"...to all the exiles whom I have sent into exile... Build houses and live in them; plant gardens and eat their produce..." (Jeremiah 29:4-5)
Have you ever felt like you were in exile and not in the place you were meant to be? A less than desirable job? A family in turmoil? A lonely community? A body that is sick and weak? A house that is falling apart and no funds to fix it? A loved one lost and with them, your heart?
Perhaps this passage from Jeremiah is for you and me just as it was for the Israelites. Babylon was not their ideal, but it was where God placed them... for good reasons.
To preserve them
To refine them
To bring them to a greater realization of who they were created to be - whole, not fractured as we all are by sin-nature
To gain their full attention
To become their only and true Hope
"For I know the plans I have for you, declares the Lord, plans for wholeness and not for evil, to give you a future and a hope" (Jeremiah 29:11).
Wholeness, future, hope. Aren't these the opposite of what you would expect from an exile experience? Yet God promises these things to the soft in heart, and He never, ever lies. "...I will fulfill to you my promise..." (Jeremiah 29:10)
As we wait, abide in our loving Heavenly Father and abound in this place of exile, He will bring beauty and joy into that land. "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 29:7).
Do you see Jesus' blessing in the land of exile? Ask for it. Seek it. He will give it to you. He never, ever lies.
