2Chronicles 07.14 “14
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.”
In todays reading, the chronicler tells
us the visible (Shekinah) glory of the LORD filling the Temple (2Chronicles 07.01-03), the sacrifices offered by Solomon and the people (2Chronicles 07.04-07), the Feast of Booths (2Chronicles 07.08-10; Leviticus 23.34-36), God’s promise & warning (2Chronicles 07.11-22). We are then told
of the things that Solomon accomplished (2Chronicles 08-09).
Today though we are looking at a
verse that, frankly, to be honest, is misquoted many times and taken out of
context.
“A text without a context is a pretext for a proof text.”-D.A.
Carson (See post from February 18.2013)
Here is the verse in context:
2Chronicles 07.12-22 “12
Then the LORD appeared to Solomon at night and said to him, “I have heard your
prayer and have chosen this place for Myself as a house of sacrifice. 13 “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, 14 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. 15 “Now My eyes will be open and My ears attentive to the
prayer offered in this place. 16 “For
now I have chosen and consecrated this house that My name may be there forever,
and My eyes and My heart will be there perpetually. 17 “As for you, if you walk
before Me as your father David walked, even to do according to all that I have
commanded you, and will keep My statutes and My ordinances, 18 then I will
establish your royal throne as I covenanted with your father David, saying,
‘You shall not lack a man to be ruler
in Israel.’ 19 “But if you turn away and forsake My statutes and My
commandments which I have set before you, and go and serve other gods and
worship them, 20 then I will uproot you from My land which I have given you,
and this house which I have consecrated for My name I will cast out of My sight
and I will make it a proverb and a byword among all peoples. 21 “As for this
house, which was exalted, everyone who passes by it will be astonished and say,
‘Why has the LORD done thus to this land and to this house?’ 22 “And they will
say, ‘Because they forsook the LORD, the God of their fathers who brought them
from the land of Egypt, and they adopted other gods and worshiped them and
served them; therefore He has brought all this adversity on them.’””
The LORD appears to Solomon at
night. The LORD then promises him that if the nation of Israel sins and turns
their back on Him, and thus incurs the wrath of God and subsequently gets
punished for their sins, that if they repent and call on His name, they will be
forgiven and restored.
This promise is for Israel. Not
for the United States of America.
This does not mean though that we
can’t apply the principle of the need for repentance and seeking forgiveness
from God for the sins that we as individuals or even we as a nation have committed.
We know that later on in his life,
Solomon did turn his back on the true God (as did the whole nation of Israel)
and worshiped false gods being influenced by his many foreign wives (1Kings 11.04-08). Many of his
successors followed foreign false gods as well, which led to the exile of the
nation (2Chronicles 06.36; 2Chronicles 36.17-18, 20).
All who say the desolation of the
land and the destruction of the Temple, knew that this was a punishment from
God because the people turned their back on Him (2Chronicles 07.21-22).
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