During the 40 Days of Lent in 1995 we led what became known as The California Prayerwalk. A group of 23 intercessors along with a support team for logistics prayerwalked the 800 mile route known as El Camino Real from San Diego to San Francisco crying out for spiritual awakening in California along this representative highway.
Along the way, we learned more about California’s rich history and its prophetic destiny. We came into agreement with Father Junípero Serra’s motto to always go forward, never go back and began to see California as the Vineyard of the Lord.
As we were walking along Hwy 152 toward Santa Cruz on our way to San Francisco we began to have a vision of an arrow. We were drawn to 2 Kings 13:14-19 and the story of the death of Elisha when Jehoash, the king, came to Elisha, to receive his dying counsel and blessing. Elisha instructed him to open the east window and shoot the Lord’s arrow of victory over Aram! Then Elisha said, take the arrows and “Strike the ground” but he only struck three times and stopped. And it says that “The man of God was angry with him and said, “You “You should have struck the ground five or six times; then you would have defeated Aram and completely destroyed it. But now you will defeat it only three times.”
We began to believe that we must keep striking the ground and have persistence in prayer. It is not enough to pray for victory once, twice or even three times. We must keep praying, even travail in prayer for 40 days again and again until we see the breakthrough. We envisioned the tail of the arrow in San Diego representing the release point along and guidance with the shaft going straight thru Los Angeles representing strength. But the tip of the arrow is in San Francisco where there is the fire and anointing. For the last 6 miles from the outer Mission into Mission Dolores Park we walked in the formation of an arrow tight, straight and true continually praying in the Spirit as a unified team. I can tell you that the Lord’s arrow of victory went straight into the heart of San Francisco.
The Lord’s arrow of victory smote the ground! In 2002, seven years later, the “Cupids Span” by Claes Oldenburg and Coosje van Bruggen was placed along the Embarcadero at the foot of Folsom Street in San Francisco. The 60-foot-high painted fiberglass and stainless-steel sculpture represents a bow and arrow shooting straight down into a sliver of the pedestrian park that borders the Embarcadero. Is this just coincidence or does God have a sense of humor? This 60’ arrow embedded in the ground is a constant reminder that breakthrough is coming to San Francisco. It is time to end rebellion and “bridge the gap” between the generations allowing God to turn our hearts back toward one another again.