Jeon ’21 Led Daily Prayer Initiative in Winter
by luke brown, dartmouth ’18
Students who steadfastly committed to daily corporate prayer experienced an abundance of spiritual growth during the winter quarter at Dartmouth.
Meeting every morning, this student-led gathering was wholeheartedly devoted to each other, to prayer, and to God before the COVID-19 outbreak shut down the Dartmouth campus. They prayed fervently, shared news of answered prayer, and were committed to flourishing Christ-centered relationships.
The daily prayer initiative was started by Paul Jeon ’21, who serves on Christian Union Vox’s Student Executive Team. Christian Union Vox is the Christian Union ministry at Dartmouth.
Early morning on Dartmouth's campus. Photo taken by Kimberly Tan on a morning walk to the prayer group.
Jeon recalled experiencing the power of united prayer while attending the Summer Christian Fellowship in 2019. The ministry is for students from various campus organizations during the college’s Sophomore Summer term. Jeon was impressed by the intimate nature of the gatherings.
Noah Crane, a Christian Union ministry fellow at Dartmouth, said, “Paul’s desire to grow in his faith and in his relationship with God is evident to all. His initiative and leadership over this prayer group is a great encouragement to the staff and a blessing to his fellow students. Paul is modeling service, sacrifice, and discipline, all the while pointing people to a closer relationship with God through these prayer times.”
In fall 2019, Jeon took an off-term from school to intern in a church community in Washington D.C. Before returning to Dartmouth for the winter, Jeon and other students offered the idea of a daily prayer group to all the Christian ministries on campus.
“It’s been overwhelming how good God has been to provide people who are committed to prayer,” said Jeon. A core group of five participants often swelled to ten for any of the daily sessions, which were held at Dartmouth’s Prayer Room. The structure of prayer varied from day to day, as each session was led by a different student. Jeon gave some examples, saying, “We’ve practiced praying through the Lord’s prayer, praying extensively for one specific request, praying during worship, praying through different prayers in the Bible, practicing listening, etc.”
“Through this, students are drawing closer to each other as they draw near to God in prayer,” Crane said.
On Saturdays, the group met to share how they have seen the Lord answer their prayers throughout the week. This has been one of the more meaningful aspects of the practice for Jeon. “It’s crazy to see how many little and big prayers have been answered and how each testimony of answered prayer is a reminder of God’s faithfulness and goodness to us,” he said.
On Sundays, they met to pray before a pre-church breakfast. Peter Surin, a freshman, is one of the core members. “My passion for Christ has grown immensely,” he said. “Being with a consistent group of believers dedicated to taking time out of each day to focus on God has been huge.”
“My prayer habits have really developed in a positive way: praising God in my prayers more, focusing on God’s eternal truths more, and being more willing simply to pray ‘your will be done.’”
Likewise, Kimberly Tan ‘22 has grown through her participation in the prayer group.“I think the morning prayer time is also an exercise in trust—I definitely was afraid of how busy I’d be this term and hesitated to commit my mornings to this, but God’s been faithful and provided for all of us in our other commitments and classes,” she said.
Tan has developed a longing for prayer that goes well outside the corporate prayer sessions: “It has helped me prioritize and develop a more instinctual relationship to prayer. Now, whenever something comes up and my heart isn’t at peace about it, I tend to turn to prayer, even if it’s a quick word with God, something that I’ve started noticing more as the term progressed.”
“I think God’s definitely using this (daily prayer) as part of a bigger plan for our campus,” said Tan. “Stay tuned!”
