Sermon Tone Analysis

*God’s Plan for Our National Health *

2 Chronicles 7:12-7:14 (NIV, NIRV, TNIV, KJV)

God’s Plan for Our Health \\ Part 2 - Our National Health \\ 2 Chronicles 7:12-14 \\ Sermon by Rick Crandall \\ McClendon Baptist Church - June 29, 2008 \\ \\ ~*We are about to celebrate the 232nd birthday of our country.

This is a good time to focus on the health of our nation, and what we can do about it.

\\ \\ ~*So please open your Bibles to 2 Chron 7:12-14.

The background here is the dedication of Solomon’s temple.

In chapter 5 they brought the Ark of the Covenant to its place and began to praise the Lord.

Then the temple was filled with a cloud and so much of God’s glory that the priests had to suspend their work for a time.

The dedication lasted seven days with prayers, praise and a sacrifice that included 120,000 sheep.

Then after the people were sent home, God spoke to Solomon in vs. 12-14: \\ \\ 12. Then the Lord appeared to Solomon by night, and said to him: "I have heard your prayer, and have chosen this place for Myself as a house of sacrifice.

\\ 13. "When I shut up heaven and there is no rain, or command the locusts to devour the land, or send pestilence among My people, \\ 14. "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 will forgive their sin and heal their land.

\\ \\ ~*That’s a promise we need to hear today as America faces some huge problems.

Gas is $4 a gallon, and may go up before it goes down.

The stock market is in the tank.

And though there has been a wonderful improvement in the situation in Iraq, we still face radical Islamists who would love to see our country go up in smoke.

\\ \\ ~*Here at home, traditional Christian values are ridiculed and under constant attack from liberal judges and legislators.

Last month, four judges on the California Supreme Court overturned the will of the voters and legalized gay marriage.

This was a terrible decision in the eyes of God.

Does saying that mean I am a homophobe who hates homosexuals?

-- Quite the contrary.

Bible-believing Christians should love homosexuals.

We should love them enough to tell them the truth.

We should love them enough to tell them that homosexuality is a sin, because God says it is a sin.

-- But also tell them that we are all sinners, and that God loved us enough to die for our sins.

We should love them enough to tell them that God will forgive their sins and save anyone who will turn to Him and trust in Jesus.

But when it comes to homosexuality or any other sin: We can never say something is right, if God says it’s wrong.

\\ \\ ~*Dennis Prager has a must-read column on the gay marriage verdict in California.

Here are some key parts: \\ \\ ~*If this verdict stands, society as we have known it will change.

The California Supreme Court and its millions of supporters are playing with fire.

And it will eventually burn future generations in ways we can only begin to imagine.

\\ \\ ~*Outside of the privacy of their homes, young girls will be discouraged from imagining one day marrying their prince charming.

To do so would be declared "heterosexist," morally equivalent to racist.

Rather, they will be told to imagine a prince or a princess.

Schoolbooks will not be allowed to describe marriage in male-female ways alone.

Little girls will be asked by other girls and by teachers if they want one day to marry a man or a woman.

Any advocacy of man-woman marriage alone will be regarded morally as hate speech, and shortly thereafter it will be deemed so in law.

Companies that advertise engagement rings will have to show a man putting a ring on a man’s finger -- if they show only women fingers, they will be boycotted just as a company having racist ads would be now.

Films that only show man-woman married couples will be regarded as antisocial and as morally irresponsible as films that show people smoking have become.

Traditional Jews and Christians -- (i.e.

those who believe in a divine scripture) -- will be marginalized.

Anyone who advocates marriage between a man and a woman will be morally regarded the same as racist.

And soon it will be a hate crime.

(1) \\ \\ ~*Do you think these radical things can’t happen?

Church, I have to tell you that it already is happening.

Jon & Elaine Huguenin are Christians who own a small photography shop in New Mexico.

Last April the New Mexico Human Rights Commission ordered them to pay $6,600 to Vanessa Willock.

\\ \\ ~*Vanessa had asked the Huguenins to photograph a same-sex “commitment ceremony” she wanted to have with her partner.

Elaine Huguenin declined because her Christian beliefs do not support homosexuality.

Vanessa took that rejection to the New Mexico Human Rights Commission which found that the photography shop discriminated against her because of her sexual orientation, in violation of the New Mexico Human Rights Act.

Thankfully, the Alliance Defense Fund is appealing the decision for Jon and Elaine.

(2) \\ \\ ~*This is just the tip of the iceberg.

We could talk for hours about the problems we face.

Is there anything we can do?

What can we do to help our country?

God says, “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 will forgive their sin and heal their land.”

Here are 5 things we can do to help our country.

\\ \\ 1. First: Give God credit for our blessings.

\\ \\ ~*With all of our problems, I truly believe we are still the best country in the world.

We have freed more people; we have helped more people than any nation in history.

We are by far more free and prosperous than most people in the world.

\\ \\ ~*Listen to this testimony from our daughter Becky.

It’s about a new friend she met on her mission trip to Africa: \\ \\ Suzanne lives in Johannesburg, and served as our tour guide throughout our mission trip to Lesotho.

One day, I decided to ask Suzanne her honest opinion of Americans, since she had spent last summer working at a camp near Philadelphia.

I never expected the response she gave.

Without hesitation, Suzanne stated that the first thing that she noticed about America was the lack of barbed wire and iron fences.

It was the freedom she felt as she walked around our country that stood out the most to her – not freedom in the traditional sense that we think of as Americans.

-- But rather the freedom to live without constant fear.

\\ \\ As we continued to talk, Suzanne told me that she fears for her life on a daily basis.

Not only that, but she fears for her family’s safety.

Although she lives a middle-to-upper-class area of Johannesburg -- one that seemed to be the “nice part of town” to me, crime and civil unrest are constant reminders of the world in which she lives.

\\ \\ ~*Suzanne later sent a text message to Becky that said, “O why couldn’t I have been born in America?” \\ \\ ~*Suzanne and her boyfriend have committed to stay right where they are, because they are devoted Christians, and God has given them a passion to reach the people of Africa.

God is also helping Suzanne to overcome her fears, but -- “O why couldn’t I have been born in America?” \\ \\ ~*We are truly, truly blessed!

-- But we have to realize that God is the source of our blessings.

God says, “My people need to humble themselves.”

We need to remember that “every good gift and every perfect gift is from above, and comes down from the Father of lights” (James 1:17).

As Paul asked the Christians in Corinth, “What do you have that you did not receive?

Now if you did indeed receive it, why do you glory as if you had not received it?”

(1 Cor 4:7) \\ \\ ~*We need to humble ourselves before God.

There is no way this nation could have even been started without Divine intervention.

Consider the final battle of the American Revolution at Yorktown.

The weather was good, -- except during two vital periods.

On the night Washington began digging approach trenches, a soldier recorded that "we were favored by Providence with a night of extreme darkness" and by a gentle rain that muffled the sound of digging.

Then, near the end of the siege, Cornwallis attempted a breakout by ferrying his best troops across the York River at night.

Halfway through the operation, "the weather… changed to a most violent storm of wind and rain" that drove the barges down river and left Cornwallis’ forces divided and scattered.

The adverse turn of the weather completely disrupted the attempted breakout," and Cornwallis surrendered the next day.

(3) \\ \\ ~*Tradition says that after the British surrender, the defeated Redcoats departed to the sounds of the song, “The World Turned Upside Down:” \\ --“If ponies rode men and grass ate cows, \\ --And cats were chased into holes by the mouse . . .

\\ --If summer were spring and the other way round, \\ --Then all the world would be upside down.”

(4) \\ \\ ~*They were blown away by the fact that the greatest army of the greatest empire in the world had been defeated by a rag-tag army of Americans.

It never could have happened without the remarkable help of Almighty God.

\\ \\ 2. We must give God credit for our blessings.

-- And answer God’s call to pray.

God says: “If My people who are called by My name will pray...” \\ \\ ~*Never underestimate the power of prayer.

In Jeremiah 33:3, God says, “Call to Me, and I will answer you, and show you great and mighty things, which you do not know.”

God answers prayer!

\\ \\ ~*Gen.

Dwight Eisenhower saw great proof 64 years ago.

On June 6th, 1944, the Allies were ready to launch the key invasion of WW II on the beaches of Normandy in France.

But the weather was terrible over the English Channel, and there was a serious debate about whether to postpone the invasion.

The tides and moon wouldn’t be right again until July.

\\ \\ ~*Eisenhower said, “Such a postponement is too bitter to contemplate.