It was 6:40 on a Thursday morning, and I was off to attend a men's group at a local church for the very first time. My good friend Bill, who leads it, had invited me countless times to join him. When I arrived, I was greeted by a handshake and a "hello" from each of the 20 men in the room. After the opening prayer, I found a seat and settled in to hear Bill's message of encouragement.

Bill did a fantastic job. It appeared that the message was really resonating with the other guys in the room. At the end of the message, we broke up into table discussion for the remaining 10 minutes. Then came the question: "Does anyone have a prayer request?"

Before I go any further, let's further unpack the flow of the morning, which went something like this: 15 minutes of coffee and fellowship, 5 minutes of opening prayer, 20-minute devotional message followed by 10 minutes of table discussion and/or prayer needs. Believe it or not, I've seen this timeline at almost every men's gathering I've attended, regardless of denomination, location or number of attendees. It's simply become the acceptable format, given men's time constraints and attention spans. Today, let's not get into whether this is the right format. For our purposes, I want to focus on the last 10 minutes, aka prayer time.

Without question, we need a paradigm shift when we gather guys together, especially when it comes to open discussion time. Unscripted and unformatted "table time" can quickly degenerate into football conversations. Open prayer time, sparked by the ominous question "Does anyone have a prayer request?" often results in lengthy periods of awkward silence, followed by bold intercessions for our second cousin's grandmother's dog who has cataracts.

Isn't it fair to say that every man in the room has a prayer need that impacts them directly and, often, urgently? Intercessory prayer is great, but after a week of being in the world, odds are pretty good that every man has a personal prayer request. So how do you maximize your time so you can really get down to business with God, together?  Try these ideas:

1. Make the time to talk. Don't get so immersed in programs or lengthy messages that you forego or abridge discussion time.

2. Draft discussion questions. This will help keep guys on point. Make your questions consistent with the message, and keep them concise to avoid going off on wild tangents.

3. Give up a few additional minutes of the message. Maybe even skip a bullet point. Real growth in our lives as men occurs through relationship, not lengthy messages.

4. Set the tone. During prayer time, submit one of your own requests first. And be real about what you need prayer for!

5. Take a week off from the "message." Give up one week of study and just hang out together. No message, no topic… just guys grabbing donuts and coffee and talking about whatever happens to come up.

6. Stick around. Be available after group time to pray with guys who have needs they didn't want to share with a group.

Remember that discipleship happens in the context of relationship. Give your men time to get to know each other and pray about what's really going on in their lives. Help them to understand that when they do so, God will do amazing things. 

David Dusek is founder and director of Rough Cut Men Ministries, a ministry which uses action-movie clips and relevant men's issues to develop David-and-Jonathan relationships among men. For more information about Rough Cut Men, visit www.roughcutmen.org.