Most Christians are familiar with the famous promise God made to Solomon in a night vision: “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 forgive their sin and heal their land” (2 Chron. 7:14). We long to see this verse fulfilled in our midst, but it is highly unlikely that such a vision will come to fruition. Let me explain my pessimism.
If there ever were a time America needed healing, it is now. Even the media agrees. We usually hear about “healing our land” from preachers, but when politicians and pundits chime in, you know the threat of division is real. Differences in politics, racial issues, and cultural values have created a perfect storm of conflict, amplified by a worldwide virus that continues to wreak havoc. But these are not the reasons why I believe Divine healing of our land will prove elusive.
The reasons are found three chapters later from God’s promise to Solomon in 2 Chronicles 10. It describes the transition of power after Solomon dies and his son Rehoboam assumes his throne. The account helps us recognize when healing the land is not on God’s agenda.
Divine Orchestration of National Crises
It turns out that, for all Solomon’s wisdom, he failed to recognize or lighten the heavy burdens his subjects bore under his leadership. When Rehoboam takes office, regional leaders seek to renegotiate their terms of service. They complain that Solomon made their “yoke hard” and they sought a reprieve from their taxing toil. “Please, lighten up!” they essentially ask.
Rehoboam, unwisely, sees this as a challenge to his manhood and doubles down on his father’s policies. The Bible offers its own commentary on this lack of wisdom: “The king did not listen to the people, for it was a turn of events from God . . .” This offers us insight into times when God might take healing our land off the table as an option: when we fail to discern that God has initiated our national crises!
At Blessing Point, we work to heal churches. We often tell them that their pain always has a Divine purpose and message. When God orchestrates painful events, He has an issue with and message for the church (or nation) in question. In Rehoboam’s case, the issue was the eye-popping idolatry initiated by Solomon’s “divided heart,” attempting to please his foreign wives (1 Kings 14:22-24). God would not heal their land from the division because they refused to see the Divine message in their pain.
Focused on The Wrong Things
The second reason follows this: The leaders request that Rehoboam lighten their load from the labor and taxation, but they were not the real issues. Releasing them from these burdens would not “heal” them. They were just the headlines. The real reasons for their pain were deeply spiritual. In the same way, political divisions, racial tensions, and divergent values often mask the real issue today, which is what God finds objectionable in the nation’s soul. He makes this clear in 1 Kings 11:33, “because they have forsaken Me . . . and have not walked in my ways . . .”
Did God care about the overtaxed workers in Solomon’s administration? Yes. Did He frown on Rehoboam’s tone-deaf policy? Yes. Does he care about the pain points in our culture? Yes. But to make those the main issues would be near-sighted and, even if successfully addressed, would only heal the land superficially. The deep divisions driving their pain remain unaddressed because they are spiritual in nature.
Trying to Hold Things Together
There is one more reason illustrating when healing our land proves elusive. After Rehoboam rebuffs the request for less burdensome service, a split escalated quickly. Rhetoric heated up and people turned their backs on each other. Rehoboam mustered an army. But just as he was headed into battle with the sons of Israel a prophet brings a message from God, “Do not go to war with your brethren . . . for this thing is from Me” (2 Chron. 11:4).
God makes it clear that the dividing of the kingdom was a result of deeper issues and He would not heal it. Could they have addressed the things and repented of the things with which God had an issue? Of course, but no one does. They will try everything else, even going to war against their brethren, before they are willing to humble themselves and repent. They do not seek the Lord about the real nature of their problems, and thus they ensure that the healing of their land will not occur.
Are the national crises we face divinely orchestrated to draw our attention to a deeper, unresolved issues between our nation and God? Perhaps it is time we sought the Lord about the real nature of our problems lest we settle for the kind of superficial healing remedies that only lead to worse and perhaps fatal crises.
Mark Barnard serves with Blessing Point Ministries. He is coauthor of The Dance of the Gifts: How Church Leaders Can Discern God’s Will and The Path of Revival: Restoring Our Nation One Church at a Time.
This commentary has also been my reading focus this last 6 months
Thank you and AMEN