Responsive

2 Chronicles 7:13-14, 19-20

“When I shut up the heavens so that there is no rain, or command the locust to devour the land, or send pestilence among my people, if 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 and will forgive their sin and heal their land.”
“But if you turn aside and forsake my statutes and my commandments that I have set before you, and go and serve other gods and worship them, then I will pluck you up from my land that I have given you, and this house that 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.”

We Christians have a habit of snatching a verse out of context and applying it as we see fit. Verse 14 of 2 Chronicles 7 is such a verse. ‘If my people who are called by my Name…” may apply to our situation but in context we should admit we have disobeyed God and are under His appropriate judgment before we claim the promise due to the repentant in this verse.

The Israelites had a long history with God of repenting, walking with, turning aside, suffering, bewailing, repenting… cycling repeatedly. This passage is recorded at the dedication of the Temple and is in light of the 430 years of Egypt, the years of the Judges, Saul and lastly, David all which forewarn of not staying close to the Lᴏʀᴅ. As much as today was a great day of praise and sacrifice, in only 40 years the Kingdom of Israel would be divided.

God is dedicated to renewal of relationship with those ‘who call on My Name’ but there is also an inherent warning to those who would take such a ‘calling on’ lightly. With sixty-some years of pursuing God with various intensities, my observation is that it becomes more difficult to repent when living in the ‘spin’ cycle. Responsiveness atrophies with abuse.

Every day is the good day to rededicate to continuing humbly close to the Lᴏʀᴅ.

2 Chronicles 7:12-22 (ESV) - https://www.blueletterbible.org/esv/2ch/7/12-22/s_374012
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