“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.”

2 Chronicles 7:14

Heavenly Father, my heart is breaking for this country. Our nation has become a people who have embraced the rewards of wealth over the rewards of righteousness. We have elevated choice above truth and have found an infinite number of creative and clever ways to repeat the sin of pride so that we might justify our pleasures and redefine evil as good and good as evil.

And those who have been called by Your name and sealed with Your Spirit have been no better. We have failed to represent the glories of a relationship with You as more sufficient and appealing than the temporary joys of this life. Indeed, we have often sacrificed our morals and our values by using a “I don’t care if you do it, as long as you don’t impose it on me” attitude, thereby flinging Your truth and Your principles out the window so that we may be well-liked, approved of, and left alone. Your people have failed to recognize that once we get angry, we have already lost the battle for our culture, for rhetoric was only supposed to explain the Gospel, while actions that emulated Christ were what should have defined it.

We have rested on our freedoms, the freedoms You gave us through Your Son as well as the freedom You gave us through our country, and failed to realize that tyranny loves to rule a passive people.

Please forgive us, Lord, for our ineptness, for our cowardice, for our endorsement of things that are in direct contradiction against Your word. Forgive us for being so self-centered and encouraging a spirit of narcissism within our culture. Forgive us for our weakness and for our unwillingness to endure the pain of repentance in order to achieve the joy of Your healing. Your word is clear on this point: “If my people who are called by my name will humble themselves and pray and seek my face and turn from their wicked ways….” The work must begin with Your people, the righteous, not with the evildoers. We must be the ones to lead the charge towards healing, not the ones screaming at the people who are following their sinful nature. We are responsible for allowing sin to ravage the freedoms others fought and died for. We are the ones who have stood back and assumed that everything would be okay as long as we did not rock the boat. And while You will always be The Standard, we must always be the standard bearers. The city set on a hill. The light for all to see. The salt of the world.

Forgive us, O Lord, for believing that we could never lose our saltiness. Come and save us. Hear our cries of repentance. Forgive us of our sins and heal our land.

And make our prayer echo David’s in Psalm 140:

Deliver me, O Lord, from evil men;
    preserve me from violent men,
² who plan evil things in their heart
    and stir up wars continually.
³ They make their tongue sharp as a serpent’s,
    and under their lips is the venom of asps. Selah

⁴ Guard me, O Lord, from the hands of the wicked;
    preserve me from violent men,
    who have planned to trip up my feet.
⁵ The arrogant have hidden a trap for me,
    and with cords they have spread a net;beside the way they have set snares for me. Selah

⁶ I say to the Lord, You are my God;
    give ear to the voice of my pleas for mercy, O Lord!
⁷ O Lord, my Lord, the strength of my salvation,
    you have covered my head in the day of battle.
⁸ Grant not, O Lord, the desires of the wicked;
    do not further their evil plot, or they will be exalted! Selah

⁹ As for the head of those who surround me,
    let the mischief of their lips overwhelm them!
¹⁰ Let burning coals fall upon them!
    Let them be cast into fire,
    into miry pits, no more to rise!
¹¹ Let not the slanderer be established in the land;
    let evil hunt down the violent man speedily!

¹² I know that the Lord will maintain the cause of the afflicted,
    and will execute justice for the needy.
¹³ Surely the righteous shall give thanks to your name;
    the upright shall dwell in your presence.

Amen.

Maranatha! Come, Lord Jesus.