Just a few days ago I had an amazing conversation with a woman who just returned to the area from the mission fields of Brazil.  She visited New Dimension on the Sunday Dr. Lance Wallnau gave his amazing talk. The woman attended Zion Bible College which used to be located in Barrington, RI before she and her husband headed out to the mission fields years ago.  While in school she studied much of the spiritual Rhode Island history and learned that when the Zion Gospel Temple of East Providence, the Pentecostal church that birthed Zion Bible College, was founded in 1914 the saints would pray incessantly for revival to come to Providence.

Many of you have heard me say that New Dimension Church is benefitting from the prayers of saints from long ago who saw these days only in their hearts.  Our church has added to a momentum that began long before we arrived.  I believe we have actually stepped into a God-ordained point in time, or Kairos moment, when the prayers of the saints  of old have joined forces with the fearless faith of contemporary saints to actually realize transformation in this area.

We can easily survey our own brief church history and surmise that God has released revival and transformation but let’s think outside of our own four walls for a moment and recognize God’s hand.

1) The transformation of downtown- Dr. Wallnau and his wife were amazed to see the beautiful downtown that Providence now has.  When they pastored in Rhode Island 20 years ago they said the place wasn’t desirable at all. Now downtown is full of quaint shops, restaurants, and it boast the #2 theater district in America only behind New York City’s famed  Broadway.

2) The transformation of crime- I attend a monthly meeting the Chief of Police host and in our April meeting he was happy to report  that the city was completely murder-free.  I don’t know what the murder stats are now, but as we went through the overall crime numbers what became clear is that we have seen an amazing drop in all crime over the last five years.  Just over the last 3 months or so we’ve also seen the last of the organized crime leaders arrested and put out of business.  Providence used to be famous for its mafia.  In fact, the Providence mafia was so strong it was in charge of Boston’s organized crime.  It was all managed from Providence and was a major blight on our city but Providence is no longer an organized crime stronghold and the mafia is all but non-existent.

3) The transformation of politics- This year our new mayor, Angel Taveres, took office and he is a Christian that loves God.  In addition much of the age-old corruption and cronyism in local politics has been eradicated over the last several years as well.

These are just a few benchmarks that I believe have deep spiritual implications.  There are more but I simply want you to know our city is experiencing real transformation.  Right at the end of our conversation the former missionary rocked me when she told me that as Dr. Wallnau reminded us about the saints of old in his message, she had an open vision sitting in our church.  She said the Lord showed her huge bowls of incense that represented the prayers of those old saints being poured out on New Dimension. Then God spoke these words to her… “This can not be stopped!”

Wow!!! I am so grateful to be a part of what God is doing in this hour and I only want to remind you of how important it is for us to keep foremost in our minds we are under an open heaven right now.  Sure, there are difficulties that surface periodically but we absolutely cannot afford to be impressed with the enemy. Don’t give him more credit than you need to.  He is defeated and under your feet.  When you give attention to the enemy you subconsciously empower his lies and undermine the current move of God. Keep your heart  and mind anchored in Heaven because we are in a Revival that is leading to Reformation.

This Sunday Doug Tunney, the director of YWAM Boston will be our guest speaker. Please remember  to pray for me while I travel in Norway and Switzerland with Pastor Che Ahn & Dr. Mark Stibbe.  We’re seeing amazing things thus far and I can’t wait to report to you all that God is doing around the globe.  Relational evangelism is the best evangelism so invite a friend or loved one to encounter God this week. One Soul!

More Fire,