Is it okay to cling to hope found in the Bible, even if the text was from so long ago and originally written to someone else?
Scripture was written at a particular time, often referencing specific events, some that had occurred already, some yet to come. It has context.
That’s all true.
“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. Then you will call upon me and come and pray to me, and I will listen to you. You will seek me and find me when you seek me with all your heart.” – Jeremiah 29:11-13
“But that was then. God wasn’t speaking about us,” or so I’m told. Yet my soul cringes every time I hear, “It doesn’t mean what you think it means.” Inconceivable!
In context, God was speaking to those who had been exiled from Israel to Babylon. We don’t live in the same time period or in the same location. None of us were there.
But does that mean He only planned for the Jews, and specifically only for those who were there at that time?
Because “those truths don’t apply to us.”
But if they don’t, why are we even here?
Aren’t we supposed to read that (and 1000 other passages) and get some semblance of comfort or confirmation that He might care about us too? To believe the Creator of the world has a plan for His entire creation? To know that if we call on Him, pray to Him and seek Him with everything in us, He listens?
I sure hope He cares for modern and future Gentiles that He has adopted into His family, as well as past, future and present Jews. I hope He has plans for all of us, as various groups and as individuals.
Knowing context, I still hold to these truths of Scripture and let them pour into my soul, clinging to them because they are from Him.
Is that such a backwards theology to believe in the God who saved His people before and hope He will again, as if His promises might be bigger than what we sometimes give Him credit for?
#iwanttobelieve