If My People ... 2 Chronicles 7:14


A Promise God Never Made and
A Prophetic Application Overlooked

 

First, the verse,

“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 will forgive their sin and heal their land.”

 

This verse is, first of all – as it is often presented – a promise never made.

“ “I … will heal their land”

As I said, these applications are arrived at by seeing this verse as self-contained. One well-meaning pastor even makes this verse part of his “single, stand-alone Scripture series”! But to see any verse – especially one like the present – as stand-alone is a recipe for exegetical disaster.

Context, always helpful for understanding

“Then the LORD appeared to Solomon by night, and said to him: ‘I have heard your prayer, and have chosen this place for Myself as a house of sacrifice.”, vs. 12.

Looking at this context we see that God’s oft-quoted “I will hear from heaven” must be qualified with the very next verse, His ears being “attentive to prayer made in this place” [that is, the Temple]. Not prayers in America, but Jerusalem.

And if  one sees how important the context and setting is here then it is much easier to follow the application: the “land” spoken of which God, upon prayer and repentance, promised to heal was Israel, not America.

The whole point is that this promise was made to the only nation on the Earth that had (past tense) a national covenant with God – Israel. And, thus, the only nation that could ever have expected corporate healing per this promise is Israel.

America

But what about the Principle?

But one principle we cannot draw out from this passage is that we are able to pull a nation out of a moral nosedive, or into a “national revival”, by the spiritual exertions of a Christian minority, however sincere. That is the promise not given. We have the proof of this in Ezekiel 14:13 – 20:

“‘Son of  man,  if  a  country  sins  against  Me  by committing unfaithfulness, and I stretch out My hand against it, destroy its supply of bread, send famine against  it, and cut off from it both man and beast, even though these three men, Noah, Daniel,  and  Job were  in  its midst, by their own righteousness they could only deliver themselves,’ declares the Lord God.”

In this whole passage God makes it clear that the unrighteous nation – and America certainly has the right to put themselves in this verse (Ezekiel 14) – will not avoid judgment by the spiritual exertions of the righteous few.

Second Chronicles 7:14 was a promise given to national, covenantal Israel at the height of their spiritual blessedness. It was for a limited time, as well: the age of legitimate temple worship. How ironically inappropriate and anachronistic for any nation to take this specific promise for themselves!

But the misuse of this verse not only entails a wrong application; it also covers up a Messianic truth.

A Prophetic Messianic Application Overlooked

“But He was speaking of the temple of His Body.” “God is Spirit, and those who worship Him must worship in spirit and truth.” John 4:21, 24

There is much in the Old Testament that is prophetic of the brighter, clearer New Testament revelation. Not only teaching and prophecy, but also types point to Christ. The Temple is one of those types that points to Christ, our Messiah. Christ is our Temple. As we abide in Christ, “a holy nation” studying His Word, worshipping in the spirit and in truth, we are also being built up (edified) into a holy building, living stones resting upon – and resting in – the living, precious Stone of Christ. This is the point of 2nd Peter 2:4 – 10. This passage should remind us of both Matthew 7:24 – 27 (the house on the rock) and Matthew 16:18 (on this Rock I will build My church).

How does this relate to 2nd Chronicles 7:14? The whole setting and basis for God’s erstwhile promise has changed. It is not as though the Old Testament assurance has become null and void. No, rather it has been amplified in Christ our Savior:

Prayers once made in the earthly temple are now made in Christ.

All of these things were wonderfully prefigured in 2nd Chronicles chapter 7. To take that one verse 14 and make it be merely about America is to cover up something comforting, gloriously prophetic, and Messianic with something transient and – by comparison –

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