Jeremiah - a voice of hope

Our key verse for the next few weeks is taken from Jeremiah chapter 29 v11. In this verse God talks to the people of Israel about his personal plans for them, plans that will bring them a hope and a future. The words were spoken by the prophet Jeremiah and at the time they might have been hard words to listen to, for the people of God were not exactly enjoying what they might have seen as prosperous times.

The prophet writes in 626BC  at a time when many from Israel where in exile in Babylon. Israel had been invaded and defeated about 20 years earlier, the temple and the city walls of Jerusalem had been destroyed and the powerful state that Israel had once been was no more.

 So to hear a prophet speak of hope and plans that will bring prosperity and a future, might have made no sense, unless of course it was God that was speaking and declaring this truth.

 As we look at the first part of the verse we will be considering that one strand that runs through the bible is that God’s timing is clearly not the same as ours. He sees a complete picture, whilst we only see the pieces and at times we struggle to make sense of what we hold in our hand.  In addition it is clear that the bible wants us to understand that some things are not about the here and now, but about the future, about something ,that although it may not see fulfilment in the present, it can still have an impact on our lives today.

 

The starting point for this amazing verse is what makes the rest of it make sense. For what matters is who speaks and who declares the truth that the verse holds. I know the plans I have for you declares the Lord. God, the creator and sustainer, the alpha and the omega, speaks of his personal relationship with his people. It is the knowledge of who it is that is speaking that brings the hope that this verse speaks of into perspective. For a people who had lost everything, who were strangers in a foreign land, whose own land had been plundered and stripped of all its power, God speaks of his plans for them and the hope that he promises them. They have not been abandoned, God is still with them.

The same is true today, for God still maintains the truth that he is the one that brings hope, a hope that is rooted in his love for us and a hope that we can be confident in because it is God who promises it.