“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. 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. (Jeremiah 29:10-14 ESV)
Many believers cling to the promise of verse 11 - that God has plans for us, so we can have hope. Specifically this promise was made to the people of Jerusalem and Judea as they were being taken into exile in Babylon. It was not general or individual. But in it we do find applicable hope, because it is based upon the character of God, and He does give us reason for hope. Rather than cling to it as one's personal life verse, however, it would be more applicable to see it as a promise to His people corporately. He has plans for us. When we turn away and get off track He will discipline us and allow us to go through the wringer. When we come together and pray, He will here. God wants us to be people of hope - not that nothing bad will ever happen to us, but that He will never turn His back on His people calling out to Him in prayer together.
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