Jeremiah: When God Calls You to Hard ThingsНамуна

Day 5: God’s Promise of Hope and Restoration

Jeremiah 29:11 is an oft-quoted verse about God promising us a hope and a future. What we may miss if we don’t read the entire context is that these words were spoken in the face of devastating loss. Jerusalem was in ruins. When the Israelites were carried off against their will to Babylon, all they could see as they looked back were ashes falling from the burning rubble. Withered and weak from starvation, the Israelites had no plan to escape from one of the fiercest and strongest armies of that time. This most ferocious of armies snuffed out any glimmer of hope with one final gust.

The promise of a hope and future meant that God would not abandon the Israelites. They could take heart because God’s presence would go with them, and one day, he would restore them to their homeland and dole out justice to all nations.

Though the Israelites were in exile, God did not abandon them or take away his presence. We can be assured that God will do the same for us. He will be with us no matter where we are: in the sweetness and comfort of “Jerusalem” and in the unfamiliar, out of place and often lonely surroundings of “Babylon.” Those are the promises to which we, as people of faith, can cling.

If you are feeling like an exile in this world, take heart. A great cloud of witnesses has gone before you. Like you, they lived as exiles of the kingdom of God, in a land which they did not call their home, looking to a future that could not be seen. Today, these kingdom exiles live in concrete jungles, mud huts, under thatched roofs, in high-rise apartments, prison cells, on the streets and in the halls of power. You will know who they are because they will be living and loving not for themselves but for the glory of God and the hope of his return.

Will you choose to live fully for God where he has placed you? Though you live in a world that is your temporary home, keep your faith and hope in the one who is not defined by political or geographical boundaries but who is above all, in all, who was and is and is to come.