seeking the welfare of the city

But seek the welfare of the city where I have sent you into exile, and pray to the LORD on its behalf, for in its welfare you will find your welfare.
Jeremiah 29:7

In this command to the Babylonian exiles, God is giving instruction on how His people were to relate to a pagan culture. He did not want them retreating from the culture. That would not have been acceptable. Instead, God encourages them to settle in, live their lives, create households, have children and grandchildren, plant gardens, and make Babylon their home as much as is possible. After all, they would be there for 70 years.

They were to be a people who benefited the culture. They were to be the best residents of Babylon that the city had ever seen. They were to seek its welfare, for as Babylon thrived, so would their families. This then is the opposite of a cultural retreat. This is engagement with the city at all levels possible.

Now I know this is a very specific promise given to the Jews in a narrow point of their history. But I find in its principles thoughts for examining my own relationship with my culture. All my life the fundamentalist/evangelical sub-Christianity from my youth has sternly cautioned me to always retreat from my world. Its voice is always in my head, even today. And from childhood I have done so. My life has been defined no so much by what I was, but by what I wasn't and by what I didn't do. And it made a legalistic hermit of me.

I believe that if Christianity is going to advance it must engage culture with an exilic attitude. It must evangelize the culture by being part of the culture. I must seek the welfare of the city, with the gospel message clearly in hand, knowing and participating in the life of my world in a Christian way.

Yikes!

And Jeremiah the prophet said to the prophet Hananiah, "Listen, Hananiah, the LORD has not sent you, and you have made this people trust in a lie. Therefore thus says the LORD: 'Behold, I will remove you from the face of the earth. This year you shall die, because you have uttered rebellion against the LORD.'"
In that same year, in the seventh month, the prophet Hananiah died.
Jeremiah 28:15-17

The penalty for false prophecy was death. And in this episode God dramatically rendered the sentence upon Hananiah in order to vindicate His message through Jeremiah. Hananiah pulled the wooden yoke off of Jeremiah's neck in disdain and boldly declared in God's name that within two years Babylon would fall and the exiles would be back home. He was denouncing the judgment that God had declared.

God quickly dealt with this prophetic rebellion. Jeremiah reaffirmed God's original message. God declared Hananiah in rebellion as a false prophet. Instead of the captives being released in two years, Hananiah would be dead in less than a year. And that is exactly what happened.

God can handle Himself nicely. The truth will triumph in Him. We need not worry about it. And circumstances will show the sovereign work of God's control. His Word will not fail and no rebellion among men will go unresolved. He will bring it all to the praise of His glory.

God over government

It is I who by my great power and my outstretched arm have made the earth, with the men and animals that are on the earth, and I give it to whomever it seems right to me.
Jeremiah 27:5

God declares His sovereignty over all political systems. These words were spoken as the yoke of Nebuchadnezzar fell hard on the citizens of Judah. And God gave a message for Jeremiah to declare to all the nations around Judah. They would all be brought under Babylonian homogeny. And this was God's direct action. All should submit to what God had decreed and thus live. Any who might fight it would die. The surrender was to God, not just the Babylonian army.

Every king that rules, every president that leads, every parliament or legislature that enacts law, or every governing power that exists on earth does so at the command of God. There is no human government on earth that is independent of God's sovereign hand. God owns the earth and its inhabitants. Human governments come in many forms and flavors. Yet even the most restrictive dictators among us only governs under God's allowance. And He will use even them. That is the lesson that Nebuchadnezzar teaches us.

Invading armies, cruel suppression, unfair laws, and sinful injustices magnified by powerful governments do not take God by surprise. In the case of Babylon's invasion of Israel, we are given direct revelation from God through His prophets detailing how His hand was in it. In cases where we cannot know these particulars today, we can however still know that God gives the earth to "whomever it seems right". And by faith, we can trust God more than any feeble government that arises among men.

protection

And when Jeremiah had finished speaking all that the LORD had commanded him to speak to all the people, then the priests and the prophets and all the people laid hold of him, saying, "You shall die!"
Jeremiah 26:8

Rejection is never really the response any servant of The Lord looks for when giving God's Word to people. But it was what came again to Jeremiah here at the halfway point of the book. And this is worse than the first round of persecution he suffered at the hands of the leaders. This time the entire nation from leaders, to prophets, to common people wanted him dead.

This is no idle threat. The text goes on to tell the stories of two recent prophets killed for prophesying the fall of Jerusalem. The people want Jeremiah to join this club of martyred prophets. And they want it immediately. This is a serious threat and shows just how far the nation had come in rejecting God. No true message from God would be welcomed by them with repentance.

But God was not finished with His prophet. The circumstances worked where a leader protected Jeremiah. No harm came to him despite the serious threats (Jeremiah 26:24). The chapter ends with Jeremiah kept safe by the sovereign hand of God in one sympathetic man. The Lord will honor His Word and protect His servants while His Word goes forth. And even when a messenger dies, in God's wisdom, the message goes on and cannot be silenced.

persistence

For twenty-three years, from the thirteenth year of Josiah the son of Amon, king of Judah, to this day, the word of the LORD has come to me, and I have spoken persistently to you, but you have not listened. You have neither listened nor inclined your ears to hear, although the LORD persistently sent to you all his servants the prophets...
Jeremiah 25:3-4

Persistence can be a good thing
when good people
obey the good words
of a good God
and blessings come from heaven

Persistence can be a bad thing
when stubbornly sinful people
resist God's Word
and turn from Him
and find justice falling from His hand

The difference in persistence
is the character
of a human heart
and its submission to God
the Creator, Savior, and Rewarder of those who diligently seek Him

accepting exile today

I will give them a heart to know that I am the LORD, and they shall be my people and I will be their God, for they shall return to me with their whole heart.
Jeremiah 24:7

These were the words that God spoke to the people as they were taken captive to Babylon. This event changed the way in which the Jews approached God. It was a disciplinary measure but the outcome was not sheer punitive retribution. God intended to still be in covenant with His people even as they lived in exile. The same terms that God had always had with Abraham's seed (they shall be my people; I will be their God) still existed as they relocated in misery to Babylon. God knew that the Babylonian captivity would be the cultural event that would recapture the hearts of exiled Israel. And His grace would flow to them during this time.

This exilic experience remade Israel. It purged them of their idolatries. It humbled them. It brought them together in tight, personal circles to worship God. The synagogue (assembly) grew out of the exile. The exile gave them a vision again... a vision that got them through the suffering they endured. It made God their biggest thought and brought worship to their hearts again. In all that happened, the exile proved to be spiritually fruitful for the nation.

Let us not forget that the exilic motif was adopted by the apostles to help the church survive in a hostile human culture. Peter called us dispersed exiles (1 Peter 1:1; 17). The early church grew by scattering (Acts 8:4). It is a metaphor for ministry. And the church's circumstances in that regard have not changed. We do not live in "christendom". We live in a foreign land as exiles and sojourners. But we work toward a greater vision. We live, loving and worshiping a God Who is saving this culture that we are moving through. And He is doing it one life at a time, using us, the strangers here, to do it!

God of hope

"Behold, the days are coming, declares the LORD, when I will raise up for David a righteous Branch, and he shall reign as king and deal wisely, and shall execute justice and righteousness in the land. In his days Judah will be saved, and Israel will dwell securely. And this is the name by which he will be called: 'The LORD is our righteousness.'"
Jeremiah 23:5-6

A promise of restoration comes to the Jews in their difficult days. Even though the fall of Jerusalem is in process (the exile starts just one chapter away in Jeremiah 24), God is making secure promises to bring His people back one day from exile (Jeremiah 23:7-8) and restore them. And a bright future kingdom shines large in these prophecies. Aspects of it have yet to be realized. And there are clear Messianic prophecies in the picture of return and restoration.

God gives hope, even in the deepest hardships. This is the message of the promise of bringing the nation back to the land and back into covenant with Him. Even when humans must bear the consequences of our sin, God will use that time to reshape us, call us to Him, and restore His people again.

Lord,
I am thankful for the hope that You give. I will cling to it in my most difficult times. I know that my own sins come between us and I also know that there is forgiveness in You. And in Your Son is found all that I need. You are all that I hope for!
Amen