The Bible gives many examples of God blessing faithful nations and withholding blessing from unfaithful ones.
Governments whose laws reflect God’s moral standard can expect to prosper. Governments whose laws oppose it can expect consequences and judgement.
This article considers what that means for the United Kingdom. As a nation, it is time to repent.
The nations have fallen into the pit they have dug; their feet are caught in the net they have hidden. The LORD is known by his acts of justice; the wicked are ensnared by the work of their hands. The wicked go down to the realm of the dead, all the nations that forget God. But God will never forget the needy; the hope of the afflicted will never perish. Arise, LORD, do not let mortals triumph; let the nations be judged in your presence. Strike them with terror, LORD; let the nations know they are only mortal. (Psalm 9:15-20 NIV, emphasis added)
Does God care how nations behave?
Scripture repeatedly shows God judging nations that ignore or abandon Him. Paul tells the Corinthians that what happened to Israel was recorded as a warning for believers:
These things happened to them as examples and were written down as warnings for us, on whom the culmination of the ages has come. (1 Corinthians 10:11 NIV)
This is both logical and fair. If God blesses a nation whose laws honour His moral law, we should expect those blessings to be withdrawn when that nation replaces godly laws with laws that contradict and insult His holiness. Why should God bless an unrepentant nation, any more than an unrepentant individual?
God set Israel apart as a witness of His holiness to the surrounding nations. When Israel obeyed, it was greatly blessed. When it disobeyed, it was cursed. Deuteronomy 28–30 sets this out clearly, and there is no reason to believe the principle has ceased.
We live in an age of grace. Salvation depends on personal repentance and faith in Christ as Saviour. Yet nations still rise and fall, and God still takes a close interest in their spiritual condition. That condition is most visible in a nation’s laws, and how they measure up to God’s law as revealed in the Bible.
When Solomon was King of Israel, he offered a remarkable prayer of dedication. God appeared to him in response, and part of His answer applies to our nation:
When I shut up the heavens so that there is no rain, or command locusts to devour the land or send a plague 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 I will forgive their sin and will heal their land. (2 Chronicles 7:13-14 NIV)
This answer matters. Natural disasters can be a remedial judgement from God, sent to get our attention. Jeremiah shows how a nation’s response to God’s warning shapes its future:
If at any time I announce that a nation or kingdom is to be uprooted, torn down and destroyed, and if that nation I warned repents of its evil, then I will relent and not inflict on it the disaster I had planned. And if at another time I announce that a nation or kingdom is to be built up and planted, and if it does evil in my sight and does not obey me, then I will reconsider the good I had intended to do for it. (Jeremiah 18:7-10 NIV)
Both passages are timeless warnings. They apply to every nation, and as much today as when they were written.
God also looks for individuals within a nation who will obey and follow Him:
I looked for someone among them who would build up the wall and stand before me in the gap on behalf of the land so I would not have to destroy it, but I found no one. (Ezekiel 22:30 NIV)
Who will rise up for me against the wicked? Who will take a stand for me against evildoers? (Psalm 94:16 NIV)
Go up and down the streets of Jerusalem, look around and consider, search through her squares. If you can find but one person who deals honestly and seeks the truth, I will forgive this city. (Jeremiah 5:1 NIV)
A nation in decline
As residents of the United Kingdom, we care deeply about this nation. As followers of Jesus Christ, we want to please Him, not only in our personal conduct but as part of a nation whose actions honour Him.
Sadly, we are witnessing a rapid departure from God. The erosion of moral standards in British life makes this plain.
It is no coincidence that the fabric of society is unravelling while legislation contrary to biblical morality is repeatedly imposed on us. Britain was at its height when its laws honoured God. How quickly that is changing is deeply troubling.
Many of our historic laws were founded on the Ten Commandments, the clearest statement of God’s moral law. With the rise of secular humanism, which seeks to put humanity in the place of God, we suspect many politicians could not name more than five of them.
Society is in deep decline. Any glance at the news reveals rising crime, family breakdown, drink and drug abuse, psychological disorders, rampant addiction, abuse of power and many other symptoms of a society in poor health.
Much of this is a direct result of legislation imposed by our own government. It is also evidence, we believe, of God allowing deserved remedial judgement. He may be permitting these things so that we turn back to Him. Instead, the nation turns further away in defiance and continues on its path to self-destruction.
Who will stand in the gap?
How many leaders across the UK genuinely stand up for God and point others to His truth? How many bring a godly worldview to their leadership?
There are a few, but they are usually marginalised by the media. In politics, the Liberal Democrats deselected a candidate over his pro-life and pro-marriage views, and in 2026 admitted religious discrimination against another.
Most disappointing of all, the visible church is often deafeningly silent. It appears either indifferent, or too willing to follow the secular narrative in its effort to stay relevant and popular.
How has the UK turned from God?
Successive governments have passed laws in direct violation of God’s eternal law. Taken together, they show an aggressive departure from the morality of the Ten Commandments.
my people are destroyed from lack of knowledge. “Because you have rejected knowledge, I also reject you as my priests; because you have ignored the law of your God, I also will ignore your children. (Hosea 4:6 NIV)
Many of these laws were introduced to accommodate social change and political correctness. Whatever the reason, the legal endorsement of behaviour that undermines God is causing our country to disintegrate before our eyes.
We are speaking here of national policy. Views on these issues vary widely among the population. However, when government policy departs from biblical standards on so many issues, the nation is on a collision course with God.
A long list could be made. Below are some of the main areas where we have departed from God’s counsel.
The Bible
The Bible is the only sure authority for the Christian. Yet the accuracy, relevance and truth of the Judeo-Christian Scriptures are relentlessly attacked in schools, universities, the media and even the church.
Christians who hold that the Bible is the inerrant Word of God are mocked, ridiculed and labelled religious fanatics in almost every sphere of society, including by some within the church.
Abortion
Whatever your views on abortion, the scale of what is happening in our land is hard to comprehend. In 2023, there were 277,970 abortions in England and Wales, the highest number since the Abortion Act was passed in 1967. Set alongside the 581,363 deaths registered that year, abortion accounted for roughly one in three of all human lives ended. (DHSC; ONS)
We have become desensitised to this, and to the offence this barbaric act causes God. Scripture records God’s horror at nations that sacrificed their children to false gods (Jeremiah 7:31). Today we end the lives of children in the womb in far greater numbers, and call it choice.
With continued pressure to legalise assisted suicide, it may not be long before we end the lives of the oldest in society, as well as the youngest, for the sake of convenience.
Marriage
God created marriage as a sacred and solemn institution for the good of society. The Bible is crystal clear: it prohibits any sexual relationship outside the monogamous marriage of a man and a woman.
Anyone promoting God’s standards in this area is widely scorned and marginalised in public life.
Is it any surprise, then, that single-parent families, sexually transmitted infections and the acceptance of every form of sexual sin have risen sharply alongside the “softening” of laws that uphold biblical marriage? Now the legal definition of marriage itself has been changed, promoting a secular worldview throughout the nation.
Education
God has gradually been removed from classrooms across the land. Children are taught they are merely evolved animals. We then look on in amazement as they behave like animals, with no fear of or respect for authority or anyone else.
A selfish “survival of the fittest” worldview is promoted in schools. It degrades the value and uniqueness of humanity as God sees it. We can only imagine the effect of this teaching on generations to come.
Science
There should be perfect harmony between science and the Bible, as there is between the Creator and His creation. Unfortunately, the scientific establishment largely interprets data only through a Darwinian evolutionary worldview.
This is a great insult to God. The Bible repeatedly describes the world as bearing His signature. Yet in scientific circles, anyone who challenges the evolutionary worldview faces aggressive persecution.
The Church
The visible church in the UK is dying and in disarray. This is not only because attendance is falling. The gospel itself is being diluted and redefined to suit a secular culture.
The accurate proclamation of the gospel is the church’s primary purpose. Much of the church has lost sight of this mandate and compromised God’s truth in almost every area of doctrine. Many churches now deny the virgin birth, the resurrection of Christ and other Bible-based doctrines.
It is a sad irony that some Protestant denominations now affirm less of the Bible’s core teaching than the Roman Catholic Church the Reformers sought to reform.
The mainstream church is now often seen by society as irrelevant. Too often it entertains congregations instead of warning them of the judgement to come and calling them to turn to Christ in repentance. The gospel is routinely watered down into a palatable “social gospel”. It cannot save anyone and makes a mockery of Christ’s work on the cross.
Israel
Scripture makes specific statements about how nations will be blessed, or not, depending on how they treat Israel:
I will bless those who bless you, and whoever curses you I will curse, and all peoples on earth will be blessed through you. (Genesis 12:3 NIV)
The day of the LORD is near for all nations. As you have done, it will be done to you; your deeds will return upon your own head. (Obadiah 1:15 NIV)
For the nation or kingdom that will not serve you will perish; it will be utterly ruined. (Isaiah 60:12 NIV)
The implications are simple, whether we agree with them or not. If God our Creator has set this out, we have a choice. We obey Him and prosper, or we disobey and face the consequences.
If we treat the Jewish people as friends and respect them as God’s chosen nation, we will be blessed. If we turn our backs on them, particularly when much of the world is hostile to them, we will incur God’s judgement. For more on international attitudes to Israel, see our article Why Israel?
A nation that repented
Is there a recent example of a national leader leading his country in repentance?
In October 2012, Uganda marked 50 years of independence from Britain. At the National Jubilee Prayers event, President Yoweri Museveni publicly repented of his own sins and the sins of the nation:
I stand here today to close the evil past, and especially in the last 50 years of our national leadership history and at the threshold of a new dispensation in the life of this nation. I stand here on my own behalf and on behalf of my predecessors to repent. We ask for your forgiveness. We confess these sins, which have greatly hampered our national cohesion and delayed our political, social and economic transformation. We confess sins of idolatry and witchcraft which are rampant in our land. We confess sins of shedding innocent blood, sins of political hypocrisy, dishonesty, intrigue and betrayal. Forgive us of sins of pride, tribalism and sectarianism; sins of laziness, indifference and irresponsibility; sins of corruption and bribery that have eroded our national resources; sins of sexual immorality, drunkenness and debauchery; sins of unforgiveness, bitterness, hatred and revenge; sins of injustice, oppression and exploitation; sins of rebellion, insubordination, strife and conflict. We want to dedicate this nation to you so that you will be our God and guide. We want Uganda to be known as a nation that fears God and as a nation whose foundations are firmly rooted in righteousness and justice to fulfil what the Bible says in Psalm 33:12: Blessed is the nation whose God is the Lord. A people you have chosen as your own.
What a wonderful example to the “Christian” nations of the West. Sadly, there seems little prospect of a UK prime minister offering such a prayer. Even if one did, most of the population would be outraged.
The sheep and goats judgement
The Bible speaks of a day when all nations will be gathered before Jesus Christ for judgement:
When the Son of Man comes in his glory, and all the angels with him, he will sit on his glorious throne. All the nations will be gathered before him, and he will separate the people one from another as a shepherd separates the sheep from the goats. He will put the sheep on his right and the goats on his left. … The King will reply, ‘Truly I tell you, whatever you did for one of the least of these brothers and sisters of mine, you did for me.’ … Then they will go away to eternal punishment, but the righteous to eternal life. (Matthew 25:31-33, 40, 46 NIV)
In this judgement, all nations appear before Christ. We believe that when Jesus speaks of “these brothers and sisters of mine”, He may be referring specifically to the Jewish people.
How will the UK’s leaders fare when they stand before Christ? And how will you fare, when asked whether you defended His people, remained silent or, worse still, campaigned against them?
It’s time to repent: a plea
Deuteronomy 28–30 ends with Moses urging the people of Israel to follow the Lord carefully and diligently. The passage applies specifically to Israel, and still does. But the UK would be wise to heed the same words.
Will we, as a nation, choose God’s ways and the life and blessing that come with them? Or will we go our own way, as history shows many nations have, and suffer the death and curses that follow?
Two doors stand open before us, and we believe it is very late in the day for the UK. The Lord is trying to get our attention.
When will we recognise that we are living on borrowed time? If we continue on this path, we can expect nothing but the judgement of God.
We urge you to repent on behalf of our nation. Pray that God would forgive our brazen rebellion and lead us back to obedience and holiness.
Where do we begin?
National repentance begins with individuals. God’s promise in 2 Chronicles 7:14 is addressed to “my people, who are called by my name”. Before we can pray for the nation, we must be right with God ourselves.
If you have never turned from your sin and put your trust in Jesus Christ, that is where to start. Our article How to be saved explains how.
If you already follow Christ, Scripture urges us to pray for those in authority, that we may live peaceful and godly lives (1 Timothy 2:1–2). Pray for our leaders by name. Speak the truth with grace wherever God has placed you. Do not stay silent.
God once searched for someone to stand in the gap for the land, and found no one (Ezekiel 22:30). May He find many of us willing today.
This day I call the heavens and the earth as witnesses against you that I have set before you life and death, blessings and curses. Now choose life, so that you and your children may live (Deuteronomy 30:19 NIV)
Blessed is the nation whose God is the LORD, the people he chose for his inheritance. (Psalm 33:12 NIV)