Hey Team Punk Monk! I hope your summer is going well. I wanted to let you know what I’ve been up to over the last few months in my prayer ministry with GOHOP.

Prayer Truck 2025:

Last week I spent most of my evenings in a U-haul truck, parked in an alley behind Living Rock (a ministry for at-risk youth). The truck was converted into a street level prayer room that was open for a week. We offered people water, friendly conversations, and prayer.

The prayer truck opened up on an evening where there was a fatal shooting downtown, so many people were understandably wanting us to pray about that. Praying for peace felt really important. A couple days later one of our hosts prayed for a family member of the woman who was shot. 

I got to pray with a teen who I would assume is trans. They asked me to pray for their mental health. I started praying, and half way through, I realized I hadn’t asked what pronouns they were comfortable with so I just went with  “they/them.” When I finished and said amen, I looked up at the person, they were beaming! I’m pretty sure I made the right choice. I don’t know why I didn’t think to pause my prayer and just ask what pronouns the youth was comfortable with, but I think God used my impromptu decision to show this young person that they were more than welcome at the Prayer Truck.

Another day I prayed for a young man who just graduated from an MBA program, had recently got married, and started a new job. I prayed for him in this season of new things. I prayed that when he looks back on this time 2 years, 10 years and 20 years from now, he would see the good roots put down in this time of change. Afterwards he thanked me and asked “How much do I owe you?” At first I thought he was joking but then I realized he was genuinely asking. I told him, “The prayer is free, this is just what we do!” I gave him a bunch of info on GOHOP and I’m hoping I’ll see him sometime in the future at one of our prayer times. 

• Pray for peace in Hamilton. There is a lot of violence happening in the city right now. It seems like every week there is another shooting. At my church we sing “Mama, put my guns in the ground” (from Bob Dylan’s Knockin’ On Heaven’s Door). That is what I pray, over and over again.

Prayer Workshops and a Festival of gifts:

At the beginning of July I was attending Mennonite Church Canada’s national gathering in Kitchener. I was a delegate for my church (The Meeting Place) but I also had some workshops and events that I was leading. 

I got to lead two prayer workshops. I was introducing an Ignatian prayer practice called Gospel Contemplation, where you use your imagination to enter into a gospel story to have a conversation with Jesus. It was very well received and many people had very profound Jesus encounters. Afterwards I had a conversation with one woman who said,

“I really loved this! I used to always try to read the Bible through my imagination but my church told me it is wrong. They told me God has cast down imagination and we shouldn’t use it to read the scripture. Now I want to bring this back to my church and share it with everyone!”

This quote is very different from what I’m used to in Mennonite circles. I have found the Mennonite Church to be really open to the intersection of spiritual & creative practices, so I was more than a little surprised.

There were so many emotions that came up for me. I was overjoyed that this person encountered Jesus in her imagination and that she wanted others to also be able to have the experience of having a conversation with Jesus. I was also very sad that this person was taught that God had cast down imagination, when our imaginations and creativity are in fact a gift from God that reflects God’s own divine creativity. After we had talked a while, I was scared, because I was pretty sure her church wasn’t going to be open to receiving her rediscovery of imagination and prayer. I advised her to hold off on trying to change everyone’s mind at her church. Insteady I suggested she try to find 2 safe people who might be open to trying out Gospel Contemplation and imaginative prayer with her. 

• Please pray for this lady and the rediscovery of her creative prayer gifts. Pray that she would find some safe people to pray with. 
• Pray for all the people who took home prayer resources. Pray that the seeds of these ideas, handouts, tricks, and tips would take root.

On the Friday night of the conference I hosted a large intercultural and intergenerational gathering called “Festival of Gifts.” There were a lot of moving pieces happening with13 different groups contributing art, drama and music. We also had over 20 new congregations being welcomed into Mennonite Church Canada. This was a very packed schedule. I put a lot of work into planning things down to the minute to squeeze all of this into just 2 hours!. 

I opened the night by telling everyone that there were a couple skill sets they were going to need to navigate this Festival of Gifts:

1. They needed to have an open heart and posture of receiving. Iasked everyone to put their hands on their lap or table with their palms facing up as a reminder of this open posture. I let them know that everyone who was bringing something to the stage was sharing an act of worship with their Creator. It might not be in a language we understand, or it could be something we aren’t used to, but we honour their gift by having an open posture. When we do this sometimes the Creator can whisper something back to us through what is being shared.
2. They needed to master THE SWIVEL! I let people know that this was going to be a very busy night and that sometimes while one person was sharing on the left side of the stage another group would be setting up on the right side of the stage. I knew this might feel awkward so it was important to name that ahead of time. I got everyone to get ready for this by all “swiveling” their attention to the right side of the stage and then to the left, back and forth, and back and forth again, as a stretch to be ready for all the hard working churches, music teams, and youth that would be taking the stage. 

No one was more surprised than I, that the plan worked. Everyone was so joyful in the room and we even finished right on time! Afterwards the head of the denomination came up to thank me and said,

 “This was the one night of the conference that I was really worried about. We didn’t really know how to pull this event off. Once I heard that you were brought on to help plan and host the night I wasn’t worried anymore. I knew you had the right energy and ability to improvise to make this work.” 

It was so nice to hear that. I had met him a few times in the past, but I wouldn’t have even expected him to know who I was. 

I was also thankful for the Mennonite Spiritual Directors who had created a prayer room for the conference with a giant indoor labyrinth. I spent a couple hours praying in that room before all the kaoss of sound check started. It was a very wise choice. I felt way more ready to tackle all the behind the scenes curve balls that happened right down to the wire. It is amazing how a prayer room can focus our prayers in a very different kind of way. A prayer room functions a lot like the secluded places Jesus would go and pray in. Space and time set aside for prayer is such a life-giving practice. 

Do you have a go-to location that you use for prayer? It could be a park, a trail, a specific room in your house, or a prayer room.

If you live in the Hamilton area, here are a couple prayer opportunities you might want to try:

•  Visit the GOHOP Prayer Room. Our summer hours are 8am – 8pm on Tuesdays until August 12th. We will then be closed for a summer break. The prayer room will open up again on September 9th from 8am-8pm on Tuesdays & Wednesdays.
• The Form & Fire Prayer Internship will be starting on September 25th. This is a great way to take 3 months to lean into prayer practices from across the many streams of the church. Get all the details here: https://www.gohop.ca/internship

Pray for GOHOP:

• Please pray for GOHOP’s fall activities. I’ll be helping to lead our Barnabas Listening Prayer Learning Lab and Asah Creative Prayer Studio. Both of these workshops have had some great momentum in the spring. Pray that we would be able to help move people from participating to leading prayer activities. We really want individuals to be able to pass on what they are learning.
• September 1st – 7th, we will be hosting a week of Zoom prayer times for people across Canada. Pray that good connections would be made and that people would be inspired to start their own rhythms of prayer. If you would like to join us for this week of prayer, sign up for the GOHOP newsletter to find out more info: https://www.gohop.ca/newsletter 

Looking for Kindness Church Shows:

I have a 45 minute version of my Looking for Kindness Amidst Anxiety show that is designed for sharing with churches on a Sunday morning. I just got to share it with the folks at Crosshill Mennonite Church and it was really well received. A number of people shared with me about their own mental health journeys and appreciated this being talked about so openly at church. One teen who is really into music, liked the sounds my telephone mic made. I could tell he was excited to hear music at church that sounded so different. I also had a bunch of little kids tease me for singing so weird. I thanked them and said “Isn’t it great that we can be weird sometime. It would be so boring if we all sang exactly the same.” I think that took them by surprise because they kept hanging around while I was packing up and told me about the instruments they were learning to play. 

My next church show will be at Westview Christian Fellowship in St. Catharines on Sunday August 24th at 10am. 

• Pray that good conversations would happen at Westview. Pray that the people who need to hear a little more about kindness would attend. 
• Pray that other churches would be open to trying something different for their Sunday service. 

Thank You For Your Support!

Thank you so much for all the prayers, donations, and encouraging messages. I couldn’t do this ministry without your support. I thank God for your generosity and trust. 

If you would like to make a monthly or annual donation to my ministry with GOHOP you can do that here:

Donate Online with CanadaHelps:
https://www.canadahelps.org/en/dn/53164

You can now donate by E-transfer:
Send your e-transfer to donate@gohop.ca
You must write “Donation for Randell Neudorf” 
in the message section.

You can also donate by Cheque:
https://randellneudorf.com/gohop/donate/

• In the fall I’ll be reaching out to more people to ask them to consider joining my monthly support team. Pray that I would be able to meet with 1 person a week in October & November. 

Summer Fun:

I got to try out paddle boarding a few weeks ago, and it was so fun. Have you been able to try something new this summer? I would love to hear about it.

Grace and Peace to you on your own summer adventures,

Randell (Randy) Neudorf