KEY PRINCIPLES

What does it take to bring healing and transformation to a nation? How can a whole nation be changed?
National Transformation is commonly thought of as the integration of God’s ways into the laws, government policy, economics and culture of a nation. While this is largely true, there is an intangible factor that must first be dealt with before any of these other “tangible” changes can effectively take place and create sustainable transformation. This intangible factor, the one that so often eludes us, is the healing of the heart of the nation. Only when the “heart” of a nation is healed, can true transformation take place.
Intangible factor: secret to transformation of a nation
God speaks of the nations in the scriptures. The scriptural understanding of nations is not, as we understand in modern times, a geopolitical location delineated by arbitrary state lines on a map. A nation is a people group, an ethnos, a race and God views these people groups as corporate persons. We see evidence of this in the way God speaks to nations through prophets who employ language such as, “Zion my daughter,” “Israel my firstborn,” and “Babylon the harlot.” The term “the Body of Christ,” too, alludes to the Biblical understanding of a group of people being a corporate person.
A nation’s ability to thrive does not originate from the outside, but rather from within. For instance, when the people of Israel left Egypt they had a problem. While, outwardly, they had been delivered and freed, inwardly they carried the wounds, mindset and culture of slaves from Egypt. As a corporate people scarred by slavery and fear, their heart needed to be healed though a new revelation of God’s character. They needed to know He was not a harsh slave master but, rather, a loving Father. Only then did they become the warrior nation who could take the Promised Land. This illustrates well that, just as individual human transformation is an inner work that then manifests externally, national transformation also originates in the heart.
How then do we assess or measure the health of a nation’s heart? A heart cannot really be quantified. It is, after all, an “intangible”. However the process is similar to a person going to the doctor’s office and filling out an intake form which may include questions such as: “Where is your pain?” “What are your symptoms and when did they start?” “What surgeries have you had?” “What illnesses run in your family?” To begin this process in a nation, I frequently begin by asking its people, “How is your nation?” This question evokes points of pain in the national history, things such as civil war, genocides, communism, slavery, depressions, colonization, divisions or separations, racism, foreign attacks, and betrayals for example. There are many other clues as to the brokenness of a national heart. These can be discovered in common sayings or mindsets, such as the saying “About us but without us,” which alludes to the pervasive fear of betrayal and victimization by friends and strangers alike. An investigation into the history and culture of the nation will also invariably turn up areas of brokenness. All these details point to wounds or illnesses in the heart of the nation, wounds that God can then show us how to “treat”, much as a doctor would treat a person wounded in battle or life.
Interestingly, but not surprisingly, the nuances of brokenness are not always readily visible to the nationals or the people who are affected by them because they are familiar and the people do not know there is an alternative. For this reason, the first step in healing a nation’s heart comes when God sends a messenger to the nation. God often anoints an “outsider” for this step. Once the message of God arrives through His person of choice, the healing (or the next stage of the healing) can begin.
Each nation and its healing journey is unique. However, just as with individuals, there are some common threads that are shared by all nations. The following keys can be used to unlock healing and restoration for a nation’s heart.

KEY 1: RELATIONAL FOUNDATIONS

Family is the highest form of authority in the Kingdom. That is why God is our “Father,” not just “God”, and why Jesus taught us to pray “our Father” not “my Father.” Building relationships that are connected at the heart level is essential to a thriving nation.
The first commandment Moses received on Mount Sinai regarding interpersonal relations was the command to honor one’s father and mother. This command came with the promise that if we followed it, we would have a long life (Exodus. 20:12). This aspect of family is the reason it is crucial, before beginning any new work in a nation, to reach out to the fathers and mothers in the land, the servants of God, and others who have been laboring in a land for decades. By doing so, we honor them and acknowledge what God has already been doing. It shows humility and honor, and enables us to join the strength of many faithful laborers. When we create such an environment of honor, it turns the hearts of the fathers to their children, and the hearts of the children to their fathers which helps to prevent judgement upon the nation. (Malachi 4:6)

KEY 2: HEARING AND OBEYING GOD

The key to success is to seek God for His ways and His timing. This is the model Israel followed to take hold of the Promised Land. As a family of believers seeking the healing of a nation, the key is to come before the Lord to ask “what” to do, “how” to do it, and “when” to proceed. The answer will be unique to each nation or corporate person.
For instance, in Czechia, after several years of repentance, forgiveness, and reconciliation between Protestants and Catholics, Czech and past oppressive nations, etc., God continued the process of healing by declaring, “It’s a New Day!” over the nation, and drawing the people into a new relationship with Him. In Slovakia, God proclaimed, “I see a New Slovakia!” and then began a process of renewing the hearts of the people. In Quebec, Canada, God instructed us to facilitate healing through a creative art festival called “Quebec, I love you.” While all the ways in which God has worked have been unique to the circumstances and “personality” of each nation, a common thread has been regional gatherings. These gatherings have played a key role in the progression of revelation and healing, though each one ended up having its own flavor or focus. God has a way of putting His finger on very specific issues.
Key 3: The Remnant
Second Chronicles 7:14 details the specific people to be part of the healing of their land. He calls them “my people.” These are not all people, but those whom God has called His own. This remnant can be likened to hinges that change the direction of a huge door; they are people who shift national history, they are the hinges of HIStory.
These individuals do not have to be numerous to make a difference. In Romans 11:4 we see that God told Elijah that He had set aside seven thousands who had not bowed the knee to Baal. In the account of Abraham interceding with the Lord for Sodom, it is written that God would have been satisfied with a remnant of merely ten righteous people (Genesis 18:32). There is synergy in the corporate gathering; “One puts 1000 to flight; two put 10,000 to flight” (Deut 32:30; Josh 23:10).

KEY 4: BIBLICAL PRESCRIPTION FOR HEALING

National issues need to be dealt with on a national level. In Joel 2, they blew the trumpet and called a national assembly to stand before the Lord. The goal is not necessarily for every single believer to stand before God, but a representation of the entire nation is to stand before Him as the remnant. This can only be effective when the call is done on a national scale, and across dividing lines (such as political, denominational and racial divisions).
Secondly, as outlined in 2 Chronicles 7:14, God has laid out a kind of prescription for a nation’s healing. In order to see the fullness of healing in a nation, He calls His people to gather together to do four things: 1. Humble themselves; 2. Pray; 3. Seek My face; 4. Repent from their evil ways. All too often, believers focus on only the second part of the prescription, prayer, and so nations only see pockets of limited breakthrough. For the prescription to be complete, all four instructions need to be followed, and they need to be done on a national scale. Then God brings the breakthrough He promises. He: 1. Hears; 2. Forgives; and 3. Heals the land.

KEY 5: GOD’S PEOPLE WILL COME

Sometimes people new to this process worry that they will go to great lengths to prepare a gathering, but that no one will come. However, in Psalm 110, the Lord promises to make His people willing for the call at hand. David writes, “Your people shall be willing in the day of your power” (Ps 110:3). It is our job to get the word out to the best of our ability, but it is God who will make His people – the remnant – ready on the day of power, the day of battle. There is a spiritual battle for the soul of nations. God’s people will be stirred and willingly be drawn to stand together; they will come and heed the call of God in the land.

KEY 6: PROPHETIC ACTS

We must never underestimate the power of prophetic acts to release victory well beyond the end of a gathering or meeting. When Elisha told the King of Israel to strike the ground with the arrows as a prophetic act of victory (2 Kings 13:18) and he only struck the ground three times, he only got victory three times. This prophetic act done with the prophet had national repercussions. There is grace for national breakthrough in prophetic acts when the remnant and the apostles and prophets of the nation come together and stand in the presence of the Lord.

KEY 7: LAYING DOWN OUR AGENDAS

When we stand together before God we lay down our agendas and become like a spiritual Switzerland, a neutral land. At the gathering in Antioch (Acts 13), the teacher did not teach, the prophet did not prophesy. Each and every person laid down their crowns and mantels and focused on the Lord. When we gather, we lay down our ministries, our agendas, and our passions in order to better hear the Lord for the nation. The key to doing this is trusting that God is the one who will bring about the fruition of our individual assignments. This frees us to hear God’s instructions in the context of healing the national heart and it helps us avoid the greatest hindrance of all to hearing God; offense. In this way revelation flows freely into the gathering.

KEY 8: MINISTER TO THE LORD

In Acts 13, the believers gathered together to minister to the Lord. Their worship was focused on Jesus. It was not a “make-me-feel-better-about-myself” kind of worship. They were ministering to the Lord with gratitude and telling Him how amazing He is. Blessing the Lord attracts His presence and the Holy Spirit comes and releases divine strategy. At time of Acts 13, the Holy Spirit revealed the strategy to reach the gentile nations through sending Barnabas and Saul. King David understood the reality that God inhabits the praises of His people and he pursued God’s presence through worship. As a result, he was able to continually hear God’s specific instructions that granted him victory wherever he went.

KEY 9: THE GIBEONITE KEY

In 2 Samuel 21, there had been a famine in the land for three years and David inquired of the Lord what the reason was. The Lord answered David, saying it was because Saul had killed the Gibeonites. Israel had sworn to protect them, but Saul had violated this agreement. Because he inquired of the Lord, David was given a key to end the famine in the land. He met with the Gibeonites, atoned for the wrong that had been done, and the famine ended. Like David, we can inquire of the Lord and ask for the Gibeonite keys in the nations where God leads us; the keys that will end the suffering and pain, and bring restoration and healing.