health officials as they work to support access to health care in rural America.
Pray for Needs Across the States
New York Governor Kathy Hochul signed a law in 2022 mandating that all school buses purchased in the state must be electric after 2027. However, the early implementation of the mandate has left some children freezing as drivers turn the heat down or off to avoid draining the battery, since the heaters run off the same power source that runs the buses. At least one bus broke down last month, leaving children stranded on the side of the road in twenty-degree weather as the vehicle was towed.
After California’s Department of Motor Vehicles (DMV) sent cancellation notices to 20,000 foreign nationals holding state-issued commercial driver’s licenses (CDLs), migrant advocate groups have sued the department and its director over alleged administrative errors. The state’s DMV notified the migrant truck drivers in November after the discovery that their CDL expiration dates exceeded the length of their legal U.S. residency. The license revocations are due to take effect in January and February.
Pray for state officials as they evaluate the administration of transportation laws and regulations.
Pray for America’s Faith Community
“Effective leadership requires being flexible. It involves adapting. Changing. Shifting. … Just because something worked well yesterday, that doesn’t mean it will remain effective today; and what works today might not be the right tool for tomorrow.
In the Old Testament, Nehemiah was charged by God to rebuild the wall in Jerusalem after the Babylonian exile of the nation of Israel. But rebuilding that wall would be a monumental task—one that would require all-hands-on-deck in order to pull it off.
In chapter 3 of Nehemiah, there’s a list of everyone Nehemiah employed and managed during the project—everyone from priests, to temple servants, to goldsmiths, to perfumers. No one, male or female, was exempt from the command to rebuild Jerusalem’s wall.
When opposition to rebuild came from the Arabs, Ammonites, and Ashdodites, Nehemiah was forced to adapt. While Israel’s enemies plotted to fight Jerusalem and foil their plans to rebuild the wall, he shifted his plan and turned his people from builders into builders and warriors! With a hammer in one hand and a sword in the other, his workers kept building the wall.
Leadershifting is not about abandoning the values, principles, strategies, and training that got you where you are; it’s about adapting those core parts of you through intuition and creativity—just as Nehemiah did by putting a sword in the perfumer’s hand and saying, “Keep building!”– Pastor John Maxwell, Leadershift
