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A Future and A Hope


Jeremiah 29:11 – “For I know the thoughts that I think toward you, says the Lord, thoughts of peace and not of evil, to give you a future and a hope.”

            These words are found on plaques, in frames, and on calendars.  We post them in our homes and offices. Many read these words during difficult seasons for comfort and hope. This is a powerful promise from the Lord to the believer.  We learn in James 1:17, “Every good gift and every perfect gift is from above, and comes down from the Father of lights, with whom there is no variation or shadow of turning.”  God knows our future.  He has already been in our tomorrow.  Revelation 1:8 reads, “I am the Alpha and the Omega, the Beginning and the End,” says the Lord, “who is and who was and who is to come, the Almighty.”

            There are many promises in the Scriptures to help us in our journey of faith.  The Apostle Peter penned these encouraging words in 2 Peter 1:4, “by which have been given to us exceedingly great and precious promises, that through these you may be partakers of the divine nature, having escaped the corruption that is in the world through lust.”

There are both conditional and unconditional promises in the Bible.  Jeremiah 29:11 promises the Lord will give us “a future and a hope.”  How do we enter into this beautiful promise?  The answer is found in Jeremiah 29:12-13, “Then you will call upon Me and go and pray to Me, and I will listen to you. And you will seek Me and find Me, when you search for Me with all your heart.” 

God desires a people who will pray, seek for Him, and search for Him with their whole heart.  It was said of Caleb in Joshua 14:14, “Hebron therefore became the inheritance of Caleb the son of Jephunneh the Kenizzite to this day, because he wholly followed the Lord God of Israel.”  The New Living Translation says, “he wholeheartedly followed the Lord.”  To realize God’s plans for our lives we must put Him first and seek Him with our whole heart.

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