The following is an excerpt from our devotional series Desperate for Change.

Introduction : Desperate for Change

Prayer is critical to any nation, especially a nation that proclaims a connection to God. The united States historically had claimed such a connection. But things have changed. We are living in days that most call post-Christian. The drift from our Judeo-Christian foundation is evident in almost every aspect of our society. That leads us back to prayer. It’s time to pray for america. This devotional is written to help you focus your prayers in a biblical way.

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Each day’s devotion is based on a passage of Scripture. The Scriptures used here must be used carefully. Sometimes a promise was made particularly to Israel as a theocracy (a nation whose leader was God). Because of this, you cannot just pull any promise made to Israel and automatically apply it to the united States or any other nation. But many of these promises are based on spiritual principles that can be carefully applied to our nation. I have attempted to do so, under the leadership of the Holy Spirit.

I suggest you do not simply pray forty days and then lay this book down and move on. There are several better ways to use this devotional.

One would be to pray this devotional through completely every forty days. Imagine what could happen after a solid year of praying these Scriptures and concepts over America?

Another way would be not to limit yourself to one devotion per day. I believe the Spirit of God can take this material and forge powerful prayers for the transformation of a nation as we pray the same Scripture day after day until the Lord turns us loose to move on to the next devotion.

The last devotion—day Forty—focuses on Esther 4:14, in which the young Hebrew queen is challenged to put her life on the line for her people. Her cousin Mordecai saying to her, “Who knows but that you have come to royal position for such a time as this?” For such a time as this, we are all called to intense intercession for our nation.

Desperate for Change: Day 1

“The fear of the Lord is the beginning of knowledge, but fools despise wisdom and discipline.” –Proverbs 1:7

This well-known passage of Scripture is typically used for individuals, and rightly so. The principle, however, can be applied to a whole nation. If a nation is characterized by the fear of the Lord in its dealings, both internally and internationally, it will be a nation known for wisdom and not foolishness.

A wise nation takes into account the Word of God as it makes laws. even a cursory reading of the history of the founding of the united States demonstrates that our founding fathers seriously endeavored to base our nation’s laws on their strong Judeo-Christian beliefs. Secularists today often counter that many of those men were, in fact, deists, and not strong Christians. Their own beliefs aside, our Founders, almost to a man, insisted that laws were based on divine revelation and not on human wisdom alone. even as strong a secularist as Thomas Jefferson said powerfully, “and can the liberties of a nation be thought secure when we have removed their only firm basis, a conviction in the minds of the people that these liberties are the gift of God? That they are not to be violated but with His wrath? Indeed I tremble for my country when I reflect that God is just: that His justice cannot sleep for ever.” (Paul Leicester Ford, ed., The Writings of Thomas Jefferson, 10 vols., Notes on the State of Virginia (New York: G.P. Putnam’s Sons, 1892-99), Query XVIII, 4:232.)

A significant shift has taken place in American political and cultural thought over the past fifty years, replacing God’s Word as the source of morality, ethics, and law, with the rule of polls and surveys. This is exactly what Proverbs warns us against. a nation that rejects the Word of God as the basis for right and wrong has become a foolish nation that despises wisdom and rejects discipline.

Prayer Points

• Pray that the United States will repent of its corporate rejection of the Word of God as the basis of law.
• Pray that a holy fear of God will sweep across our nation, leading us back to a place of wisdom.
• Pray that courage born of wisdom will be given to Christians in places of leadership in government, the courts, and law schools across the nation so that they will stand for a godly basis for law.

My Prayer

Father, I give You thanks for the godly foundation of my nation. Thank You for instilling the fear of the Lord into our Founders, so that our laws were based on Your Word. Imperfect though they were, the original docu- ments of government for the United States made a real effort to reflect Your will and Your truth.

Forgive us for drifting from Your ways. We have turned from the fear of God to the fear of man. Our laws change with the shifting winds of human opinion. We have embraced foolishness and rejected Your discipline.

We confess our desperate need for Your truth once again to become the foundation for our country. Pour out a hunger for truth and righteousness on everyone from preachers to professors to presidents. Raise up a standard of righteousness across this nation that honors Your Word and exalts Your name!

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David Butts is the chairman of America’s National Prayer Committee and the president of Harvest Prayer Ministries. Photo Credit: PonyWang/Getty Images Signature via Canva Teams.