Solomon’s prayer of dedication for the house of God revealed his “great familiarity with and reverence for the warnings of God, which were given to all Israel through Moses (see Leviticus 26; Deuteronomy 28)” (note on 2 Chronicles 6:14-42). Solomon’s primary petition in this prayer was that God would listen and forgive them when his people cried out to him for help. Solomon mentioned specific circumstances that would require God’s forgiveness: if a man sins against his neighbor (2 Chronicles 6:22); if the people were defeated by their enemy (2 Chronicles 6:24); if there was famine in the land (2 Chronicles 6:26); if they sinned against God (2 Chronicles 6:36). Each time, Solomon asked that God would hear from heaven and forgive his people who had sinned against him (2 Chronicles 6:39). Afterward, “the LORD appeared to Solomon in the night and said to him: “I have heard your prayer and have chosen this place for myself as a house of sacrifice. When I shut up heaven so that there is no rain, or command locust to devour the land, or send pestilence among my people, if my people who are called by my name humble themselves, and pray and seek my face and turn from their wicked ways, then will I hear from heaven and will forgive their sin and heal their land” (2 Chronicles 7:12-14). “This is a key Old Testament passage that presents the conditions of true repentance: humbling oneself, praying, seeking God’s face, and turning from evil” (note on 2 Chronicles 7:12-14). God said if his people truly repented, then he would hear from heaven and forgive their sin.

Humbling ourselves means that we are bringing ourselves into subjection to God. This has to do with being submitted to God’s will, allowing God to have control of our situation and circumstances. An example of humbling oneself is shown in 1 Kings 21:27 where the wicked king Ahab repented of his sin after being confronted by Elijah the prophet. It says in 1 Kings 21:17-29:

 Then the word of the Lord came to Elijah the Tishbite, saying, “Arise, go down to meet Ahab king of Israel, who is in Samaria; behold, he is in the vineyard of Naboth, where he has gone to take possession. And you shall say to him, ‘Thus says the Lord, “Have you killed and also taken possession?”’ And you shall say to him, ‘Thus says the Lord: “In the place where dogs licked up the blood of Naboth shall dogs lick your own blood.”’”

Ahab said to Elijah, “Have you found me, O my enemy?” He answered, “I have found you, because you have sold yourself to do what is evil in the sight of the Lord. Behold, I will bring disaster upon you. I will utterly burn you up, and will cut off from Ahab every male, bond or free, in Israel. And I will make your house like the house of Jeroboam the son of Nebat, and like the house of Baasha the son of Ahijah, for the anger to which you have provoked me, and because you have made Israel to sin. And of Jezebel the Lord also said, ‘The dogs shall eat Jezebel within the walls of Jezreel.’ Anyone belonging to Ahab who dies in the city the dogs shall eat, and anyone of his who dies in the open country the birds of the heavens shall eat.”

(There was none who sold himself to do what was evil in the sight of the Lord like Ahab, whom Jezebel his wife incited. He acted very abominably in going after idols, as the Amorites had done, whom the Lord cast out before the people of Israel.)

And when Ahab heard those words, he tore his clothes and put sackcloth on his flesh and fasted and lay in sackcloth and went about dejectedly. And the word of the Lord came to Elijah the Tishbite, saying, “Have you seen how Ahab has humbled himself before me? Because he has humbled himself before me, I will not bring the disaster in his days; but in his son’s days I will bring the disaster upon his house.”

It says that “there was none who sold himself to do what was evil in the sight of the LORD like Ahab” (1 Kings 21:25), and yet, because he had humbled himself, God said he would not bring disaster in Ahab’s days (1 Kings 21:29). The Hebrew words that are translated dejectedly in 1 Kings 21:27 are translated went softly in the King James Version of the Bible. Another way of describing Ahab’s response to God’s condemnation of his behavior might be that Ahab treaded lightly or exhibited a gentle spirit toward God as a result of God holding him accountable for his sin.

Even though Ahab humbled himself before God, he did not truly repent of his sin. Ahab stopped short of asking God for forgiveness. The second condition of true repentance is praying, or more specifically, asking God to intervene in your situation so that your sin can be forgiven. Psalm 51 is a prayer that King David prayed when Nathan the prophet confronted him about his sin with Bathsheba. David began by asking God to have mercy on him. David prayed, “Have mercy on me, O God, according to your steadfast love, according to your abundant mercy blot out my transgressions. Wash me thoroughly from my iniquity, and cleanse me from my sin!” (Psalm 51:1-2). David asked that God would blot out his transgressions and wash him thoroughly from his iniquity. The Hebrew word that is translated wash, kabas (kaw-basˊ) “refers to God’s internal cleansing of the heart, making it white as snow. Jeremiah 4:14, however, showed that God’s people must work to cleanse their hearts and avoid temporal destruction” (H3526). David’s genuine sorrow wasn’t all that was needed for true repentance, David needed his relationship with the LORD to be restored.

Another condition of true repentance is seeking God’s face. This aspect of true repentance has to do with restoring intimacy with God. Moses’ relationship with God is one of the best examples of what it means to have intimacy with God in the Bible. It says in Exodus 33:11, “Thus the LORD used to speak to Moses face to face, as a man speaks to his friend.” The place where Moses went to speak to the LORD was called the tent of meeting. “Now Moses used to take the tent and pitch it outside the camp, far off from the camp, and he called it the tent of meeting. And everyone who sought the LORD would go out to the tent of meeting, which was outside the camp. Whenever Moses went out to the tent, all the people would rise up, and each would stand at his tent door, and watch Moses until he had gone into the tent. When Moses entered the tent, the pillar of cloud would descend and stand at the entrance of the tent, and the LORD would speak with Moses. And when all the people saw the pillar of cloud standing at the entrance of the tent, all the people would rise up and worship, each at his tent door” (Exodus 33:7-10). It says in Exodus 33:7 that everyone who sought the LORD would go out to the tent of meeting, which was outside the camp. Seeking the LORD requires us to get away from other people and to focus our attention only on God. All the people watched Moses go into the tent of meeting and worshipped God from afar, but only Moses experienced intimacy with God.

The final condition for true repentance may be why so few people actually do it. God told Solomon that he would hear from heaven and forgive the people’s sin if they humbled themselves and prayed, and sought his face, and turned from their wicked ways (2 Chronicles 7:14). The Hebrew word that is translated turned, shuwb (shoob) “is used to describe divine and human reactions, attitudes, and feelings” (H7725). Jeremiah described this kind of turning as washing your heart from evil. Jeremiah stated, “O Jerusalem, wash your heart from evil, that you may be saved. How long shall your wicked thoughts lodge within you?” (Jeremiah 4:14). Jeremiah indicated that wicked thoughts can lodge within us, but we are able to dislodge them through an intentional effort of washing our hearts from evil. The Apostle Paul described this process as putting off your old self and putting on the new self. Paul told the Ephesians:

Now this I say and testify in the Lord, that you must no longer walk as the Gentiles do, in the futility of their minds. They are darkened in their understanding, alienated from the life of God because of the ignorance that is in them, due to their hardness of heart. They have become callous and have given themselves up to sensuality, greedy to practice every kind of impurity. But that is not the way you learned Christ!—assuming that you have heard about him and were taught in him, as the truth is in Jesus, to put off your old self, which belongs to your former manner of life and is corrupt through deceitful desires, and to be renewed in the spirit of your minds, and to put on the new self, created after the likeness of God in true righteousness and holiness. (Ephesians 4:17-24)

Paul said our old self belongs to our former manner of life and is corrupt through deceitful desires (Ephesians 4:22). In order to get rid of the old self, we must put on the new self, which Paul indicated was “created after the likeness of God in true righteousness and holiness” (Ephesians 4:24). The key to being able to do this is what Paul referred to as being “renewed in the spirit of your minds” (Ephesians 4:23). This means that we are under the controlling power of the indwelling Holy Spirit who is directing our energies toward the enjoyment of fellowship with the Father and with his Son Jesus Christ. Spiritual regeneration involves more than the free act of God’s mercy and power by which he removes the sinner from the kingdom of darkness and places him in the kingdom of light, it is “the gradual conforming of the person to the new spiritual world in which he now lives, the restoration of the divine image. In this process the person is not passive but is a fellow worker with God” (G3824).

God told Solomon that he would hear from heaven and would forgive their sin, if his people would humble themselves, and pray and seek his face and turn from their wicked ways. God contrasted this promise with an alternative that actually did take place. God said, “’But if you turn aside and forsake my statutes and my commandments that I have set before you, and go and serve other gods and worship them, then I will pluck you up from my land that I have given you, and this house that I have consecrated for my name, I will cast out of my sight, and I will make it a proverb and a byword among all peoples. And at this house, which was exalted, everyone passing by will be astonished and say, “Why has the LORD done thus to this land and to this house?” Then they will say, “Because they abandoned the LORD, the God of their fathers who brought them out of the land of Egypt, and laid hold on other gods and worshipped them and served them. Therefore he has brought all this disaster on them.”’” The prophet Jeremiah foretold that Nebuchadnezzar’s invasion of Jerusalem would result in God fighting against his own people (Jeremiah 21:5) and in his message to the house of David, Jeremiah gave the people a final opportunity to repent of their sin against God. Jeremiah concluded his message to the house of David by stating, “’”And many nations will pass by this city, and every man will say to his neighbor, “Why has the LORD dealt thus with this great city?” And they will answer, “Because they have forsaken the covenant of the LORD their God and worshipped other gods and served them.”’” Weep not for him who is dead, nor grieve for him, but weep bitterly for him who goes away, for he shall return no more to see his native land’” (Jeremiah 22:8-10).