After months of extreme depression, Cassi and I arrived in New England feeling like exiles. I began attending Seminary at Gordon-Conwell and was directed to a healing prayer ministry by one of my professors. Slowly, I began to heal and regain hope. We did the Spring 10 days at our church, a mere 3 hours each night. 1 other person joined in—God showed up throughout and healed Cassi of strep-throat instantly on our wedding anniversary.

In 2006, we did “A Time to Mourn” with 7 others from our church. During this time, God gave me substantial healing from the pride that had haunted me from my youth. He also gave me an assignment, although I was not looking for one: “Call 120 to pray for 10 Days leading up to Pentecost”. He showed me four rooms of prayer—I saw people moving like bees between rooms for Worship, Intercession, Public Scripture Reading, and Silence. Jeff Marks, my mentor from New England Concerts of Prayer, encouraged and confirmed me in this call. I began to be involved in the New England Alliance, a regional group of leaders that was just beginning at the time. David McCahon, a prayer leader and pastor from the Pioneer Valley partnered with me at this time for our first 10 Days Northfield. Along the way, God amazingly confirmed each step we took. Among other signs, He confirmed our choice of location by showing us that DL Moody had done a similar 10 Days of Prayer in that very spot in 1880.

From May 17-May 27 2007, a core group of about 12 people and 122 total people participated in the first ever 10 Days in Northfield, Mass., a place I had never heard of four months before we arrived. We capped our 10 days off by attending the New England wide GDOP in Fitchburg. Those of us who stayed for the entire 10 days left changed people, having experienced, in the words of one participant “a degree of unity that I did not believe possible before heaven.”

From May 1-May 11, 2008, a core group of about 25 adults and 10 children participated in the second 10 Days, Northfield. Our ranks ebbed and flowed with visitors who stayed a few nights and locals who showed up at night for dinner and worship—one night we served 90 people for dinner—our worship room was beginning to overflow. Local pastors got involved, met one another, prayed together, and served at the Lord’s Table together. The presence of God was strong, a tangible increase from last year—we each grew and changed so much and left with awesome stories of what God had done as well as a charge to “freely give” what God had given us during the 10 Days to our local churches. We were joined during this time by praying Christians around the world, but relationally by 10 days of prayer events in Salem, Haverhill, and Bethlehem, Israel.