Today’s reading is on Jeremiah 29.
It is quite impossible for me to imagine the last few years without my wife Paige by my side, supporting, listening, and loving me. I have seen through the blessing of this marriage how God demonstrates His love for us through what he’s planned for us. There is incredible comfort in knowing you are heard; loved; cared for. Jeremiah’s letter to the Babylonian exiles speaks true to us about this fact even many years later. We, too, are in a land of exile, the weight of our human sinfulness and a broken world deeming us unworthy on our own accord by God’s judgement. But Jeremiah 29 is a reminder all of us need constantly: God hears us, He listens, and He wants us to seek him and share the wealth of life found in Him with those around us. God is thinking about us and cares about us even as we are; as Psalm 40:5 says, “You have multiplied, O Lord my God, your wondrous deeds and your thoughts toward us; none can compare with you!”
Beyond all, I find immense comfort in Jeremiah 29:12: “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.” Hope for the future when looking at this world seems nigh impossible to come by. However, despite all else, the knowledge of my hope in the Lord and my future in His presence provides a peace and joy that simply can not be found elsewhere. In my own exile, do I put myself in the position of these false prophets God condemns, who want to rush God’s plan and determine His undeterminable thoughts on their own? Or do I want to be someone instead who trusts God’s future for me, draws close to Him in the meantime, and prays for the same for those around me? In response to this ineffable gift and the action it inspires in me, I can only list verse 13 as the prayer of my heart: “You will seek me and find me, when you seek me with all your heart.” The Lord hears our cries to Him, and when it is our greatest desire to seek Him and follow His word, I know we will find a greater fortune than any riches could hope to compare to.