Ed Silvoso - That None Should Perish: How to Reach Entire Cities for Christ Through Prayer Evangelism

Praise for That None Should Perish

This may be one of the most important books to be written in this last decade of the twentieth century. It will convict and encourage you. It will stir you to faith and action. It will bring you to your knees. Above all, it will give you the missing keys to unlock the demonic prison doors of sin and misbelief which holds millions of city dwellers in bondage till today.

Dr. Ed Murphy, author of The Handbook for Spiritual Warfare

Ed Silvoso makes the incredible credible. Can whole cities be evangelized? Yes! Is prayer really capable of bringing this to pass? Yes! Are there practical steps that anyone can take to defeat Dark Powers and set the captives in your neighborhood free? You bet! This book sounds the call to seize the moment. It gives you reason to hope!

David Bryant
Founder and President
Concerts of Prayer International

by Ed Silvoso

Published by Chosen Books
11400 Hampshire Avenue South
Bloomington, Minnesota 55438
chosenbooks.com

Chosen Books is a division of
Baker Publishing Group, Grand Rapids, Michigan.
www.bakerpublishinggroup.com

Chosen edition published 2014

ISBN 978-1-4412-6875-4

Previously published by Regal Books

Ebook edition originally created 2011

All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any meansfor example, electronic, photocopy, recordingwithout the prior written permission of the publisher. The only exception is brief quotations in printed reviews.

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data is on file at the Library of Congress, Washington, DC.

Scripture taken from the New American Standard Bible, 1960, 1962, 1963, 1968, 1971, 1972, 1973, 1975, 1977 by The Lockman Foundation. Used by permission.

The following Bible versions are also used:

KJVKing James Version.

Scripture quotations marked (NIV) are taken from the Holy Bible, New International Version. NIV. Copyright 1973, 1978, 1984 by International Bible Society. Used by permission of Zondervan Publishing House. All rights reserved.

This book is also available in Spanish (1-56063-849-4) and Portuguese (1-56063-850-8). Published by Editorial Unilit, Miami, FL.

Dedicated to my number one team
Ruth, loving and devoted wife
and our daughters
Karina, loyal helper and confidante
Marilyn, wise counselor and enabler
Evelyn, faithful intercessor and encourager
Jesica, close friend and partner

Cities are central to Gods redemptive strategy. The Great Commission begins with a cityJerusalemand culminates when another citythe new Jerusalembecomes Gods eternal dwelling with His people. In order to fulfill the Great Commission, we must reach every city on earth with the gospel.

Prayer is the most tangible trace of eternity in the human heart. Intercessory prayer on behalf of the felt needs of the lost is the best way to open their eyes to the light of the gospel.

In order to take the gospel to every creature, the Church is called to engage the forces of evil. The battleground is the heavenly places. This is where the battle for our cities is won or lost.

4. Strongholds: What They Are
and How to Pull Them Down

Spiritual strongholds are Satans secret weapon. It is through the surreptitious use of strongholds that Satan controls the behavior of the Church. They must be identified and destroyed in order to regain control of the heavenlies.

The believer is a deputy of the Court of Calvary assigned to enforce the judgment awarded to Jesus: the salvation of the lost. The believer is to use this delegated authority mainly in prayer.

By identifying and organizing the faithful remnant, a beachheador perimeterof godliness is established on the edge of the vast spiritual darkness that engulfs the city. This perimeter provides a tangible setting in which the kingdom of God comes.

Establishing Gods perimeter in the midst of Satans domain is a very sensitive operation. It is not enough to simply set up a perimeter; it must also be secured.

God uses the faithful remnant to establish a model. With that model in place, now others whose hearts God has been preparing must gradually be brought inside the perimeter to build up the expeditionary force that eventually will launch the attack on the forces holding the city in spiritual darkness.

Satans perimeter is best infiltrated by parachuting behind his lines and establishing thousands of prayer cells (lighthouses) to cover the entire city, block by block.

Now that the Church is in force inside Satans territory, it must sound the trumpet to signal the beginning of an all-out attack on the enemy for the purpose of bringing down the walls that keep the unsaved captive.

11. Establishing Gods Perimeter
Where Satans Used to Be

Unless spiritual warfare results in solid, tangible conversions, and those conversions are incorporated into churches, nothing of consequence has happened. We have limited ourselves to a spiritual parade.

The Great Commission began with a city: Jerusalemthe city where the disciples resided. Gods strategy to take your city for Christ begins with you and other members of the faithful remnant as you all move forward in unified prayer.

THE WORD IS BECOMING CLEARER AND CLEARER. THE HOLY SPIRIT is saying to the churches: Take the cities for God, and bring them into My Kingdom.

I believe that the primary target for Gods spiritual armies in the 1990s is the cities of the world, not that other evangelistic targets are pass or unimportant. We must continue our aggressive efforts to evangelize nations and people groups and individuals and religions and rural populations, reaching unsaved souls wherever they may be found. But lets be clear: Nothing is more important in our day than reaching our cities.

I am not alone in this conviction. Many other Christian leaders around the world are also hearing the trumpet call for the cities. Research, publications and training focused on urban populations is exploding as never before. Pastors, missionaries, teachers and other Christian workers are responding in large numbers to Gods call to the cities.

But what is the best way to evangelize a city?

Ed Silvoso, in my opinion, has the most viable and strategic answer to this question. Ed thoroughly understands the traditional methodologies for urban evangelism that we have been applying and refining over the years. His strategy makes full use of citywide crusades, friendship evangelism, door-to-door witnessing, open-air preaching, films, literature distribution, humanitarian aid, community development and whatever other way has been devised to communicate the gospel.

However, not only Ed Silvoso, but, numerous other Christian workers who have been called to the cities in general are saying to each other: The methods we have been developing are excellent. We have a solid, biblical theology of evangelism. Why, then, are we not seeing more fruit and fruit that remains?

Over many years, this question has been burning in the heart and soul of Ed Silvoso. His passion has been to provide an answer that will not be just an interesting theory or a robust exhortation, but also a practical way forward that will bring our urban evangelistic efforts more in line with what we have always hoped they would be and what we clearly know is Gods will. Gods will is that none should perish, the biblical phrase from 2 Peter 3:9, which Ed is using as the title of this book.