# Can a nation repent? Or is repentance restricted to the individual?



## JBaldwin

In the politics and government forum, I made a comment that I believe our nation should repent. The comment was not made with II Chronicles 7:14 in mind, but rather the incident with Jonah and Ninevah. 

It was pointed out, and I believe correctly, that II Chronicles 7:14 is directed at the nation of Israel, and now, the church. I believe the church in our nation (USA) as whole is in a deplorable state and desperately needs to repent. While this is true, does it now make it wrong for us 
to pray for the repentance of a our leaders and our nation? 

Can a nation repent? If not, how does one interpret the repentance of Ninevah?


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## Tim

This ties in with a question I have pondered for a while. Does God regard nations today? If God does regard nations, then it would seem that a nation as a whole could repent.


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## ADKing

Our Puritan forefathers certainly believed so. If a nation has hitherto been non-Christian they should acknowledge Christ and covenant with him. If they are a covenated nation (as is the UK) then they should repent of those transgressions publicly and renew the covenant. See an example: http://www.apuritansmind.com/WCF/PDF/PublicSins.PDF

Public sins should be repented for publicly. The Bible is full of examples of God dealing with "corporate persons" such as nations and families as well as individuals. "The wicked shall be turned into hell and all the nations that forget God" (Psalm 9.17).


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## rbcbob

If some within the "nation" that "repents" do not personally repent, then has the "nation" repented?


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## ADKing

rbcbob said:


> If some within the "nation" that "repents" do not personally repent, then has the "nation" repented?


 
Thankfully, unanimous consent of all its citizens is not necessary for a nation to follow a course of action. The idea, is that the nation, officially, through its representatives and leaders should repent.


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## R Harris

Folks, absolutely the best resource to answer this question and deal with this issue is _Messiah the Prince_ by William Symington. You may have seen his name or this book referenced in other threads.

He deals extensively on how the Scriptures clearly teach that God regards nations (governments) as moral agents.


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## Wayne

Good question, and thanks for bringing it up. As I was the one who pointed to 2 Chron. 7:14, I'll say that I think it is at least easier to start with the Church when seeking or expecting wide-scale repentance. 

To put the question another way, "For those outside the Church, can we possibly expect repentance apart from their conversion?" And if so, what _sort_ of repentance? Obviously apart from conversion, it would not be a repentance unto godliness.


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## JBaldwin

Wayne said:


> Good question, and thanks for bringing it up. As I was the one who pointed to 2 Chron. 7:14, I'll say that I think it is at least easier to start with the Church when seeking or expecting wide-scale repentance.
> 
> To put the question another way, "For those outside the Church, can we possibly expect repentance apart from their conversion?" And if so, what _sort_ of repentance? Obviously apart from conversion, it would not be a repentance unto godliness.



It seems repentance should start with the church. When I speak of repentance, I speak of conversion.


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## Pergamum

Is nation in Scripture a political entity or an ethnic-linguistic people group? Ethne seems to be a people. But Assyria, etc, were political entities as well.


Also, does God recognize illegitimate governments. Who properly represents a government?



Can a nation also call down a curse upon itself and bind itself to the devil? Pat Robertson says Haiti paying for 'pact to the devil' - CNN.com


Does God listen to a minority or does He require a majority?

If it is said that Ninevah repented, isn't this merely a way of saying that many in Ninevah repented? We often speak in corporate generalities in order to express the effects of individual decisions on a large scale. And "national revival" is merely individual revival on a large scale.


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## JBaldwin

Pergamum, 

You asked more questions than you answered 

I often wonder if it was Ninevah's leadership that repented or if it was the people or a combination. The USA, Wales (the two that come immediately come to mind) experienced nation-wide and large regional revivals at times. I recently read the statistic that during the time the George Whitfield preached it was estimated that about 90% of the nation's population had heard him preach. That was the Great Awakening. I would personally consider this to be a national revival (repentance). 

I'm waiting for others to weigh in on your other questions, because I have the same ones.


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## R Harris

JBaldwin said:


> Pergamum,
> 
> You asked more questions than you answered
> 
> I often wonder if it was Ninevah's leadership that repented or if it was the people or a combination. The USA, Wales (the two that come immediately come to mind) experienced nation-wide and large regional revivals at times. I recently read the statistic that during the time the George Whitfield preached it was estimated that about 90% of the nation's population had heard him preach. That was the Great Awakening. I would personally consider this to be a national revival (repentance).
> 
> I'm waiting for others to weigh in on your other questions, because I have the same ones.



Again, read the Symington book. Difficult to give a synopsis of it here, but as I said, he deals with all of this extensively.


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## Peairtach

Tim said:


> This ties in with a question I have pondered for a while. Does God regard nations today? If God does regard nations, then it would seem that a nation as a whole could repent.



God does regard nations. The Bible says He made them for Himself.

That doesn't mean that He regards nations in the same manner as Old Covenant Israel, or the New Covenant Israel of God (the Church). This can be part of the confusion behind theonomy. The civil magistrate in modern nations is God's minister/servant, not the Lord's Anointed, like David, Solomon or Christ.

But God can send repentance to _a nation as a whole _ while leaving other nations (relatively) untouched, so that as a whole the nation turns around. This turning can be so profound as to affect the constitution and politics of the nation. Establishmentarianism can result from national repentance, along with National Covenanting, and the careful following of the true general equity of God's law for the nation.

This ties in with a thread in the Revelation and Eschatology Section on whether God has a problem recognising Jews to send them repentance as a nation (Romans 11). God will have no problem recognising Jews if He wants to send them repentance, and He will have no problem recognising Scots, Brits or Americans either, even although they also are of mixed ancestry.

As a current example of the Holy Spirit working along national lines in His own wisdom, is god not doing a more notable work - apparently - in China rather than Japan currently?

There are numerous historical examples of this as well. Ultimately it was down to the Lord's choice where the boundaries of the Reformation in Europe were to be set when the dust had settled on the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries, and which States and sections of States would be left under the darkness of Romanism.

Obviously any repentance in a nation is almost certainly bound to involve the repentance of any existing Church in the nation aswell, if not start there.

God will convert the World, and particular nations in that World, how and when He wants to, but not without His people's prayers and work.

I don't see Scotland's leaders taking out and dusting down the National Covenant and the leaders of Great Britain taking out and dusting down Solemn League and Covenant any time soon, without some truly remarkable works of God happening in people's hearts. It will happen, but maybe not in our lifetimes. 

There's more likely to be a period of Ecclesiastical and State persecution of biblical Christians first.


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## Willem van Oranje

Yes.


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## Pilgrim Standard

Does God regard his covenant children as a Nation? They are part of his Kingdom on earth correct? So does God "regard" His people as a Nation within a Nation?

For example, Did God regard His people Under Pharaoh as a Nation separate from the Nation of Egypt? Or His children Israel as a Nation when they were captive in Babylon? 

If so could National repentance be seen as one of the following:

1) God's people in the nation Repent, the National Government Repents, Majority Of citizens Repent.
2) God's people in the nation Repent, the National Government Repents, Majority Of citizens *Do not *Repent.
3) God's people in the nation Repent, the National Government *Does not *Repent, Majority Of citizens Repent.
4) God's people in the nation *Do not *repent, the National Government Repents, Majority Of citizens Repent.
5) God's people in the nation *Do not *repent, the National Government *Does not* Repent, Majority Of citizens Repent.
6) God's people in the nation Repent, the National Government *Does not *Repent, Majority Of citizens *Do not *Repent.



This thread is quite interesting.


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## Christusregnat

Nations can repent as political entities, as is very clear from example after example from Scripture.

The idea that Old Testament Israel was unique in this (and in many other regards) demonstrates that the anabaptists' social and political views have become mainstream in "Reformed" thinking.

When the Puritans or coveanters or Reformers wanted to discuss contemporary political trends or to guide their contemporary political leaders, they drew heavily from the Old Testament, and the nation of Israel. The only people who used to object to this procedure were considered fanatical heretics. Now we consider it normal. How have the mighty fallen!


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## ZackF

What is a "nation" at all? Is the US a nation? What about Kansas? How about the Kaw Nation indian reservation south of Wichita about 60 miles. I find it hard to believe Scripture is talking about the modern nation states that rose from the Middle Ages. What about stateless societies?


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## Christusregnat

I think that was Perg's point: there are tribes, tongues and nations, and not everyone belongs to all three.


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## Peairtach

God is constantly dealing with nations as nations throughout the Bible, and He still does.

He also deals with other entities e.g. congregations and denominations - e.g. the Epistles and the Seven Letters to the Churches of Asia.

He also deals with families, although that must be anathema to many non-Covenantal Baptist ears.

Non-Covenantal Baptists have an allergy about the idea of God dealing with any entity apart from the individual.

Ultimately and at the highest level He deals with individuals qua individuals. See Abraham's prayer for Lot and His family. God will not ultimately destroy in Hell one individual who repents and believes in Him, even although everyone else in a nation of millions is damned.


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## Pergamum

Christusregnat said:


> Nations can repent as political entities, as is very clear from example after example from Scripture.
> 
> The idea that Old Testament Israel was unique in this (and in many other regards) demonstrates that the anabaptists' social and political views have become mainstream in "Reformed" thinking.
> 
> When the Puritans or coveanters or Reformers wanted to discuss contemporary political trends or to guide their contemporary political leaders, they drew heavily from the Old Testament, and the nation of Israel. The only people who used to object to this procedure were considered fanatical heretics. Now we consider it normal. How have the mighty fallen!


 
Interesting and unapologetic theonomic perspective. Thanks.


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## alhembd

R Harris said:


> Folks, absolutely the best resource to answer this question and deal with this issue is _Messiah the Prince_ by William Symington. You may have seen his name or this book referenced in other threads.
> 
> He deals extensively on how the Scriptures clearly teach that God regards nations (governments) as moral agents.


 
Randy,

I am so glad that you mention the doctrine of the government's being a "moral agent." Cunningham rightly taught that, too. In fact, the reason the government is duty-bound to profess the true religion, by endorsing it with a national establishment, is because, as a moral agent, it is required to set the right example for its citizens.

Sherm Ishbell has done the Church a great service by posting William Cunningham's excellent treatises on the Establishment Principle at his website.

Relation Between Church and State - The Westminster Presbyterian

I highly recommend you read them. The doctrine of the Establishment had well matured by the time of the Disruption in 1843. The purpose of an Establishment is not to persecute dissenters, no. The purpose of an Establishment is to set forth an example for the people, and to give the people a national profession of faith. Thus, in Scotland, the national Church, while it still held to the Westminster Confession of Faith, wonderfully set forth that Confession as the religious Confession of the nation, while dissenting churches were still allowed freedom to worship. Jews, for that matter, had total freedom.

This is little know outside Scotland, but from 1870 to 1970, because of the Establishment in Scotland, every child in the public schools memorised the Westminster Shorter Catechism and the Scottish Metrical Psalms. That set the culture for the entire nation. Westminster doctrine was part of the culture.

Without this, in my opinion, there is no complete national repentance. 

What a sad day it is today, that Scotland has so grievously fallen from this glorious profession that once made her the glory of nations!


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## JBaldwin

> This is little know outside Scotland, but from 1870 to 1970, because of the Establishment in Scotland, every child in the public schools memorised the Westminster Shorter Catechism and the Scottish Metrical Psalms. That set the culture for the entire nation. Westminster doctrine was part of the culture.
> 
> Without this, in my opinion, there is no complete national repentance.
> 
> What a sad day it is today, that Scotland has so grievously fallen from this glorious profession that once made her the glory of nations!



I have been thinking about this a lot. In USA, for example, in its earlier years, all students in public schools read the Bible or some portions of it for literature. I have in my possession a high school literature book printed in 1963 for public school use which has Psalm 1 as part of the required reading. My husband says that in the 1960s in the south where he grew up, students in his public school prayed and read scripture every day. 

Even though Scriptures are readily available to anyone in the USA, very few have ever heard the whole Gospel presented. They get smatterings, but true faith and repentance are not preached much or understood. Where are the George Whitfields? 

I want to know, can a nation truly repent without the presentation of Gospel? How can they hear without a preacher? This grieves me greatly and drives me to my knees. How important it is for us who know the Lord to ask God to wake us.


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## Peairtach

One of the problems is that an Establishment of religion works well and is rightly called for during a period of ascendency of biblical Christianity in a nation, but during a period of decline if the Established Church(es) aren't dealt with rigorously, it could be said that the Established Churches which are progressively apostasising, as the CofE and CofS did from the nineteenth century onwards, become a spiritual wetblanket suffocating the spiritual life of the country and confirming its progressive spiritual death.

It's difficult to assess how helpful or harmful the Establishment Churches in the British Isles have been to the spiritual life of the nation over the last 200 years, but the fact that so many evangelical and Reformed people have felt the need to be quit of them, may indicate the way things have been and are.

This isn't an argument for disestablishmentarianism. I am an antidisestablishmentarian. But there is a case for a different kind of establshment of the Christian religion.


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## Christusregnat

Pergamum said:


> Christusregnat said:
> 
> 
> 
> Nations can repent as political entities, as is very clear from example after example from Scripture.
> 
> The idea that Old Testament Israel was unique in this (and in many other regards) demonstrates that the anabaptists' social and political views have become mainstream in "Reformed" thinking.
> 
> When the Puritans or coveanters or Reformers wanted to discuss contemporary political trends or to guide their contemporary political leaders, they drew heavily from the Old Testament, and the nation of Israel. The only people who used to object to this procedure were considered fanatical heretics. Now we consider it normal. How have the mighty fallen!
> 
> 
> 
> 
> Interesting and unapologetic theonomic perspective. Thanks.
Click to expand...

 
I'm not ashamed of the political views of the Reformers. I don't have to say, "I'm a Calvinist, despite Servetus." They did what God commands, and were not ashamed of it. Why should I be?


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## ZackF

Christusregnat said:


> Pergamum said:
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> Christusregnat said:
> 
> 
> 
> Nations can repent as political entities, as is very clear from example after example from Scripture.
> 
> The idea that Old Testament Israel was unique in this (and in many other regards) demonstrates that the anabaptists' social and political views have become mainstream in "Reformed" thinking.
> 
> When the Puritans or coveanters or Reformers wanted to discuss contemporary political trends or to guide their contemporary political leaders, they drew heavily from the Old Testament, and the nation of Israel. The only people who used to object to this procedure were considered fanatical heretics. Now we consider it normal. How have the mighty fallen!
> 
> 
> 
> 
> Interesting and unapologetic theonomic perspective. Thanks.
> 
> Click to expand...
> 
> 
> I'm not ashamed of the political views of the Reformers. I don't have to say, "I'm a Calvinist, despite Servetus." They did what God commands, and were not ashamed of it. Why should I be?
Click to expand...

 
As I understand it Calvin opposed the mode of Servetus' execution if not the execution itself.


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## R Harris

Richard Tallach said:


> One of the problems is that an Establishment of religion works well and is rightly called for during a period of ascendency of biblical Christianity in a nation, but during a period of decline if the Established Church(es) aren't dealt with rigorously, it could be said that the Established Churches which are progressively apostasising, as the CofE and CofS did from the nineteenth century onwards, become a spiritual wetblanket suffocating the spiritual life of the country and confirming its progressive spiritual death.
> 
> It's difficult to assess how helpful or harmful the Establishment Churches in the British Isles have been to the spiritual life of the nation over the last 200 years, but the fact that so many evangelical and Reformed people have felt the need to be quit of them, may indicate the way things have been and are.
> 
> This isn't an argument for disestablishmentarianism. I am an antidisestablishmentarian. But there is a case for a different kind of establshment of the Christian religion.



These are good points. Note the European nations, especially the ones that have CROSSES in their flags. These nations were at one time distinctly Christian, and now they no longer are.

BUT, that is not a good reason to say that a nation should not be explicitly Christian, for the same reasoning that one should not evangelize anyone simply because the risk exists that they could apostasize after having become a professing Christian. That is absurd.


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