Turning

2 Chronicles 7:14
If my people, which are called by my name, shall humble themselves, and pray, and seek my face, and turn from their wicked ways; then will I hear from heaven, and will forgive their sin, and will heal their land.
What is "turning"? If your driving and you turn you go a different direction. If your walking and you turn the corner, it is the same, you end up going a different direction. In the above verse God gives us a way to "Heal our Land", and also our bodies, our families, our work, our relationships, our WHOLE WORLD. We always seem to dwell on the "turning" part which is very important, BUT that is listed third in this verse. There are two,no three points that God seems to think are prerequisites to Turning. (Not less important, but there is a order here.) 1:The most important thing really, we have to believe we are "God's People, who are called by HIS name" in other words, Christians. 2: Humble ourselves. Wow, who among us is truly Humble 100% of the time? No hands, mine is not up, we are a "Proud People" in other words we think allot of ourselves most of the time. This is why God says to "Humble Ourselves" because He knows we have to come to a place in our minds and spirits and admit we are not the center of the universe, God is. To "Humble" oneself, I believe, is to calm down, rest and seriously admit you cannot do "it" alone, we all rely on God. Now, that we are at rest, calmed down, and feeling less Powerful, and more in awe of God, we can move on to step 3: Pray. I have never realized how important these steps are until recently, , Humble ourselves, get over ourselves, calm down, let the pressures of life roll off our back, realize that God is more then............you name it, He is more then it. Then when we are in the right place, we come to Him in prayer. I believe worship is a way of humbling ourselves. We raise our hands, or bow in reverence to Him, we sing or say words of Praise to the one who has made us and who knows EVERY detail of our lives, and still loves us. This has a real humbling effect. This gets us ready to do the next step of Praying. Really praying, talking to this God that is worthy of our praise, and admiration.
So far we have acknowledged we are His children, called by His name, we have gotten ourselves to a place of awe and inspiration at His glory, Now we are ready to 4: "Seek His face" What does that mean? To seek His face? How do you do that? You look deep into his face and you concentrate on HIM> If you really love someone and you look deep in their face, their eyes and tell them how much you love them, there is something there in their eyes that you cannot explain, it is just a KNOWING . So "Seeking His (Gods) face, is concentrating solely on Him, letting the noise of the world fall away, and being lost, if you will, in the moment. You know what happens in that "moment"? God, the maker of everything, has your complete attention, He loves this, you are listening to His every whisper, every word of love for you. He is telling you to trust Him, that He has everything under control. He is telling you nudging you, guiding you, loving you.
Now, here we are, we have 1: acknowledged Him as our Father, We have 2: Humbled our self 3: Started to realize WHO we are talking to, 4: Really get deep in communication with only Him, now and only now are we ready for the next step. 5: Turn from our wicked ways. NOW we have the God given power to turn. Now, we have the face of our GOD, our savior, in our life, we can and want to turn.
The Twelve steps have helped allot of people, me included. BUT this verse: 2 Chronicles 7:14
"If my people, which are called by my name, shall humble themselves, and pray, and seek my face, and turn from their wicked ways; then will I hear from heaven, and will forgive their sin, and will heal their land" This is the TRUE way to freedom. I believe when God says."...............He will heal their (OUR) land. I believe He means MUCH more then our "Land" (Physical). He will hear our Body He will hear our Marriage, He will hear our relationships, He will heal our finances, He will heal our jobs, He will heal our leaders, He will heal our churches, He will heal our............you name it, HE WILL HEAL IT.
1: Admit He is our Father, He loves us and we are called by His name.
2: Humble ourselves, (Admit we are helpless without Him)
3: Pray, (Open up communication with God, not a list of wants and desires, but really open our hearts to Him)
4: Seek My Face. (Get seriously in His face, and look into those "Wonderful Eyes" There are answers to our questions right in His eyes.
5: THEN, and ONLY THEN we have the power, the purpose, the desire to "turn from our wicked ways" and never go back.
Without these steps, and in the right order, we are setting ourselves up for failure.
I was in jail some years ago,(I share my testimony someday here) I got to know a young kid, Joker. We talked often about all kinds of things. I asked him one day what he was going to do when he was released. He responded, "I will be back here within a year or so, guaranteed" This shocked me, I ask him why he thought that, and he told me, basically, he had no intention of changing the things that got him locked up in the first place. He said that on the "Inside" is were he belonged, and these guys here were his family. I talked to him allot about the Lord, and how He wanted to set him free. Joker was not very receptive, but I hope some of it stuck. Joker was not even at the step where he could accept that God was his father, he just felt the things he had done could never be forgiven. He could not "turn from his wicked ways" because he could not see a way out.
There is a way out, Joker, and anyone reading this who feels like he did. BUT YOU must make that first Choice, yes we have the choice to trust in Him or not. The first choice is: "If my people, who are called by MY name,,,,,,,,,,,,are you called by His name? He wants you to be. Nothing else matters, the whole world is meaningless without that first step.
Nothing else in our lives means a thing, without that. To be "Called by His name". Once we choose to let that happen, then we move own to the next step. You don't have to "turn from your wicked ways" yet, that is not important yet. Just realizing that God is your father, and you can be called a "SON OF GOD". Wow,
Think about it, what have you got to lose, except everything bad in your life?
I got so excited I almost forgot. God tells us not only will He "Heal our Land" but that He will " Forgive our Sins!!!! No One else can forgive us, Only God, Jehovah. This is the only way we can enter the gates of Heaven and be with Him forever. Because we are born into sin, He must and will forgive us . This is only done, because of Jesus Christ sacrifice on the cross. He gave Himself, willingly, so that we have the choice to be with Him forever or not. Thank You Lord.