The initiation and growth of the ministry, Walking the Prayer Labyrinths, developed in a very organic way over the past several years. It is an example of cooperative partnerships and connections which cause a rippling effect which expands a ministry beyond any initial conceptions.
A couple of weeks ago over lunch, Scott Hensley, the coordinator of Walking the Prayer Labyrinths, shared story after story of how this ripple effect has impacted his life and connected him with people he would never have otherwise met. One of the stories Scott shared was about a labyrinth restoration project in Pahrump, Nevada. It exemplifies the Great Connection of networking, partnering, and friendship-making.
I asked Scott to write about the project, here is what he had to say…
(View Slide Show Below!)
Using labyrinths as an outreach of ministry starts with a single step. That is to say, the step you take when entering the labyrinth. To walk and pray in the labyrinth is to release your worries and anxieties, listen for God’s voice and prompting at the center, and then return to the world as you exit the labyrinth.
Walking the Prayer Labyrinths of the north district started as a ministry of the north district lay leader to introduce people from various churches and no churches to our area’s fantastic prayer and meditation labyrinths. Phyllis Murray has created a renewed interest in walking public labyrinths in southern Nevada.
The ministry thrived during Covid as people responded to the opportunity to be outdoors. During the labyrinth ministry, Phyllis connected with one of the master gardeners at the Pahrump Cooperative Extension, where the labyrinth group walked the labyrinth in the garden several times each year. In July of 2021, when the Pahrump labyrinth was decimated by severe flooding, we reached out to collaborate and offer help to restore it.
The call went out to all of the labyrinth prayer walkers in southern Nevada, and a plan was created to restore the flooded labyrinth. Volunteer members of the prayer walkers met first to remove the original rocks, and then topsoil was donated for the new base layer of the labyrinth. One of the volunteers, a retired architect, designed a new path that would be easier to walk with wider tracks, and finally, when the topsoil had been packed and prepared, volunteers met again to replace the rocks using the new design.
During the restoration project, Phyllis remarked, “It has been wonderful to meet new people, find out how labyrinths came to be, and watch their impact on people’s lives.” To see a map and photos of prayer labyrinths in southern Nevada, visit www.vegaslabyrinths.org.
