and my people, who are called by my name, humble themselves, and pray, and seek my face, and turn from their wicked ways; then will I hear from the heavens, and forgive their sin, and heal their land.
God appeared to Solomon the night after the king dedicated the temple, and answered the prayer he had just prayed. They deal with a hard question: what happens when God's own people fail, and He Himself shuts the sky over their heads?
An answer given to intercession
Solomon had stood before God and pleaded for the nation. This promise is God's reply. One writer notes that the reply is fuller here than in the parallel account in Kings.
In the previous chapter Solomon took the place of one who pleads for others. God gives him a full answer (vv. 13-14), and Kings does not record it... From the moment Solomon stands before God, the answer to his pleading is certain. The people's unfaithfulness may delay it. It is still a real fact, granted because the king God had anointed asked for it.
"My people"
Notice the shift in the pronoun between the prayer and the answer. God answers in the same detail Solomon prayed in, and changes one word.
The Lord is as detailed in His answer as Solomon was in his prayer... Solomon prays for Israel as the Lord's people, and in his prayer he said, "Your people." The Lord claims them as His own and says, "My people."
Why the sky was shut
The verse begins with "if," and what comes before it is a list of troubles God says He Himself sends.
The Lord then answered Solomon's prayer about how He disciplines Israel. He may hold back rain, or send locusts, or send disease. If Israel would humble themselves and pray, seeking God's face, and turn from their evil ways, then God would hear from heaven, forgive them, and heal their land (vv. 13-14).
That changes how we should read trouble. God never meant hard times to be endured in silence or explained away.
A famine, then, was God's call to repentance, and they should always have read it that way: "When heaven is shut up, and there is no rain because they have sinned against You." Even when there had been no open turning away from God, such trouble should have brought them face down before Him. It should have made them search their hearts and ask, Why is this?
The four conditions
The promise is generous, but it has limits. God asks four things before He gives anything: humbling, praying, seeking His face, turning.
There can be no recovery apart from the conditions named in these verses. His people who have failed must first humble themselves, pray, seek His face, and turn away from their evil ways.
More than Solomon asked for
Solomon had asked God to keep His eyes open and His ears attentive to prayer at that house. The reply grants that, and then goes further.
The excess seen in 2 Chronicles 7 is delightful. Both Solomon and Nehemiah ask that God's eyes and ears be open to His people. God adds to that and says, "My heart." It is a blessed thing to see. God's eyes and ears are turned towards His people, and His heart is towards them too.
When the conditions were ignored
God said His name would be at that house forever, yet the building came down. One writer asks why, and gives a blunt answer.
God says again that He had chosen the temple and set it apart for Himself. His name would be there forever, and His eyes and His heart would be there always (v. 16). Yet after this the temple was destroyed and there has been no temple in Jerusalem for centuries! Why is this? Because Israel themselves were guilty of desecrating the temple.
The same order today
The principle in this verse is not confined to Israel's fields and rainfall. One writer traces the same order in a day of defeat: it starts in self-confidence and ends in the dust.
That memorable day began in the pride of confidence in self, but it ends with torn clothes in the dust before God. It is a merciful provision of grace, for if it did not end there, where else could it end? There restoration begins, and there only... The same thing is true now; restoration can only come after confession, whether for one believer or for a whole company.
Summary
- The cause. Shut skies, locusts and disease are named by God as His own chastening — trouble is a call to repentance, not just a misfortune to escape.
- The conditions. Humble, pray, seek His face, turn. There is no recovery apart from these; the "if" is real.
- The claim. Solomon prayed about "Your people"; God answered about "My people" — He owns the very people He is disciplining.
- The excess. Solomon asked for God's eyes and ears; God added His heart as well, and grounded the whole answer in the intercession of His anointed king.
- The result. Forgiveness first, then a healed land — and where Israel ignored the conditions, they lost the temple itself. Restoration begins in the dust, and only there.