If my people, who are called by my name will humble themselves and pray and seek my face and turn from their wicked ways then I will hear from heaven and I will forgive their sins and heal their land.
I recently watched a faith-based movie that I really enjoyed. I will not share the name of the movie because I do not want this to be a political post. However, it was based around the verse above. I am sure I cannot expound on this verse as eloquently as the movie did, but I will try my best to at least do it some justice.
When looking at this verse more closely, I noticed some things that I had not seen before. For example, who the verse is directed towards. I have been around a church environment most of my entire adult life, and have often heard this verse quoted as being, we as Americans, need to pray for our country,. While this is always a good thing, that IS NOT to whom this verse is referring. The beginning of the verse states…”if MY people, who are called by MY name,”…this does not mean Americans, this means…Christians! We are the people group who are HIS people and who are called by HIS name.
The next thing that jumps out at me is our attitude when we pray. I have heard prayer described in many ways such as: being like shooting a basket, you aim for the hoop and hope it goes in; or maybe saying a popcorn prayer, this is alright in emergency situations, but should not be our daily habit; I have a friend whose prayers are usually something almost flippant…a quick folding of the hands and thank you Jesus…this is the full extent of the praying I have heard from them. This verse indicates that our prayers should be something much more reverent…that we should “humble ourselves and pray and seek His face”. We need to approach God’s holy throne with humility and a remembrance that He is God, and we are not. That His ways are righteous and Holy. That He wants only the best for us and His will is sovereign. We need to remember that we can see only a small portion of our own personal timeline, whereas, He sees the past, present, and future of everyone that has ever existed and ever will exist. So, we need to ask Him what His will for us and our lives are, to discern what He wants us to do, then do it.
This verse goes on to say that we are to “turn from our wicked ways”. I know this is much harder to do, because we have been given a spirit of free will, and self-control is difficult. However, it is not impossible. With God nothing is impossible. As Jesus told the woman caught in adultery, we are to “go and sin no more”. Romans 3:23 tells us that “all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God”. Since we are all sinners and yet we are to go and sin no more, I feel this speaks more to our attitude than it does our actual actions. For example, if we are truly trying to live according to God’s word, we will still fail at times, but the Holy Spirit living within us will also convict us when we fail and prompt us to ask God for forgiveness. This also brings us back to the beginning part of the verse our attitude of humility and humbling ourselves before God.
The last part of this verse tells us what God will do for us, if we do our part…He says that He “will hear from heaven and heal their (our) land”. Can we all agree that our land is broken and in desperate need of healing? God has given us the solution to this brokenness. Even our government though prayer was important enough to set aside a special day for just that purpose. In 1952, the United States congress designated the first Thursday of May as the National Day of Prayer. This is a day when people are asked to “turn to God in prayer and meditation”. The president is required, by law, to sign a proclamation each year encouraging all Americans to pray on this day (36 U.S.C. ss 119).
As a Christian we are called by God to pray for our nation and as an American citizen our government is encouraging us to pray for our nation. Either way our nation is counting on us—expecting us—to lift it up in prayer. For these reasons, I am asking you all to join me in praying daily for our country and its leaders and prospective leaders…from now through election day, November 05, 2024. Praying that God will show us mercy, and that He will put in place the leaders that He has ordained to lead us as a nation back to Him.