Jeremiah 29:1-32 “Faithful Where God Placed Us”

1:04Those words are on t-shirts and coffee mugs, bumper stickers, and bodies. Never mind the actual context of the words, when they were spoken, to whom they were spoken, why they were spoken. Never mind the fact that the word You in Hebrew is plural, not singular. And especially, never mind the fact that God is actually saying the exact opposite of what many people conclude when they first read or hear that verse: that yes, God does indeed have good plans for his people in the future, but what he's actually calling them to is a life of faithfulness today.

2:02Here and now, in the circumstances that you find yourself in, in the place you live, the job you have, and the people that you live among. What a challenging message for our future-oriented generation, whose greatest challenge might just be contentment and faithfulness today. Jeremiah 29 contains excerpts from three separate letters written sometime between the first deportation to Babylon in 597 BC and the destruction of Jerusalem in 587 BC, so that 10-year period. The first letter is found in verses 1 through 23, and that was written by Jeremiah from Jerusalem to the exiles in Babylon.

2:55The second letter is found in verses 24 through 28, and that was written. By Shemiah in Babylon back to the people in Jerusalem. And then the third letter is found in verses 29 through 32 and is again written by Jeremiah from Jerusalem to the people in exile in Babylon in response to Shemiah's letter. Got all that? This is my life every week in Jeremiah. On Monday, I never know what year it is, who is king, what is going on.

3:28It's very disorienting. This morning, we are going to cover verses 15 through 23 first, which Carly just read for us, because those verses deal with the comfortable lies of the false prophets that were leading the people astray. And then we're going to finish with the uncomfortable truths spoken by the prophet Jeremiah that would lead the people to receive God's blessing. You see, his words actually provide hope in a hopeless situation because his words are based on God's promises. And God never lies.

4:06So we're going to be challenged and encouraged this morning that until God fulfills his promises, we must be faithful where he placed us. So let's take a look at verses 15 through 23 here. This again is in the second half of Jeremiah's letter to the exiles in Babylon, and here he's focusing on those false prophets who are among them. Taking aim at their wicked lies and their wicked lives. Let's start with the wicked lies of the false prophets.

4:41You probably remember from last week and earlier in the book, false prophets were saying that the yoke of Babylon, their reign and rule over the people, was just going to last two more years. That in two years that yoke would be broken, and King Jeconiah and all of the exiles and all the stuff they took out of the temple, that was going to come back in two years. But those words directly contradicted all that God had spoken through the prophet Jeremiah, who said that the exile was not going to last two more years, but 70 years, and that the people who were left behind in Jerusalem needed to repent or face judgment.

5:18And so Jeremiah writes to the exiles and he tells them not to be misled by false prophets like Ahab and Zedekiah and Shemiah, because they were prophesying lies in God's name. It wasn't true that the exiles were going to be back in two short years, but more importantly, it was not true that all was going to be well with King Zedekiah and all of the people who remained in Jerusalem who refused to repent. So take a look again at verse 17 here in chapter 29.

5:51Verse 17, Thus says the Lord of hosts, Behold, I am sending on them, that is the people of Jerusalem, sword, famine, and pestilence, and I will make Make them like vile figs that are so rotten they cannot be eaten. I will pursue them with sword, famine, and pestilence, and will make them a horror to all the kingdoms of the earth, to be a curse, a terror, a hissing, and a reproach among all the nations where I have driven them, because they did not pay attention to my words, declares the Lord, that I persistently sent to you by my servants the prophets, but you would not listen, declares the Lord.

6:29So the people who are left behind in Jerusalem should not be expecting blessing from God. No, instead, they should be expecting sword, famine, and pestilence, because they did not pay attention to the word of the Lord. For hundreds of years, prophets had been coming to them, calling them to repent, calling them to return to the Lord, calling them to turn from their sin against each other. Jeremiah himself at this point has been prophesying to them for 30 years. Think about that. 30 years in a row, he's been calling them to repent and turn back to God.

7:03But the people refused to listen. They would not repent. They would not pay attention because they preferred the comfortable lies of the false prophets to the uncomfortable truths spoken by Jeremiah. And since Jeremiah wouldn't stop speaking the word of God to the people, Shemiah wrote a letter from Babylon saying that somebody needed to arrest him and put him in neck chains and in irons, as we heard in verses 24 through 28. So, friends, the false prophets are committed to spreading their lies, and those wicked lies were also accompanied by their wicked lives.

7:43I want you to look again at verse 23. God says in verse 23 that the false prophets have done an outrageous thing in Israel. They have committed adultery with their neighbors' wives. So, I want you to understand what's being said here. Thousands of people have been violently torn from their homes and their families. They have been on a forced march 700 miles north to a foreign country, to Babylon. They are traumatized, scared to death, and desperately in need of spiritual leadership.

8:29Now, lying in God's name is never okay, but at some level, I can understand a little bit why they would tell the people lies. You do not want these traumatized people who are scared to death panicking even more. And so, you tell them, hey, listen, everything's going to be okay. We're going to be home in two years. We just have to tough this out for a little while, and we'll be home soon. But you see, in addition to that, To lying in the name of the Lord, these men who are supposed to be providing spiritual leadership to these traumatized, scared people instead are taking advantage of them, committing adultery with their neighbors' wives.

9:17It would be bad enough if they were sleeping with unmarried women. But these predators are literally going around and seducing their neighbors' wives while their husbands are off somewhere trying to figure out how to feed their families in this foreign country. It is disgusting. God calls their behavior an outrageous thing because that's exactly what it is. It is outrageous. And almost nothing makes God angrier than spiritual leaders taking advantage of people, whether that is sexually or financially or for power and prestige and position or any other thing.

10:07But I think you know that these things almost always go hand in hand. Almost 100% of the time, leaders who teach wicked lies also lead wicked lives. But here is some comfort. If you have been hurt by spiritual leaders in the past, look at what God says at the end of verse 23. Last phrase of verse 23, I am the one who knows, and I am witness, declares the Lord. See, spiritual leaders can speak wicked lies and they can lead wicked lives, but God knows. He is witness. He is going to take the stand against them on the day of judgment, and he himself is going to testify against them. Look at Hebrews chapter 10.

11:12For we know him who said, Vengeance is mine, I will repay. And again, the Lord will judge his people. It is a fearful thing to fall into the hands of the living God. So if you have been hurt by a spiritual leader, I am so sorry. That should not have happened. Nobody should ever be lied to or taken advantage of by a spiritual leader. But vengeance is coming. And vengeance is coming not from the hand of man, that will always leave something to be desired. Vengeance is coming. From the hand of the Lord. And God says in verse 21 that Ahab and Zedekiah are going to be struck down by Nebuchadnezzar. And he says later in verse 32 that Shemiah and all of his descendants, none of them, are going to see the good that God is going to do to Israel.

12:15All people, especially spiritual leaders, will stand before God on the day of judgment. And it is a fearful thing to fall into the hands of the living God. Especially if you've taught wicked lies and have lived a wicked life. Thankfully, there was at least one faithful man among them who was speaking uncomfortable truths instead of comfortable lies, one man who lived faithfully instead of outrageously. And some of his words are very hard to hear, but they would provide real hope and lasting comfort because they came from the God who never lies and who is also full of grace. So let's now turn back to the beginning of chapter 29 and look at Jeremiah's words to the exiles.

13:10Chapter 29, verse 1. These are the words of the letter that Jeremiah the prophet sent from Jerusalem to the surviving elders of the exiles and to the priests, the prophets, and all the people whom Nebuchadnezzar had taken into exile from Jerusalem to Babylon. This was after King Jeconiah and the queen mother, they The eunuchs, the officials of Judah and Jerusalem, the craftsmen and the metal workers had departed from Jerusalem. The letter was sent by the hand of Elasa, the son of Shaphan, and Gamariah, the son of Hilkiah, whom Zedekiah, king of Judah, sent to Babylon to Nebuchadnezzar, king of Babylon.

13:49Now, I want to pause there for a minute because I want you to think again about the people to whom Jeremiah is writing. You notice that he says he's writing to those who survived, to the surviving elders, to the surviving people. Because these are the people who were in Jerusalem when the army showed up and they slaughtered their friends and relatives. They slaughtered their kids in front of their eyes, and then they marched them 700 miles. Think about that. 700 miles.

14:22They are now in a foreign country. They don't know the culture. They don't know the language or anything. It makes you wonder how they thought about the whole thing. It makes you wonder how they thought about those people who committed those atrocities against them. But you know, we actually don't have to wonder because they told us in the Bible. Look at Psalm 137. By the waters of Babylon, there we sat down and wept when we remembered Zion. On the willows, there we hung up our lamps. Liars. For there, our captors required of us songs and our tormentors mirth, saying, Sing us one of the songs of Zion.

15:10How shall we sing the Lord's song in a foreign land? If I forget you, O Jerusalem, let my right hand forget its skill. Let my tongue stick to the roof of my mouth if I do not remember you, if I do not set Jerusalem above my highest joy. Remember, O Lord, against the Edomites, the day of Jerusalem, how they said, Lay it bare, lay it bare, down to its foundations. O daughter of Babylon, doomed to be destroyed, blessed shall he be who repays you with what you have done to us. Blessed shall he be who takes your little ones and dashes them against the rock.

15:53How did the exiles feel? They felt overwhelmed with grief when they thought about home. They felt overwhelmed with shame when their captors and tormentors, the Babylonians, made them sing the songs of home to entertain and amuse them. As a result, they actually looked forward to the day that Babylon would be destroyed. They looked forward to the day that their children would be dashed against rocks, just like their own children were killed in that grisly manner. Those are shocking things to pray.

16:35And as cultured people from the West in America today who have not known the horrors of war in that kind of way, we can look at those words and think, how could you pray that? But I think at least humility requires that we might be tempted. We might at least be tempted to pray those same things in that situation. But, friends, I want to set the table for you. I want to set the context for you here because the rest of the words don't seem impossible unless you understand what's going on here. So now hear the command of God. Hear the verses that we all know so well in that context. Look with me at verse 5.

17:20Build 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. 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.

18:10Build houses and live in them? Absolutely not. I am not buying property in this wasteland. We are living in a tent because we are leaving as soon as possible. Plant gardens and eat their produce? No. I don't even know what grows here. What a waste of time and energy. We're not going to be here long enough to harvest anything. Marry and have kids? Stay long enough for their kids to have kids? That is out of the question.

18:58We are from Judah. My marriage certificate and my kids' birth certificates are not going to say Babylon. Who would raise a family here? And seek the welfare of the city? Pray for it? Jeremiah, have you lost your mind? Do you not remember what they did to us? You saw it with your own eyes. You're still there. Do you see? Do you see how impossible all of this must have seemed to them? God is calling them to an obedience that went against every single thing that they felt on the inside.

19:47But, friends, all of these commands were part of God's plan for the exiles. Because for hundreds of years, they refused to submit to God and listen to his word. So they had to learn in Babylon what they refused to learn in Jerusalem. The discipline of exile would teach them what a million-second chances had not. You see, ever since the fall, since our first parents rebelled against God and his word, everything in us says, I know best.

20:27I cannot trust God. I have to do things my way. That is what the Israelites said over and over again. And until God changes our hearts, it is no different for us. Friends, the Christian life is all about learning how to submit to God, how to submit to his word, believing that he knows best, that he always does best, that his word is absolutely true. And when we can't, Cannot learn those things the easy way, then God teaches them to us the hard way through discipline.

21:10These impossible commands to build a life in Babylon, to put down roots there, to pray for a foreign city and a foreign government that had carried them off as the spoils of war, all of it, all of it was part of God's infinitely wise and good plan to humble them, to teach them to submit to Him, to show them that His word is true and can be trusted and must be obeyed. These impossible commands formed the curriculum of God's master class in submission.

21:47Let me ask you a question. Have you ever found yourself praying, God, I do not want to be here. I do not want to live in this place. I do not want to live among these people. I do not want this job. I want to live somewhere else and do something else among different people. Well, of course you have. We all have. And you know what? We could actually do it. That's right. We could actually do that. We live in the internet age. We live in the age of airplanes, in the age of unlimited possibilities. You could get a different job in a different city and live among different people tomorrow if you wanted to.

22:49And that feels very freeing until you get on the internet and you find your dream job in your dream city among your dream people and you move there and a year later it's not new anymore. And now you're dreaming of a different job in a different city among different people. Because you see, the human heart is never satisfied. We are never satisfied with where we live or what we do for a living or who we live among.

23:28It is what author Stephen Altroghi called the Greener Grass Conspiracy. It's a great book. Highly recommend it. The Greener Grass Conspiracy is the idea that the perfect life is out there somewhere. We just have to find it. You know what the Greener Grass Conspiracy leads to? A generation of people that never builds houses and lives in them, that never builds gardens and Their produce that puts off marriage and children and everything else because the perfect life is out there somewhere.

24:11It's just not here. It never is. Look at what Eugene Peterson wrote. The only place you have to be human is where you are right now. The only opportunity you will ever have to live by faith is in the circumstances you are provided this very day. This house you live in, this family you find yourself in, this job you have been given, the weather conditions that prevail at this moment. Exile, being where we don't want to be with people we don't want to be with, forces a decision. Will I focus my attention on what is wrong with the world and feel sorry for myself? Or will I focus my energies on how I can live at my best in this place I find myself?

25:11Friends, I do not know what God has planned for your life. He may very well call you to a new place, just like he did Abraham. He may very well move you to a new place without your consent, just like these exiles. What God is reminding us through Jeremiah 29 is that you are exactly where you are because God has placed you here for a purpose. Paul teaches us in 1 Thessalonians 4 that God's will for our lives is our sanctification. That is our conformity to Christ, our being transformed into a holy people. And a huge part of our sanctification is through where we live and what we do and who we live among. That is one of God's primary ways that he sanctifies us, especially when we would rather live somewhere else and have a different job and live among different people.

26:18The exiles did not want to live in Babylon. They did not want to live among the Babylonians. They did not want to do whatever work it was that they were forced to do there. But friends, that is where God placed them. He placed them there to discipline them and to teach them what they could not and would not learn in Jerusalem, and that is to submit to him. And when they learned that, they would then know that God is not just a promise maker, but a promise keeper. Look at the promises that he makes in verse 10.

26:55For thus says the Lord, when 70 years are completed for Babylon, I will visit you, and I will fulfill to you my promise and bring you back to this place. 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. Then you will call upon me and come and pray to me, and I will hear you. You will seek me and find me when you seek me with all your heart. I will be found by you, declares the Lord, and I will restore your fortunes and gather you from all the nations and all the places where I have driven you, declares the Lord, and I will bring you back to the place from which I sent you into exile.

27:41Jeremiah tells these people that he has great plans for them. A future and a hope. The very things that seemed to evaporate a little more with every step on that death march 700 miles north into Babylon. 70 years would come and go, but at the end of that time, look at what God promises. Look again at verse 10. I will visit you, and I will fulfill to you my promise to bring you back to this place.

28:18Friends, he is using that language and that language particularly because it is the same language that is used in the Exodus. This is exactly what God says in Exodus chapter 4 to Moses. He says that the Lord visited the people and that the Lord saw their affliction. He had compassion on them and promised to lead them out of slavery in Egypt to the land that God promised to Abraham. And here in Jeremiah 29, God says that he will visit his people again.

28:52Not a people who lived in Egypt because of a famine, but people who lived in Babylon because of their own sin. As we've seen, that's what makes the return from exile even more glorious because it was more gracious even than the exodus from Egypt. Look at verse 12. Then you will call upon me and come and pray to me, and I will hear you. Now, I want you to remember what God said earlier in the book. Look at Jeremiah chapter 11 on the screen.

29:30Therefore, do not pray for this people or lift up a cry or prayer on their behalf, for I will not listen when they call to me in the time of their trouble. The same God who said that he would not listen when his people prayed because of their unrepentant sin and idolatry now says that after 70 years he would listen to them. Why? Because he is fickle. No, because finally, after 70 years, the people would do what God had been calling them to do all along. Repent and turn back to him.

30:12Friends, God never despises a person who comes to him with a broken heart and a contrite spirit. Look at verse 13. You will seek me and find me when you seek me with all your heart. I will be found by you, declares the Lord. Now, let me pause there. When my kids were little, they loved playing hide-and-seek in our house. And I could have hidden in some spots where they would have never found me. Like, I'd still be there today gathering dust.

30:56But I didn't do that. I hid in plain sight behind a fake plant, under a blanket in the middle of the floor. Why? Because I wanted my kids to find me. Our Heavenly Father is the same way. We find him when we seek him because he wants to be found by us. You see, the problem is David identifies in Saul. Psalm 14 is not that God is too hard to find, it's that our hearts are too hard to want to seek Him.

31:42But thankfully, God is in the business of changing hearts, and that is what 70 years of discipline would do. It would give them the desire to seek the Lord for the first time in generations. And God changes our hearts through His Spirit and His Word, placing in us that desire that did not exist before to seek and to know Him. Verse 14 again: I will be found by you, declares the Lord, and I will restore your fortunes and gather you from all the nations and all the places where I have driven you, declares the Lord, and I will bring you back to the place from which I sent you into exile.

32:21What amazing promises from God. And He never lies. These promises were 70 years away from being fulfilled, but they were guaranteed because God is always faithful to His Word. And meanwhile, those exiles needed to be faithful exactly where God placed them. Not pining for a different place among different people doing different things, but right where He placed them. And friends, in many ways, their experience mirrors. Our own. You see, our first parents, Adam and Eve, enjoyed everything that God promises here in this chapter. They lived in a special place that God had prepared just for them. He called them to be fruitful and multiply. They had dominion over all things. They could enjoy any part of that creation except for the fruit of one tree. God sought them and found them. They sought and found God as they walked with him and talked with him in the cool of the day.

33:33But all of that changed when Adam and Eve were tempted by the serpent to disobey God's word. He convinced them that submission to God was actually a bad thing. That submission to God did not lead to freedom. They would only have that if they rebelled against his repressive rule. Well, that was a lie. Their rebellion did not lead to freedom or fulfillment or life. It led only to disappointment, to emptiness, to bondage, and to death. So, with a broken heart, God exiled our first parents from that special place that He had prepared just for them.

34:24But here's the good news: God sent His Son Jesus to bring us back from our exile, to bring us back. To a better promised land that we would never again be exiled from, because he would deal permanently with the reasons that we were exiled in the first place. Jesus went out into the wilderness, and like Adam and Eve, he was tempted by Satan in every way. But unlike Adam and Eve, he withstood every temptation by holding fast to God's word.

34:57Jesus went to the cross, and in our place, he accepted the wages of sin, which is death. In our place, he was buried. And in our place, on the third day, he rose from the grave, defeating death. And many years after his resurrection, Jesus appeared to his best friend, John. And he gave him a picture of what is to come with promises that are unspeakably beautiful. And so, thinking back to what our first parents enjoyed in the Garden of Eden, I want you to look at the words that Jesus reveals to John in Revelation 22.

35:38Then the angel showed me the river of the water of life, bright as crystal, flowing from the throne of God and of the Lamb through the middle of the street of the city. Also, on either side of the river, the tree of life with its 12 kinds of fruit, yielding its fruit each month. The leaves of the tree were for the healing of the nations. No longer will there be anything accursed, but the throne of God and of the Lamb will be in it, and his servants will worship him. They will see his face, and his name will be on their foreheads, and night will be no more. They will need no light of lamp or sun, for the Lord God will be their light, and they will reign forever and ever.

36:29Brothers and sisters, that is what all who trust in the life, death, and resurrection of Jesus Christ have to look forward to. The promise of eternal life with God in a new heavens and a new earth, whose centerpiece is a perfect garden and a tree of life that we get to enjoy and eat from every day for all eternity. And the best part is that God is seated right in the middle of it on his throne. We get to talk with him and walk with him in the cool of the day and anytime we want to, just like Adam and Eve did in the garden. This is what God has promised to all who love him: that we will live in a perfect place doing meaningful work we love to do among people that we love and never want to be apart from.

37:21To all who trust in Jesus' life, death, and resurrection, that is what the future holds. That is the future. That we can look forward to. But, friends, that day has not yet arrived, and it may not arrive in our lifetime. And so, until God fulfills His promises, we must be faithful where He placed us. Let's ask for His grace today and every day to do that. Let's pray. Father, we confess to you that we are a people who continually struggle with discontent.

38:21We are discontent about things that we didn't even know you could buy yesterday because we saw them today on the internet. Lord, we pray for your grace to be faithful in the city that you have placed us in, among the people that we live around, and in the jobs that you have given to us here and now. Forgive us for buying into the greener grass conspiracy that the perfect life is out there somewhere. That we would be content if we just had a different set of circumstances.

39:06I pray that we would learn to submit to you here and now. Thank you for hearing our prayers. In Christ's name, we pray. Amen. Thank you for listening to the sermon audio from New Life Baptist Church in College Station, Texas. For more information or to support our ministry, visit us online at newlifecs.net.