Richard Gamble - Building Faith: The Journey to Constructing the Eternal Wall of Answered Prayer

Hearts of Oak Podcast

🎙️ "Welcome, dear listeners, to a special episode of the Hearts of Oak podcast!

Today, we dive into a project that's not just building walls, but building faith, hope, and community. Join us as we explore the ambitious vision behind the Eternal Wall of Answered Prayer with its founder, Richard Gamble.

Imagine a monument not of stone, but of stories—a towering structure outside Birmingham, set to open its gates in 2027, where each brick whispers a tale of answered prayer.

This isn't just any wall; it's a beacon of positivity in a world that often highlights the negative. Richard Gamble, a man of many hats—from IT to church planting, and now, a monumental architect of faith—shares his journey, from a divine inspiration on a country walk to rallying a global community to contribute to this living testament of hope. Through his eyes, we'll see how this wall aims to change the narrative, showcasing the dynamic, ongoing conversation between humanity and divinity. It's more than a structure; it's a movement towards recognizing the miracles in our daily lives, a cultural shift towards embracing faith in a society where it's often overlooked.

Are you ready to be part of something bigger?

To add your story to a wall that will stand as a reminder of God's continuous work in our lives? Stay tuned as we delve into the vision, the challenges, and the ultimate goal of the Eternal Wall. This isn't just an interview; it's an invitation to participate in a legacy of faith and answered prayers. Let's get started!"

Special thanks to Bosch Fawstin for recording our intro/outro on this podcast.
Connect with Richard and the Eternalwall project:
Website Eternal Wall: https://eternalwall.org.uk/Home - Eternal Wall
Richard Gamble: https://www.richardmgamble.com/Richard M. Gamble
Linkedin: https://uk.linkedin.com/in/gamblerichard

Interview recorded 22.10.24

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(Hearts of Oak)

And hello hearts of oak thank you so much for joining us once again with a brand new guest discussing a huge venture up in the middle of England on prayer and that is Richard Gamble.

Richard thank you so much for your time today yeah

Peter thanks for having me on I appreciate it.

Great and I've come across the website through different friends. This is the eternal where you can get eternalwall.org.uk.

And if you don't go any further in this interview, then check out that.

You can see how you can be involved in a huge project, maybe one of the first of its kind, looking at the importance of prayer and looking at answered prayer.

And I think often, certainly as Brits, we talk about unanswered prayer.

And this is about answered prayer, which is something very different. But this is the eternal wall of answered prayer just outside Birmingham, up in the middle of England.

But before we get into all of that, Richard, maybe I can ask you to introduce yourself.

You've got a varied background from Bible College, IT, chaplain at Leicester City, and then this huge project that it seems like a NOAA endeavor, being given something which is phenomenal.

But maybe take a moment and introduce yourself before we get on to the wall of answered prayer

Yeah, I'm 56 years old, three children married became christian when I was 20, I suppose you'd describe me as a bit entrepreneurial, tried loads of things, planting churches and stuff like that was rubbish at it.

Bought and sold a software business been involved in consultancy all you know really varied and you touched on being a sort of pastor to footballers in in the in the premier league so wide and varied a little bit crazy nobody knows what to do with me, but in 2004, I was and this sounds a bit strange, but I was I was carrying a cross around my county, because I wanted people to just think about Jesus during Easter rather than Cadbury's cream eggs, though I do love them.

And while I was doing that, it got a massive reaction and I sort of prayed and said, God, what do you want me to do next?

And he gave me this idea, vision to build a national landmark about Jesus.

So, the last 20 years of my life have been largely devoted to that.

And this is getting closer.

This is opening in 2027, so three years away. It'll be the largest symbol of hope.

This is from the website In the world, and we'll host an interactive collection of stories that will be a testament to God's faithfulness.

And it'll be constructed with one million bricks, each one linked to answered prayer.

Maybe just touch on that how people can go to websites and be on one of those for answered prayer and then we'll take a step back of the process.

Yeah, sure I mean the the thing that's unique there are many elements of this project that's unique, but if you look at all the national landmarks across the globe this is one that is crowdfunded, crowdsourced, but also crowd created.

So, what we're trying to do is create this giant infinity loop piece of art with stories from all over the world and the idea is that people go online onto eternalwar.org.uk and just share with there's as many stories as they can of times that they've prayed and how God has answered and the concept is that other people then can come to the monument or look online maybe they type in the storm of life that they're currently going through and then they can find stories of people who've been in the same situation of them but have found hope through prayer to Jesus and I suppose part of it is birthed Peter from you know that there's never any good news, you know.

There's never any good news I don't really watch the news very much these days because I just find it utterly depressing and we have to find ways to get the message of hope out there there's a lot of good.

Stuff happening on this planet God is not dead he's still alive he's still he's still active.

But but we are not in the structures of this world free to share those stories anymore so we have to find another way.

I'll not bring up the picture of it because I'll let the viewers and listeners go to the website and look it up for yourself.

It is a colossal endeavor.

I will get into all of that, but maybe take a step back.

I mean when did you have this idea which obviously is a god idea because no sane person would come up with this themselves using their logic and reason, but yeah, give me an insight into how you begun to have this idea and then how conversations were.

I mean how do you tell your wife you're going to build something?

Yeah, I mean that is the thing I came home one day and my wife saw my little twinkle in my eye and she was like, oh what's going on, and I was like I think we're going to build a national landmark babe.

And I suppose you know that the thing is well where do you start and bear in mind I'm completely impractical.

I'm banned from DiY in the house.

I set fire to my own bathroom once and that was the final straw for my wife.

So I had no idea where to start with that it was just an idea and a concept so really I spent 10 years talking about it to people and praying you know simple as that and then I carried on with my different businesses and endeavors.

And then 10 years ago, just that was the time when in my prayers, I really felt God's only right.

It's time to, it's time to get moving on that.

So I, The way that we started it really was we ran a global competition with the Royal Institute of British Architects because I thought I've got to have something to get this going.

And, you know, the crazy thing was we did a crowd funder where I basically said we're going to build a national landmark about Jesus.

It's going to be made of a million bricks.

I don't know what it's going to look like.

I don't know when it's going to be where I don't know where it's going to be and I don't know when we're going to be able to build it but if you want to back this project that'd be amazing and we had an incredible story where where all the money came in with a day to go on the campaign and that sort of literally kick-started us to get going.

And then with the royal institute of British architects we ran this global competition and we got 133 entries from 28 countries, and, you know, just try to get to that point of finding the right design, which is the winning design is like a giant white infinity loop, and it arches sort of 50 metres into the skyline.

So to give you an idea, in the UK, for UK listeners, that's about two and a half times the height of the Angel of the North.

For those in the States, if you imagine the Statue of Liberty taken off her plinth she'd just fit underneath it so it will be a it will be a colossal structure, and there's been a lot of prayer to get to where we've got and and to get the right people to help us to build this.

And when you think of size, the Christ the Redeemer statue, which many people will think of as a symbol of Christianity in Rio de Janeiro, I think that's like 30, 35 meters or something for the size.

So this would tower above something like that.

Yeah, absolutely.

But the interesting thing, Peter, is if you Google Christ the Redeemer in Rio de Janeiro, you don't find anything about Jesus.

And it basically has turned into this sort of supposedly a symbol of Brazil welcoming all people to the country.

And you may Google it and find out about a French bloke who built it.

But I think it's diverted significantly from its original purpose.

We believe that around 30 million people Google that landmark every year.

And our our vision if you like is well if we can get 30 million people googling eternal war then they're going to open it up and find this database of a million answered prayers, and what are you going to do you're going to want to search it.

You're going to want to find out the things that God has done and we hope that that will inspire people to try praying.

I think we find in today's age that a lot of signs that were built to point people towards God have just become tourist attractions.

You think of cathedrals all over the world, and people flock to see a cathedral.

And somehow many people don't make the connection that this is actually for God and pointing to God.

Yeah, I think you're absolutely right I remember in the beginnings of this watching a program about Notre Dame being burned and you know a leading architect started talking about what an incredible piece of architecture this was.

And I was like, wait a second, this is built for the glory of God and so we are doing a lot of work to make sure that we put in mechanisms to make sure that this is always unashamedly Christian, And the beauty, of course, is because every brick represents a story of answered prayer, you can never really change its meaning.

And we are building something that is going to last for hundreds of years.

And who knows what our country and what Western society is going to look like in a hundred years' time.

But what I can tell you with supreme confidence is that right in the heart of it, there'll be a massive landmark that will be telling people about Jesus and I think for your listeners that's the exciting thing that if they can take the time to share stories of when they prayed those stories are going to keep being told long after we've all left the planet.

It's a proper legacy project in that respect.

It's very unusual for the UK, for US listeners for the war and posse, faith and Christianity is very much a public issue where people regularly talk about we've moved far away from that in the UK.

I'm sure there must have been people that said, Richard you know, maybe we need something a bit smaller, just just hidden away somewhere.

We don't need to be so loud about this.

Yeah, you know it's really interesting in the in we have like a public consultation for the for the planning process the zoning process for those in the States and you know somebody came up to me, a Christian, and she said, you know I know god answers prayer, but why do you have to brag about it.

And sort of stormed off.

And it's very interesting to me that you know that the British culture is one of of reserve not really wanting to brag about it, and yet you know we've had an incredible story about how God gave us the land so that we know this is exactly the right place to build it.

And God has decided to do that in a country that is so quiet, but the word of God is pretty clear.

You know, there are literally hundreds of scriptures that talk about proclaiming the deeds of the Lord, remembering the things that he's done, meditating on his deeds.

There's loads of evidence of people putting stones down to remember what God has done.

And so I do think it's going to be a little jolt to the culture in this country when when it finally starts to get built you the.

The size of it, you touched on that, having the land.

You don't put something like this just in your back garden, so what were the what were those conversations, because you have an idea of concept one you can build it that's one thing.

You need to put it somewhere what were those conversations like with me local authorities or local landowners as you sought to find not only a piece of land, but permission to put it there?

Well yeah I'll take those two two things because they're two significant stories really. In terms of the land we presented the concept in parliament in 2000.

I think it was 2014 and I remember one of the members of parliament asking me well this is a great vision, but how are you going to fund it, and I just quick as a flash said oh I've got a really big backer behind me.

Which at the time I was very convinced that that was Jesus that was behind me, because I only had five pounds in the bank.

I was very happy that he didn't follow up with the question of who that big backer was, but at that point I was like well I really need to find some land so we were invited to go to a conference, my wife and I, in Reading, California.

And we went to that conference and my wife and I were like okay we've got to find land now, and then somebody came up to us and said, hey I've been praying, I don't know who you are, but I feel like I've got a word for from God for you.

Which I was like oh right okay, and she just basically said you know God wants you to know he's got some heavenly land for you.

Now for me that was pretty amazing early on in the journey to travel halfway across the planet and somebody to tell me something like that.

So I just had a had a chat with my team right and I said you know I've got this word that God's got some land and one of my team just said well I'll just ask him where it is.

She said that'll save us a lot of time and money and I just sort of laughed, I went yeah okay.

And so she basically prayed and you know sent me a google map with this piece of land circled and said either this is the land or the person who owns it is going to be significant for the project.

And then but what when she sent it through what she didn't know was two days previous the guy who owned that land had emailed me and asked to meet with me which is mad and so then I meet with him and he basically the end of the meeting God had spoken to me in 2004 to build a landmark.

He then told me that God had spoken to him in 2003 to build a landmark. And I'd never told you about...

You mean God was ahead of you, surely not.

Yeah I know, I know well that has been one of my major lessons on this 20 year journey he has a better plan than me and yeah so incredible so he decided to give me some land I didn't tell him about the land that the woman had circled and basically he gave me a number of bits of land which didn't work and then eventually he paid an architect to look at all the land they owned in the UK and he came back with the piece that the woman had circled which is just outside Birmingham which is 90 miles north of London in between two motorways where you know.

I think it's sort of about 800,000 people will see. It'll have that much impact so.

That's great but then the massive hurdle on top of that is how do you get how do you get planning and and in context of we're talking about a country where you can lose your job for wearing a cross, you know.

we we are now I think, you know, in in recent days somebody has got arrested for praying you know outside silently praying so we're now we now live in a country we're in certain parts of the country it is illegal for a Christian to silently pray.

I mean it's an incredible move so for me on that journey peter i'm talking to people about this great vision and everyone's going oh that's really nice rich yeah that's great and inside they're thinking he is never getting the planning permission he is never getting the planning permission but but one of the things that I've discovered I was expecting it to be an immense battle and and it wasn't as as much as I thought there were multi-faith objections, but my argument was hey we do live in a multi-faith society in this country.

But I love the fact that we live in a multi-faith society because we have the freedom to express our faith and this is how we as a faith want to express it and actually the planning consultant did a brilliant job of demonstrating that their multi-faith policy is couldn't restrict them from giving us permission, because it wasn't multi-faith.

So you know it was a long process, COVID hit in the middle, but we just kept on going and you know through through a lot of prayer we pretty much turned around the council that was 14-0 against to to winning 13-0 with one abstention.

And the council are all behind us they're very, very positive.

They appreciate the sensitivity in which we're approaching this because in our education center, we will have a piece where we say, well, this is what other faiths believe about prayer.

I don't think we need to be shy about that.

And I'm very happy for people to come and make their own decisions.

But the beauty of the project is you're creating a piece of art that allows people the space and time to consider whether Jesus is alive and whether they should pray and as long as you do that in the appropriate sensitive way I think it's okay.

Obviously, for the council it's a massive bonus that we're building a national landmark that I think we did an economic report that said it's going to generate 1.2 billion for the local economy in 10 years.

So, you know there were practical economic reasons why they were positive but I didn't get the degree of opposition I was expecting in that respect.

As a sidestep I would also love to get to Reading California but never been able to get there I've tried on two occasions and both times God's put a block so I'm hoping for the third time.

I can pigeonhole you now immediately, Richard.

But it's that opposition, because this is about prayer.

It can be general.

People can see it as general.

You talk to those who are not Christians who say at times of crisis they pray.

Say, well, who are you praying to?

And that's a confusing topic for them when they don't actually believe in any greater being, in any creator. But what were the conversations?

Because, again, we live in a very multicultural society.

We live in a society where under 50% say they probably believe in God.

Church attendance has fallen.

And you're probably doing what, in effect, the church should be doing, but maybe has taken a backseat on this.

But tell us about the conversations you have with local authority, with councils as you're putting forward.

What was that like?

Because you talked about full opposition to full acceptance.

Well, I think in some respects, the narrative that we are a secular society is false.

I don't believe that is the truth.

And so we're spun statistics that just aren't true.

We did some research just after COVID and 50% of 25 to 18 year olds said that they prayed at least once a month.

Now, when that was presented on the BBC, they spun that. And they spun it to say, well, there's a rise in Islam and a rise in Sikhism.

And I was like, that is not what the statistics say.

That's not what the research says.

Richard Gamble:

[22:15] And you can go online and see me getting quite cross on the BBC.

But the reality was those statistics were 56% of people said that they were Christian.

I think it was seven percent said they were Muslim so the statistics don't bear that out and I think even that the narrative of like oh well the church is in decline. I don't believe that, that is not what i'm seeing and what I'm seeing. I'm in a unique position because I'm traveling around churches all over the country to share about this vision and what i'm seeing is that there are pockets of churches that are seeing explosive growth in this country and that growth is predominantly you know in your sort of 15 to 25 year olds who of of a younger generation coming through who want certainty. You know their identity is is based in the in the certainty of of the word of God and they're attracted to it.

So I think when you present that as a with a with more sort of statistics to back it up it shows that this is of interest and you know one of the surprising things for me Peter on the journey is the amount of people who are, I mean the most of the opposition I've had has been church-based opposition and

Richard Gamble:

[23:49] for people who don't have a faith.

They they love it it's it's so encouraging you know we have people we had a guy put up a sign in our office he was like this is amazing and just took loads of brochures from us just went off and told everybody about it.

So, I think when this goes up in 2027 it's going to have a major impact not only on the nation but I think it was it'll spread across the nations.

I think it's the time in a God that we're building this and I personally believe it like I spoke in the revival that's coming.

Yeah, 100 percent with you.

Another concept of this is look we have many statues of saints and churches covered with paintings of Jesus but that's focused on the person of God where this focuses on the relationship with God, because you there's no way you can look at prayer, you've an image of God and that's an image, but this is a direct link to Who God is and that's why this is something I think fairly different

Yeah, and and I think people when they hear of the title eternal wall of answered prayer often think that we are sort of promoting a what I would call a supermarket God.

You present your list and you get all the things well you know that has definitely not been my experience over the last 20 years trying to build this and so you're gonna have a whole range of stories in there and some of them are immediate wows, you know, we had one come in yesterday of a person with a brain aneurysm that got healed and you read it like, wow.

This is just amazing, but then other stories are stories of people who've waited 50 years for God to answer their prayer and then other stories are you know this is what I prayed but the answer was no.

And this is how God helped me through my through the suffering of that answer.

And what people, I think, will be surprised about, and you've absolutely hit the nail on the head, is this is about relationship.

It's about having a relationship. And we want to really encourage people to share loads of stories that then paint that picture.

And, you know, a million is a huge number.

I mean, again, my naivety.

I just went, oh, let's just do a million.

That sounds good I mean if we put if we put a million Lego bricks on top of each other it would reach into the stratosphere that's how big a million is, so a million stores is a lot, but for people who come whether they visit or whether they visit online if somebody's in Dallas and they go onto the database they may ask the question, well does god answer prayer in Dallas and they'll be able to search through the database and find stories from the place that they live wherever they are in the world.

They've only got to find one story that they believe in and it's going to rock their world and that's what we're trying to achieve right that's our way of making hope visible.

Think people the term unanswered prayer makes people come up with an idea that God chooses to ignore prayer yet the flip side is which I know I'm sure will come across the educational center is that that unanswered prayer means prayer that God has said wait or has not said yes or no there only is one of two answers this is binary it's yes or no in terms of answer it's never a ignore.

Yeah, I think there is yeah.

I totally agree, I don't really bide for the the philosophy or theology of unanswered prayer.

I think it is a, I think it is a comfort for many people to not press into God and to stop praying.

I don't want to be glib about that.

I've had many, many times where God has not answered prayer in the way that I would like, and that does cause pain.

So I know that a lot of people would swap all those answered prayers that they have had for the one to keep their loved one with them.

I get that.

but I think God is I think god is less interested in the moment when the prayer is answered or isn't answered and more interested in the relationship and the journey that we that we travel.

And that's the message that we've got to get out to the nation, because as you've touched on you know the church is largely on mute in this country.

It's been put on mute by by different strategies and we've got to break open to that to say that actually our relationship's available for everybody.

I heard somebody saying it was a very interesting comment, they said you know in relation to the guy who was healed at the pool of best said a is that the right way to say it, and they said you know if that happened in the modern day journalists would be all over, interviewing the 1,990 people who didn't get healed and say well how did you feel about that, And that's the trap, I think, on an answer prayer is that instead of people going, wow, that's amazing.

God did that.

They go, yeah, but why didn't he do this? And why didn't he do that?

We're not getting involved in that.

We are very simply going, we're just going to tell you loads of stories. I'm going to tell you loads of stories of the amazing things that he's done. And, you know, we're having those stories fly.

And I've got two stories about God helping people to move jeeps out of sand dunes. I mean, that's just ridiculous.

I never thought we'd get that.

But it's incredible to see them come in.

And it will be, I think, an absolute treasure trove for people once we're up and running.

Well, people will learn that God is creative, if nothing else.

But at the top of the website, there's a tagline, making hope visible, which is a really interesting idea, because hope, according to the world's thinking, is kind of that expectation or desire for something to happen.

And it's not really rooted in reality as such.

We could unpack the whole concept, but what do you mean by making hope visible?

Cause hope as maybe a feeling is something that's hidden, but you want to put this on one of the largest monuments in the world.

So what do you mean making hope visible?

I suppose, I suppose the best way, let me describe it like this, is if I can describe it in a single story, I was diagnosed 30-odd years ago with a disease called Ankylosing Spondylitis, which causes extreme curvature of the back, and met with the doctor, and he basically said, you know, it's going to move up your back, and as it moves up, as it gets to the top, I mean, these are his words, he went, you're screwed.

And I just went out of that, out of that surgery going, I was quite angry and I was like I'm not gonna have those words over my life.

I know that he's an expert.

he's trying to do his best, but i'm not gonna let that overall what the word of God says about me.

Now I spent a good 15 to 20 years praying to be healed and I was healed.

So, we often live in a culture where fear-mongering despair.

You know bad news which we touched on the beginning is is all that's ever broadcast, so I'm imagining somebody who maybe is diagnosed with Ankylosing Spondylitis, and loses hope and they whether they're digitally visiting or physically visiting find my story and then that gives them hope that there is a there is an alternative, that the facts that they've been presented with are not the truth.

They're the facts but they're not necessarily the truth, and so it hopefully moves them into a dynamic of like there's an alternative here I can pray.

And that way, we are stacking together a million bricks to actually declare to the nations that there's a whole load of hope here.

There's a whole load of evidence that can change your mindset and your paradigm that you're currently operating in.

Does that make sense?

Oh, it does.

And I think it's a concept which sometimes, well, many Christians struggle with, but the world 100% struggles. And there's a verse in the New Testament that's well-known, often read at weddings and written by Apostle Paul to the church in Corinth, which is just west of Athens.

And it's 1 Corinthians 13, 13.

It says, now these three remain, faith, hope, and love, but the grace of these is love. I think people have an understanding.

All those three concepts are utterly under attack.

And people are questioning what it means.

But hope is faith and love, people maybe understand, because there's a worldly understanding of what they are.

But it's interesting, this term hope, that it's one of those three, I think, which people maybe struggle to grasp and understand.

Because in Christianity, in the Bible, it's rooted on absolute, and that is God.

where in the world it's shifting sands and therefore people don't have that foundation or root so they don't have any hope in anything.

Yeah, and I, you know, my journey in this impossible journey to build a national landmark and we are hey listen we're starting in march we're going to make a big big announcement next year.

I've had to constantly at times on a daily basis recalibrate my mind and my soul and my spirit, because you get a barrage of you can't do it, it ain't going to happen, you're never going to raise the money, you'll never get the stories, you'll never get the planning permission, no architect's ever going to want to design this, and you know the list is massive, but where I get my hope from is I look at the stories where God has done things on the journey that no man could do.

And that hope then causes me to pray for the next obstacle to overcome and that hope then over time transforms into faith which is the conviction that it's going to happen.

And so we are I think going to be a catalyst for literally millions of people to begin that hope journey which we trust will transform to a faith and a conviction that God can.

And this is all another word that comes into mind is thankfulness. And I think we often take things without giving thanks. And the Bible is full of stories.

I mean, the lepers, when Jesus healed 10 lepers and one came back and thanked Jesus. I think we are often guilty of a lack of gratitude.

And I know that's often not talked about in a worldly context.

You can have write down your your thoughts of gratitude each day, your journaling all of that.

Well it was written in the bible a long time ago this concept of thankfulness and such a public monument of gratefulness I think it'll be extremely powerful

Yeah, and I think it's it's something that doesn't naturally sit in our culture.

And if you look at Israel, you know, with their thanksgiving.

Their remembrance of the Passover, you know, that thread runs through the Bible and you know I wrote a book simply called Remember which just looks at the way that the importance of that remembrance and thankfulness and appreciation of what God has done and continually revisiting that.

And the importance of that and we we are in this sort of like throwaway society which I think has actually influenced Christianity where people are praying God is answering and half the time they don't even notice he's answered and if they do they They just go, well, that's great, and then move on to the next one.

So there are many layers, I think, to what we're trying to achieve here.

And I just and I hope even even the act, if you like, the the the process of Christians going, oh, I wonder what break I shall have.

I mean, I'm hearing of loads of people going, oh, I don't I don't know if I've got to answer my prayer.

Then they they spend 20 minutes thinking about it and suddenly they get a great list and they're thankful and it restores their faith they renews them.

So, hope some of your listeners will do that for us that'd be amazing.

No, definitely go to the website and see have a think of how God has intervened in in your life and whether it's big or small we are called to to give glory to God and respond to that.

And the Bible is it's actually for one other term in the Bible is there are a number of cases whenever a prophet or the angel comes says the Lord has answered your prayer and I kind of think we live in a society where we would say which prayer, because we just come with our shopping list and you talked about the concept of pressing in and because we don't focus on one issue or a number of issues we kind of well we pray that I say move on to something else.

And there's this idea of actually holding on to something you need or believe in and you don't let go as Jacob you don't let go until you get an answer.

Yeah there's a great song out at the moment called don't stop praying by Matthew west and it's great challenge but again that's the short term is, you know, I've you mentioned it's a bit of a Noah project when you look at Noah most of his time was spent waiting.

You know he had very little action to be truthful most of the time he's just banging about waiting for god to do the next thing and but again as i said that's the process and the journey of going deeper with god if god just said yes all the time we we'd never learn about him we'd never learn his ways which is more precious than any answer and more precious than than gold and silver I think there's a film with Jim Carrey isn't there when he's got Bruce Almighty that's it and he just says yes all the time it's a disaster and you know i'd probably be easier to get answered prayers but i'm, God loves us so much to hold back those answers at times so that we really get to know him better.

And we often draw closer to him in the valleys than we do on the top of the mountain.

Yeah.

And also the idea of prayer being public and private.

We think in the UK it's something, private prayer.

You go to other churches and it's very public with everyone praying at once.

You've got different concepts or ideas, but I think we often forget that actually in the UK, we did have national days of prayer, certainly during Second World War.

I think there were six or seven days called for prayer.

One of the first was the evacuation at Dunkirk.

And I think something like this, this concept, this wall of answered prayer can point us towards, again, the act of calling the nation to prayer, because we've a lot to pray about in our nation.

Yeah, yeah, that's very good.

That's a very good point.

And encouraging people to pray big prayers.

We've just, I don't want to advertise a competing podcast, but I will give it a go.

We're in the middle of a podcast called When We Prayed, which is capturing what actually happened on the seven times that the King of England called the nation to pray during the Second World War.

And some of the stories are incredible.

the Dunkirk story that you point out I think is particularly poignant because the reality was Churchill was told we'd get 30 000 soldiers off the king off the beaches.

The king called the nation to pray, there's records of over a million people praying in churches and then we see a number of miracles.

Hitler changes his mind makes one of the worst military decisions in history.

We see we see bizarre weather patterns that causes planes to not be able to take off and yet you know by the sea that the the sea is described like glass and all of those we have incredible immunity of soldiers where they're shot down, they all lie down in the sand, get up and see their silhouettes in bullets, but they're unharmed.

I mean, some incredible things happen.

But that story of Dunkirk, two generations on, has been lost.

You know, it's the film by Christopher Nolan doesn't even mention prayer.

It's all put down to the courage of men on boats, which, again, I believe is part of the answer to prayer, that men were so courageous to do that.

And we've put out a video about this. And then you get loads of people going, no, no, no, it wasn't that.

Well, God wasn't involved, da, da, da, da, da, da, da. And unless we go well hang on a second if God wasn't involved then why did the whole nation, have a day of thanksgiving to God only a few days afterwards, because they knew it was it was a move of the divine.

But two generations later we've forgotten it, and I and and you see that of course in the Bible where they forget the things that God has done you know as they escape from Egypt.

So, part of our role at Eternal War is to capture all those stories of answered prayer through history.

So we are capturing stories from 500 BC, 500 AD, sorry, not BC, 500 AD, all the way through to the present day.

You know we are grabbing stories of people being raised from the dead in the north of Scotland you know some incredible stories.

And and we believe that we can demonstrate to people and we're going to do the same in countries all over the world but demonstrate to people that actually god's been active he's been active all this time it's just been forgotten.

Let me finish off just on how people can be involved.

They go to the website.

They can have a think.

When they finish this, sit and have a think about, actually, you've prayed and how God has answered. Even if you don't click on that link, that's a very important endeavor.

But people can also donate.

They can play a part financially.

They can maybe even send the website to maybe church leaders.

Because it's not just the individual.

It's about actually churches getting behind.

So just maybe touch on some of those to leave people with action points they can take away.

Yeah.

Well, first point then, we're a broad church.

We want to have, you know, the vast majority, I won't say all, but the vast majority of the church believes that you can pray and God can answer.

So we had 400 church leaders on the land praying together, an incredible show of unity.

The more churches we have across the world involved in this the better secondly, we need finance I'm pleased to say that we're in we're in really good shape so we'll be signing contracts very soon to begin the building but we still need more, so please get on board and help us.

18 000 people have done so far an incredible crowdfunded national landmark, but more precious than those two is your actual story.

And you can do that by video by audio you can do that by written word and just go online and I would say you know if you're in England if you're in the UK sorry have a cup of tea if you're in the states maybe a coffee would be better and just spend, give us 20 minutes of your life, to just think about what God has done and you will not be discouraged.

And then share those stories with us and those stories will then be shared around the globe for perpetuity and people will read your stories over time in this century, in the next century, maybe beyond and you are going to help people find the god who answers and what greater privilege is there than that in life completely.

So, I looking forward to this make sure the viewers listeners are are part of it the eternal wall of answered prayer which I think will not just be a physical monument, but actually will be a spiritual monument to the nation.

So Richard thank you for coming on, and I mean a slightly different focus and podcast but it's essential that this is successful and is built and that I will certainly want to be there to see it when they're the ribbon is cut and to see what God has done to bring it together so thank you so much for coming on and sharing the story of the wall of answer prayer

Thanks very much for your time peter.

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