2 Timothy 2:8–15 ESV

Remember Jesus Christ, risen from the dead, the offspring of David, as preached in my gospel, for which I am suffering, bound with chains as a criminal. But the word of God is not bound! Therefore I endure everything for the sake of the elect, that they also may obtain the salvation that is in Christ Jesus with eternal glory. The saying is trustworthy, for: If we have died with him, we will also live with him; if we endure, we will also reign with him; if we deny him, he also will deny us; if we are faithless, he remains faithful— for he cannot deny himself. Remind them of these things, and charge them before God not to quarrel about words, which does no good, but only ruins the hearers. Do your best to present yourself to God as one approved, a worker who has no need to be ashamed, rightly handling the word of truth.

Jeremiah 29:1 ESV

These are the words of the letter that Jeremiah the prophet sent from Jerusalem to the surviving elders of the exiles, and to the priests, the prophets, and all the people, whom Nebuchadnezzar had taken into exile from Jerusalem to Babylon.

Jeremiah 29:4–7 ESV

“Thus says the Lord of hosts, the God of Israel, to all the exiles whom I have sent into exile from Jerusalem to Babylon: Build houses and live in them; plant gardens and eat their produce. Take wives and have sons and daughters; take wives for your sons, and give your daughters in marriage, that they may bear sons and daughters; multiply there, and do not decrease. 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.

Grow Where You are Planted

Sometimes, the detour takes you to an unexpectedly beautiful place: I usually take Wednesday off from #crossfit . But when the wod for today showed up online last night, I was bummed I wasn’t signed up for class. It was #kelly which is my all time favorite. I got on the waitlist, but it didn’t clear in time for me to make it to class. So I decided to go for a three mile run on my regular route around the park. But my regular route was closed. I almost packed it up and went home. Instead, I made myself reroute and take the trails. After a couple miles, the beauty of #autumn hit me like a paintball. I had to stop and just take it in. It was totally worth it. The journey is rarely what we expect. So we just have to stop and take in the beauty right here and now where we are regardless of how many obstacles we had to go around to wind up where we are.

Trouble in the World

This church has been here for a long time. I know this isn’t news to anyone. When we did the timeline together a few weeks back, we got a great visual of how much change in the world this congregation has weathered.

Why is it, after surviving the civil war, both World Wars, inventions of cars and airplanes and space shuttles and phones, generations coming and going, that it’s now the church seems to be struggling so much?

There is one huge difference now: we no longer live in Christendom.

Merriam-Webster’s Collegiate Dictionary (Eleventh Edition) Christendom

Chris•ten•dom \ˈkri-sən-dəm\ noun

[Middle English cristendom, from Old English cristendōm, from cristen] before 12th century

1: CHRISTIANITY 1

2: the part of the world in which Christianity prevails

Concise Oxford English Dictionary Christendom

Christendom

■ noun literary the worldwide body or society of Christians.

Christendom is when Christianity is assumed to be the practice for everyone. And I say “practice” purposefully. There are many people out there who self-identify as Christian, but are really only Christian by family affiliation or are the “spiritual but not religious” type. Practice means that people are engaging in a local community and living out their beliefs together.

It’s not necessarily a bad thing that Christendom is over in our country. Christendom has, historically, caused the church to become corrupt and/or lazy when it’s just assumed that everyone is going to go to church.

When the majority of the people around us aren’t actually practicing Christians, we have to be more creative and faithful in the ways we interact with the community around us. When it’s not just assumed that everyone goes to church, we can be confident that those who are here want to be here. It’s actually a pretty exciting time to be church because we get to be on the ground floor of the new thing that God is creating out of the ashes of the past.

But it’s also a hard, confusing, and sometimes sad time to be church. We’re in a new place - uncharted territory - trying to keep our way of life alive in a strange new world.

Trouble in the Text

This is not a new feeling, for a community to be in exile. In our passage from Jeremiah, we see the Judean people living in Babylon as refugees. They had been forced from their homes and were pining for the way things used to be.

When I was in Palestine, we went to a refugee camp and at the entrance to the camp was a giant key. We asked what it meant and were told it was a symbol representing the desire to return to their homes. Many homes have been destroyed in war or claimed by occupiers as their own, but the owners of the homes still carry keys to the houses around their necks or keep them in a prominent place as a reminder to keep hope alive that one day they might be able to return home.

There is a haunting song from Godspell

Much like Palestinian refugees holding on to long-unusable house keys, our exiles in today’s scripture are hoping to hear from Jeremiah a word from God that tells them when they will be able to go home. But that is not what Jeremiah brings them. Jeremiah tells them to put down roots, get used to it, you’re going to be here a while.

Feasting on the Word: Preaching the Revised Common Lectionary: Year C, Volume 4 Pastoral Perspective

When Jeremiah prophesied these words, the people of Judah had been forced to leave their homes in Jerusalem and become refugees in Babylon. They were moving from traditions to change and from the familiar to the new. Many longed for their former life. They wept by the rivers of Babylon, unable to sing or play their harps. They reflected,

By the rivers of Babylon—

there we sat down and there we wept

when we remembered Zion.

On the willows there

we hung up our harps.

For there our captors

asked us for songs,

and our tormentors asked for mirth, saying,

“Sing us one of the songs of Zion!”

How could we sing the LORD’s song

in a foreign land?

That must have felt like quite a depressing word at first. But Jeremiah is not being morose here. He’s issuing the people an important challenge: when you are stuck in a place you don’t want to be, you can still find God there.

Feasting on the Word: Preaching the Revised Common Lectionary: Year C, Volume 4 Pastoral Perspective

Yes, we will miss much of the past, but whining and pining about it will not make it reappear. Instead, Jeremiah challenges the Jews in captivity, and us, to embrace the place where God has us and find ways to be faithful in our living, so that others might inquire about our inspiration, our resolve, and our trust, and thereby be drawn into relationship with God.

Feasting on the Word: Preaching the Revised Common Lectionary: Year C, Volume 4 Exegetical Perspective

God has promised that they will be returned to their land, so sit back and trust the promise.

“For in its welfare, you will find your welfare.”

“For in its welfare, you will find your welfare.”

Feasting on the Word: Preaching the Revised Common Lectionary: Year C, Volume 4 Theological Perspective

No “quick fix” is appropriate, according to Jeremiah. The exiles’ creative flourishing is possible only if they reconcile themselves to their long-term circumstances. Even though they despise their plight, their future depends on their acceptance of it.

“For in its welfare, you will find your welfare.” Yeah, you can’t “go home” but you can do what you did at home, just in a new place. And by doing what you did at home in that new place, everyone will prosper.

If they are to just sit around sad and nostalgic all the time, nobody is helped. But if they live and grow and put down roots wherever God placed them, everyone will benefit!

How do we benefit the community around us, even if it’s way different than it used to be? We celebrate. We live into where we are - where God placed us.

You cannot control the changing culture around us. Man churches have tried through the years and it never succeeds. Digging in our heels against the pull just tears our shoes. The more we try to do that, the more we demand that culture change to make us comfortable, the more harm we do to ourselves and to those around us. We cannot control the world around us. We can only control our attitudes toward and behaviors in spite of the change around us.

Note that this is about attitudes and behaviors. Attitude change is the first step, but it has to be followed up by action. Some of us are ok changing our attitude, but have no idea how to change the ways we are acting out our calling. Some of us are willing to grit our teeth and go along with a new way of doing, but our attitude deep down is still one of pining for the old ways and refusing to embrace new ones.

And remember that we may not always see the fruit from our perseverance while in exile. Abraham was promised by God to be the father of multitudes, and yet Abraham never lived to see his descendants grow and prosper. Likewise, Jeremiah tells the exiles that they will even have grandchildren born into exile. They may never see the day when they are brought out of exile, so live today. Own the moment you are in and be faithful in it.

Great place for an illustration here.

Feasting on the Word: Preaching the Revised Common Lectionary: Year C, Volume 4 Pastoral Perspective

Shockingly, this prophet was telling those who moped that God says, “Your old life is dead. Your new life is to be found in Babylon. Deal with it. Settle down. Adjust!” It is a seemingly harsh and provocative message to all who face the uncertainties and consequences of unintended change.

Feasting on the Word: Preaching the Revised Common Lectionary: Year C, Volume 4 Exegetical Perspective

God has promised that they will be returned to their land, so sit back and trust the promise.

Abraham was promised by God to be the father of multitudes, and yet Abraham never lived to see his descendants grow and prosper. Likewise, Jeremiah tells the exiles that they will even have grandchildren born into exile. They may never see the day when they are brought out of exile, so live today. Own the moment you are in and be faithful in it.

Feasting on the Word: Preaching the Revised Common Lectionary: Year C, Volume 4 Exegetical Perspective

Remarkably, Jeremiah’s letter is concerned not only with the life of the exiles; it also addresses the well-being of the “enemies” among whom they live (v. 7). The exiles are to “seek the welfare [shalom] of the city” in which they now live (see Prov. 25:21). Indeed, the word shalom is used three times in verse 7 (and for the exiles in v. 11). This repeated language has reference to well-being in every walk of life.

Hope in the World

This isn’t just about the wellbeing of the church. The future of this congregation isn’t the only thing at stake here. The life of this faith community isn’t all that’s at stake. The wellbeing of all those we come into contact with is at stake! Jeremiah says to seek the Shalom of your city of exile - not just of yourself in the exile.

Sometimes, you wind up in an unexpectedly beautiful place that you just have to embrace. I usually take Wednesday off from the gym, but this week, when the workout for Wednesday showed up online the night before, I was bummed I wasn’t signed up for class. It was my all time favorite workout - it’s all running, box jumps and wall ball shots. So I tried to sign up for class the next day and got on the waitlist. To my dismay, I didn’t ever get off the waitlist. So, disappointed by that, but still wanting to get some sort of workout in, I decided to go for a three mile run on my regular route around Riverview park.

I usually take Wednesday off from the gym, but this week, when the workout for Wednesday showed up online the night before, I was bummed I wasn’t signed up for class. It was my all time favorite workout - it’s all running, box jumps and wall ball shots. So I tried to sign up for class the next day and got on the waitlist. To my dismay, I didn’t ever get off the waitlist. So, disappointed by that, but still wanting to get some sort of workout in, I decided to go for a three mile run on my regular route around Riverview park.

When I got to the park, I discovered that my regular route was closed. So now, I’d missed my favorite workout and I had to reroute the run I’d decided to do. I almost packed it up and went home. Instead, I sucked it up and made myself reroute and take the trails through the woods. After a couple miles, I finally stopped whining to myself about how nothing had gone the way I wanted it to that morning and started to just embrace the run I was on. I came around a bend in the trail and I was suddenly slapped with a beautiful autumn scene that looked like something out of a painting. I had to stop and just take it in. It was like God had just been sitting in the woods by a tree waiting to meet with me when I got there. And I realized that had I gotten into class or not been rerouted, I would have missed out on that entirely.

You may not be where you want to be, personally or communally, but if you just keep complaining about how things aren’t what you expected, you’ll miss God’s beauty. God has promised hope and abundant life to those who follow, so sit back and trust the promise.