The Floodgates Are Open: How Prayer Is Shifting America
Torrential rain in the nation’s capital this week was a sign of answered prayer.

I’m sure you heard the reports of thunderstorms that dumped more than a foot of rain on Washington, D.C., the last week of June. The floods washed out highways, closed government buildings, knocked out power for thousands of residents and felled a 100-year-old elm tree on the White House lawn. “I’ve never seen anything like it,” one Maryland highway administrator, Wayne Mowdy, told a local news reporter on June 26. 

What most Americans did not know was that Christians were praying up a storm behind the scenes.

“Some of our team then discerned that God was saying to us: ‘I am listening to the prayers of My people.’”
—David Cannistraci

My friend David Cannistraci, pastor of GateWay City Church in San Jose, Calif., arrived in the nation’s capital on June 18 with a team of 15 intercessors. Months earlier, David had felt strongly prompted by the Holy Spirit to lead a “prayer journey” throughout the city to ask for spiritual cleansing and to pray for a spiritual awakening in the nation. 

“I had heard [Colorado-based author and prayer leader] Dutch Sheets speak about his passion for America, and about his sense that the summer of 2006 would be key for the nation to pray,” David told me. “This strengthened our sense that something special was happening.” 

The team from San Jose literally bathed the city in prayer for three days, visiting the White House, the Capitol, the Supreme Court building, Embassy Row, the Pentagon, the U.S. Treasury and the National Cathedral, as well as all the major national memorials and museums. They also prayed at all four corners of the District of Columbia, which is laid out as a perfect square with stones marking each corner. 

The intercessors even drove stakes into the ground at the four corners as a prophetic statement, claiming the city and the nation for the gospel. They also poured oil on the stones (which were laid in 1792) and planted Bibles at each location. 

Said David: “I’m not sure if anyone in our nation’s history has ever done this, but we got it done.” 

David was particularly overcome by emotion when he stood to pray in front of the White House. “The Lord opened my ears and I could hear the sound of believers interceding across the nation,” he said. “It totally wrecked me. I will never forget the sound of tens of thousands of voices collectively crying out to the Lord. Some of our team then discerned that God was saying to us: ‘I am listening to the prayers of My people.’” 

What was most fulfilling for David and his team was their discovery that a major prayer conference had been scheduled in Washington the weekend after their prayer journey was complete. The Shift the Nation event, sponsored by prayer mobilizer Cindy Jacobs, was held at the Chevy Chase Baptist Church in one of Washington’s Maryland suburbs. It also featured Sheets, prophet Chuck Pierce and revivalists Lou Engle and Will Ford. 

At one point during the conference one of the speakers shared a prophecy that God was planning to “wash Washington.” Many of those who participated in the event believe that the deluge that began on Saturday, June 24, was a direct response to the prayers of God’s people for spiritual revival. 

David Cannistraci is convinced that something is shifting in the spiritual realm. “Standing at the zero marker [the center point of D.C., near the White House], I became convinced that God will honor the prayers of His people for America,” he said. “But the enemy’s efforts are so unrelenting that we must tirelessly press the battle until we see the breakthrough.” 

Have you grown weary in praying for the nation? Have the negativity of news reports, the continual violence in Iraq or the cynical mood of so many Americans caused you to doubt that God is working? 

Thousands of Christians were involved in intensive prayer campaigns during early 2006, including a 40-day effort during the spring and the massive Global Day of Prayer on June 4. This kind of collective intercession may not get the attention of the media, but we can be assured that heaven has noticed. The prayers of God’s people are collecting like water in a reservoir—and we are heading for a dramatic tipping point when those prayers will unleash unprecedented blessings—as well as judgment on our unseen spiritual enemies. 

God’s Word promises us that He will heal our land if we humble ourselves and pray. I believe a spiritual dam has broken. The floodgates have been opened. We can pray together: “Lord, let it rain.” 

J. Lee Grady is the editor of Charisma. He will join Peter and Doris Wagner, Dutch Sheets, Chuck Pierce, Cindy Jacobs, Kim Daniels and other speakers at the International Congress on Spiritual Warfare and Strategic Intercession from July 6-8 in Orlando, Fla. For more information log on at www.globalharvest.org.