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Promises from God
Jeremiah 29:11, 2 Corinthians 5:21
“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.” (Jeremiah 29:11)
A few years ago, I had a pastor’s conference that was in Denver, Colorado. Now, at the time, I was serving a church in Nebraska. So to get to this conference, I would have to drive 14 hours each way. 28 plus hours of driving for a 48 hour conference. So I decided the reasonable thing to do, and the more affordable thing to do would be to fly. So I booked a flight, so I would land in Denver about 6 p.m., have time to kind of settle in, have time to visit with some friends in the area. The conference started very early the next morning, so I wanted to get a good night of rest.
So I arrive at the airport and as I sit there at the gate, I get a notification on my phone. I pull it out. 30 minute delay. No big deal. 30 minutes is not the end of the world. But then I got another notification and another notification and another notification until I ended up landing in Denver about 3 a.m.. As you can imagine, I was not in a fantastic mood. I called an Uber, a taxi cab, it showed up at about 3:30 in the morning, and I get in the car with all my luggage, exhausted and frustrated.
The lady who’s driving the Uber is polite and she asks the reasonable question, what brings you into town? And so I tell her, well, I’m a pastor and I’m here for a pastor’s conference. She kind of scoffs when I say that, and she says, “you know what? I could write a book on religion.” And the way she said it would have not been a very flattering book on religion. She asked me, what is it that your church even teaches about the Bible?
So here I am, exhausted, 3:45 in the morning at this point. I look at the app up on her phone I see I have four minutes. I have four minutes to tell her what we as a church believe. So I give her what’s called the Great Exchange. I talk about how in 2 Corinthians 5 it tells us that
God made him who had no sin to be sin for us, so that in him we might become the righteousness of God. (2 Corinthians 5:21)
When God looks at us, he sees righteousness. So through Christ, through that sacrifice, salvation is ours. And it seemed to sink in a little bit as I said that. And soon after speaking, she dropped me off at my hotel. And as I was lying in bed that night, I couldn’t help but to marvel at God and to marvel at the plans that he has, the places that he puts us. When I was sitting late in the night at an airport in Omaha, getting more and more frustrated as she was driving a taxi cab at three in the morning. God saw to it that we came together and that she had an opportunity to hear about Jesus. Maybe it’s sunk in, maybe it didn’t. But God gave me an opportunity to plant the seed.
God promises a lot of things. He promises to give us hope and a future. When we’re going through difficult times, whether they’re minor frustrations like an airport and a delay or major frustrations, major things in life, we can remember that. Now, when God tells us that he’s going to prosper us and give us a future, it’s not necessarily money and it’s not necessarily a long life. It’s something better. It is a closer relationship with him. It is a closer relationship with him here on Earth and a closer relationship with him in heaven.
So when we find ourselves growing frustrated with God, saying, God, why are all of these things, these inconveniences, these difficulties, why are these happening? We can know that they’re not just random, but rather God is using those to strengthen us, to give us opportunity to share His Word and give us opportunity to grow in our faith with him. Amen.
