On September 29, 2011, a group of about 45 pastors, intercessors and worshippers of all ages traveled 346 miles by bus to seven locations in the Mat-Su Valley to declare the Kingdom of God – that Jesus was reigns as sovereign over our valley using scripture, worship, and prayer.  A prayer team had worked for several months, asking God specific questions.  They were:

1.  Where are the highway gateways to the Mat-Su Valley?

2.  Why are they gateways?

3.  What specifically do You want declared in each of these places?

Though the date was arbitrarily chosen, it landed on Rosh Hashanah, the Jewish new year – The Feast of Trumpets.

Leviticus 23:24

“Give the following instructions to the people of Israel. On the first day of the appointed month in early autumn, you are to observe a day of complete rest. It will be an official day for holy assembly, a day commemorated with loud blasts of a trumpet.”

“The Holy One said, ‘on Rosh Hashanah recite before Me [verses of] Sovereignty, Remembrance, and Shofar blasts (malchuyot, zichronot, shofrot): Sovereignty so that you should make Me your King; Remembrance so that your remembrance should rise up before Me. And through what? Through the Shofar.’”

 In Jewish tradition, kings were crowned at the riverside at Rosh Hoshanah, the Feast of the Trumpets.   The day was also symbolic of the day of judgment of the Lord, when sins were forgiven.

The group included an expert shofar blower and the Word of the Lord was sounded at each of the gateways, accompanied by the powerful blast of the shofar.

The week prior to the bus trip, acting on II Chronicles 7:14, the pastors of VPPN spent time during their regular meeting to address the four things scripture says defile a land:  1.  the shedding of innocent blood, 2.  idolagry, 3. fornication and immorality, and 4.  covenant breaking.  (Gen. 3:17, 4:10-11; Lev. 18:20-30, 25:2-4, 26:32-35; Num. 35:33; Jer. 16:18; II Sam. 21; Isaiah 24:5-6; & Malachi 2:16)

For a copy of the crafted prayers decreed over the Mat-Su Valley:  Highway Gate Prayers