Prayer. It's one of the most important things you'll do together as a small group... but also one of the most intimidating. Especially when your group first gets going.

Help ease the discomfort by modeling and leading different types of prayer during your meetings. After a while, you'll notice your group members becoming more and more comfortable with the idea of praying together.

Here are several types of prayers you can use to help your group get started:

1. Leader Prayer. For a first meeting where people may not know each other well, take prayer requests and then, as the leader, offer a closing prayer. To solicit prayer requests, ask the question, "How can our group pray for you this week?"

2. Volunteer Prayer. You can learn who is comfortable praying aloud by asking for volunteers. In your second meeting, ask "Who would like to close in prayer for us tonight?" Take prayer requests and have your volunteer pray.

3. Group Prayers. Divide the larger group into pairs or groups of three or four. The people in these smaller groups can focus on praying for each other.

4. Sentence Prayers. Another way to pray in a group is to have everyone complete short, simple sentence prayers. For example, ask everyone to complete one of the following sentences: "Lord, I want to thank you for..." or "Lord, I want to pray for..."

5. Silent Prayer. Don't overlook the power of silent prayer. There's something moving about a room full of individuals all pouring out their hearts to God at the same time.

6. Assisted Silent Prayer. Read each prayer request aloud and pause briefly (for ten seconds or so) after each one to allow the group to pray before moving on to the next item.

7. Prayer Circle. Form a circle with hands joined, and ask each person to take a turn praying. Make it clear that silent prayer is an option. A person who prays silently can squeeze the hand of the next person to indicate that he or she has finished praying.

8. Pray Scripture. Pray the Lord's Prayer or read a psalm. This can be done together or by breaking up the passage into parts. This is a form of scripted prayer that will make praying aloud easier for some.

9. Open Prayer. Anyone can offer up a prayer or prayers. When doing this, it can be helpful to designate a person to open and a person to close the prayer time. Don't rush and don't be put off by some short periods of silence.

10. Domino Prayer. Ask everyone to "Pray for the person to your right or left-silently or aloud." If someone chooses to pray silently, ask him or her to say "Amen" at the end of the prayer to indicate that he or she has finished praying.

11. Musical Prayer. Sing a common chorus or hymn, such as the Doxology.

12. Planned Prayer. Read a prayer from a book of prayers.

13. Ending Prayer. Make a final session or meeting's prayer time special by asking the group to stand together in a circle. Each group member can take a turn standing or, if comfortable, kneeling in the center of the group as the group prays specifically for him or her.