Where repentance stops, inhumanity begins.
The vaccinated and unvaccinated will join together in a ‘Day of Prayer and Repentance for Australia’ on Saturday 11th December.
The Zoom event, hosted by The Canberra Declaration, is planned to kick off at 9am and finish around 6pm (AEDT).
Organisers said that despite the ‘short notice, they believe the situation is urgent.”
They add, “as such, we extend this invitation to all who are available to join in prayer for our nation.”
People can join at any time between 9am and 6pm on Saturday via the Zoom link: https://zoom.us/j/776881184.
Those who cannot make the Zoom event, are encouraged to ‘pray on the day in whatever way they can, whether individually or by organising or joining a corporate event’ of their own.
The event is a call to prayer and repentance. This is a request for the ‘gift of repentance’, lamenting the downgrade of freedoms in Australia, including the erosion of values, particularly those which aim to affirm life.
Australia is fast becoming a nation of socio-political excess.
Daddy government is replacing Father God.
The termination of both the dying and the unborn is being embraced as “healthcare.”
Abortion up to birth is not just legal, but celebrated. Euthanasia is encouraged over against palliative care.
Vicious “vaccine” mandates, excessive lockdowns and the indefensible creation of a two-tier society between the “vaccinated” and unvaccinated are symptoms of nation on the precipice of the Abyss.
Add onto this the one-eyed ideological totalitarian takeover of the academy, clergy and bureaucracy; corruption and nepotism in university, church and government.
As Jeremiah, the prophet proclaimed,
“They bend their tongue like a bow; falsehood and not truth has grown strong in the land; Everyone deceives his neighbour, and no one speaks the truth; they have taught their tongue to speak lies; they weary themselves committing iniquity. Heaping oppression upon oppression, and deceit upon deceit, they refuse to know me, declares the Lord.” (9:3-9, ESV)
John Calvin’s admonishment of the condition of Israel in Jeremiah’s day reminds us that ‘false gods were counted as fathers and authors of salvation by the people.”
Some of the practical benefits to come from a National Day of Prayer and Repentance is unity, solidarity and equality; the putting of both citizen and Ceasar before the Lordship of Christ the King, not above it.
In his 1938 sermon, Theologian, Helmut Gollwitzer responded to the horror of Kristallnacht (Night of Broken Glass) with a call to repentance.
He declared,
“Those who cannot admit their guilt before God can no longer do so before men and women.”
Gollwitzer then stated,
“Thus begins the insanity of persecution that seeks to make the other person into the devil in order to make themselves into a god.”
Leaving the best for last, Gollwitzer admonished the German people, saying,
“Where repentance stops, inhumanity begins; there all common bonds shatter even while one tries to strengthen them through tenacious self-justification and self-pardon.” [i]
There is no greater act of freedom and responsibility than life-changing repentance.
To be raised from a place of brokenness where we tell the world that it does not own us, because in Jesus Christ, God has graciously liberated us from the World’s false claim upon us.
The good book summons us in Proverbs 3:7-8, to live:
‘Not wise in our own eyes, [but] to fear [trust] the Lord, and turn away from evil. It will be healing to your flesh, and refreshment to your bones’
In the words of Jewish liturgical lyricist, R. Yehudah ha-Levi of Spain wrote in the 12th Century,
“Extract us from sin, He Who dwells in the heavens.
As the sun sets, call to those who pass through fire and water.
Next Year in Jerusalem.”
Specific Bible verses for this Saturday’s National Day of Prayer and Repentance are Numbers 14:17-19; Acts 5:31 and 2 Chronicles 7:14.
The event will coincide with, but is not connected to national #Reclaimtheline protests planned for the 12th at 11am.
People are encouraged to join The Canberra Declaration and prayer networks around Australia, for the National Day of Prayer and Repentance, any time between 9am and 6pm on Saturday via the Zoom link: https://zoom.us/j/776881184.
An A4 downloadable poster has also been provided FREE for anyone interested in promoting the day, and the Zoom gathering: An Appeal to Heaven.
References:
[i] Gollwitzer, H. 1938 in Stroud, D. (ed.) 2013 Preaching in Hitler’s shadow: Sermons of resistance, Wm.B Eerdmans Publishing p.120
First published on Caldron Pool, 7th December 2021.
©Rod Lampard; Caldron Pool
Gratia Veritas Lumen 