The Hourglass from Refreshing Hope Ministries on Vimeo.

Before we begin, I want to say that this is a very simple message, that everyone should know, but we seem to have forgotten. Keep an open mind and let the Lord speak to you about whether it is right or wrong, but this is what He told me:

Picture an hourglass in the shape of your country slowly draining sand, and each person in it who commits an evil act makes it drain a little faster. Meanwhile, each person who humbles themselves, repents, turns from their wicked ways, and prays slows it down and buys the country a little more time. That's God's judgment in a nutshell. Let's begin with a conversation that God had with Abram in Genesis:

(Genesis 15:13-14 NKJV) Then He said to Abram: "Know certainly that your descendants will be strangers in a land that is not theirs, and will serve them, and they will afflict them four hundred years. And also the nation whom they serve I will judge; afterward they shall come out with great possessions."

Abram was childless at the time, but God was speaking of the future of his grandson and his descendants. Later, Abram had a son named Isaac, who in turn had a son named Jacob (Supplanter). After a wrestling match with God in Genesis 32:24, Jacob was changed forever and renamed Israel (Prevails with God). God also renamed Abram (Exalted Father) to Abraham (Father of multitude).

(Genesis 15:15-16 NKJV) "Now as for you, you shall go to your fathers in peace; you shall be buried at a good old age. But in the fourth generation they shall return here, for the iniquity of the Amorites is not yet complete."

Israel's descendants would be enslaved for four hundred years in Egypt, then God would send Moses to bring them out with great possessions, just as He had told Abram. Then God said something very interesting: the iniquity of the Amorites is not yet complete.

God is so patient that He waited 400 years for the Amorites to completely fill up with iniquity and sin before He removed them from their land. The earth beneath them grew nauseous and vomited them out (Leviticus 18:25). The Lord gave them hundreds of years to choose right, but they constantly chose wrong.

The Amorites, the inhabitants of Canaan, took full advantage of God's long suffering. According to W. F. Albright, the three principal goddesses of the Canaanites were Ashtaroth, Anath, and Asherah, and they were primarily concerned with sex and war. "Sex was their primary function."

Leviticus 18:1-24 lists twelve variations of incest that were common to Canaan, along with adultery, child sacrifice, sexual perversion, and bestiality, and it ends with this warning to us: "Do not make yourselves unclean by any of these things, for by all these the nations I am driving out before you have become unclean." They served the gods of sex and war.

There would ultimately come a day when the Amorites had reached the point of no return - their hourglass would be empty, and the land would vomit out its inhabitants. That is when God unleashed a flood of Israelites out of Egypt and across the Jordan. In truth, Joshua's invasion was actually an act of God's justice and judgment. The history of the world is under the moral governance of God. The displacement of the Amorites by Israel was not simply the result of divine favoritism. The Amorites had long flaunted God's moral law written on their hearts (Romans 2:15).

God is long-suffering, but not blind. When someone commits a sin in our country, it adds to the scale and tips it a little more. When someone prays, repents, and asks for God's mercy on our nation, it removes a little of it. When the sin of the Amorites had reached its fullness, God sent another nation in to destroy them. To Israel, it was the new promised land. To the Amorites, it used to be home. Can we see it happen here? Absolutely.

When sins outnumber the prayers, the scale is tilting. To be honest, in the USA, I am not even sure we can right this boat, but I pray every day for our country because that is what God told us to do (Jeremiah 29:7).

When our nation has peace, we have peace. So it is in our best interest to pray for our nation and its leaders, even when we don't like them. In Ezekiel, God sought someone to stand in the gap for Jerusalem. He wanted someone to stand up and speak for them, to intercede on their behalf, but He found no one.

(Ezekiel 22:27-31 NASB) "Her princes within her are like wolves tearing the prey, by shedding blood and destroying lives in order to get dishonest gain. "Her prophets have smeared whitewash for them, seeing false visions and divining lies for them, saying, 'Thus says the Lord GOD,' when the LORD has not spoken. "The people of the land have practiced oppression and committed robbery, and they have wronged the poor and needy and have oppressed the sojourner without justice. "I searched for a man among them who would build up the wall and stand in the gap before Me for the land, so that I would not destroy it; but I found no one. "Thus I have poured out My indignation on them; I have consumed them with the fire of My wrath; their way I have brought upon their heads," declares the Lord GOD.

Notice the words the Lord used: the princes of the land practiced oppression, mistreated the poor and needy, wrongfully oppressed foreigners, destroyed lives, and sought dishonest gain. While the prophets surrounding them smeared whitewash for them, saying, "This is good..."

I can tell you that all the sins mentioned in Ezekiel and all that the Canaanites did have been done here, and you can watch most of it on television. God sought someone to stand in the gap so He would not have to give up on them and destroy them, but He found no one.

It is an abomination to wear crosses and wave Christian flags while we hunt foreigners, shoot innocent people in the face, and bomb nations to seize their resources, all under the banner of Christianity. You can smell the stench rising to heaven over our nation, and if you believe God doesn't care, you are mistaken.

Let's look at some facts: In the Old Testament, God put Adam and Eve in the Garden of Eden, but because of sin, He later threw them out. God put Israel in the promised land, but after backsliding, used pagan nations to carry them into exile. In the New Testament, Jerusalem and its temple were destroyed by Rome in 70 AD, and Israel ceased to exist for 1,878 years.

You think your country is special? Exempt from God's judgment? God's chosen people? You've been lied to. Rinse off that smeared whitewash and read the Bible for yourself.

Think of the great flood in Genesis, when every thought of man was continually evil, and God was sorry that He had even made them (Genesis 6:5). He destroyed all but eight people, Noah and his family (1 Peter 3:20). Don't think that when mankind grows more evil, God is blind. He is patient and long-suffering, but make no mistake: our hourglass is draining fast. Unrepentant sin will always find you out (Numbers 32:23).

Before God destroyed Jerusalem, He told Jeremiah this:

(Jeremiah 5:1 NASB) "Roam to and fro through the streets of Jerusalem, And look now and take note. And seek in her open squares, If you can find a man, If there is one who does justice, who seeks truth, Then I will pardon her."

One person could have changed the city's fate, but God couldn't even find one. Consider the destruction of Sodom and Gomorrah in Genesis 18. The outcry of the city had reached heaven, and it literally means the cries of its victims and the oppressed. We tend to think of Sodom as a city overrun with perverted sex, but Ezekiel said this about it:

(Ezekiel 16:49-50 NASB) "Behold, this was the guilt of your sister Sodom: she and her daughters had arrogance, abundant food and careless ease, but she did not help the poor and needy. Thus they were haughty and committed abominations before Me. Therefore I removed them when I saw it."

When Sodom's hourglass was empty and their time had come to be removed, God sent angels to confirm what He had been hearing, and He shared His plans with Abraham, His friend.

Abraham asked God, "What if fifty righteous people are there?" God said He would spare the whole city of Sodom if He found fifty righteous there. Then Abraham asked, "What about 45? 30? 20? 10?" And God agreed to spare the whole city if He found that many righteous people there. Then Abraham stopped, and God left. (Genesis 18:24-32)

God went as far as Abraham asked Him to. He did this because Abraham stood in the gap for them and asked Him. That is the essence of standing in the gap for our cities and countries. We can make a difference. God promised Solomon this:

(2 Chronicles 7:13-14 NASB) "If I shut up the heavens so that there is no rain, or if I command the locust to devour the land, or if I send pestilence among My people, and My people who are called by My name humble themselves and pray and seek My face and turn from their wicked ways, then I will hear from heaven, will forgive their sin and will heal their land."

You can pray this with me if you like:

Prayer: Heavenly Father, please forgive my country for its sins and draw our hearts to You. I stand in the gap today and ask for mercy for our nation and its leaders. I ask that You give us time and wisdom to set things right and show us how to begin. Change our hearts. Change our minds. Bring our country back to You. In the name of Jesus Christ, I pray. Amen.