Word of Salvation – Vol.51 No.18 – May 2007

 

Pray for the City

A Sermon by Rev John Haverland

on Jeremiah 29:1-14

Scripture Readings:  2 Kings 24:8-17; 1 Timothy 2

Theme: The exiled people of Israel were called to settle down in Babylon and seek the well-being of that city and trust that God would bring them home.

Purpose: As a pilgrim people Christians are to seek the good of the cities we are in, trusting that one day we will receive a heavenly city.

 

Brothers and Sisters in Christ.

Most of us have had the experience of moving at some time in our lives. Sometimes that is exciting and a great adventure; but it can also be very difficult and it always involves a huge upheaval in our lives.

When you move, it is important to make an effort to settle down in your new home. You may have moved unwillingly; you may have moved because of your husband’s job when you didn’t really want to; or you may have moved because your parents decided the family was going to shift. Even if your move was not your choice, you have to make the best of it. If you keep looking back to the place from which you came you will make yourself miserable. If you keep making unfavourable comparisons between your new home and your old home, you will be unhappy.

When you move you should not look backwards, but forwards. You need to get involved in your new situation and get to know the people and throw yourself into everything there is to do.

This was Jeremiah’s advice to the people of Judah who had moved to Babylon. He addressed the exiles of Judah in the second of what would be three deportations. The first had occurred in 605 BC. This second one took place in 597 BC and it had included the king and Ezekiel and all the others mentioned in verse 2.

They had travelled a long way – over a 1000 kilometres on foot. The journey would have taken three months. They had been forced to move – it was not their choice. They had been taken away as exiles by the Babylonian army into a foreign land. They had been dislocated and were far away from family members and friends. They were in a strange place with unfamiliar customs and unusual food and a different climate. They longed for home – for Jerusalem and the temple and the sacrifices. Their feelings are reflected in the words of Psalm 137, one of the psalms of the exile.

Then they received this letter from Jeremiah, carried by two men who were sympathetic to the prophet and who were on a diplomatic mission to King Nebuchadnezzar.

In these days of email we don’t receive as much postal mail as we used to, but if you are away from home you are always glad to receive mail. Here was a letter from home – from the prophet of the Lord. But it was not the sort of letter they wanted to receive and not the news they wanted to read.

In it the Lord explained that he had carried them into exile (vs 4). This had not happened because the Babylonians were stronger or because the Jewish army had lost their nerve. This was God’s doing; it was his action; he was behind it all. This was their punishment for Judah’s ongoing unrepentant sin. The Lord had done this.

The false prophets in Jerusalem and in Babylon told the exiles that they would soon be home again. At that time there was a lot of unrest in the Babylonian empire. Some of the Jews were involved in these internal troubles and at least two were executed as a result (29:21 f).

Some believed that the empire was about to collapse and that they would soon be going home. The false prophets in exile encouraged this idea and promised them they would be out of there within two years (Jer 28:3f). “Don’t build or buy a house because you’ll soon be home. Just rent in the meantime because before you know it you’ll be back in Jerusalem!” That was their promise.

Jeremiah, however, told them the opposite. He passed on GOD’S INSTRUCTION. They had to settle down because they were going to be there for a long time. This was their new home. Build houses, he wrote. You are not camping here temporarily. Make a permanent home. “Plant gardens and eat what they produce.” Planting a garden is a sign of permanence. You go to the trouble of setting it up and you know it is going to take time for everything to grow.

“Marry and have sons and daughters.” Some of the young couples may have considered putting off their wedding so they could marry in Jerusalem, in their familiar surroundings. But Jeremiah urged them to settle into the normal routines of living and family life. “Increase in number.” They were to do what they did when Israel was in Egypt 1000 years before this.

The apostle Paul had to give the same advice to believers in the early church at times. Some of the believers in Thessalonica were under the mistaken idea that the Lord would return at any time and so they had quit their jobs and were hanging around waiting for him. Paul told them to get back to work. No one knows when the Lord will return. It could be tomorrow or it could be another 1000 years.

This is true for us today. Some today think the return of the Lord is just around the corner. But no one knows when he will come. So you have to keep busy. Work and plan for the long-term. We have to do that as a church with our prayers and plans and goals and projects. We need to plan for the next 10, 20, 50 years. We need to think ahead about the spiritual well-being of our children and grandchildren.

The people of Judah had to settle down. They also had to seek the prosperity of the city. When they arrived in Babylon they had three choices before them.

They could have done what the Babylonians wanted them to do; that is, to assimilate into the culture – to become Babylonians. This was the policy of the empire. This is why Daniel and his three friends were taken to Babylon, along with more of the finest young men of Israel. Nebuchadnezzar wanted them to take on Babylonian names, adopt their customs, eat their food, learn their language and practice their religion. Daniel and his friends refused to do this – they did not want to assimilate like this.

Another alternative was to isolate themselves from that pagan world. To retreat into a ghetto, to withdraw into their synagogues. Many did this and become an isolated sub-group in the empire.

Jeremiah urged them to follow a third alternative – that of mission. “Seek the peace and prosperity of the city” (vs 7). The Lord had always called them to be a light to the nations. But through their history they had ignored that and had not lived up their calling. Now in exile they would have time and opportunity to think and reflect on who they were and what they should do.

They had been taken away from their land and cut off from Jerusalem. Within 10 years the temple would be destroyed. All of this forced them to reconsider their place in the world and to develop a fresh perspective of what God had called them to do. What was their position, their task, their role in the world? The Lord told them to “seek the peace and prosperity” of Babylon. The word translated peace is “shalom”. It referred to the well-being of the city.

This went against the grain. This went against all they had known and lived as a nation up to this point. They prided themselves on being a separate people. They did not want to associate with those “dogs”, the Gentiles! They wanted to live in isolation. But the Lord was preparing them for bigger and better things.

Daniel and his friends caught on to this. They refused to assimilate into the culture; but they didn’t isolate themselves either. Instead they took an active part in the life and government and culture of the empire, seeking to do good, striving to be a witness for God, praying for the king and the nation.

Here is a pattern for us. These same three alternatives lie before us too. You could assimilate into the world. Some Christians do that, to the extent that there is no difference between them and the people of the world. This is a particular danger for Christian young people who may talk like the world, and live like the world, and party like the world, so that you cannot tell them apart from the unbelievers of the world. The Apostle Paul warned us against that when he said, “Do not conform any longer to the pattern of this world”; don’t let the world squeeze you into its mould (Rom 12:2).

Or you could withdraw from society and isolate yourself from it, like the monks in the Middle Ages, hiding in their monasteries; or like the closed brethren do today, shielding themselves in buildings without windows and secure behind high fences and gates. This is a greater danger that you might think. You may be tempted to give up on society, especially as it gets worse. You may are tempted to withdraw, to retreat, to toss it in as a hopeless case. But this is not the answer.

Rather we are called to mission. We are in the world but at the same time not of it. We need to live in it and get involved and seek the good of the people around us, striving to be a Christian witness – a salt and a light. This is your calling – to seek the kingdom of God in your home, in your workplace, in your office or factory, on your farm and in your community, at school and tech and university. Our society needs Christian mothers, lawyers, judges, engineers, businessmen, nurses, doctors, farmers, builders and politicians who are seeking the well-being of this society, who are working for peace and wholeness.

You are to seek the prosperity of this city. Be a kind neighbour, help out in your school, become a volunteer in some community group, donate blood, drive safely, pick up rubbish, show love and compassion to those around you, do good to all men. This is true for us as individuals and as a church. Let’s be the salt and light Jesus calls us to be.

But it is not enough to just do good. We must also pray: “Pray to the Lord for it,” wrote Jeremiah to the exiles. Paul wrote the same thing to Timothy when he urged that “requests, prayers, intercession and thanksgiving be made for everyone – for kings and all in authority so that we may live peaceful and quiet lives in all godliness and holiness” (1 Tim 2:1).

Pray for the Prime Minister, for the Members of Parliament, for our society and nation. Above all, pray that people will come to know Jesus as Lord. Pray for a spiritual transformation in people’s hearts and minds. Pray that men and women would put their trust in Jesus, submit to him as Lord and join his church and kingdom.

This was God’s instruction for the people then, and for us today. We are to settle down in our cities and towns and districts and we are to work for and pray for peace.

After all this instruction the Lord gave them a PROMISE. One commentator describes verses 10-14 as one of the most powerful and intense promises in the Old Testament.

God told the exiles of Israel that the Babylonian empire would last 70 years. That was given as a round figure, but it was very close to the mark. Babylon came to power in 612 BC with the fall of the Assyrian empire and its capital, Nineveh, and it lasted till its own fall before the Medes and the Persians in 539 BC – a total of 73 years. Yes, the Lord had his plans for Babylon.

But he also had his plans for Israel. These are expressed in the beautiful words of verse 11: “For I know the plans I have for you”, declares the Lord. He planned to bring them back to their own land. Two years after the fall of Babylon, King Cyrus issued a decree allowing the exiles from Israel to return home. What seemed impossible for men was possible for God.

Yet that was not automatic. It was conditional on their repentance and their calling on the Lord and seeking him. If they sought the Lord with all their heart then the Lord would fulfil his promises. This is what they did during the exile. It was a time of self-examination, of reflection, of repentance. A time to take stock and to re-examine their lives. The Lord promised that if they would seek him, he would listen to them and they would find him. “I will be found by you” declares the Lord (vs 14).

This is still God’s promise today.

Sometimes the Lord allows us to go through times of trial and difficulty for our learning. He wants to teach us the fruit of the Spirit. He disciplines us for our good so that we might grow in holiness. He wants you to call upon him and to pray. When you do, he will hear your cries for help; he will listen to your prayers; he is aware of your needs; he is available to you; “I will be found by you”, declares the Lord (vs 14).

Jesus promised this: “Ask and it will be given to you; seek and you will find; knock and the door will be opened to you (Mt 7:7). This is the promise of the gospel: If you do not know God and you want to find him and you seek him with all your heart, then you will find him. “I will be found by you”, declares the Lord. God will make himself known to you.

God has plans for us as individuals, in our families, as a church. We don’t know exactly what they are because they belong to the secret or hidden will of God. But we do know what we should be doing: believe in the Lord Jesus, follow him, seek his kingdom, love and serve God, love your neighbour.

If you are obedient to the Lord, then the Lord will fulfil his promises to you – he will give you a place to live with him forever. God does not promise that he will give us the land of Israel – that was for the Jews in the Old Covenant, not for the church in the New Covenant. Rather, the land of Canaan was a symbol of the eternal rest of heaven (Heb 4). The earthly city of Jerusalem was a type of the New Jerusalem that is going to come when Jesus returns.

We are to seek the prosperity of the city in which we live, but we are also looking forward to “the city with foundations whose architect and builder is God” (Heb 11:10). We are longing for a better country – a heavenly one (Heb 11:16).

The Jews longed to return to their land.

We long to go to our home in heaven.

The Jews knew how long that would be – 70 years.

We have no idea how long it will be until Jesus returns and we receive our eternal inheritance. But that doesn’t matter. In the meantime there is much work to do. We have a mission. We have a task to perform. Seek the peace and prosperity of this city.

” ‘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 a 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 you will find me when you seek me with all your heart. I will be found by you’, declares the Lord” (11-14a).

Amen.