Prayerhouse
Davids Hut

the origen

the name

the practice

Development of the vision

Some years ago we started to realise how important it is to worship God. King David also knew the importance. He therefore set up a continuous worship of God (1 Chron. 16:37-42, 23:30 etc.) In the Old Testament you even see how battles are won through worship. Also in the New Testament (Heb. 13:15) it speaks about bringing God a continuous offering of praise.
Over the whole earth we see more and more Christians discovering the importance of worship. Worship builds a throne for God from where He reigns. We wanted this reign of God also in The Netherlands!

Then came the question ' would it be possible for us to create a place in the Netherlands where there is continuous worship of God?' But how do you organise something like that? David had no problems with resources - only the amount of his musicians and singers was already 4000!

Other people in the world have also wrestled with these questions. Some people built a kind of temple, a holy place. But we didn't feel that was the way. Our God does not live in a building made of stone, but in the hearts of people. According to the New Testament, e.g. 1 Cor. 3:16, 1 Pet. 2:5, we are a temple of God, a spiritual building.
In the old temple sacrifices were made to reconcile man with God. These sacrifices are no longer needed, since Jesus Christ was the perfect sacrifice, once and for all. But in this new temple, the spiritual building of whom we all as Christians are living stones, other, spiritual, sacrifices are made: sacrifices of praise and thankfulness.

An other question was, how do you organise continues worship? Do you need a large group of people? Everyone e.g. one hour ? But then everyone is constantly on his own, and you need at least 24 people per day…. Some groups have therefore chosen to pray in larger blocs, like 3 hours, so you are together with more people at the time. Others organised something with a lot of different churches together, in which e.g. one church would cover Tuesdays, another Thursdays. Etc.
It seemed like something impossible. Very discouraging.

But God started to draw us, personally, deeper and deeper into worship. We learned that worship is more than saying 'God is great, God is faithful. His goodness remains for ever.' Worship also is more than singing. Obeying God is true worship. In everyday life. Learning more and more to do only those things that God says or shows us. Worship is what Jesus said in Gethsemane, 'not my will, but Yours be done'. And that because of relationship, not out of blind obedience. Done out of love for God.

We all know the great commandment: you shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, with all your soul, all your mind and all of your strength. What does that mean, to love? How do we model that? What does it mean to love God with all my strength? To dance for God? To shout? To jump? To kneel? To lay on my face? All these things we knew out of the Bible, but we slowly learned to understand them better.

It is a pilgrimage. A voyage of discovery. Loving God. Continuously.