FHBC Sermon Notes

During a time of graduations we reflect on a time of endings and beginnings, of transitions and plans. This can be scary as well. In Christ though, we can rejoice, for God is in control, and his plans... well let's see.
Jim came as a freshman to FSU, and it was a fearful experience.  There was a joy in finishing high school, but it was a beginning far from home, with no friends or family.  But a friend at that time gave him this verse to memorize.

For I know the plans I have for you, declares the Lord, plans for welfare [2] and not for evil, to give you a future and a hope
null (ESV)

This verse was comforting, but also frustrating, because he did not see all that goodness he thought was promised in this verse. Like so many of us who read this verse, he had stumbled into an understanding of this verse that is all to common. Why am I experiencing so much less that what this verse seems to promise? Is God powerless, or is he just not loving?  Am I excluded from this?

But this verse is absolutely true.  To understand it we must look at the whole context of the verse.  From this we will realize God's plans do not meet our expectations.  He plans are not our plans, which are so often just about us, about self. God's plans are so much more.  His plans are not just for the here and now, for this moment. It is for our good, but for a good so much greater than we can imagine.

1. God's plans for you often come in the context of suffering. (29:1-3)
If you read just verse 11, it sounds pretty good, but understand what has been happening in these story.  The people had disobeyed God, doing many wicked things.  In turned God warned then, and ultimately they were judged, carried off by a foreign power, the Babylonian empire, as slaves, without hope, without a future. God isn't letting go of his children.  Suffering is not a detour on the road of life, it is the main highway.  God is leading us through, for our good, for his glory. 

2. God's plans for you primarily focus on the process of refining. (29:4-10)
God is less concerned about our circumstances that our character.  Why does God not just take away the outward concerns?  It is because his concern is our inward heart.  This hope is not just a tickling of the ears like we so often hear.  Jeremiah is making it clear that the are going to be there a while. Pray for your enemies he says. The false prophets are promising relief from the immediate circumstances, but God has Jeremiah declare that it was not to be so.  Seventy years!  A generation, two in fact, would be lost in this place.  But God was at work.  His love abounded in a way much deeper that temporary relief. He wants our hearts to be transformed, "perfect and complete, lacking in nothing", as James says in James 2:1-4.

What is the value of this work?  It is worth more than gold, more than financial "security" and wealth.  God's crowning glory is his Son, hung on a cross, raised from the grave, and it is his desire to conform us to that image.

Here is a pretty awesome Spirit moment: This morning on the way to church I was listening to this -
http://www.russellmoore.com/2013/04/26/false-teachers-by-shai-linne/


3. God's plan for us lead us to a deeper relationship with God. (29:11-14)
God is saying here that the purpose of this suffering, of this difficulty, is to lead us back to God, to rely on Him!  "Seek me!", he says, for in Him we will find our best.  The best in life is God himself.  Yet in our nature we want to run from him, "prone to wander", as the hymn says.  But God sent His Son, running towards us.  He pursued us and grabbed us, to say, "I love you, and I will not let you go..."  In this state in which we have been lost, for all eternity, God has us. 

How is this to be, we must turn, we must repent, we must seek.  He must be more than just a savior, who saves us from temporary pain, but Lord and Master, who loves us and cares for us in his love, for all of time, for eternity.  Eternal Life. Is a gift, received by those who turn to his shining face.

And so, his plans may not be the "perfect" job, or the "perfect" family life, in this moment, but let us pray that we all may graduate this day to live in God's eternal plan for our lives. Amen!