How Prayer Changed New York

I have a good friend who lived in New York city years back, and so I sent him this interesting analysis of the changes in the city.

I really enjoyed his response:

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Glenn,Thanks for the article. I lived in NYC in the late 80s and early 90s. He is right; it was a very bad place. Crack vials piled up along gutters like leaves in autumn. My neighborhood had the highest homicide rate in the city; it was a fearful place. Olasky left out what I believe is the single biggest reason that NYC changed...prayer. In 1989, the city had Calvary Baptist (anchor of evangelicals) and Gordon MacDonald and Tim Keller. Those churches began praying for the city. [My wife and I] would get up early on Friday morning and travel to mid-town to a small prayer meeting of leaders at Redeemer where we experienced the most delicious group prayer times that I have ever had. We prayed for the usual Aunt with a bad hip and friend with a dying dog, but mostly we prayed that God's kingdom would be realized in the city; we affirmed that God loved NYC and wanted to change it; we implored Him to do so. We prayed for social justice and for individual hearts; we prayed for revival in the Jonathan Edwards sense of word. We didn't pray for church programs; we prayed for the chaotic outpouring of the Holy Spirit. As Harvey Conn says, "prayer is rebellion against the status quo" that is what we did.
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This helps get me fired up to pray for revival in my area!