Over the last few years in the Diocese of Birmingham we have been encouraging people to do positive things in Lent rather than giving something up in the more traditional way.

We have run programmes to prompt people to form the habit of every day acts of kindness and there are many similar schemes now that encourage daily deeds to help the environment, support a charity or challenge global poverty.

But this year I am asking people to take up the challenge of doing nothing else but pray for a little while every day. Prayer starts by creating space in busy lives to find stillness and by doing so to begin to listen to what the Bible calls the still, small voice of God. Then we can learn to trust God and ourselves enough to speak with Him.

Recent research has suggested that around two-thirds of the population pray and I believe prayer is the beginning of a journey of faith – a foundation for discipleship.

In Lent we remember that Jesus spent 40 days in the desert, praying and fasting, before he went on to take his unique part in the work of God on earth, with three years’ teaching, healing, preaching, then dying on a cross and rising again to new life.

You can read about those three amazing years when Jesus walked the lands of the Middle East in the Gospels, written by Matthew, Mark, Luke and John. The writers do not only record the sayings and miracles of Jesus but they also remind us that Jesus too made space to pray. They tell us that Jesus often withdrew to find time alone so he could communicate with God, whom he calls Father.

In the Diocese of Birmingham we have begun to produce prayer calendars that encourage people to pray every day. They have stories from across the region of what the churches and communities are doing and make requests from our parishes and chaplaincies for prayer. They also have a calendar of prayer that helps us pray for our Christian brothers and sisters across the world in the worldwide family of Anglican churches of which the Church of England is a part.

To begin the 40 days of Lent 2010,  I will spend Ash Wednesday outside Birmingham Cathedral giving away prayer calendars and collecting prayers from passers-by that I will then read silently during Evening Prayer at 1745h. This is part of a national initiative called ‘Say One For Me’ and I hope that we can all get into a habit of saying ‘one’ for each other, for our friends and neighbours in need or in plenty, and for those across the globe who we know are suffering or rejoicing.

If you’d like me to Say One For You – do e-mail me a prayer request to website@birmingham.anglican.org and I’ll remember you during my daily prayers.

+David, Bishop of Birmingham