Jeremiah 29:11-14

“11 For surely I know the plans I have for you, says the Lord, plans for your welfare and not for harm, to give you a future with hope. 12 Then when you call upon me and come and pray to me, I will hear you. 13 When you search for me, you will find me; if you seek me with all your heart, 14 I will let you find me, says the Lord, and I will restore your fortunes and gather you from all the nations and all the places where I have driven you, says the Lord, and I will bring you back to the place from which I sent you into exile.”

These are familiar words. You can find them on bumper stickers, pass it on cards, pictures at Christian bookstores and Hobby Lobby and greeting cards meant to encourage and inspire. They’re mostly quoting Jeremiah 29:11 but I feel like when you leave off the other verses you lose the context, and to me the context makes it even more powerful.

Who was Jeremiah? What was his context? Jeremiah was called the “weeping prophet,” he is credited with writing the books of Jeremiah, Kings, and Lamentations, and he served under 5 Kings of Judah: Josiah, Jehoahaz, Jehoiakim, Jehoiachin, and Zedekiah. Jeremiah chapter 1 gives us this context. Jeremiah, much like Moses or Jonah, didn’t want to be the mouthpiece of God, but God tells him God has designed him for such a time as this.

Jeremiah’s Call and Commission

⁴Now the word of the Lord came to me saying,

⁵“Before I formed you in the womb I knew you,
and before you were born I consecrated you;
I appointed you a prophet to the nations.”

⁶Then I said, “Ah, Lord God! Truly I do not know how to speak, for I am only a boy.” ⁷But the Lord said to me,

“Do not say, ‘I am only a boy’;
for you shall go to all to whom I send you,
and you shall speak whatever I command you.
⁸Do not be afraid of them,
for I am with you to deliver you,
says the Lord.”

⁹Then the Lord put out his hand and touched my mouth; and the Lord said to me,

“Now I have put my words in your mouth.
¹⁰See, today I appoint you over nations and over kingdoms,
to pluck up and to pull down,
to destroy and to overthrow,
to build and to plant.”

Whoa. No pressure, right? God wanted him to speak up. You and I can do that, right? It’s easy to deliver good news. God didn’t call him to be an oracle; God called him to be a prophet, to speak out against the status quo. I can’t help but think God wants us to be little prophets. God formed us and knew us, just as God did Jeremiah, and God calls us to speak out when we something wrong in our world today both in big and small ways and it doesn’t matter what our age. I shared on facebook a blog post I read on Momastery. It was written by a mother before her son, Chase, entered into third grade. She talks about how there was a kid in her class that she didn’t stand up for or invite to sit at her lunch table.

“I think that God puts people in our lives as gifts to us. The children in your class this year, they are some of God’s gifts to you.

So please treat each one like a gift from God. Every single one.

Baby, if you see a child being left out, or hurt, or teased, a little part of your heart will hurt a little. Your daddy and I want you to trust that heart- ache. Your whole life, we want you to notice and trust your heart-ache. That heart ache is called compassion, and it is God’s signal to you to do something. It is God saying, Chase! Wake up! One of my babies is hurting! Do something to help! Whenever you feel compassion – be thrilled! It means God is speaking to you, and that is magic. It means He trusts you and needs you.

Sometimes the magic of compassion will make you step into the middle of a bad situation right away.

Compassion might lead you to tell a teaser to stop it and then ask the teased kid to play. You might invite a left-out kid to sit next to you at lunch. You might choose a kid for your team first who usually gets chosen last. These things will be hard to do, but you can do hard things.

Sometimes you will feel compassion but you won’t step in right away. That’s okay, too. You might choose instead to tell your teacher and then tell us. We are on your team – we are on your whole class’ team. Asking for help for someone who is hurting is not tattling, it is doing the right thing. If someone in your class needs help, please tell me, baby. We will make a plan to help together.

When God speaks to you by making your heart hurt for another, by giving you compassion, just do something. We send you to school to practice being brave and kind. Kind people are brave people. Because brave is not a feeling that you should wait for. It is a decision. It is a decision that compassion is more important than fear, than fitting in, than following the crowd.”

Jeremiah did something. He proclaimed the word of God, even though he was persecuted, even though he delivered awful news and that made him the least popular of all time. He did it because God told him to. Remember that still small voice Elijah heard, that’s the Holy Spirit speaking to your heart. The Holy Spirit gives you these nudges whether you want him to or not. When you invite Jesus into your heart, he doesn’t remain hidden in a box figuratively under your bed. Jesus has a way of infiltrating even the things that you would rather keep hidden.

Jeremiah is not a short book. He goes through a lot, false prophets preaching a prosperity Gospel, being imprisoned, people basically spitting in his face. He continues to speak the word of the Lord through 52 chapters, offering words of reckoning and judgement, as well as hope and promise of restoration. Jeremiah 29 was a letter to the exiles in Babylon and in it is both hope and restoration. I’m going to read now those same verses from The Message version of the Bible.

Jeremiah 29:11-14The Message (MSG)

^10-11This is God’s Word on the subject: “As soon as Babylon’s seventy years are up and not a day before, I’ll show up and take care of you as I promised and bring you back home. I know what I’m doing. I have it all planned out—plans to take care of you, not abandon you, plans to give you the future you hope for.

¹²“When you call on me, when you come and pray to me, I’ll listen.

^13-14“When you come looking for me, you’ll find me.

“Yes, when you get serious about finding me and want it more than anything else, I’ll make sure you won’t be disappointed.”

“I’ll turn things around for you. I’ll bring you back from all the countries into which I drove you bring you home to the place from which I sent you off into exile. You can count on it.”

God’s gonna be faithful. God’s gonna keep God’s promises.

God’s promises last forever, age to age, but sometimes our promises to God are another story.

Case in point: a man was driving down the street, desperately searching for a parking place so he wouldn’t be late for an important meeting. In desperation, he gazed into the heavens and prayed: “Lord, take pity on me. If you find me a parking place, I promise to go to church every Sunday for the rest of my life and give up smoking!”

Instantly, a parking place opened up before him and he took it.

Whereupon, he looked toward heaven again and said: “Nevermind, I found one.”

That’s a silly illustration, to say that if we see God like a giant Santa in the sky or a genie, that’s a one-sided relationship and there’s more to it than that. Are we trusting God to lead and guide us in all that we do? Are we trusting God with our children and grandchildren that God will pursue them with an abundant love, reaching out to them and seeking a relationship with them? Even if they have drifted away, even if they have made mistakes and they’re as far from God as can be and they like it that way or they full unworthy to approach the throne of grace with confidence. Even then God remains faithful. This is why parents cling to Jeremiah 29:11-14. This is why teachers, coaches, principals, Sunday School teachers, anyone who works with youth clings to these verses. It’s not just about the plans that God has designed specifically for them, but it’s about restoration. Restoring them to who they were truly created to be. Restoring us and transforming us into a new creation in Christ. We were CHOSEN to be RESTORED.

Have you ever felt like you live in exile? Do you ever feel so far from God that you don’t know your way back? God does not desire that for you. In Psalms 37:4 says, “Take delight in the Lord, and he will give you the desires of your heart.” God desires healing, wholeness and hope. William Carey, founder of the Baptist Missionary Society, says, “The future is as bright as the promises of God.” Is there something holding you back from leaving your self or society imposed exile? God doesn’t want that for you. Danny Gokey in his song “Tell Your Heart to Beat Again” wrote these words.

You’re shattered
Like you’ve never been before
The life you knew
In a thousand pieces on the floor
And words fall short in times like these
When this world drives you to your knees
You think you’re never gonna get back
To the you that used to be

Tell your heart to beat again
Close your eyes and breathe it in
Let the shadows fall away
Step into the light of grace
Yesterday’s a closing door
You don’t live there anymore
Say goodbye to where you’ve been
And tell your heart to beat again

Beginning
Just let that word wash over you
It’s alright now
Love’s healing hands have pulled you through
So get back up, take step one
Leave the darkness, feel the sun
‘Cause your story’s far from over
And your journey’s just begun

Let every heartbreak
And every scar
Be a picture that reminds you
Who has carried you this far
‘Cause love sees farther than you ever could
In this moment heaven’s working
Everything for your good

As Romans 8:28 says, “²⁸We know that all things work together for good for those who love God, who are called according to his purpose.” We have to forgive ourselves so that we’re able to grasp hold of all that God has in store for us. We need to trust God in the letting go of whatever is holding us back that God will restore us to right paths and give us a future with hope, even though we may have walked through the darkest valley, even if we’ve been in literal or figurative exile. The light will eventually break through. We as the church can walk with one another and lead each other to the light. Professor James Limburg tells this story of going bicycling with his son. “We took a ride on the bike path around our town. Just off the path was a drainage tunnel which ran under the interstate highway. We decided to explore it. We parked our bikes and began to walk through the tunnel. It was made of concrete, wide enough for us to walk side by side, but not high enough for me to stand up straight. We walked for a distance and then the tunnel took a sharp turn and suddenly it became dark. A hand reached out and took mine. Neither of us said anything about it, but we continued, hand in hand, until we came to another turn and we could see the light.”

We are called to be the voice of God, even when it’s not popular, speak for the least of these, walk with people in exile, and trust the promises of God. That God who began a good work in you and me will bring it to completion. As the last verse of the Hymn of Promise says, “There’s a song in every silence, seeking word and melody; There’s a dawn in every darkness, bringing hope to you and me. From the past will come the future; what it holds, a mystery, Unrevealed until its season, something God alone can see.” No matter what God is going to be faithful, even if you’ve been in exile. You will be restored.