If My People
Community Service- 2023
CCCAG 8-20-23
Scripture- 2 Chron 7:13-14
Good morning! It’s great to be back here speaking to all of you, and love it that we have a moment every year where we can come together and celebrate our savior together.
Today I want to talk to you about a scripture that is referenced a lot when we talk about national days of prayer, and renewal of spiritual vitality in our nation.
If you brought your bible with you this morning, that scripture is in 2 Chronicles, chapter 7 if you want to turn there.
One quick point about this particular scripture-
When we interpret the bible, it’s important that we view these scriptures within their historical context-
In this case, God is speaking to Solomon about the nation of Israel. Therefore, it would be a mistake to directly take them and directly apply them to modern America.
So, before we read today’s verse, let me put it in it’s proper context.
King Solomon had just dedicated the Temple in Jerusalem to God. Prior to this, God was worshipped in a very fancy tent that could be moved around, but now Solomon had built this huge temple where people could come to worship God.
During this time, God appears to Solomon one night and has a talk with this young king.
When you read the entire conversation- it’s very fatherly. The whole conversation sounds like a loving father speaking to his son.
What God tells Solomon is that sometimes HE will have to bring discipline to the Hebrew nation when it starts to wander too far from HIM.
Good father’s bring disciple to their children. Quick example-
When I was a little boy, my father would take me to Montgomery Wards- was a department store in Kenosha, like Sears.
As a small child, I was a wanderer- if you didn’t tie me down, I was gone. I’d see something shiny, and away I’d go, much to the annoyance of my father.
That day, I saw something really cool over in the entertainment section- a big screen TV showing cartoons and wanted to go look at it. My dad started talking to the salespeople in home and garden, so I took my chance and I was gone toward the electronics section. I went over and checked out what I wanted to look at and turned around and went back to where my dad was…
But he wasn’t there.
So I went over to the tools section to look for him
But he wasn’t there.
Now I’m getting a little worried. I have no idea how to get home. Kenosha had about 80,000 people at that time, and was a good size city, and I knew how to back and forth to school, and that was it.
I was getting pretty scared when a store employee found me, trying to think about how I was going to find my dad or get home, when my dad appeared from behind a shelf- he had been hiding himself from me to teach me a lesson, and then took me to the car to continue the lesson with some backside reinforcement.
I tell you this story, because this is exactly how God is setting up this principle that we are going to read this morning-
Father God is saying, “Children, occasionally you are going to need some reminders of who I am, and who you are.
Those times may not be pleasant, but they are for your own good, and you need to trust me that I have your best in mind when I am forced to discipline you.”
In this case, God talks about drought, locusts destroying crops, or a sickness that causes widespread panic and death.
But, being a good Father, God gives us the way to come back to him when we chose to wander away.
That’s what I want to focus on this morning- this is God speaking-
2 Chron 7:13-14
13 "When I shut up the heavens so that there is no rain, or command locusts to devour the land or send a plague among my people, 14 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 will I hear from heaven and will forgive their sin and will heal their land.
Prayer
Today’s message is titled “IF” My people. It shows us a promise of God that I think many of us need to hear this morning.
There are many kinds of promises in the bible. Some are God making promises to individuals regardless of what they do.
Abraham and the Abrahamic covenant is a good example.
Other promises are like this one- “If you do this, then I will do that”
This promise of God to restore and heal us after we wander away comes with some conditions.
The first one we see is the big one-
I. IF MY people
If. It’s a small word with a big meaning. IF implies there is a decision to make, and an action to perform.
Now I said that this specific scripture should be interpreted as God speaking to the King of Israel and the nation he leads.
But there are some principles that we can glean and apply to us as individuals in the 21st century. God put this specific occurrence in the bible for a reason, and the bible says that ALL Scripture is God breathed and is useful for correcting, rebuking, and training in all righteousness, so let’s dive in.
The who being described here- then, and now, are God’s people.
Throughout the bible, when God chooses to bring some sort of disciplinary actions, it was always based on the purity of their worship.
In the Old Testament, it was based on obedience to the Law of Moses- if they were doing God’s worship God’s way, everything was fine.
Today in the New Testament, it’s based on those people, who are called by His name.
In other words, Followers of Jesus. AKA Christians regardless of denominational title.
IF we are calling ourselves God’s people,
What are we supposed to do when it seems like God is hiding Himself from us and the world either, on a personal level or even a national level, seems to be spinning out of control
II. God’s people-
A. Humble themselves-
Most of us know or have memorized the LORD’s prayer. This is a model for our prayers given to us directly from Jesus.
In case you have forgotten, Here is the first few lines-
Our Father in heaven, Hallowed by your name
Your Kingdom come, Your will be done
On earth as it is in heaven.
By teaching us this prayer, Jesus starts by reminding us of a very important principle-
God is God
We are not
The big idea here is this-
IF you come to God asking for things, you need to recognize who HE is.
HE is God.
Which means you have to humble yourself before HIM.
That might ruffle some people- they don’t want to be humbled before anyone- even God.
But here is the problem- you can’t ask for God’s stuff without asking for HIM, because HE comes with his stuff.
This isn’t just an Old Testament principle-
Both James and Peter quote from the Book of Proverbs when they say “God opposes the proud, but gives grace to the humble.”
Humility is the key to drawing God and His blessings into your life.
The second thing we can do as God’s people when it seems like He is far away is
B. And pray/seek his face.
We’ve already established the humility is the key to drawing God close.
Prayer is the tool to developing a close, personal relationship with HIM.
I’m not talking about using thee’s and thou’s in your prayer.
It doesn’t have to be a super formal thing. You’re not in a job interview where you have to be on your best behavior- you are talking to God, who knows your every thought and inclination so trying to impress HIM with spiritual sounding language is kind of silly.
Prayer is simply talking to God.
It’s an honest, truthful, open communication with the Almighty.
Really, it should be the most honest and intimate conversations you have with anyone.
This was really hard for me to understand when I was a newer Christian.
When I was in the military, they issued us a New Testament with Psalms and Proverbs in it. Not knowing the bible at all, I remember reading some of the Psalms that King David wrote. In them, David expresses very raw emotion- disappointment, fear, loneliness, even anger at God.
It made me think- who is David to talk back to God like that? It seemed very disrespectful to me.
But then I learned something about David- what the bible had to say about HIM.
Do you know what the bible said about David-
The bible says- David was a man after God’s own heart. (1 Sam 13:14).
It took me a long time to reconcile that with David’s history.
If know anything about David-he had a lot of failure in his life, up to and including murder.
There were many times that God had to humble him- but that is the point to what we are talking about this morning- David allowed himself to be humbled by God, and would always turn back to God in repentance.
The way David came back was that he learned to be a man of deep, honest prayer.
That’s why prayer is one of the keys to God restoring us, and through us, our land. Honest, open dialog with your Father brings His presence close, and in the presence of the LORD, there is liberty and freedom.
I can’t state this enough- we need to become people of prayer again. We need to seek the face of God before all other things.
If we get these first two things down- humble ourselves and pray, the next one is easy-
III. Turn from their wicked ways.
In my late 20’s, I received a call from God into the ministry. My pastor at the time was very supportive so I started attending school.
But then my senior pastor left along with eventually all of the associate pastors. I was the only one with any formal bible education in my church, so they made me the informal interim pastor.
During that time, I was also a member of the pastoral search committee, and we had a couple of candidates for the senior pastor position. One of them came to interview, and we were driving him around the city.
We drove through downtown, which at that time was kind of seedy- a lot of drugs, a lot of questionable establishments, and a few drugged out people just wandering the streets. I was kind of embarrassed by it and started apologizing to the pastor about the condition of the downtown area. The pastoral candidate, sat silent for a moment and said, “John, these people need Jesus. They are drunk or drugged up because their souls are screaming for relief, and they don’t know any other way to deal with that. They don’t need some preacher screaming at them, they don’t need us to hold up signs or tell them how they are a sinner. They need to get into a relationship with Jesus as savior and let HIM do the cleaning.”
As a brand-new pastor, this changed my entire way of approaching ministry. It also dramatically changed the way I look at people in general.
When we talk about wickedness or evil actions being done by people, we are really taking about a lack of God’s presence.
Wickedness or evil is a deficit of God’s spirit manifesting in our lives or the lives of others.
It’s very important to realize that there are only two choices for spiritual influence, and where God’s spirit is lacking, satan and his hordes come knocking.
This is why the key to combatting wickedness in our hearts, and the hearts of other is simple-
Bring Jesus into it- put HIM In His rightful place as LORD, God, Savior, and King in a person’s life, and the wickedness will vanish.
That is especially is true in the life of those who follow Jesus, but is also true with those who don’t know HIM- they need HIM just as much as you and I do.
This also applies to our nation- this might not get me many likes on social media, but it’s the truth-
God isn’t so interested in healing America as HE is in healing HIS people.
So I want to ask you today- are you “His” people?
Are you a person who has drifted a little in your walk with Jesus- if so-God wants you to come home. Never think HE doesn’t want you back.
I would ask you to trust in HIM again- to become a follower of Jesus.
Maybe you’ve never followed Jesus. Maybe you’re here because a friend invited you, and now you feel something pulling at you on a deep level.
Friend- that’s the Holy Spirit- that’s God Himself calling you to come home- to quit running, and to experience His presence and His forgiveness in your life.
If that is you- Please don’t resist that. The bible says that now can be your day of salvation- the day that you accept Jesus’ invitation to follow HIM.
Your father wants you home, in his arms, and safe.
Prayer-
John 3:16.
