Pray for Our Nation

If I shut up the heavens so that there is no rain, or if I command the locust to devour the land, or if I send pestilence among My people, and My people who are called by My name humble themselves and pray and seek My face and turn from their wicked ways, then I will hear from heaven, will forgive their sin and will heal their land.  (2 Chronicles 7:13-14, NASB)
Do the verses above remind you of something?  In the context of ancient Israel, God is sending a warning to His people.  If they lose their way, and forget about Him, then He will send drought, locusts to devour crops, or pestilence.  Only when His people repented would He heal their land. Indeed, this was the pattern during the era of the judges and kings of Israel:  Prosperity, complacency, devastation, repentance.  Rinse and repeat. Over and over again.

The same is happening in our nation today.  Hurricanes. Wildfires in the west.  A plague we call COVID-19 (and all its aftereffects). General lawlessness.  Rampant inflation.  A humiliating national defeat in Afghanistan.  A southern border which no longer exists.

We’ve seen what happens when God’s people pray.  After 9/11, houses of worship were packed. People prayed.  Soon after, our nation invaded Afghanistan to defeat the forces responsible for the attack on our homeland.  It was a swift victory. As life got back to normal, people stopped going to church. Our country then got bogged down in a war of attrition in Afghanistan.  Are the decrease in worship and difficulties in our nation connected? Does one cause the other?  We’re now in the 17th month of “15 days to flatten the curve” of this pandemic.  Houses of worship were closed for months during the “lock down.”  Now that they’re open again, attendance is significantly down. Have God’s people stopped praying?

What, then, can we do?  “If . . .  My people who are called by My name humble themselves and pray . . . ”  God says He would heal the land and forgive His people if they would pray to Him and confess their sins.  How, then, should we pray?

The Old Testament has some examples of prayers for national repentance in ancient Israel. Prophets and kings would confess the areas in which the nation had fallen short (they self identified with the sins even though they were not guilty themselves); confessed their own sins; and asked God to forgive them, and restore the nation to its fellowship with Him. We can do the same!

I can confess my own sins.  I haven’t done enough in my life to fight for those to whom injustice is committed.  I haven’t written to my elected representatives enough to express what I feel they should do.  I’ve been entirely too complacent.  The Bible calls us to pray for those in authority, that is, those who are elected.  Why?  So that we will have a tranquil and peaceful life.  We can pray for those in the military and our first responders.  We should pray for peace and harmony in our land.  We should especially pray for revival, for a Great Awakening, that people would turn or return to God.

Many people blame some of our calamities on “global warming,” or “climate change.”  One pastor said, “Our problem isn’t global warming.  It’s God’s warning.  I find that when I pray for the nation, I’m left with a lot more hope.  Praying is certainly something I can do, even as I sit or lie here, not able to move!

Blessed is the nation whose God isthe Lord, The people whom He has chosen for His own inheritance.  (Psalm 33:12, NASB)

Worship:  If My People Pray, sung by Avalon