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A FUTURE WITH HOPE (JEREMIAH 29:1-14)

REFLECTION

A future with hope is the theme for today’s reflection. The future refers to time regarded as still yet to come. Human intellect is unable to grasp the uncertainties of the future. The best we are able to do is to study the present and predict what may happen in the future. Being taken captive and forcefully exiled into another land is not a pleasant experience. This was what some of the people of Israel had experienced during time of Jeremiah. The future was uncertain for the people of Israel. King Nebuchadnezzar had besieged their city and exiled some of the prominent leaders and the people of Israel. What will the future hold for these exiles?Obviously, most people will be thrown into a state of hopelessness or despair. Many had lost their farms, properties, and investments in Israel and now find themselves in a foreign land, Babylon. Again what made their situation complicated was that fake prophets were giving them messages against God’s will and plan. The exiled population was being deceived that the Lord will deliver them soon and they will within a short time return home. These positive but false prophesies encouraged the people to relent in their effort to work and seek a brighter future for themselves and their families, they rather abhorred and prayed against Babylon, their host and benefactors. It is, for this reason, Jeremiah wrote to them that “Thus says the LORD of hosts, the God of Israel, to all the exiles whom I have sent into exile from Jerusalem to Babylon: Build houses and live in them; plant gardens and eat their produce.  Take wives and have sons and daughters; take wives for your sons, and give your daughters in marriage, that they may bear sons and daughters; multiply there, and do not decrease. But seek the welfare of the city where I have sent you into exile, and pray to the LORD on its behalf, for in its welfare you will find your welfare. (Jeremiah 29:4-7) 

 Jeremiah again wrote to warn the people of Israel in exile, “For thus says the LORD of hosts, the God of Israel: Do not let your prophets and your diviners who are among you deceive you, and do not listen to the dreams that they dream,  for it is a lie that they are prophesying to you in my name; I did not send them, declares the LORD. (Jeremiah 29:8-9) There are fake prophets who are able to perceive people’s hopeless and vulnerable situations and then take undue advantage of them for their own selfish gains, they speak what they have not heard from God and give fake and unreliable message and hope to people. Instead of preaching the message of repentance, they give the message and promise of prosperity, and instead of delivering the message of faith to the weary, they cause fear, panic, and despair to their own advantage.

It is important to note that the people of Israel were in exile in Babylon because of their disobedience to God yet in their predicament God still had plans to revive and restore them. God does not give up on us, He always has a recovery plan for us. We may fall today but tomorrow we shall rise. Surely, we have a future with hope. “For thus says the LORD: When seventy years are completed for Babylon, I will visit you, and I will fulfill to you my promise and bring you back to this place.” (Jeremiah 29:10)

The key lesson of the day is that the God of the past is the God of the present and the future. No matter the situation we find ourselves in, whether good or bad, we must be hopeful and reconnect our faith to God for His plan is to give us victory, success, and prosperity even after we have fallen. “For I know the plans I have for you, declares the LORD plans for welfare and not for evil, to give you a future and a hope”.  (Jeremiah 29:11). God’s plans for us are not restricted to geographical location, whether we are in our land of birth or in a foreign land, He is the omnipresent God and is able “to do far more abundantly than all that we ask or think, according to the power at work within us,” (Ephesians 3:20). What is most important is that we must repent from the disobedience or sin that sent us into exile and develop a deeper and closer relationship with God . The Lord assures us that “If my people who are called by my name humble themselves, and pray and seek my face and turn from their wicked ways, then I will hear from heaven and will forgive their sin and heal their land.” (2 Chronicles 7:14) 

My dear friend a future with hope is for those who put their trust in the Lord and do His will even in the period of exile. “But if you turn aside and forsake my statutes and my commandments that I have set before you, and go and serve other gods and worship them, then I will pluck you up from the land that I have given you, and this house that I have consecrated for my name, I will cast out of my sight, and I will make it a proverb and a byword among all peoples.  And at this house, which was exalted, everyone passing by will be astonished and say, Why has the LORD done this to this land and to this house?’ Then they will say, ‘Because they abandoned the LORD, the God of their fathers who brought them out of the land of Egypt, and laid hold on other gods and worshiped them and served them. Therefore he has brought all this disaster on them.’” (2 Chronicles 7:19-22) May the Lord continue to grant His children who find themselves in a hopeless situation, a future with hope. Shalom.

PRAYER 

GRACIOUS GOD, FORGIVE OUR TRANSGRESSIONS AND STRENGTHEN US TO CONTINUALLY REMAIN COMMITTED TO YOU IN FAITH, ALTHOUGH WE MAY PRESENTLY EXPERIENCE CHALLENGES AS A RESULT OF OUR ACTIONS AND INACTIONS, WE HUMBLY PRAY THAT YOU GRANT US A FUTURE WITH HOPE. AMEN