Wednesday, March 28, 2007

Revival is coming!!

God is doing some amazing things in my city.

About 18 months ago (Nov 2005), one of the ministers in the city (a Baptist minister, I think), had a vision from God, making it clear that unless something was done and done soon, to deal with the sin in the city (and I can tell you there is a lot!), the city would come under God's judgment.

He was sufficiently disturbed that he talked to some of the other ministers, and they agreed he should go to the Mayor and tell him what God had said. (The Mayor is a catholic, but I'm not sure he is born again - please pray for him)

He did so, and to everyone's amazement, the Major responded by asking what could be done. It was suggested that he call the churches together for a week of penitential prayer (as per 2 Chronicles 7:14). This was called "Our Turn"

As a result most of the evangelical churches (now c. 25, and even the largest Catholic church in the city) organized a week long time of prayer last November, with two churches per night opening their doors for prayer meetings and one church having a 24/7 Prayer facility open to anyone who wanted to come, with the focus on praying for God's mercy and forgiveness for both the churches and the city leaders, businessmen and inhabitants.

All this was done with the Mayor's active encouragement, and he even arranged for a final night's meeting at one of the colleges managed by the city, so as many as possible could get together for a prayer and worship meeting. To my knowledge, the Major attended almost every night at one of the churches. Furthermore, it is the first time in anyone's knowledge that a city Mayor has done this in Canada.

This has been followed up in February of this year by another 24/7 week of prayer (same church as before), with a prayer and worship service open to all the churches on the last Sunday evening.

The Mayor has now requested that the churches hold another week long "Our Turn" event later this year. This is now in preparation.

We are seeing ministers from the different churches coming together regularly to pray, and as a visiting speaker said recently, this is the first time he had ever seen a group of ministers come together to do something positive, as opposed to complain and take a stand against another ministry.

The core group includes pastors from Baptist, Methodist, Mennonite, Pentecostal, Charismatic and Word of Faith churches!!! They meet every 2 weeks in the Mayor's Chambers at City Hall for prayer and fellowship - with the Mayor's encouragement and support!!

We are also seeing steady growth amongst the evangelical churches, and in my church (which is a relative newcomer to the area), we are seeing a spurt in solid growth from an average of 25 last year to the upper 40's since the beginning of this year, and with new faces at almost every service.

John