Five Coals to Cultivate a Culture of Extraordinary Prayer
Are we waiting for a prayer movement to start, or is Jesus waiting for us to wake up to the one He’s already leading?
This article is a companion piece to the video we posted yesterday on cultivating a culture of extraordinary prayer and fasting in the Kansas City Underground. If you haven’t watched it yet, you can check it out.
Today, we will dive into the heart of that talk by exploring the five coals that keep the fire of prayer burning in a movement.
Prayer is not preparation for the work; prayer is the work.
That’s the conviction we hold at Kansas City Underground—before we are a microchurch movement, before we are a disciple-making movement, we aspire first and foremost to be a prayer movement.
But let’s be real—we don’t share this from a place of having it all figured out. We do this imperfectly. Yet, as I step off the toxic shame ladder to write this and onto the level ground grace gives us, I want to share our journey—and introduce you to someone whose life embodied the fire of extraordinary prayer.
Her name was Esther.
Esther’s House of Prayer
At 16 years old, my mom voluntold me to help an elderly shut-in named Esther. She lived in a small, rundown house in the south suburbs of Chicago, and my job was to mow her lawn, take care of her poodle, and do all the chores she couldn’t manage.
Not exactly how I wanted to spend my time as a newly licensed teenager with a lead foot.
But something happened every time I entered Esther’s home.
Despite her declining health, despite eventually losing her mobility and her only housemate, Lucille, she radiated something unexplainable. A joy. A presence. A power.
And when she spoke of Jesus, it was different.
It was as if He woke her up every morning, sat with her in her kitchen, and tucked her into bed every night. She would grab my hands, look into my eyes, and say:
"Rob, I can't run around like you and your friends anymore, but I can sure pray. The Lord and I talk all day, and He is so wonderful. The hours fly by."
Esther was a modern-day Anna in the temple, worshiping, praying, and storming the throne of grace day and night (Luke 2:36-37). She embodied Jesus the Intercessor, Jesus the Prophet, Jesus the One who bridges heaven and earth. And she taught me what we call extraordinary prayer.
Everybody prays. That’s ordinary.
Not everybody prays like Esther. That’s extraordinary.
The Five Coals of Extraordinary Prayer
As I've been reflecting on the last six years of the Kansas City Underground, there are five elements we are cultivating—five coals at the center of the fire. These coals must be kept together, consistently stoked, and allowed to burn brightly. When they do, they ignite a culture of extraordinary prayer that fuels movement.
Let’s walk through these five coals.
1. Personal Embodiment
The first question for us as potential movement leaders regarding extraordinary prayer and fasting is simply this: Am I embodying what I am advocating?
Before we think about structures, strategies, or mobilizing others, we must first examine our own lives. Do we model the intimacy, dependence, and desperation for God that we want others to have? Esther, my prayer warrior, wasn’t leading a movement—she was simply faithful to her King. And that faithfulness was and is the “one thing...necessary (Luke 10:41-42).”
In the Underground, we’ve learned that a movement of prayer doesn’t begin with campaigns or meetings. It begins in the secret place—with individuals who actually pray. It starts with leaders who cultivate an abiding, unshakable intimacy with Jesus, awakening to the reality that His presence has always saturated every part of their lives.
We have been asleep—not Him.
Prayer movements aren’t built on strategies. They are ignited by burning hearts—by those who linger long enough, who intentionally gaze at Jesus until their hearts are set ablaze.
Every disciple-making movement throughout history has been fueled by one essential rhythm: returning to Jesus, again and again. It is the abiding life (John 15:4), the unceasing hunger (Psalm 27:4), the persistent knocking (Luke 11:9) that unleashes the power of God into us, and then, the world.
Movements don’t rise from polished plans. They rise from people on their knees—people who refuse to move without Him.
We can only move forward as fast as we can on our knees.
So pause. Ask the Lord: What do You want to say to me about extraordinary prayer in my own life?
2. Paradigmatic Frameworks
A paradigm shift is needed for extraordinary prayer to take root. Most people assume they already know what prayer is. Studies show most people pray daily. But do we see prayer the way Jesus does?
We’ve built two paradigmatic frameworks to help cultivate “aha” moments that awaken people to extraordinary prayer:
We use two key frameworks to awaken people to this reality:
The Missionary Pathway – Our primary training framework, which begins with extraordinary prayer and fasting as Phase One. This reinforces the idea that prayer is not optional—it is the foundation of everything. We never leave Phase One; extraordinary Prayer is the undercurrent for all the other phase of the Missionary Pathway.
Prayer Circles – A ground-level framework that helps people develop three core forms of prayer:
Contemplative Prayer (listening and attunement)
Contending Prayer (intercession, spiritual warfare, missional blessing)
Practical Prayer (daily needs, communal dependence)
When people map their prayer lives, they often realize their practical prayer circle is huge, their missional prayer circle is smaller, and their listening prayer barely exists. But prayer without ceasing happens when these circles begin to overlap. You can learn more about Prayer Circles here. It’s a wonderful way to help folks get a sense of where they are on their prayer journey, and what part of their life of prayer to develop next.
3. Practical Tools: What Are Our Essentials?
We live in an era of information overload.
If we want prayer to multiply, our tools must be simple and reproducible. People primarily learn by doing, not by hearing abstract concepts. We prioritize simple, repeatable tools and practices that enable people to engage prayer, and make it simple for them to share this joy and practice with others.
In KC Underground, we focus on a “three-club golf game”—a small, essential set of tools for each form of prayer. If a 12-year-old can’t grasp it, we haven’t made it simple enough.
What are your core prayer tools? And are they actually working? You can take a look at our KC Underground toolkit here to explore these prayer tools.
4. Public Rhythms: How Do We Weave Prayer into Everyday Life?
Private prayer fuels everything. But for a culture of prayer to grow, we must connect it to public rhythms:
📅 Daily – Early morning prayer gatherings online, along with a zoom room that’s open all day, every day, dedicated specifically to prayer.
📅 Weekly – Tuesdays: A day of fasting where the whole network is invited to pray and fast together using a common guide. You can explore those guides here.
📅 Monthly – Equipping Gatherings: A time of equipping that includes communal prayer. In addition, we are joining in with a city-wide prayer movement called PrayKC, where we gather quarterly with the larger body of Christ for A Night with God to intercede for our city.
📅 Annually – We have helped sponsor Thousand Fires: A movement-wide push for 1,000 hours of prayer during Holy Week.
Too often, fasting is seen as an individual discipline. But biblically, fasting is almost always corporate. Public rhythms of prayer and fasting keep us connected, accountable, and expectant.
5. Permission to Prune, Produce, and Reproduce
Finally, every movement must learn to prune what isn’t working, produce new expressions of prayer, and reproduce leaders who multiply prayer communities.
This means we have to be ruthlessly honest about what is actually fueling movement and what is just activity. Some prayer gatherings will flourish, while others will need to be pruned. Some strategies will be fruitful, while others will need to die so that new ones can emerge. For example, Zero Hour, the student Hub of the KC Underground, pivoted from their early morning prayer meeting and replaced it with a commitment to a 24 hour prayer chain using a tool called Prayer Fuel. It’s an amazing tool. Check out Zero Hour’s page.
We also empower anyone to start new expressions of prayer. If someone feels led to start a weekly prayer huddle at work, they don’t need permission—they just do it. If a microchurch wants to host a neighborhood prayer walk, we encourage it. If a student wants to start a lunchtime prayer circle at school, we celebrate it. We want a culture of constant, spontaneous, multiplying prayer.
Of course, no one needs to ask permission—Jesus is the Head of His Church. This means prayer multiplies at the pace of the Spirit’s leading, not because a church leader is programming it.
Returning to Jesus
Finally, what do we mean when we keep saying, “Return to Jesus?”
John 15:7:
"If you remain in Me and My words remain in you, ask whatever you wish, and it will be done for you."
This is the highest invitation we will ever receive. Abiding prayer is not about getting more of something but more of Someone.
To close, I want you to do a simple exercise.
1️⃣ Close your eyes.
2️⃣ Picture the person you are most deeply connected to.
3️⃣ Imagine being with them in silence—you know what they are thinking and feeling, even without words.
That is the goal of abiding prayer. To be so attuned to Jesus that we know His heart before we even speak. This is what we return to again and again.
Final Questions for Reflection
As we close, I want to invite you to reflect on five key questions:
🔥 What has the Lord said to me today about extraordinary prayer?
🔥 What paradigmatic frameworks guide us toward the priority of prayer and awaken us to a holistic life of prayer?
🔥 What practical tools do we use? What is our core set? Are they simple and reproducible?
🔥 What public rhythms of prayer and fasting are in place in our movement? 🔥 What needs to be pruned? What needs permission or is blocking the permission for new expressions of prayer to be produced and reproduced?
How are you cultivating a culture of extraordinary prayer in your network or faith community? Drop a comment below and let’s learn together.
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