Someone once said, “A text without a context is a pretext.” If you don’t take the context of a text (especially an ancient text) into account, you essentially turn it into your own self-written text.
Take Jeremiah 29:11 as an example. I was 17 years old, already months in hospital after an accident, when Old Reverend Dirk read this promise to me. “This is meant for you,” he said, as he read: “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 future and a hope!” In youthful naivety, I erased the “you” and wrote my own name there.
But, “A text without a context is a pretext.”
In reality, Jeremiah 29:11 is a promise that has already been fulfilled. God promises that the people in exile will return to Jerusalem (see v10). Seventy years later, they did return—just as God had promised. The irony is, if you add 70 years to your age, you would probably no longer be alive, only your children. And that is exactly what the promise is about. God would start again. Although the people deserved God’s judgment for their unfaithfulness, God would be merciful.
This promise certainly does not guarantee a smooth life as we might prefer. Bad things happen, even to good people. Yet today, I know I can still write my name there. And so can you. Because so many other texts make similar promises:
- “I am convinced that the sufferings of this present time are not worth comparing with the glory that will be revealed to us” (Rom 8:18).
- “Our light and momentary troubles are achieving for us an eternal glory that far outweighs them all” (2 Cor 4:17).
Sometimes we get so caught up in today that we forget about God’s tomorrow.
PRAYER: Thank You that You also have a hope and a future for me—with You.
ART: Prophet by Marta Maria.
MUSIC: The Wells Cathedral Choir, Somerset, led by Matthew Owens, performs Howard Goodall’s setting of Psalm 23, The Lord is My Shepherd.