Sermon: God Has Great Plans For You
Scripture Lesson - Jeremiah 29:8-14 “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. Then you will call upon Me and go and pray to Me, and I will listen to you. And you will seek Me and find Me, when you search for Me with all your heart. I will be found by you, says the LORD, and I will bring you back from your captivity; I will gather you from all the nations and from all the places where I have driven you, says the LORD, and I will bring you to the place from which I cause you to be carried away captive.”
Introduction: What is God's plan for you? The Bible tells us that God desires us to have an abundant life filled with joy and peace. He also wants us to lead lives of faithfulness, obedience, and integrity. In other words, He desires us to live according to His will and purpose. He wants us to seek Him daily and trust in Him completely. When our plans are upended, dreams are derailed, life can be scary and uncertain. How good it is to hear the Lord's still got a plan - a good plan to prosper us, provide hope and point us to the future he has prepared for us.
Today, It may feel like all our plans are constantly changing. Many things seem so confusing. I thought by now the pandemic would be over, church attendance would have improved, the economy would be more stable, and the wars would have ended, but not so. Many people are challenged by mental and emotional stress, physical illness, persistent grief and pain with no relief in sight. Sometimes, we all wonder, Does God have a plan? Does God plan include me? What will happen during the election? I can only imagine how those with school-aged children are navigating these times. How often have their plans changed with the soaring cost of childcare? Suddenly many find themselves searching for childcare providers when you thought you had it all figured out. Some are now working from home, hours at work have been reduced and maybe you’re wondering if you’ll have a job in the coming months. Vacations and doctor’s appointments have been rescheduled or cancelled. Maybe you find yourself facing a crisis and you can’t help but wonder, “What’s next?” and maybe even, “Where is the Lord in all of this? Lord, what’s your plan?”
If you find yourself with those thoughts and feelings, you are certainly not alone. The words of our text were written to people who may have felt that way. In Jeremiah 29:11, “’For I know the plans I have for you,’ declares the Lord, ‘Plans to prosper you and not to harm you, plans to give you hope and a future’”
While those words might be familiar to you, do you know when and to whom they were written? This is part of a letter that the Lord had the prophet Jeremiah write around the year 600 BC to a group of Jews who were now living in Babylon, hundreds of miles to the east of Jerusalem. These Jews living in Babylon were not living there by choice. They were exiles. The Babylonian Captivity was a period of time when the Jewish people were exiled in Babylon from their home in Israel. The King of Judah had refused to pay taxes to Babylon for three years. As a result, Jerusalem was captured by the Babylonians, who declared war on Judah. The Babylonians had come and ripped them away from their families and friends, forced them to leave their jobs and their homes, and to live in a strange culture, carry them into world that was completely new and foreign to them. This was certainly not anything that any one of those Jews living in Babylon had planned or wanted! You can imagine how often these exiles must have wondered, “What’s next? Has the Lord forgotten about us? Lord, do you even have a plan for us any longer?”
Well, in the previous verses the Lord told these exiles in Babylon to get comfortable in their new surroundings, because they were going to be there for the next 70 years. Yet the Lord also assured them that what they were going to make it through because this was a part of his plan for them. This plan is not designed to hurt or harm them, it is a plan with a purpose. What was that purpose? The Lord planned to prosper them, to give them hope and leave them to a bright future.
Do you feel like those exiles? I certainly have at times in my life. My world today is vastly different than the world I lived in when I was 40 and in great health. Maybe your world has changed too. A loved one is sick or maybe even passed away; raising children has become more difficult or peer pressure has changed. How many of our plans have been overturned? How many people’s dreams have been derailed? How many people are feeling scared and lonely, suddenly separated from loved ones and family members? The Lord comes to you this day and says, “I want you to know that I have a plan for you…plans to prosper you and not to harm you, plans to give you hope and a future.”
1. The Lord always has a purpose for what we are going through. “Then you will call upon Me and go and pray to Me, and I will listen to you. And you will seek Me and find Me, when you search for Me with all your heart. I will be found by you, says the LORD…”
God’s plan is always to draw us closer to himself. Notice He says you will call me and seek me. We tend to forget God until a crisis come. C. S. Lewis said, “God whispers to us in our pleasures, speaks in our conscience, but shouts in our pains; it is His megaphone to rouse a deaf world.”
I’ve heard a lot of people saying, “Don’t worry, we’ll get through this.” I appreciate their optimism and when it comes from a Christian, I am grateful for their encouragement to trust God’s promise that he will be with us and bring us through. But one of the things that I think we need to be careful of, is just settling for getting through it. I think the bigger question is to ask is, “What is the Lord trying to Teach us through this? What does God want us to learn from this?” Remember, the purpose of God’s plan is to prosper us. He wants us to become stronger, wiser and better. Those Jews were living in Babylon. The reason that they were there was because of their spiritual indifference towards the Lord. Many of God’s chosen people had become no different than their unbelieving neighbors. They ran after the gods of their friends. They bowed to the gods of selfishness and greed, injustice and violence, sexual sin and drunkenness. For the most part, they had decided to do what They wanted to do, instead of trusting the Lord and his goodness. And as their lives went along smoothly, they thought that they did not really need the Lord. The Lord sent prophet after prophet, calling people to repent of their sin, to return to the Lord and to receive the forgiveness of their sins that he offered through the promised Savior, but they refused. It’s hard to hear God when things are going great!
Finally, the Lord seemed to step back and allowed something drastic, something painful that he hoped would get their attention and bring them back to him. He allowed them to be carried off into exile, hoping that this would lead them to recognize the weakness of the idols they relied upon, that they would repent of the sins they had committed, and return to him so that they would have the hope and the future he wanted them to have.
There are at least four causes of our suffering in the world. Satan is the cause of some suffering. The Book of Job shows Satan's role in some human suffering, as he pled with God for the opportunity bring pain to Job. But Satan's rare appearances in Scripture give way to other, more significant causes of human suffering.
Our Personal Sin causes some suffering. Much of what befalls us we bring upon ourselves through our own sin or weakness. King Saul lived much of his reign in anguish after his disobedience left him outside of God's plans. (1 Samuel 15:24–28)
The Sins of Others causes some suffering. We often suffer the consequences of someone else's sin. Daniel was exiled to Babylon not because of something he did, but because the sins of his forefathers led God to decide that exile was in order. Finally, our world is broken, wars occur, accidents happen, and storms arise. Many things happen in this world because of the brokenness that comes with the presence of sin. All is not as it should be. Hurricanes wreak destruction. Fires decimate homes. Sin has broken our world. But know, the Lord always has a purpose for what we are going through. 1 Corinthians 10:13 “There hath no temptation taken you but such as is common to man: but God is faithful, who will not suffer you to be tempted above that ye are able;”
2. Disruptions are Sometimes a Part of God’s Plan. The text says, “and I will bring you back from your captivity; I will gather you from all the nations and from all the places where I have driven you, says the LORD, and I will bring you to the place from which I cause you to be carried away captive.”
When all else fail, God allowed a disruption. His people were locked away intentionally. If a person or animal is released from somewhere where they have been locked up or looked after, they are set free or allowed to return to a prepared place. The Lord has plans for prospering us and our world today. After years of unrest and chaos, pandemics and wars moving across the world, all hope is not loss. I remember thinking to myself, “I can’t believe what I’m seeing. Are they really shutting down airports and museums and sporting events and playing in empty arenas and stadiums?” Is Russia really invading Ukraine? Is Hamas really attacking Israel? Is Hezbollah really getting involved? Is President Biden Really leaving the race? And I think that like a lot of people I thought, that would never happen. Where did such confidence come from? A strong stock market and economy; full grocery stores; number 1 world class medical technology? How humbling these situations have been! No one could imagine a pandemic could bring the world as we know it to a standstill.
Could it be that the Lord is calling us to take a look at what we are relying on for security and strength? As the Psalmist would ask and then answer, “I will lift up mine eyes unto the hills, from whence cometh my help. My help cometh from the Lord, which made heaven and earth.” (Psalm 121:1-2). How often has the Lord’s powerful hand been pushed away because we thought we did not need his help or his support? It is when we see our weaknesses, when our plans are derailed, that we quickly realize that any hope and any future that relies on us is at best unstable and always temporary.
While people are quick to ask at times like these, “Where is the Lord?” maybe the better question to ask, “Where have we been? What have we been doing?” And what do we see? Like those exiles in Babylon, we too often realize that we also have run after the idols of the world, blending in with the world around us instead of being the light in this dark world. That we have been seduced by the gods of greed and selfishness, sex and entertainment – gods that have led us into sin. “Christian” becomes a label that we claim when convenient but don’t really know what the Bible says or allow it to affect our decisions or the lives that we choose to live. Yes, the Lord uses these times to call us to prayer, to call us to repentance, to forsake our sin and turn to the Lord, and what is the Lord saying to you today?
3. God’s Plan Will Conclude with Restoration. “I know the plans I have for you… and I want you to be sure that my plan includes you and end in restoration. “...and I will bring you to the place from which I cause you to be carried away captive.” You are called His Disciples, His living epistles, salt and light of the world, and so much more!
You see, the Lord’s plan has always included you, believers will spend eternity with him, not in this world of sickness and fear and sadness, but an eternity in perfection, peace and safety with him. God’s plan does not rely on you and me alone, but instead it relied solely on him sending His Son Jesus to come into this world to live the perfect life that life with God requires. God’s plan for you included Jesus going to the cross there to suffer and die for punishment that our sins deserved, so that we would never have to. God’s plan for you included Jesus rising from the dead to give us hope that we stand at peace with God through the forgiveness of our sins, and future that assures us that we are ready for heaven.
The Lord has a purpose for what he is allowing us to go through, a plan that is meant to prosper us, to teach us, to lead us back to the Lord that we might gain an even greater appreciation of the richness of our God’s grace and mercy, the power of his love and faithfulness. A plan that also helps to open up our eyes to the many blessings that we take for granted. Yes, we may have some trials and trouble, but we also have one another. It gives me great appreciation just being able to gather with my fellow Christians each week around our Savior’s gospel message of love and forgiveness. But I am also reminded that a church is much more than a building. Church is a body of believers, a people who the Holy Spirit has brought just like me to trust in Jesus as their Savior. On Sunday morning, every handshake, every hug reminds me that I am not alone. God has given us each other – fellow Christians. Our hope and our future are solid and secure because they are built upon a God that no trouble of this present world can stop from doing what he has promised.
Yes, our plans may have changed, but the Lord’s plan has not. His plans are still to prosper us, to give us hope and a future. May the Lord be with us and bless us as his plans are carried out in our lives, not just getting us through this, but helping His believing children to learn from it, that we might come out of it more prosperous, more appreciative, stronger and more focused in our faith in the Lord whose plans are always good ones.
