Read Jeremiah 29:4-15
“For thus says the LORD: After seventy years are completed at Babylon, I will visit you and perform My good word toward you, and cause you to return to this place. For I know the thoughts that I think toward you, says the LORD, thoughts of peace and not of evil, to give you a future and a hope.“—Jeremiah 29:10-11
No matter what you’re experiencing right now, God has a plan for your life. The Master Architect of the universe crafted you to perform a specific role in His grand design. Everything that has occurred, even your darkest moments, have been purposeful steps toward God’s purpose for your life.
That’s God’s message to the Israelites in Babylonian captivity—I have a bright future planned for you! Difficult to imagine any brightness after Judah had been decimated by the Babylonians. The best and the brightest of Jerusalem had been taken captive, and the glorious temple ransacked. In the midst of so much despair, the people wanted to know their nightmare would end soon.
God’s instructions to the Babylonian captives came through a letter from Jeremiah: Build houses, plant gardens, marry, have children, give your children in marriage, plan for grandchildren, and seek and pray for the peace and well-being of the city in which you reside because you’ll be in captivity for 70 years.
Not the plan the captives hoped to hear, but God indeed had a plan: To free them from captivity according to His plan, not theirs. Liberation would come, but meanwhile, God called for them not only to survive, but to thrive in their current conditions.
As with the Israelites, God doesn’t always shelter us from “exile” moments in life. Somehow He makes even those experiences a part of the plan that shapes us into the person He uses. He even calls us to thrive and grow, not because we’re immune to the challenges of our circumstances, but because those are opportunities to commune with Him even more. God may not deliver us as quickly as we want, but He assures us He will never leave nor forsake us. He promises to always bring us back from our Babylon.
Lesson to Remember: No matter your circumstances today, God still has a plan for your life! He promises to always bring us back from our Babylon.
“Have I not commanded you? Be strong and of good courage; do not be afraid, nor be dismayed, for the LORD your God is with you wherever you go.”—Joshua 1:9
