Pleading His Case
Ron Auch Sr. has been encouraging congregants, ministers, and married couples about the power of an active prayer life for 36 years.
It’s a message he travels the globe to preach at conferences through his evangelism ministry, Pray-Tell Ministries and shares from numerous books he has written on the subject. He puts prayer into practice as co-lead pastor of Prayer House Assembly of God in Kenosha, Wisconsin, the church he planted in 1999.
“The thing that has burdened me all these years is how prayer changes the pray-er,” says Auch, a graduate of North Central University in Minneapolis. “I’m focused on what spending time in the presence of God does to change the life and heart of the one who is praying. That’s what still drives me today.”
Auch’s passion for prayer grew from personal desperation. In the 1970s, Auch struggled with a pornography addiction that affected his relationship with his wife, Lou Ann. When he began studying at Trinity Evangelical Divinity School in Deerfield, Illinois, he thought more learning would remedy his problems.
But ultimately he discovered the solution involved going back to the basics.
“In seminary, God really began to deal with me about prayer,” Auch says. “The things that prayer did in my life really healed me and my marriage.”
As Auch continued his studies, peers recognized his fresh fervor. In 1980, Auch designed a Bible-based teaching on how to develop a personal prayer life and soon had every weekend booked with speaking engagements for five months.
Through the years, Auch says he has seen prayer help churches grow, both numerically and spiritually. One example came when he worked with the staff of Journey Church in Kenosha for a year. In that time, the congregation grew by 400, with hundreds of salvation decisions.
When Auch felt the Lord calling him to plant a church in 1999, he named it Prayer House because of the centrality of prayer in what he teaches.
“People who come here know that prayer is the heart of this church,” Auch says of Prayer House, which averages 270 attendees on Sundays. “It’s why we exist.”
Auch now travels two Sundays a month to continue speaking by invitation at churches and conferences. His conferences include teachings on revival, marriage, the relationship between Christ and the church, and the role of the Holy Spirit.
For the past year, he has shared pastoral duties with his son, Ron Auch Jr., who graduated from Central Bible College in Springfield, Missouri, in 2014.
“At Prayer House, we see prayer as the mode of developing that personal relationship that’s going to be a sustaining force in life,” Auch Jr. says. “That’s pretty countercultural right now.”