Sometime around the Fourth of July or Memorial Day, you might see a sign advertising a “God and country” rally or prayer breakfast. I can almost guarantee that, if you attend, you will hear, at least once, 2 Chronicles 7:14. For those of you who don’t know it, this passage reads: “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 heal their land.”
Often, the way this verse will be preached in many evangelical pulpits is as a rallying cry. In so many sermons, the “people” referred to in the passage are the American people, and the “land” is the American land. The meaning of the text is understood as an invitation to 21st century America to “return to God” and then enjoy God’s blessing once again. It’s no wonder one scholar said that 2 Chronicles 7:14 is “the John 3:16 of the American civil religion.”
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