Our friend Tim Wildmon, President, American Family Association sent us a reminder that the American Family Association’s National Gathering for Prayer and Repentance is tomorrow, February 1, 2023.
Some of the nation's most prominent, Bible-believing Christian organizations, along with national political leaders, will come together to pray and repent for our nation. We will hear biblical exhortations from Anne Graham Lotz, Carter Conlon, Andrew Brunson, and Jonathan Cahn. The event will be live-streamed beginning at 8:30 AM ET and will also feature AFA's Abraham Hamilton III.
One glance at the news headlines on any given day reveals America is a troubled nation, observed Tim Wildmon. Scripture makes clear the issue is not with God, but with His people. As Americans have turned to Him in prayer and repentance in critical junctures in the past, there is an urgency to do the same now.
Tune in to pray along with Members of Congress and evangelical leaders from across the nation who are joining together for this solemn event, responding to God's call to repent for that which is counter to His word.
National Days of Prayer and Repentance have a long history in our country. Calling the nation to unify in prayer is deeply rooted in American history. It even pre-dates the Republic, as the writers at religiousfreedominstitute.org observed. For instance, three months after the British attacks at Lexington and Concord, the Continental Congress called for “A Day of Public Humiliation, Fasting, and Prayer” with the following intention: “That we may with united hearts and voices, unfeignedly confess and deplore our many sins and offer up our joint supplications to the all-wise, omnipotent, and merciful Disposer of all events…” (July 20, 1775)
As Commander of the Continental Army, George Washington encouraged his troops to participate in a congressionally authorized day of prayer on Thursday, May 6, 1779.
During the Civil War, the Senate requested that President Lincoln call for a National Day of Prayer:
Whereas, the Senate of the United States, devoutly recognizing the Supreme Authority and just Government of Almighty God, in all the affairs of men and of nations, has, by a resolution, requested the President to designate and set apart a day for National prayer and humiliation.
And whereas it is the duty of nations as well as of men, to own their dependence upon the overruling power of God, to confess their sins and transgressions, in humble sorrow, yet with assured hope that genuine repentance will lead to mercy and pardon; and to recognize the sublime truth, announced in the Holy Scriptures and proven by all history, that those nations only are blessed whose God is the Lord.
And, insomuch as we know that, by His divine law, nations like individuals are subjected to punishments and chastisements in this world, may we not justly fear that the awful calamity of civil war, which now desolates the land, may be but a punishment, inflicted upon us, for our presumptuous sins, to the needful end of our national reformation as a whole People?
We have been the recipients of the choicest bounties of Heaven. We have been preserved, these many years, in peace and prosperity. We have grown in numbers, wealth and power, as no other nation has ever grown. But we have forgotten God…
It behooves us then, to humble ourselves before the offended Power, to confess our national sins, and to pray for clemency and forgiveness.
This Civil War-era proclamation makes some important points about the value of prayer and robust religion. First, religion serves as a check on government tyranny. The state should be limited to its narrow sphere of influence. Lincoln and the Senate realized that religiously informed morality was the foundation for law and society. Otherwise, there was either anarchy or government-imposed duties. They realized that we live in an objectively moral world and that individuals and societies could participate in “presumptuous sins,” such as slavery. The American people needed to repent. Finally, they recognized that true thanksgiving has as its proper object a person, in this case, a Divine Person. It is right to thank God for past blessings.
We urge CHQ readers and friends to take the opportunity presented by Tim Wildmon, and the American Family Association, and other evangelical leaders to, as Abraham Lincoln so correctly put it, “to humble ourselves before the offended Power, to confess our national sins, and to pray for clemency and forgiveness.”Please save this link and use it to join the American Family Association at 8:30 a.m. on Wednesday, February 1, 2023, for a National Gathering for Prayer and Repentance.
Tim Wildmon
American Family Association
National Gathering for Prayer and Repentance
Anne Graham Lotz
Carter Conlon
Andrew Brunson
Jonathan Cahn
National Days of Prayer