Thoughts on 2 Chronicles 7:14 in Our National Moment

2 Chronicles 7:14 has long been a clarion call by the religious right to call our nation back to God’s ways.

“If 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 and will forgive their sin and heal their land.” 

Four things this verse has for us in this national moment:

 

1. We need Jesus.

More than tests, masks, or social distancing – we need Jesus.

Whenever a verse is quoted out of context, study the context!  Here, Solomon has prayed for God to hear Israel’s prayers from the temple he just built.  God says, “Yes” and this is part of that yes.  “When Israel repents HERE, I’ll forgive them.”  Jesus is the new temple (John 2:18-22) in the new covenant.  Prayers offered in His name, looking to Jesus, and no other, have the same effectiveness.  The popular usage of this verse I fear is to hold a national prayer service with the rabbis and imams and shamans and everyone else, instead of calling on the true God.  The popular usage of this verse I fear is to repent of OTHER people’s sins, not humble “THEM [OUR] SELVES.”  Also, we use this verse from a desire to make America great again, not to truly turn from our wicked ways.

 

 

2. Don’t get indignant to defend America’s awesomeness and glory

Don’t equate America with “My people.”  We are a great nation, but do not think God looks with special favor on the USA, more than other earthly nations.  God is talking in this verse about Israel as His chosen people, and about the church now in the new covenant.  NOT about America.  God owes the USA nothing for our great and pious founding.  (It wasn’t steeped in systemic rascism as the 1619 project would have you believe, but neither was it completely Christian as David Barton would tell you.)

But we CAN beg the Lord for mercy on our land.

 

 

3.  National revival is possible

God DOES deal with nations as nations, and families as families.  There is legitimate application to groups, tribes, and nations.  There is such a thing as national revival, corporate repentance.  And God brings healing to a LAND when it turns to Him, not just personal forgiveness of sins.

 

 

4.  God is acting

The immediate context is striking.  “When I shut up the heavens so that there is no rain, or command the locust to devour the land, or send pestilence among my people, if my people…”  I know all the abuses we can make of God’s providence.  Pat Robertson liked to say years ago that the last hurricane was God’s judgment for our endorsement of homosexuality, etc.  Well, I’m starting to believe it in earnest in 2020.  Pestilence, hurricanes, riots, etc.  Could God be trying to get our attention?  “If I send you COVID-19, if I send wildfires and hurricanes along with it, then if you repent…”  If this is anywhere close to true, America is clearly NOT “doing 2 Chron. 7:14” right now.  We aren’t even in the MOOD.  We are indignant and outraged (at all the wrong people), not humble and contrite.  We believe government restrictions and scientific expertise can save us – we think we don’t need God, except as a prop for our political conventions.

 

 

Where does this leave us?

America is doing according to Jeremiah 44:16-19 more than Psalm 51:1-4:

We pursue the pagan goddess Equality, and believe it is because we haven’t worshiped her enough that all these evil things have befallen us.  When really, it is because we have left the true Creator God.