Monday, October 10, 2016
This is
what the Lord says: “You will
be in Babylon for seventy years. But
then I will come and do for you all the good things I have promised, and I will
bring you home again. For I know the plans I have for
you,” says the Lord. “They are
plans for good and not for disaster, to give you a future and a hope. In
those days when you pray, I will listen. If you look for me
wholeheartedly, you will find me. I will be found by you,” says the Lord.
“I will end your captivity and restore
your fortunes. I will gather you out of
the nations where I sent you and will bring you home again to your own land.” You claim that the Lord has raised
up prophets for you in Babylon. But this
is what the Lord says about the king who sits on David’s throne and
all those still living here in Jerusalem—your relatives who were not exiled to
Babylon. This is what the Lord of
Heaven’s Armies says: “I will send war,
famine, and disease upon them and make them like bad figs, too rotten to eat. Yes,
I will pursue them with war, famine, and disease, and I will scatter them
around the world. In every nation where
I send them, I will make them an object of damnation, horror, contempt, and mockery.
For they refuse to listen to me, though I have spoken to them repeatedly
through the prophets I sent. And you who
are in exile have not listened either,” says the Lord. Jeremiah 29:10-19(NLT)
Who can know
the mind of God? His plans and ways are
more like a tapestry than a picture, and we tend to look at it from the wrong
side!
Evidence of
that is the way we use Scripture to suit our own thoughts and preferences
rather than seek the will of God.
Through Jeremiah God said, I know the plans I have for you…. We want that to mean everything is
going to be peachy, lovely and easy.
But if we
read the whole context, God is getting his people ready for losing the war with
Babylon’s King Nebuchadnezzar, and the seventy years of brutal captivity that
will follow. Not exactly something you’d
want to write on the flyleaf of your Bible!
It is
dangerous to predict any future, especially if you’re basing it on something
that happened to someone else. But we
tend to do that, don’t we. And we tend
to do that as we deny facts. You can lay
down on a train track and assume everything is alright because the sun is warm
on your face, and the gently vibrating rail beneath your back is like a massage
to your degenerated spinal discs. You
can deny the fact that the gentle hum you feel is really the approach of a 195-ton
locomotive, and it’s getting really close.
Your spine isn’t going to enjoy the meeting unless you change your
thoughts and ways!
There was a
lot of uneasiness in Jerusalem. Strong
and evil enemies were gathering on the horizon, and the words from the seat of
government were: oh, don’t worry; we’re going to
be just fine…go back to your parties, vacations and shopping. Hey, go get a tattoo, it’s all good here!
But the voice
from the prophet was: when
things fall apart, look for plenty of bloodshed, famine and slavery to prevail
for the next few generations. And, by
the way, God will do this. Eventually he
will bring your descendants back from the woodshed…but, for now…brace
yourselves…your greatness is over!
We have
conflicting views in America (boy, do we ever!!!), especially now that we’re in
an election year. TV is inundated with
urgent messages to elect one or the other to fix everything from terrorism to
budget woes and toenail fungus.
We may be headed for the kind
of wake-up call Israel received at the point of Nebuchadnezzar’s sword. I pray it will not be that, but the parallels
are too much like the hum of the locomotive on the train tracks. Consider
another nation/city steeped in wickedness - Nineveh; they heard God’s prophet
speak God’s word and repented:
Who can tell? Perhaps even
yet God will change his mind and
hold back his fierce
anger from destroying us.” When God saw
what they had done and how they had put a stop to their evil ways, he changed
his mind and did not carry out the destruction he had threatened. Jonah 3:9-10(NLT)
For You Today
You chew on that as you hit the Rocky Road…have a
blessed day!
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