Daniel 9:4-5, 9-10 I prayed to the Lord my God and confessed:
“Lord, the great and awesome God, who keeps His covenant of love with those who love Him and keep His commandments, we have sinned and done wrong. We have been wicked and have rebelled; we have turned away from Your commands and laws. … The Lord our God is merciful and forgiving, even though we have rebelled against Him; we have not obeyed the Lord our God or kept the laws He gave us through His servants the prophets.

2 Chronicles 7:14-15 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. Now My eyes will be open and My ears attentive to the prayers offered in this place.

DEVO:
God bless America, land that I love
Stand beside her and guide her
Through the night with a light from above

If you don’t already know, those are lyrics from the song, “God Bless America,” written in 1918 by an immigrant named Irving Berlin. It was set to music in 1938 during World War II, in hopes that it would boost the morale of the troops fighting overseas as well as American citizens on the home front.

As you may already know, America began as a Christian nation. The founders of this nation really did want a place where people could practice their various religions in peace and safety. Through the early years of the United States of America, traditional, Christian values really were the guiding factor in many national decisions.

But just like everything else that God blesses, satan attacks. I probably don’t need to rehash any of the decisions that have led us to where we are as a nation today, but there was a definite turning away from the things of God that led us here.

What are we to do? How do we become a nation where God resides and grants His favor to us as the inhabitants? How can we help influence the trajectory of this nation’s history towards good and right instead of evil and wickedness?

I believe there are three steps that we can take as the Church, and the first two are most often overlooked.

The first step is confession. We see this modeled by Daniel when he confessed that the nation had sinned against God, that they had turned their backs on Him, and that they had rebelled. Confession is important because it aligns our hearts with God. In confession, we pause and think about the things that God calls evil, and we come into agreement with Him and also call them evil. We think about the things that break God’s heart and we allow them to break our hearts. I believe we often skip this step because it can be hugely uncomfortable. Part of that discomfort comes in the actual emotion part, because we don’t like to feel the guilt of sin or the sadness of a broken heart. I believe discomfort also happens because we don’t truly believe that our confession of sins that we didn’t commit can do any good. But if you look at the OT model, confession happened often on behalf of an entire nation. That means, a prophet would confess the sins of the entire nation to God. We as a church can confess of the sins we see happening in the world today, because in doing so, we align our hearts with God and recognize that things are not as they should be.

The second is repentance. We read about repenting in 2 Chronicles, which occurs after King Solomon completes building the temple. God tells King Solomon that His people need to humble themselves and pray and turn from their wicked ways and THEN He will hear their cries, and forgive them, and heal their land. We need to learn how to humble ourselves and repent. We have to acknowledge the things which grieve the heart of God, whether they are currently happening or happened in the past. Then we repent of those things and ask for God’s forgiveness. Humility is a part of this because we acknowledge and ask for forgiveness for things that we played no active role in. In this instance, I believe humility shows God that we are not proudly objecting by saying, “Well, that doesn’t concern me because I’ve never done that!” and instead pray something like, “God, I wasn’t there when it happened, but I know that thing must have broken Your heart, and because it broke Your heart, it breaks mine, too.”

The third step is intercession. This is where we pray on behalf of others and ask for God to intervene and work miracles, to move in the supernatural so the we see a shift in the physical. We can ask God to put the right people in places of power, people who would seek His will and honor Him, who wouldn’t be afraid to be vocal about their faith in God, and who would fight the right fights. We must remember that we have so much power when we go to God in prayer, and that our enemy would love nothing less than to see our nation continue down this road that will take us even farther from the things of God. We can push back against the enemy through prayers of intercession, and we have even more strength because we’re all joining our prayers together!

PRAYER:
God, I thank You for this nation I call home. Thank You for the guidance I find in Your word that helps me understand how to pray for this nation.

God, I confess the sins of this nation to You. I agree with Your word and call sin what it is. I know that we have strayed from our Christian roots, and that as a nation, we have embraced wickedness and evil. I acknowledge the atrocities that have occurred in this nation and I confess that they were not honoring of You. God, I know that in this nation today, things which are sinful are not being labeled sinful, but I choose to recognize them as sinful because that’s how You see them. Please show me where my heart and my beliefs are not in line with Yours.

I repent on behalf of this nation, God, and ask that You would forgive our sins. I ask that You would not withhold Your blessings from this nation because of our wickedness. I ask that You would turn our hearts back to You, that we would learn how to seek You and follow Your ways. I ask that we would see this nation turn from embracing evil to embracing the ways of God.

I ask that You would set things right in this nation. I pray for bold leaders to be placed in offices where they can do good on behalf of You. I pray for our President, that You would change his heart and give him ears that are attuned to Your voice. I pray that he would put his hope and his faith in You, and that it would change the way he does life. I pray for our Vice President, that You would give him wisdom and guidance as he assists the President. I pray for members of the Cabinet and Congress, that they would be drawn into relationship with You. I pray for the Supreme Court, that they would make laws that would honor You and benefit this nation. I pray for wise advisers for these people, that You would send people their way who would speak Your truth to them, and that they would come into relationship with You and allow that to influence their choices that involve our nation. God, I am willing to allow my heart to break for the things that break Your heart, and I am willing to align my heart and my beliefs with Your word. Don’t allow me to become complacent in my prayers for this nation. God, let this be a nation that honors You and upholds Your will.