Prayer for Direction

Prayer for Direction: Positioning Ourselves for God's Favor

On this 250th anniversary of our country, we turn to Proverbs 16 and 2 Chronicles 7 to learn about our future. We live in a time of uncertainty—worried about what will happen in generations to come, scrolling and wondering if we're going to be okay. But Scripture reminds us that God holds our future.

God Holds Our Future

Listen to what God has to say about the future:

Commit your work to the Lord and your plans will be established. (Proverbs 16:3)

The heart of a man plans his way, but the Lord establishes his steps. (Proverbs 16:9)

The lot is cast into the lap, but every decision is from the Lord. (Proverbs 16:33)

The scripture is clear: God holds our future. Our future is dependent on God's favor—His providing hand for our good and His glory. These things are always working together. It's not leaders, global events, politics, or our 401k. It's not war or trade agreements. Our future is determined by almighty God.

So the pressing question for us is: How do we experience the favor of God?

The Tension: Our Responsibility and God's Sovereignty

There's a tension between our responsibility and God's sovereignty. God is ultimate—He is the supreme authority, and nothing or no one can stand against His power. Yet we need His favor. We want His favor on our lives, our families, and our nation. But favor is a gift from God in His sovereignty—it's His decision.

Here's what's important: We do not control the favor of God. But we can position ourselves to receive it—or we can disqualify ourselves from it. There's a famous passage that shows us how to receive God's favor. It's in 2 Chronicles 7, where God speaks to King Solomon about how the nation of Israel can receive His favor. This passage has both a promise and a warning.

The Promise

If my people who are called by my name would humble themselves and pray and seek my face and turn from their wicked ways, then I will hear from heaven, will forgive their sin and heal their land. Now my eyes will be open and my ears attentive to the prayer that is made in this place. For now I have chosen and consecrated this house that my name may be there forever. My eyes and my heart will be there for all time. (2 Chronicles 7:14-16)

Isn't that what we want? The favor of God.

The Warning

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 you out of my sight, and I will make it a proverb and a byword among all the peoples. (2 Chronicles 7:19)

Important qualifier: This passage was written to Solomon specifically for the nation of Israel. We are not Israel. However, there are timeless truths we can learn from these promises and warnings and apply today.

How to Position Ourselves for God's Favor

There Is No Favor Without Prayer

The scripture begins with a command: humble themselves and pray and seek my face. When we face needs, concerns, worries, and heartbreak on behalf of our nation, is our first response prayer? There will be no move of God, no healing in our land, no returning to Him if His church does not pray.

The future of our country is dependent on God's favor being poured out on a praying people. But so often prayer is not our first response. Instead, we jump on our phones and argue with someone, or try to change something in our own power and strength.

Notice the command before the word pray: humble yourselves. This means recognizing that we are nothing apart from God, that the future we long for comes from His hand. Only when we begin to desperately pray for Him to pour out His favor will we experience the healing we desire for our land.

If we want more of God in our country, it will start with humble and desperate prayer from people like you and me.

There Is No Favor Where There Is Sin

The scripture says: "if you seek my face and turn from their wicked ways. Then...I will hear from heaven forgive their sin and heal their land." Sin blocks the favor of God.

Now, we all sin every day. But there's a difference between the type of sin we fall into because we're imperfect, and the type of sin we hold onto and refuse to let go. God is expecting us to leave sin as a necessary part of receiving His favor. God does not bless active sin.

You can pray all you want—pray personally, pray for your family, pray for your country—but if you are harboring sin, not confessing it, and not repenting of it, God will not send His favor.

In our own lives, we run from anything that is offensive to God: from pride to lust, from lies to the love of money, from anger to selfishness, from harming anyone. Every person is valuable to God from the womb to the tomb. We run from anything offensive to God because favor requires the turning from sin.

But here's the good news: "He will heal us and forgive us." You haven't done anything so far gone that God wouldn't heal you or forgive you if you would seek His face and turn from your wicked ways.

As we turn from sin in our own lives, we become like light in the darkness to help others turn from their wicked ways.

Living for Others

We do have collective national sins that need to be turned from. But here's the tension: We can't control others. We cannot control even those little babies that live in our house, so how are we going to control other people?

Here's the truth: I can't control anyone, but Jesus can change anyone. This is how we need to live.

When I recognize that I can't control others, here's what I can do: I can live for others. Followers of Jesus set the pace of living for others if our nation is to experience healing. Because Jesus has done so much for us, we have a responsibility to give ourselves away to others—living in such a way that when people know us, they hear the gospel from our lives.

Instead of getting obsessed with trying to control an entire group of people in the name of Jesus, share Jesus with one more until all have heard. When we live for one more, we create a culture that impacts the many.

There Is No Favor Where There Is Idolatry

The warning says: "But if you turn aside and forsake my statutes and my commandments...and go and serve other gods and worship them, then I will pluck you up from my land."

An idol is anything that captures our attention and our devotion over God. It could be another religion, a pagan god, but for many of us, it's something in our lives that has captured our attention and our devotion over God.

When Christianity began to grow in the Roman Empire, the Romans weren't angry that people were worshiping Jesus—they had plenty of gods. But the gospel said this: if you're going to worship Jesus, it means you can't bow to anything else. That refusal to worship any other god made people upset 2,000 years ago.

Does that sound familiar? We live in a culture expecting us to bow to their little-g gods. When we don't, they will hate us. But don't give in. We love and worship the one true God only.

Search your own heart: What idols are you bowing to? Entertainment? Convenience? Money? Comfort? Sex? What idols might you be bowing to that aren't Jesus?

A Final Warning for Our Nation

Here's something that's important on a day like today: The United States itself can become an idol. There is great risk in putting our national pride higher in our hearts than our devotion to Jesus. Many of us may need to turn from putting our primary identity in patriotism rather than in Jesus.

The ultimate unifier is not the World Cup or national pride. The ultimate unifier is the gospel. The ultimate unifier is the truth of God.