GOD RESPONDS TO PRAYERS OF REPENTANCE
The Bible shows that God has responded with love and kindness to people who prayed and repented of their sins. And God is the same yesterday, today and forever (Hebrews 12:8).
RESPONSE TO GOD’S OLD TESTAMENT CHOSEN PEOPLE
God allowed his people of Israel to go into Babylonian captivity because of sin and disobedience. As God intended, captivity caused them to repent and pray to the Lord for deliverance. God heard their prayers and recognized their repentance. After their being in captivity for seventy years, God showed his love and kindness. The Lord moved on the heart of the King Cyrus of Persia to free his people from captivity. . (Jeremiah 29:10-14; Isa 45:1-6; Ezra 1:1-4; 5:13-17).
RESPONSE TO PEOPLE NOT HIS CHOSEN
When God saw the great wickedness of Nineveh, he sent his prophet Jonah to warn them that he was going to destroy them. Although they were not recognized as God’s people, the King of Nineveh believed Jonah. The King ordered his people to pray and fast, and to turn from their sins. In response, God showed them his mercy rather than his judgment. (Jonah 3).
RESPONSE TO US TODAY
In speaking to his people today, through people-rallying preachers like Evangelist Franklin Graham and others, God promises to show his forgiveness and help, if his people pray and repent of their sins. In his biblical Word 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 (2 Chronicles 7:14).
If we confess [repentantly] our sins, he is faithful and just to forgive us our sins, and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness (1 John 1:9).
God does not want any to perish, “but that all should come to repentance” (2 Peter 3:9; 1 Timothy 2:4). God sent his only begotten Son Jesus Christ into the world to die on a cross as an atonement for the sins of whoever repents and believes in his Son (John 3:16; Acts 2:38).
