Heaven Closed

A Test of Faith, a Call to Humility

“When I shut up heaven and there is no rain, or command the locusts to devour the land, or send pestilence among My people, 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 7:13-14 NKJV)

Do you ever have the sense that heaven has been “shut up” and that God has decided not to send refreshing times to you anytime soon? Have locusts eaten your productivity? Has disease or death brought sorrow to you or to those you love? So, what do these hard times signify? How should we ‘read’ God’s dealings with us in hard times, when it seems that, while others are experiencing good, enriching times, God has surrounded us with loneliness or trouble?

At the level of knowledge our faith may regard the unchanging love of Jesus as an irrefutable fact. But at the level of experience even true faith may find little comfort in His very real love when He has “shut up heaven and there is no rain.” When He has commanded locusts to ravage the spiritual or material economy, it is hard to ‘feel the love.’ When He has sent pestilence and everything seems ashen, dead, or dying, even the truest faith may struggle to peacefully rest in the love of Jesus.

The why of it all is, often, beyond any real understanding. Why does our Lord “shut up heaven?” Why locusts? Why pestilence? The Lord told Solomon that it was a matter of time. When God deems them appropriate, He still sends things like these among His people. “When I shut up heaven” does not mean “if I shut up heaven.” But what is God’s point? Just to prove that He can turn our little lives upside down? Merely to show His might and make us feel bewildered by an unpredictable life?

Hard things do happen and Jesus Christ not only knows about them, He governs them as to their degree and scope and dimension. He gives, He withholds; blessing and cursing are His to command. The sun is His; by it He can gently warm or fiercely parch the earth. The rain is His; He may sweetly water the soil with pelting droplets or overwhelm it with torrents. “The Lord has His way in the whirlwind and in the storm.” He is the King of kings; the entire creation belongs to Him. It is His world and nothing ever just happens. Jesus is Lord of all. Down to the least detail, everything is under His power and all things fall out according to His ultimate purpose.

Now this can be a tremendous comfort to one who trusts the Lord, to know that our God is God and that nothing can happen or does happen apart from His will. And this applies to big things as well as little stuff—from the whole vast universe to our tiny lives. But during those times when He has shut up heaven and we don’t understand anything, His sovereignty can be acutely sobering and even bewildering. What a test of faith hard providences are! And what a summons that we should humble ourselves!

In light of God’s words to Solomon, we are not arrogant to think that God intends to speak to us through difficult providences. And the sooner we rightly respond, the sooner He may relent and open heaven for us and send those spiritually refreshing times again. It is a humility thing. Worldly people won’t get it; redeemed people will.

Occasionally, we think we are independent; but we can’t even breathe unless God grants it. If we are breathing and living, existing in this world, a mighty and loving God means for it to be so. And how precious a thought this should be to any discouraged believer in Jesus. But what is the meaning of our troubles; what is the purpose of this life? How do we make sense of it, especially when the God who loves us sends such hard things into our lives? We will never make sense of anything until we see our own life in reference to God, His glory, and His will.

Christ loves all who are His; if you are His by the grace of adoption, it is sure that He loves you. From eternity He loved you with an everlasting love. But this is not something we always feel. Sometimes we just know. Often, we must wait until later to feel a sense of His love. This is exactly what faith must do in those awful, dry times, when the heavens have been shut up and locusts have come and the very life has gone out of life—we must deeply trust in Him who changes everything, yet who changes not.

Meanwhile, do we simply tell our hearts, “It’s what we know that counts, not what we feel. Feelings are not on the same plane as facts. Facts are real. Figures are real. Feelings are too changeable, too temporary; they’re just not as real as the rest of what we call reality. So, get real, snap out of it, and live by what you know!” If we take that approach we would drain life of its essence. Love and hate, liberty and bondage, joy and misery, justice and injustice, kindness and cruelty—none of these are important if they are unreal. These all concern thoughts, ideas, emotions—and they all are monumental! Indeed, the coming Judgment at the Last Day will be greatly concerned with such things.

One is thought quaint if he truly thinks God actually touches this world and has anything to do with everyday life—the weather (floods, tornadoes, tsunamis), bug infestations (fleas, mosquitoes), deadly epidemics (Bubonic plague, HIV-AIDS). Why would God concern Himself with such things since they only involve fortune and poverty and life and death?

The Lord says, “When I shut up heaven…” Locusts show up at His “command” and pestilence goes where He “sends.” Unbelievers imagine a random universe existing of itself, but the Scriptures tell us of God who is sovereign over the details—all of them. If He is God at all, He is God over the details. After all, big things are just a bunch little things taken together.

Is it really arrogant of us, in times of stress and hardship, to think that our faith might be in the process of some testing? Do we delude ourselves to think that God would try us? If we are truly Christ’s we delude ourselves to think that He could leave us alone and never intervene. We are, after all, not our own—He bought us with a price. Our Master does intrude. He does intervene.

When God sends hard times to wicked, worldly people it often comes as a punishment for their sins. But when hard times come into the lives of His redeemed people, we know that He intends to use those things to draw us to Himself, not to harm us or drive us away. When He shuts up heaven we are tested. How much trial and trouble and spiritual drought must come before we happily humble ourselves? What will it take for us to cease from pride and thoughts of our own sufficiency and for us to turn again to the Lord? What will motivate us to turn from our wicked ways?

If you have been tested, if you are being tested, turn your mind now to God’s promise. He resists proud hearts, but draws near to the humble person. If we belong to Christ, being called by His name, these words provide tremendous hope: “…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…”

The humility we must have is a self-imposed thing that causes us to pour forth prayer—we speak from our hearts to our God and make our desires known to Him. The prayers prayed by one who has humbled himself show a desire, not for more stuff, but for more of God and more of His grace. That sort of serious humility makes us glad to repent, to think and then live differently—to think God’s thoughts after Him, and then, by grace, to live righteously.

He promises to hear us. What a thought, that the God of heaven would actually bend an ear and listen to you and me! And forgive our sin. And make the place we live a happy place! Is there any kindness we need more than His forgiveness and the peace that accompanies it? What promises! The Lord Christ who shuts up heaven can also open it. He can send times of refreshing and give great joy to those who have endured brazen, silent skies. O that we will humble ourselves, pray, and seek His face, and turn from our sinful ways—expecting our loving Christ to refresh us with a deeply felt sense of His love yet again. –TSA