6 Min Read
1 March 2023
This blog was written by Yanneck Blank from 24-7 Prayer Switzerland, telling the story of their exciting project.
It is amazing… when God speaks and we listen, the most incredible things happen. For a long time, a quiet thought about a “prayer bus” had been dormant in the minds of the 24-7 Prayer team from Switzerland. Above all, Susanna Rychiger dreamed of a travelling prayer room.
When we went to our annual retreat in autumn 2021, this thought reawakened. But what do you do with a dream like that?
How are we supposed to run a prayer bus? We wondered. We have no finances, no resources and no time to manage such a project in the next year. But we didn’t discard this idea. Instead, we gave it back into God’s hands. We said, “If you want us to have a prayer bus, then we need people to carry this vision and you must provide the finances for it.”
A few months later we got a message from a man named Martin. He told me that he had a vision laid on his heart that he absolutely had to share with us. After a short conversation it was clear to both of us that this was God opening the door to a prayer bus. Shortly afterwards we were in possession of a 12m long bus.
And now the story really unfolded: We started with a dream and no idea how to make it happen, and then within a month of this first phone call, we bought a bus, found a place to park the bus, and found 24-7 Prayer and Campus für Christus as partners for the bus.
In April we began preparations to remodel the prayer bus. All seats were removed, and the charity “Livingbus” was founded.
During this time, a lot of thought was given to the concept: What should a prayer bus look like to lead people to God? What could be removed from the old bus and what would need to be made new? Would we need additional heating and air conditioning? What should the bus look like from the inside?
When it came to the practical side of the remodel, our team had so many questions. We desperately needed an expert who knew about this type of bus who could help us get it ready for the road.
Incredibly, we were connected with Heinz, a local man and former bus electrician. He said he’d like to have a look at the bus, and when he came to check it out, it turned out that he had been working with these buses all his life! He was our key person who we absolutely needed and who we’d been praying for. Without him, the bus conversion would not have been possible.
With Heinz generously helping us out, we started work on the interior of the Livingbus.
During the rebuilding phase, we experienced one miracle after another. I’ll tell you just one: for the whole rebuild we needed tools to work with. That’s when an Instagram story came in handy for my brother, Charlie. A friend of his posted a drill for sale on Insta. It immediately turned out that he was selling a lot of other power tools as well. The price for these new machines was only a third of the original price!
Over and over, we saw God’s provision come in at just the right time to keep this project going.
After half a year of interior work, the prayer bus was used for the first time on 27 December, 2022 at Praisecamp (a youth camp in Switzerland with over 6000 young people). It was a complete success. The bus became a place for people to meet, retreat and pray.
I like to explain it by saying that the bus has two wings. One wing is prayer. The bus is to become a place where people pray, storm heaven and create a “thin-place”. The second wing is evangelism and mission. The bus is a place where people can meet God, receive prayer and meet people who represent the Kingdom of God. Both wings are necessary. One does not work without the other.
Through the whole process of creating this prayer bus, it was clear that God was determined for the vision to come to life. I have rarely experienced such miraculous provision – open doors, miracles and also the finances that came in little by little show me that God has something mighty in mind. Let’s hit the road!
