When Intercession Is Made

Letter from a Herald reader

    Just wanted to give you a report from the “furnace room” (Intercessory Prayer Room) at the Promise Keepers in Oakland, California.  We prayed in four-hour shifts.  The largest group at any time was probably 30 – a small number to do prayer-covering for 50,000 men!  But Jesus covered the whole world with twelve, and only three of those felt the call to stand by.

    The prayer room was located in the lowest basement of the Oakland Arena, which was next to the Coliseum where the conference was being held.  It was interesting to follow the tracking of the prayers.  As prayers were ascending in the basement the answers were coming from the stadium!

    For example, we prayed for a harvest of souls and then hastened to the other building as Greg Laurie was giving the altar call and there witnessed the awesome sight of hundreds and hundreds filing toward to the front!  This must have continued for 10 to 15 minutes. Jeremiah 33:3 says, “…I will show you great and mighty things which thou knowest not.” One of those “things” was seeing a man, probably in his fifties, under such a God-given burden that he lay prostrate on the floor of the prayer room uttering only gut-level cries and wails.  His body actually convulsed with the heavy load.  Though this was completely new to some, there was a quiet hush and a tremendous amount of support.

    Before long we began to realize this man was in the throes of travail and the rest of us prayed quietly and waited.  Having gone through similar experiences myself, I felt every pain and the agony he was bearing.  I could only fall on my knees nearby and pray.  Soon I found myself doing the breathing exercises that a coach would do for some mother-to-be who was in childbirth.  But the role was reversed!  Never before have I seen a male give spiritual birth like this!  It is difficult to say how long this continued before the victory came, but when it did we all knew and began singing praises to our God.  It was awesome!

    Outsiders, like the construction crew, found their way to the prayer room, which was no easy task, and we had opportunity to pray with them.  Some of the speakers came for special prayer before going to the platform.  We laid hands on them and sent them out with God’s anointing.  Wish you could have been there!