It has go increasingly popular in contempo years for teachers of the Bible (myself included) to disparage people who apply Jeremiah 29:11-thirteen to their lives. "Yous're not paying attention to the context!," they loudly protest ( … as I accept). This post will explore whether such disparagement is appropriate, and conclude that often information technology is not. I hope to model something almost how to interpret the Bible at the same time.

Jeremiah 29:eleven-thirteen are favorite verses for many people:

For I know the plans I have for you, declares the LORD, plans for welfare and non for evil, to requite yous a time to come and a hope. And so you will call upon me and come and pray to me, and I will hear you. You will seek me and notice me when you lot seek me with all your center (Jeremiah 29:11-13 ESV).

People dearest these verses because they notice encouragement in the thought that God has good intentions for them even in the midst of suffering. They are heartened when they read that God hears their prayers. They are strengthened with the thought that when they seek the Lord with all their heart they will find the Lord.

Simply teachers of the Bible sometimes point out that the immediate literary context pertains to God's hope to bring back the people of Israel from Babylon after 70 years in exile (Jeremiah 29:ten). Thus, these verses apply merely to the exiled Israelites living in the 6th century B.C. — not to us, or so it is claimed. "Pay attention to the context!" is the reminder they offer, and, truthfully, a reminder that all of u.s. need to hear.

But I think that there is a bit more to consider in biblical interpretation. The dissenters are correct that the literary context (the verses surrounding these verses) connects the reader to a detail historical context, that is, return from the Babylonian exile. Information technology tin be terribly frustrating (maddening, actually) to listen to people interpret the Bible who glibly ignore literary and historical contexts. But are those two contexts (the literary and historical contexts) the but 2 contexts y'all demand to pay attention to when reading Scripture?

No, there is another context that is crucial if you lot want to read the Bible well. That context is the approved context, or, labeled differently, the whole-Bible context. The whole-Bible context is the context you work with to identify patterns and themes that run through (you lot guessed information technology…) the whole Bible and pay attending to whether such themes are also present in the verses you are trying to interpret. If whole-Bible themes run through the verses to which y'all are attending, and so it is proper — even necessary — to call out such patterns and themes — non as the main meaning of the verses, merely every bit a proper broadening of the meaning that connects specific verses to the overall narrative and teaching of the whole Bible.

Are there such whole-Bible patterns and themes that announced in these verses from Jeremiah 29? Yes. In that location are at least iv.

  1. God makes promises that are good, and intends to fulfill them (verse 11) (compare 1 Kings 8:56; Psalm 105:8-10; Jeremiah 32:42; Luke 24:49; Rom 11:29).
  2. God listens to his people when they pray (verse 12) (compare 2 Chronicles 7:12-xvi; Psalm 34:15; Matthew 7:11; James 5:fourteen-xviii).
  3. God allows his people to find him when they seek him (verse xiii) (compare Deuteronomy 4:29-31; 1 Chronicles 16:11-17; Isaiah 51:1-3; 55:6; Matthew seven:7).
  4. God repeatedly rescues his people out of exile (poetry xiv) (compare Exodus 2:23; Psalm 144:11; Ezekiel 34:10-22; Colossians 1:xiii; 1 Peter 1:1).

Any time we neglect to pay attention to the literary and historical contexts of Jeremiah 29:eleven-xiii, we deserve the wrist-slap we've been getting from teachers who complain that nosotros have been misinterpreting these verses. Nevertheless, it turns out that the primary ideas institute in these verses are consistent with the canonical (whole-Bible) context. Consequently, these verses do communicate words of encouragement that God'southward people tin can draw upon for encouragement in their daily lives, not considering the verses offer such encouragement directly, but because they do and so in conversation with patterns and themes that course their manner throughout the whole Bible.[1]

Notes

[one] Now, if people take this passage to mean that they individually will prosper (say, materially or vocationally), then that is a different kind of error birthday. I have left that issue out of today's mail service to make the point about the need to pay attention to the broader canonical context of the Bible.

This mail and other resource are available at Kindle Afresh: The Blog and Website of Kenneth Berding.