THINKING AGAIN……

Ancient and Modern

A few days ago, I went outside to saw some logs; a handsaw was adequate for the relatively small amount of timber I had recently cut down.
Not long after I began, a chainsaw burst into noisy life nearby. Its user was invisible and I had no idea what was being sawn, but it set me thinking; comparing.
How different could two saws be? Mine was a simple bow saw; a thin steel blade tensioned on a metal frame cutting the logs with minimum effort. In addition, I was having healthy exercise – and time to think.
My saw produced no ear-damaging noise; I was not inhaling poisonous exhaust gasses; there were no masses of wood chips; no disturbance to neighbours or wildlife; no need for protective clothing and no fossil fuel was being consumed.

It is easy to be so impressed with a chainsaw that the humble muscle-driven handsaw is discarded as being behind the times.
Yet the handsaw has been around for 1000s of years: chainsaws for less than a 100.

It set me thinking about church.
In the last 20 years or so, the IT revolution has captivated much of the UK church and some products and techniques have certainly been a great help. Using the Internet, for example, can be a great tool for good in God’s hands.
However, church technology can be so impressive that the priceless simplicity of prayer can become ‘surplus to requirements’.
Prayer has been around for 1000s of years, IT for a few decades.

The chainsaw can deprive a man of healthy exercise in the open air.
Technology can deprive the church of insufficient exercise in prayer.

Gene Jackson, Superintendent of the Tennessee District Assemblies of God, USA, made this comment about his denomination’s weakness, “We have PowerPoint in our computers to enable us to get fancy in our singing and ‘current’ in our preaching. But let me tell you, if you don’t have power in your soul, PowerPoint in your projector is not going to be worth a hoot.”

In the mid-20th century in the Scottish Hebrides, God began a mighty work of salvation and revival. However, the church at Barvas had no organ, no guitars, no orchestra, no choir, not even a hymnal. The church had no organisations, no coffee mornings, no special young people’s meetings, no church staff, no seminars or any elaborate programmes.
Apart from its Sunday services, there was the weekly prayer meeting and other spontaneous prayer meetings here and there.
Yet people came in their crowds, and many people were converted.

Some of God’s children prayed, and that was sufficient.

For the full text of Gene Jackson’s “God is not Surprised” go to Gene Jackson

The comments about the church in Barvas are based on an account in ‘Sounds from Heaven’ by Colin and Mary Peckham. It is published by Christian Focus

Peace?

“Oh, that you had heeded my commandments!
Then your peace would have been like a river…”  Isaiah 48:18   NKJV

Who does not want peace? Inward peace and contentment is a great prize in this troubled world and society. Money cannot buy it, education cannot gain it, research cannot discover it, nor is it in the power of anyone to get it by any effort or strategy.
Some religions offer a type of peace, but it cannot be the peace of which the old Hebrew prophet spoke.

God’s peace is a pure gift. Jesus Christ promised that peace in the context of hearing God’s voice and obeying his word.  See John chapter 14.
That is consistent with what God said through Isaiah, “Oh, that you had heeded my commandments! THEN your peace would have been like a river…”

     “My son, do not forget my law,
     But let your heart keep my commands;
     For length of days and long life
     And peace they will add to you.
        Proverbs 3:1-2.   NKJV

     I will listen to what God the Lord will say;
     he promises peace to his people, his saints –
     but let them not return to folly.
        Psalm 85:8  NIV

Preparations

Right back in October, the commercial world was already well geared up for Christmas.
Christians generally feel uneasy about the world’s takeover of their traditional celebration of the birth of Jesus. However, I guess that before October many churches had their own Christmas plans and programmes well under way to use the season for spreading the Gospel. And there’s nothing wrong with that.

Micah’s prophetic words about Bethlehem are read countless times every Christmas, and rightly so.

        “But you, Bethlehem Ephrathah,
        though you are small among the clans of Judah,
        out of you will come for me
        One who will be ruler over Israel,
        whose origins are from of old,
        from ancient times.”
        Micah 5:2  NIV.

The picture of the future infant Jesus is conveyed clearly to all who hear. The problem is that for the majority of people, Christmas goes no farther than the appealing baby in a manger.
A couple of verses on in Micah’s prophecy about Bethlehem, the Lord Jesus Christ is described as the victorious One who saves and guards his people.
The prophet was speaking of a Bethlehem that was the beginning of Jesus’ route to Calvary to save his people from their sins. At that point, 2000 years ago, God’s preparations were in place. The scene was set for Jesus’ victory over sin and death.

        “He will stand and shepherd His flock
        in the strength of the Lord,
        in the majesty of the name of the Lord His God.
        And they will live securely, for then His greatness
        will reach to the ends of the earth.
        And he will be their peace.”
        Micah 5:4-5   NIV.

Today, that ancient predicted security and peace is experienced by those
who repent of sin and believe on the Shepherd who gave his life for his sheep.

Peace and goodwill are not just for Christmas.

           John Puckett

Someone Else’s Holy Ground
‘And the Angel of the Lord appeared to him in a flame of fire from the midst of a bush. So he looked, and behold, the bush was burning with fire, but the bush was not consumed.
Then Moses said, “I will now turn aside and see this great sight, why the bush does not burn.”
So when the Lord saw that he turned aside to look, God called to him from the midst of the bush and said, “Moses, Moses!” And he said, “Here I am.” Then He said, “Do not draw near this place. Take your sandals off your feet, for the place where you stand is holy ground.” ’
Exodus 3:2-5  NKJV

Years earlier, Abram had his holy place of meeting with God – Bethel, and later on, he returned to Bethel and communed with God again.  See Genesis chapters 12 and 13.
Many years later, God appeared to Abram’s grandson, Jacob, at the same place. Jacob had his dream of the ladder to heaven, and he set up his stone headrest as a pillar, and poured oil on top of it, and called the place Bethel.
He was also commanded by God to go back there. See Genesis chapters 28, 31 and 35.

Much later, Joshua, the leader of the Israelites, also met God in a holy place, and God told him, “Take your sandal off your foot, for the place where you stand is holy.” See Joshua chapter 5. God appeared to King David at a particular place, as he did also to Solomon and a few others.

In the New Testament, there are numerous places where people met with God. Every one of those whom Jesus healed must have remembered the exact site of their miracle. Every location of Jesus’ teaching sessions must have been special to some whose hearts were opened by his word.
Beyond the obvious places of Gethsemane, Calvary, the tomb, the upper room, ‘holy places’ for individuals would have been distributed throughout much of the Roman Empire.
James and Peter and John had an encounter with God on a mountain. Paul had his Damascus Road. John had his Patmos.
And so it has been down through the Christian centuries. Every believer has known unique experiences of God in particular places. To them it is entirely appropriate to think of those places as special, though not necessarily to return to that place and expect a repetition of the blessing.

Beware.  Every such individual’s ‘holy place’ is exclusively the holy place of that one person.
No one else can access or benefit from the blessing which another person experienced by visiting their ‘holy ground.’.
For example, visiting Israel to ‘walk where Jesus walked,’ offers no increased likelihood of obtaining a personal encounter with God. That is because a particular geographical location never guarantees any such spiritual advantage.

Plenty of well-meaning Christians visit the chapel at Blaenannerch in West Wales to sit where Evan Roberts sat when God met with him.
No doubt, the Isle of Lewis has its visitors in similar pursuit of the Revival experiences of its past generations; similarly Kells in Northern Ireland, Azusa Street in the States, and many other places.
The pulpit of Daniel Rowlands at Llangeitho in mid Wales, or that of Joseph Jenkins at Newquay on the coast, or the chapel at Loughor in south-west Wales are special sites for visitors from all over the world.

However, neither in the Old or New Testament is there any warrant for visiting such places to obtain the ancient blessing of some past believer.
The burning bush of Moses became no holy shrine for succeeding generations. No one in the Old Testament obtained blessing by visiting the holy place of Abram and Jacob. To associate spiritual power with particular places was in fact, a characteristic of idolatry.
Bethel itself eventually became a site of obscene idolatry.

So why is there the idea that the land of Wales is somehow invested with special spiritual potential? No doubt the question is valid in respect of other places worldwide where God has come down in the past. Why is there this yearning to recapture the past through places? As I see it, the New Testament provides no evidence to validate such activities or ideas.

Most of us would love to experience those blessings our predecessors knew, but let us avoid the temptation to tread paths for which God himself gives no warrant.
We all need to get our hands clean and our hearts pure if we want that experience in which we ‘ascend into the hill of the Lord.’
And that can happen without regard to geography.

Someone Else’s Holy Ground can never become Mine!

           John Puckett

Where is the Wilderness?
The Wilderness stretched out for mile after mile after mile. Over 3,000 years ago, the Israelites had just escaped from generations of slavery in Egypt, and under the leadership of Moses, were on their way to the Promised Land. But the route to that land “flowing with milk and honey” lay across a vast and inhospitable desert – the Wilderness.
Not long into that journey, God met with Moses on Mount Sinai. While 2 million Israelites waited on the plain at the foot of the mountain which “burned with fire to the midst of heaven,” God gave Moses the Ten Commandments as well as his detailed Moral Law.
That law was to remain valid for all time.  See Exodus chapters 20 – 23.

Many centuries later, John the Baptist emerged from his wilderness retreat to fulfil a brief ministry. To explain who he was, he quoted the prophet Isaiah, “I am ‘The voice of one crying in the wilderness, “Make straight the way of the Lord.” ’ ”
John’s arrival was the climax of God’s revelations through the prophets. That is why he rejoiced to announce the perfect earthly ministry of the spotless Lamb of God, “Behold! The Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world!”
 See John chapter 1.

However, the end of the prophets did not mean the end of the Law. Jesus himself said, “Do not think that I came to destroy the Law or the Prophets.”  Matthew 5:17.
That unchangeable law was John’s warrant to command his hearers to repent and live holy lives. Jesus did exactly the same. “Jesus began to preach and to say, ‘Repent, for the kingdom of heaven is at hand.’ ”  Matthew 4:17.

The Scripture makes it clear that everyone has broken God‘s Law. “They have all turned aside, they have together become corrupt; there is none who does good, no, not one.” Psalm 14:3
And God demands perfect obedience. “Whoever shall keep the whole law, and yet stumble in one point, he is guilty of all.”  James 2:10.
Today, however strongly we may determine to obey God’s law, the strength of our natural feelings and appetites dooms us to failure. We can never completely obey God’s laws and thus fully please him.

When he lived on earth, the Lord Jesus Christ was “the radiance of God’s glory.”  Hebrews 1:3 NIV. His life was the perfect and unique expression of that holiness of God which was set out in the Old Testament moral law.
Simply to stand beside him would convict us of our utter sinfulness.
Therefore, our moral imperfection consigns us to wander in a spiritual wilderness separated from a holy God.
The Law is God’s instrument to define sin. “I would not have known what sin was except through the law,” Paul said.  Romans 7:7  NIV.
The Law is the instrument that the Holy Spirit uses to convince the sinner of his or her sin, and it is a sobering experience to be thoroughly convinced that in God’s sight you are totally wrong. However, God does not leave us there. The Holy Spirit goes on to enable the convinced sinner to obey the command to repent. He then reveals the Lord Jesus Christ as the perfect Saviour from our sin.

The great evangelist of the 18th century, John Wesley, understood that process. Here is an extract of a letter he wrote to a Methodist friend, Ebenezer Blackwell, on December 20th, 1751: ‘I think the right method of preaching is this. At our first beginning to preach at any place, after a general declaration of the love of God to sinners and His willingness that they should be saved, to preach the law in the strongest, the closest, the most searching manner possible; only intermixing the gospel here and there, and showing it, as it were, afar off.’

He goes on to say that he would mix in more of the gospel as more people became convicted of their sin. He would not be too quick to omit the law entirely, because he feared that some people might ‘heal their own wounds slightly.’
He insisted that it was ‘only in private converse with a thoroughly convinced sinner that we should preach nothing but the gospel.’
He also asserted that it was essential to maintain the preaching of the Old and New Testament laws to believers, so that their conviction and subsequent obedience would open their hearts to the joy of the Lord.
And Wesley was absolutely right that the Moral Law of God is fundamental to His purifying both unbelievers and believers.

Most Christians deplore the moral decline in our nation. We abhor its relentless slide into corruption. We resent the constant pressure to abandon the standards of God’s word.

There are some churches where the law of God is carefully and consistently expounded, but today that does not seem to be the norm.
It is obvious that such a failure to set out God’ standards of behaviour has contributed to a moral decline in some parts of the Church.

If, in many of our churches, we have no clear definition of sin, are we hindering the Holy Spirit from doing his convicting and purifying work? Logically, and Biblically, the Holy Spirit can only “convict the world of sin, and of righteousness, and of judgment”(John 16:8), by applying the law to the heart of a sinner. Therefore, without a Biblical setting out of the Old and New Testament commands, surely we deprive the Holy Spirit of the means by which he convinces both believer and unbeliever.

Throughout their history, the Israelites enjoyed God’s blessing as long as they lived according to His laws. God had made his conditions plain to them in the beginning – obedience brought the blessing – disobedience brought the curse. Simple. See Deuteronomy 30.
Jesus said, “If you obey my commands, you will remain in my love.”  John 15:10 NIV.
Nothing has changed. The conditions still apply, but I wonder if we have to some degree lost sight of them and become complacent and presumptuous.

In the book of Revelation, the Lord Jesus Christ exposed the complacency of the church of Laodicea. “I am rich; I have acquired wealth and do not need a thing,” they said.
They believed they were in the full blessings of the Promised Land.
Jesus’ diagnosis was razor-sharp: “You do not realise that you are wretched, pitiful, poor, blind and naked.”
They were not in the Promised Land at all! They were in the Wilderness!

Are we in danger of wandering in a spiritual wilderness which our neglect of the law has created? Do we need the Holy Jesus of Revelation to break into our wilderness, calling us to “Repent!”?

“If you love Me, keep My commandments.”  John 14:15

     “Return, O Lord! How long?
          And have compassion on your servants.
      Oh, satisfy us early with your mercy,
          That we may rejoice and be glad all our days!”  Psalm 90:13-14.

        All quotes from New King James Version unless otherwise stated.

           John Puckett

Church Militant or Church Weak?

Some claim that the church is ‘Like a mighty army marching unto war,’ as the old hymn puts it.   They point to fast-growing urban churches, huge crowds gathering at venues all over the UK for celebrations, conferences, conventions, missions, seminars and suchlike. Some will point to a host of other indications of God’s blessing being poured out on a victorious church.

However, it seems to me that few of the evil strongholds in our nation bears wounds from the church’s attempts to pull them down. In fact, it seems that new strongholds of evil rise up every day.
The dedicated enemies of truth and righteousness rub their hands with glee. After all, for them, in this ‘enlightened’ 21st century, there is freedom to mock God, blaspheme his holy Name in the vilest of ways, and pour out their crude writings and other so-called art forms and media productions.
Sadly, many of our political leaders seem to be hand-in-hand with those who are determined to destroy the remnants of the Christian standards of our land.

Surely the continuing increase in evil in the UK testifies that the church is more impotent than militant. Why is the church weak?
I read in Scripture that the weapons of the church are ‘mighty through God’ to enable us to ‘pull down evil strongholds.’  See 2 Corinthians 10:4.

So why is the church virtually powerless to combat this tide of insistent evil?
Why do so many efforts to address the pressures against the church dwindle to nothing?
Victories against the demands of new legislation from our own Parliament and from Europe are achieved, but they are mostly minimal.
I read recently that in 3 out of every 5 brave efforts to establish a church plant as a witness in our corrupt society fails.
What is the cause of this weakness in much of the UK church?

Go back to Paul’s ‘strongholds of evil’ passage in 2 Corinthians for the answer. He declares that the weapons the church possesses to combat such evil ‘are not carnal weapons.’ They are not weapons that the world would use. They are not the natural weapons that human nature would devise.
Undoubtedly, he has one weapon in mind above any other. Prayer. The mighty weapon of prayer.
Go to John Bunyan and see Pilgrim in the Valley of the Shadow of Death. His sword was of no avail to combat the darkness of evil around him, and he at last resorted to the weapon of ‘All-Prayer.’
In Matthew chapter 17, we read of the disciples’ futile efforts to expel a demon from a young lad. Jesus chides them for their lack of faith and impotence against evil, but points out that this kind of problem cannot be resolved except ‘by prayer and fasting.’

Prayer is not a natural weapon. It is not in our human nature to admit that our only hope is in the Lord God Almighty and cry to him alone. Oh no. We can do it our way!
Too readily, we ‘go down to Egypt for help.’ See Isaiah 31:1.
Too easily, we rush to put all our trust in the ark of our church methods, traditions, programmes, meetings, strategies etc. See 1 Samuel chapter 4.
Too quickly, we devise a ‘Plan B’ when we suffer discouragement. See the end of Numbers chapter 14.

Prayer is definitely not a natural weapon.
Prayer is not agreeable to the natural man.
Prayer demands sacrifice.

When will you and I learn that Jesus meant every word he said?
‘Without Me you can do nothing!’ Nothing! Absolutely nothing!

Jeremiah spells out God’s conditions coupled with his absolute promise, “And you will seek Me and find Me, when you search for Me with all your heart.”   Jeremiah 29:13  NKJV

Why do so many of us find such difficulty in giving ourselves time to wait upon God?
Why are we so unwilling to sacrifice ourselves wholeheartedly to seek his blessing?
        The blame for the weakness of the church in the UK lies at our feet.
         And surely the blame for the state of the nation lies at our feet also.

Does it lie at my feet?

“And in the morning, rising up a great while before day, he went out, and departed into a solitary place, and there prayed.”  Mark 1:35  KJV

Jesus had time.

Every blessing,

           John Puckett

Revival!
Two Hundred Years of Revival in Wales

During the 18th and 19th centuries, Wales repeatedly experienced God’s Spirit reviving the church and bringing salvation to many thousands through the Gospel of Jesus Christ.
However, some would argue that in the latter part of that period, some of those experiences and ‘revivals’ were not as well founded on Scripture as those in the earlier part of the period.

Interspersed with intervals of spiritual decline, from about 1720 to 1870 God repeatedly came amongst his people in various parts of Wales. They were times when joy, hope, peace, faith and Christian love, transformed churches and society under God’s power through the Gospel. Conviction of sin was widespread as preachers and preaching took on a new seriousness. Ministers and lay people preached with increased intensity as fresh movements of God occurred and many were saved from sin.
Praying and prayer meetings gained new impetus as the love of God through the Cross of Jesus was proclaimed. God’s people awoke to pray with new passion.
The message of holiness and mercy took on vast importance as God aroused churches from spiritual slumber. Spiritual issues displaced the normal topics of the day. The forgiveness of sin through the blood of Jesus, atonement, repentance, faith, trust, assurance, sanctification, and many other truths of the Bible dominated conversations in the church, in the home, and on the street. God came with his Word and his grace, churches were strengthened and many people were converted.

The seeds of this phenomenon might be seen when the English national church broke away from the Roman Catholic system in the Reformation of the 16th century. During the 17th century, strong Christian movements and meetings independent of the state church and its doctrine sprang up, despite much persecution. The Puritans led the way, and their massive theological and practical writings helped to supply Protestantism with a strong understanding of the Bible for years to come. The Reformation had on-going benefits for spiritual life throughout Britain.
In the early 18th century in Wales, an important figure was Rev Griffith Jones, at the Anglican Church in Llanddowror, in South Carmarthenshire. He boldly preached the Gospel for many years despite opposition from his fellow clergy. He recognised the need for God to do something to rescue the nation from the godlessness into which it had sunk. He set up Circulating Schools to teach young and old to read, especially so that they could read the Bible.

While Griffith Jones was ministering at Llanddowror, God intervened decisively in Wales and in England. In the decade 1730-1740, Howell Harris was converted under the ministry of the vicar of Talgarth in Breconshire, Daniel Rowland was converted, probably through Griffith Jones, and began a mighty ministry at Llangeitho in Cardiganshire, and William Williams of Pantycelyn near Llandovery in Carmarthenshire began his great ministry of hymn and poetry writing.
Around the same time, George Whitefield was converted, and his ministry later became very beneficial in Wales within the Calvinistic Methodist awakening. John and Charles Wesley had their spiritual eyes opened and the English Methodist revival began.

Farther on in the 18th century, as the ministries of these spiritual giants were ending, God raised up other preachers to carry the Gospel torch.
Thomas Charles of Bala was an influential figure in Wales, and beyond, in the late 18th and early 19th centuries. Like Griffith Jones, he saw the need for literacy and good reading material. He re-established Circulating Schools that then led to a strong Sunday School movement. Prominent in the establishment of the British and Foreign Bible Society, he was especially concerned to establish a supply of Welsh Bibles at a price ordinary folk could afford.
John Elias, Christmas Evans, Richard Tibbott, Isaac Price, Robert Dafydd, Robert Roberts and Ebenezer Morris were among a number of anointed preachers, some of whom travelled throughout Wales preaching the Gospel powerfully and effectively well into the 19th century.

As a consequence of the American awakening which began in 1857, another visitation of God occurred when Humphrey Jones returned from America to his home district of Tre’rddol in north Cardiganshire in 1858.
Fresh with God’s message of restoration to arouse the churches and church leaders from their apathy and worldliness, his urgent methods stirred up some conflict. Although the Biblical doctrines were known, the Ten Commandments familiar, the language of Zion was habitual, and hymn-singing was a constant feature of chapel life, the life-changing experience of a risen Saviour had become relatively unfamiliar among many church and chapel attenders.

However, when God began by using the enthusiasm of Humphrey Jones to stir up the churches of north Cardiganshire, his theology introduced controversy. Jones had been deeply affected by the Arminian teaching of the American, Charles Finney, believing that revivals were the inevitable result of the strenuous efforts and fervent prayers of God’s people. In less than a year, his ministry faded away, and God replaced his leadership by the more Biblically-based ministry of Dafydd Morgan, a Calvinistic Methodist minister who was born between Devil’s Bridge and Cwmystwyth. He lived for many years at Ysbyty Ystwyth, where he is also buried.

Up to this point, most of the ministry which God used so effectively was soundly based on the Bible, and it produced a succession of preachers who remained true to the Reformed faith of the Puritans.
However, following that great and widespread work of God in Wales 1858-1860, there was a relentless drift towards the Finney theology and methods of ministry. The success of the American-style ‘revival’ meetings of D L Moody encouraged replications of that style and ministry in much of the UK.

Today, the best known of the Welsh Revivals is that of the early 20th century – ‘The 1904.’
A few years before 1904, religious concern was stirring many of the churches of South West Wales. Among the ministers longing for a religious revival, was Rev. Joseph Jenkins, minister of the Calvinistic Methodist Church at New Quay.
On a Sunday morning in February 1904, the heartfelt testimony of the young teenager, Florrie Evans, seemed to act as a catalyst to ignite the spiritual fire among the young people in their prayer meeting. This move of God spread to Blaenannerch and Newcastle Emlyn and other nearby places.

Unknown to many at the time, a young coal miner turned blacksmith, Evan Roberts, experienced intense spiritual struggles during 1903/04. Eventually he left his work and his spiritual home, Moriah Calvinistic Methodist Chapel, to prepare for entering Trefecca Theological College to train for the ministry. Improving his education at Newcastle Emlyn Grammar School in September 1904, he came under the helpful ministry of Rev Evan Phillips. However, the School lessons clashed with his fervent longing to preach the Gospel immediately.

During the late summer of 1904, Rev. Seth Joshua of Cardiff, an evangelist of the Calvinistic Methodist Forward Movement, held a mission at Newcastle Emlyn. He had been praying for years that God would raise up a young man from the pits to revive the churches. As far as is known, he did not know that a 26-year-old ex-miner student in the town had been praying for revival for over 11 years.

On Sunday, September 25th, 1904,a conference began at Blaenannerch Chapel near the coast, about 8 miles from Newcastle Emlyn. Rev Joseph Jenkins and the young people at New Quay were involved, and on Thursday, September 29th, 1904, Evan Roberts went there with Mr. Joshua and about twenty others to Blaenannerch.
It was during the 9 a.m. service that Evan Roberts had his famous experience of giving himself completely to God.
That outbreak of the activity of God the Holy Spirit a century ago in Wales spread throughout Britain and to other countries round the globe. According to estimates at the time, 100,000 new converts came into the Church in Wales alone.

With hindsight, the relative lack of consistent Biblical ministry at that time may have contributed to the vulnerability of the churches to the onslaughts of modernism and false doctrine that swept through the theological colleges and pulpits of Wales in the succeeding years.
However, God undoubtedly did a mighty work in Wales at that time. As always happens, in God’s powerful grace, a substantial ministry of the Holy Spirit continued through the following years in many people.

Since that time, there seems to have been no substantial or widespread work of God in the Principality. The reasons for the past century of ‘small things’ may be a subject needing serious exploration in the Word of God and in prayer for today.

“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  NKJV

THERE IS NO ALTERNATIVE!