Kitty O'Shea's Prayer Group - June 5

Seven regulars gathered at Kitty’s to pray, joined by D. who had been before but who had meanwhile been involved in starting Fenway Church. He shared of the experience of the starting the church there.

We also heard of the prayer meeting at Tremont Temple on the day of Pentecost, the day before, which several people had attended.

We were reminded of the prime call to faithfulness in witness—through the examples of S’s evangelism team which had gone to Newton to evangelize, despite the rain when they started; and B’s recent encounter with a woman on a plane flight.

In prayer, we lifted up all churches and organizations which sought the Kingdom in Boston, praying for unity and a sense of partnership. With D. present, we prayed especially for Fenway church and the Fenway/Kenmore area. We prayed also for the safe arrival of their first child later this month, and that he and his wife would be ready, and blessed.

We prayed for the small seeds sowed faithfully—whether in Newton or on airplanes—that God would water them by his Spirit and cause them to grow to become mighty oaks of righteousness. We prayed in the words of Galatians 6:9: Let us not become weary in doing good, for at the proper time we will reap a harvest if we do not give up.

We also continued to pray for Trinity Congregational, Wayland and Newton, and other areas like it—that affluence would not choke hunger for God. We prayed especially for Jewish people—that they would come to know the true Messiah. We kept up our prayers for good to come from the viewing of the daVinci Code movie.

We remembered M’s son Steve, currently in Istanbul—praying that the trip there would be truly transformational in his life.

June 4th - Global Day of Prayer @ Tremont Temple

Over the past few months, God has been wonderfully at work bringing His people closer together. He has been breaking denominational and racial barriers, bringing urban and suburban churches into greater unity, increasing our sense of being part of a corporate Church that He wants to revive and empower to do His will in the world. The Global Day of Prayer gathering on June 4th at Tremont Temple is an opportunity for believers in this region to continue strengthening the bonds of Christian unity.

Seven weeks ago, thousands of Christians gathered near Franklin Park in Dorchester to celebrate a "Sacred Assembly." We were blessed by the corporate prayer, and the intense passion and hunger for God expressed by the diverse group of believers that gathered there on that day. Before that event, a wonderful time of prayer and worship took place in January at Tremont Temple, with over a thousand believers gathering to celebrate this new wind of revival that is beginning to blow over New England. Meetings of intercessors from all over the region have been regularly taking place during the past few weeks, and gatherings of key spiritual leaders have been increasing revealing an unprecedented sense of trust and camaraderie among them. God is certainly doing a new thing, and we should all feel blessed to be alive at such a time as this.

Many of us have sung that chorus that says: "Bind us together, Lord. Bind us together, with cords that cannot be broken." There is certainly a significant role God must play to bring His people together. But there is also a ministry work He has left for us to do to help bring us into the unity of the faith. We have a sacred responsibility to discern God's intentions for this time and to do all that we can to reach out to one another. God is calling us to embrace the effort to promote Christian unity in this region. By attending activities that facilitate functional unity among believers, by supporting financially efforts such as the Global Day of Prayer and Covenant for New England, and by lending our time and talents to the organization of similar efforts, we will be aligning ourselves with God's Spirit and setting a strong foundation for revival.

I urge you to come and gather with us on June 4th at Tremont Temple, particularly from 5 to 8 p.m. It will be a wonderful, intense time of celebration and prayer. God's Spirit will meet us there, and we will advance what He is doing in His Church. It will also be a time of vision casting, spiritual impartation and further development of a sense of corporate identity for all of us. Please do not miss it. Commit right now to attend and to pray for this event. Let others in your church know and invite as many as possible to come with you on that day.

Prayer rooms will be open in the Temple from 8:00am to 4:30pm for prayer.

I look forward to seeing you there!

-Dr. Roberto Miranda, Pastor, Lion of Judah, Boston, MA

The Blessing

"...You are the sons of the prophets and of the covenant which God gave to your fathers, saying to Abraham, 'And in your posterity shall all the families of the earth be blessed.' God, having raised up his servant, sent him to you first, to bless you in turning every one of you from your wickedness" (Acts 3:25-26 RSV).

A few weeks ago in our inner-city neighborhood, my wife and I attended the funeral of a young man who was killed a street away from his home and several streets away from our own doorsteps. We wept as people from near and far; church, community and city leaders, eulogized a life tragically cut short by a senseless act of violence. Days later, a direct descendant of a very wealthy family shared a sad tale of his difficult upbringing. His mother was left out of the family's fortune (blessing). His most memorable statement was that leaving his mother out of the will (blessing) was an act of violence to her and her offspring.

The Blessing is an ancient institution that passed not only the rights of the family fortune but also favor with God to the firstborn. In Jacob's case, it created separation between brothers. Christ comes and interprets the Blessing in light of redemption. The criterion now is no longer birth order or affluence, but Christ. In Christ, we are all inheritors of the Blessings of God. The Blessing of Christ breaks down the walls of separation that divide fathers and sons, Greeks and Jews, us and them. The dirty little secret in our churches is that we often live in places where we believe the blessing is based on criteria other than Christ. We believe we do not have to be our brother's keeper; we believe some deserve the blessing while others do not. We believe that our private sins do not have public implications. All the while, blood is on our streets and the righteous cry remains silent.

Let us pray that during this season the Church unifies under the banner of Christ and Christ alone. Like it was in the days of Pentecost, may the Church be a model of unity of all people groups, miraculously speaking diverse languages, but yet understood. The promised blessing is for all who seek the Lord and proclaim His name. Let the church be an instrument of God's Blessing.

-Rev. Ronald Verna, PureSpring Ministries Boston, MA