![]() ![]() It was his promise to the Ancient Israelites, the people of the Old Testament, who had recently lost the land they had been promised due to their disobedience. Jeremiah 29:11 is not God’s promise to you. If you can’t answer “Yes” to both of the above questions, then the promise of verse 11 does not apply to you. Has God sentenced you to 70 years of banishment in Babylon?ĭid God ever promise you that you and your people would live in the land of Israel, so long as you followed the commandments he laid out in Exodus, Leviticus and Deuteronomy? Verse 10 takes away the mushy gushy feeling I get that God wrote verse 11 just for me and my life. Now, have you ever seen this verse cross-stitched next to verse 11?! Well of course not, because it ruins everything. Verse 10 says, This is what the Lord says: “When seventy years are completed for Babylon, I will come to you and fulfill my good promise to bring you back to this place. To understand the meaning of a movie, you need to watch the entire thing, then understand each scene and chapter within the context of the rest of the story.ĭoes this mean you need to read the Bible cover to cover to uncover the meaning of Jeremiah 29:11? Not necessarily.ĭoes it mean the Bible is a hieroglyphic mystery riddle that only academic brainiacs can unlock? Thankfully this isn’t the case either.Įven if you’d never picked up a Bible before and you opened it to Jeremiah 29:11, the first thing you should do is read the verses immediately before it and after it. You might walk away thinking Superman is a bad guy or that the world actually gets taken over by aliens. In fact, you are quite likely to get a very opposite meaning of the movie itself. ![]() If you popped in a DVD and randomly watched one chapter in the middle and then turned it off, would you have gathered the meaning of the movie? Or if you watched one scene within one chapter and turned it off? Or course not, on both accounts. And within that big story, it is made up of many smaller stories–all hooking together as one. Jeremiah 29:11 serves as a helpful case study though because it’s such a popular text and also has a fairly simple answer to how to read it correctly. This of course doesn’t only apply to Jeremiah 29:11, it applies to every word of the Bible. And if we get the wrong meaning, we aren’t getting God’s meaning. And isn’t meaning what we’re really after when we call the Bible “God’s word?” If it’s in the wrong context, we are going to get the wrong meaning. The simple answer is: context dictates meaning. Whatever the intended application a person has, taking a verse out of context is never a good idea as it takes God’s word and turns it into man’s word, something that is very dangerous indeed! But the verse can also stand for much more dangerous meanings for some who cling to it as a life verse. Typically people are holding on to it for a sense of hope that God is for them and is in control, two concepts that are biblical, based on other parts of the Bible. Taken out of context, Jeremiah 29:11 is usually pretty harmless. It’s also one of the most taken out of context verses of all time… It’s one of the most memorized and cross-stiched verses of all time! ![]() My wife had it on our fridge for years, written on an index card. It was on a poster on our children’s ministry door at church. I once wore it on a bracelet as a teenager. You’ll find Jeremiah 29:11 in many places. 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. ![]()
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