Repentance Leading To Revival
2 Chronicles 7:14 (NIV)
‘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 sin and will heal their land.’
As my 3-year-old stands on her bed, we pray the Scriptures together with actions saying, ‘Thank you God that “If my people, who are called by my name (cupping hands around our mouths), will humble themselves (bowing), pray (hands-together), and seek my face (wiggling our hands together) and turn from their wicked ways (turn our faces away), then I will hear from heaven, and I will forgive their sin (beating chest) and will heal their land (banging the floor).” What a promise!
A friend of mine did some research and found that confession and fasting were the least practised Spiritual Disciplines in the Western Charismatic church. Sadly, this probably isn’t that surprising! Yet so often we pray as a church for revival. Throughout the Bible and history, revival is almost always preceded by God’s people humbling themselves through confession and repentance. Might there be a relationship between our own posturing before God and an absence of revival?
In 2 Chronicles, Solomon had built a new temple representing God’s restoration of and forgiveness towards his people. God called Israel to consecrate their lives with a renewed call to repentance: To Humble themselves, pray, seek (God’s face), and turn from their wicked ways.
Repentance is a necessity in God’s plan to forgive sin and heal the land. Rejecting God’s way leads to injustice and slavery and sin of every kind, instead of the ‘open spaces’ of God’s freedom. Jesus’ first word in Mark’s gospel is ‘repent’, meaning ‘to turn’ towards him and turn away from sin.
When we turn to him, we receive abundant eternal life now and in the future. As a church we must continually turn back to him in confession and repentance and pray that his Holy Spirit will bring revival, new spiritual life, to our hearts, our church, our city, our society.
Prayer – Lord Jesus, I humble myself, pray, seek your face, and turn from all that displeases you. I confess and repent of…
I pray that as we do this you will hear our prayers, forgive our sins and heal our land.