Forgive and Heal

July 7

"Even now," declares the Lord, return to Me with all your heart, with fasting and weeping and mourning. Rend your heart and not your garments. Return to the Lord your God, for He is gracious and compassionate, slow to anger and abounding in love, and He relents from sending calamity.

“Who knows? He may turn and relent and leave behind a blessing, grain offerings and drink offerings for the Lord your God.

“Blow the trumpet in Zion, declare a holy fast, call a sacred assembly. Gather the people, consecrate the assembly; bring together the elders, gather the children, those nursing at the breast. Let the bridegroom leave his room and the bride her chamber.

“Let the priests, who minister before the Lord, weep between the portico and the altar. Let them say, Spare your people, Lord! Do not make your inheritance an object of scorn, a byword among the nations. Why should they say among the peoples, Where is their God?

“Then the Lord was jealous for His land and took pity on His people. The Lord replied to them: I am sending you grain, new wine and olive oil, enough to satisfy you fully; never again will I make you an object of scorn to the nations,” Joel 2:12-19.

There’s a penalty to be paid by the nation that forsakes the Lord. The Israelites discovered this truth over and over throughout their history of the cycle of rebellion and repentance. Because the Lord is faithful, He would always receive them back and restore them when they had turned from their wickedness to once again pursue the Living and True God.

The Holy One has said of Himself, “I am the Lord; I change not,” Malachi 3:6. In Matthew 24:35, Jesus said, “Heaven and earth shall pass away, but My Word shall not pass away.” Jesus is the living Word of God in that He is God’s greatest revelation of Himself, and He forever stands as the image of the Godhead.

Colossians 1:15 states unequivocally, “Jesus is the image of the invisible God.” He who no man can look upon and live is clearly revealed in Christ unto life eternal, and any man or any nation that returns to Him shall be fully restored to Himself that they may not be ashamed, that they may never again be made an object of scorn among the nations.

May we who are steeped in trespasses and sins accept His gracious and unspeakable gift of restoration. May we, undeserving, vile, lost creatures that we are embrace the One who has exchanged our sin for His righteousness so we may receive the fullness of His gift of eternal salvation as well as of temporal provision.

May we fast and pray and, according to II Chronicles 7:14 repent in the behalf of our nation. Let us beseech the Holy One to "forgive our sin and heal our land," even as He counseled Israel, His people of old to do.