Praying for the City

While we were in Caracas for our planning trip, our group really wanted to have a time of prayer for the city. Of all the large cities in South America, Caracas has the smallest percentage of Christians among their population. While discussing what we could do with our free afternoon on Friday, someone suggested riding the cable cars up to the top of the mountain to look out over Caracas. We decided this would be a great opportunity to look out over this huge city of 6 million and pray for its people. So the seven of us...Kerry & Diane, Buck, Gail, Jacobo, Ladimiro, and Bill...rode up to the top of the mountain. We weren't very high before we began to see the city spawling below us in every direction. We saw the stadium where we hope to hold the evangelistic crusade in January. We saw hundreds of highrises which housed the people of Caracas. We saw the different areas of the city where pastors and leaders will be trained for the crusade. We saw the houses built up on the side of the mountain, in every little crevice and valley. The higher we went, the more we saw. But this is the rainy season in Venezuela, and there were dark clouds threatening around us. Sure enough, just before we got to the top, we were enveloped in a cloud. Stepping out of the cable car, the air was cold and misty...you could barely see twenty yards down the path, much less the city down below. As we walked along the path on the top of the mountain, surrounded by a cloud, we knew we were also surrounded by God, and He was encouraging us to do as we had intended...to stand and pray for the city of Caracas. He just wanted us to see it, not through our physical eyes, but through our spiritual eyes...through His eyes. Even if we could have seen, we would only been able to see buildings. Through our spiritual eyes, we began to see what God saw...each and every individual thirsting to know of His love. That is how we prayed...that God would begin now to prepare each and every heart in the city of Caracas...some would be led to be a part of the leadership team...others would be led to attend the crusade, perhaps hearing about Christ for the first time...still others would be led to bring a friend, a family member, a neighbor. We prayed that all would know of the grace and mercy and salvation known only through Jesus Christ. Then we sang a couple of praise songs, standing in a circle, under a flagless flagpole, in the midst of a cloud on top of a mountain. We sang in English, then with the help of our translator, we sang in Spanish. Our hearts are still burdened for the people of Caracas, but we continue to pray for each and every man, woman, boy and girl. We pray by faith, and not by sight.