““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. 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 29:10–11, ESV)
Sometimes the way we plan things do not work out the way we desire. We just returned from a visit to see my daughter, son-in-law, and grand-children for the Thanksgiving holiday. Normally, when I visit my children, I will do some projects. However, on this occasion I looked forward to a nice relaxing time with nothing to do except enjoy the holiday.
However, things changed after we arrived. The first day, I heard that the grandson’s car was not working correctly. Then the other car would not start. The family did not have a reliable car. Had I known, I would have taken the tools to do the work. So, we did not have the necessary tools to work on either car.
I spent most of Thanksgiving Day and Black Friday scrambling to get their cars going. Thursday was frustrating. I did not have the tools or know how to get the starter off of one car and did not have the sparkplugs for the other. On Friday, I got the set of plugs from the auto store and we got one car going. Unfortunately, without the right tools and enough time we could not get the starter changed out.
As I look back on this experience, I now understand that the Lord was doing something that was very important. Among teaching me more about patience, I spent a lot of time with my grandson. We worked together on the projects. Rather than do all the work, I spent some time coaching him through the work by demonstrating and then letting him do the work. Thus, I was passing on some knowledge to him, the next generation.
This Scripture came to mind.
“The heart of man plans his way, but the Lord establishes his steps.” (Proverbs 16:9, ESV)
You see, I had plans to chill out for a week, but the Lord had something more important in mind.
When we look at the time of Jeremiah’s ministry, we can see the same pattern. The surviving exiled Israelites would much rather have been in Jerusalem than in Babylon. Yet, there the Lord tells them to be a blessing to their new place of residence and to have children and families throughout a 70-year time of exile. They were to prepare families, the next generations, for a future time when the Lord would take them back to their land. His plan was to reestablish the nation in Jerusalem, which was essential to fulfill His great redemptive plan. The reestablishment of the nation was vital for bringing the Messiah, Jesus, to save us from our sins.
The point of this is that often we are not in the place that we have planned for ourselves. However, in every circumstance, the Lord our God is working to accomplish something greater, even if we do not know what that greater end purpose may be.
Renewing the Heart 