Finding God’s Plans For You

I’d like to begin by reading 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.”

That is a jewel of a verse, like a treasure buried in the Old Testament almost right in the center of your Bibles and my wife likes jewelry. When I travel I buy her presents, and almost always I buy jewelry. Every country has cheap jewelry, guys, just so you know. This is not that I have the big bucks, but I’ve been traveling to Tanzania a lot lately. In Tanzania they have a gemstone that you can only find that one place in the world, so they call it tanzanite. On my last trip there I purchased a stone for her. When I brought it back, I had to figure out how to put it in a setting, whether it’s a ring or part of a necklace or an earring, you look for a setting, a way to take that gem, that jewel, and lift it up so that you can look and see its beauty from every different angle.

Somehow, I feel like this verse is like that. You’ve got a verse that’s one of our favorite verses. How many of you have already got verse 11 marked in your Bible or in your memory? The question is, how can we understand how to apply it to our lives, and how does it work? To me, it’s like a jewel buried in the Bible that needs to be lifted up, and there’s a setting. The setting of any verse is the context in the verses surrounding it.

One of Pastor John’s, and my, favorite teachers is G. Campbell Morgan. He used to say, “A text without a context is a pretext.” You want to always look at what is the Bible saying? Where is that great promise found? Somehow, as I was looking at these verses around the great promise, the great jewel, I want to title tonight’s message, “Finding God’s Plan For You,” because as you look at what it says around the great promise, it shows us how to find what is God’s plan for me. In fact, you might have noticed verse 11 began with the Lord saying, “For I know the thoughts that I think toward you, says the LORD.” God knows, but then the question is, how do we know? How do we figure out what those plans are? How do we find them out? Verse by verse, as we unpack the setting and lift this promise up, there’s instruction for us in how this word works and how we can find God’s plan for our lives.

Could we back up and go back to verse 1, and we’ll begin to unpack these things of the setting of this beautiful promise. Back in verse 1, Jeremiah 29:1, it says, “Now these are the words of the letter that Jeremiah the prophet sent from Jerusalem to the remainder of the elders who were carried away captive—to the priests, the prophets, and all the people whom Nebuchadnezzar had carried away captive from Jerusalem to Babylon. 2 (This happened after Jeconiah the king, the queen mother, the eunuchs, the princes of Judah and Jerusalem, the craftsmen, and the smiths had departed from Jerusalem.) 3 The letter was sent by the hand of Elasah the son of Shaphan, and Gemariah the son of Hilkiah, whom Zedekiah king of Judah sent to Babylon, to Nebuchadnezzar king of Babylon, saying . . . .”

This is the background and the setting. The first thing you learn is that this is actually, verse 1, “ . . . the words of the letter.” This is the first letter in the Bible. Now, the heart of the New Testament is letters. In fact, you might say the bulk of the New Testament is letters. It’s the most personal and familiar form of communication known to man, but here you find that it’s not just the New Testament, you’ve got a letter in the Old Testament that Jeremiah writes to these who have been carried away captive. Then, they give the time according to the times of the kings. So, when he starts talking about Jeconiah the king, verse 2, and this whole group of people that were carried away captive, that’s sort of the Old Testament calendar and way of dating when this was written.

It is confusing at times to study the fall of Jerusalem and the exile because actually there were three groups of deportees. You might remember Daniel was one of the first ones deported to Babylon from Jerusalem. But there was a second group that went, and this is what he’s talking about in verse 2, a second group that actually included Ezekiel—he’s already there in Babylon with a group. There was a third group after the destruction of Jerusalem that Jeremiah himself was a part of, but this would’ve been around 597 B.C., this second group. By the way, there were three groups of returnees, which again to keep it all straight you have to think of it in terms of three—there was a group under Zerubbabel that went back first and rebuilt the temple; later, Ezra went back, and he rebuilt the people; then, you remember famously Nehemiah went back and rebuilt the wall. You have to kind of put all of these things in sync. What does it mean? It means that this letter was written in a very bad time. This was written eleven years before the destruction of the temple in Jerusalem. We might say the letter was written in a bad time, but when things were going to actually get worse.

There are times where we think that the promises of God only work in good times. We read the promise of God saying, “I’m going to give you peace. I’m going to give you a future and a hope,” and we tend to think, Well, that’s a true word of God of promise, but it could only happen when things are good, right? The answer is no. This word, “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,” He spoke it into a very bad time. You know, as you search your Scriptures and you gather your promises—right? we live and feed on the promises of God—so often the great promises of God were spoken at times that were really awful.

There’s a great word in the Scripture that, “God’s mercies are new every morning.” Does anybody know where that verse it found? Lamentations. Who nailed it? You and I are going to go out and have a hamburger afterwards. Lamentations, which Jeremiah also wrote. You know, the word “Lamentations” is speaking about weeping and tears. He wrote a poem about the fall of Jerusalem. He was an eyewitness, and right in the middle of that book, in the very heart of “the book of tears,” in fact, we often call Jeremiah the weeping prophet, that’s where the Bible says His mercies are new every morning. Does that strike you? That some of the great words and promises of God were spoken to God’s people at a point of great need when they’re really being crushed. Sometimes we think, Does the Word of God really work? Are these promises…it just seems like they could only really be true or happen if things were going great, but it’s actually the opposite, isn’t it?

So often when the Lord speaks to us powerfully, it’s when we need to hear it, it’s when we’re desperate, when we’re hungry. We’re asking the Lord to speak to us because things aren’t good. This is a part of finding God’s plan for you is realizing that you’re not going to wait for things to get good to find God’s plan for you. God might speak right into the now of whatever is happening in your life where you’re really needing, “I need a word. I need to hear from God. Speak to me, Lord,” and that’s when He says, “Hey, I’ve got thoughts. I’ve got plans, and they’re for peace, not for evil. It’s to give you a future and a hope right into the dark time, right into the dark hour.” That’s when this letter was written.

Now, the letter begins in verse 4, “Thus says the LORD of hosts, the God of Israel, to all who were carried away captive, whom I have caused to be carried away from Jerusalem to Babylon: 5 Build houses and dwell in them; plant gardens and eat their fruit.” The Lord says, “Settle down in the place of captivity.” Now, that is exactly what they did not want to hear. They were people that did not want to unpack their suitcase, “We’re in a foreign land.” Babylon is about 900 miles away from Jerusalem, but we’re talking about pre-modern transportation. To go 900 miles in 597 B.C. is to go to almost another planet! Again, it would’ve been another culture, another language, a place filled with idolatry. They would’ve felt oppressed there by their enemies. They are refugees. The last thing they wanted to hear was, verse 5, the Lord says, “Build,”—(what?)—“houses and dwell in them; plant gardens and eat their fruit.” I want you to settle down. I want you to get your roots in the ground.

There are times where God wants to work His plan, but we feel not ready. We feel like we’re in the wrong place. We might actually feel a bit like we’re captive where we are. We don’t want to be where we are, so we’re thinking, I’ve gotta get outta here! I don’t want to be here. God’s plan for me, it can’t possibly be here! So, we struggle with where we are now, and yet this is what the Lord is saying, “I want you to build a house. I want you to dwell in it. I want you to plant a garden. You’re going to be there a while because you’re going to eat its fruit.”

There are some people that struggle with where they’re at and they are living like a potted plant, where you just sort of stay in your pot and you don’t want to get your roots in the soil. You think, This is just temporary. I know I’m not supposed to be here, and maybe you’re even fighting God about where you’re at. They certainly were. They didn’t want to be there. They didn’t want to hear this word from God. You want to insulate yourself. You don’t want to get involved with other people. You’re not ready to settle down. You want to move on, and this is just a thing to get rid of and to move on from here. But the Lord’s first word is, “You need to settle down. You’ve got to take this plant of your life out of the pot, and we need to put it into the soil. You need to get your roots in there and settle down and see what does God have for you now, where you’re at, and not to fight with that.

He goes on, verse 6. It says, “Take wives and beget sons and daughters; and take wives for your sons and give your daughters to husbands, so that they may bear sons and daughters—that you may be increased there, and not diminished. 7 And seek the peace of the city where I have caused you to be carried away captive, and pray to the LORD for it; for in its peace you will have peace.”

How many of you have that verse marked? It’s just another great word from the Lord. It’s not an accident that you are where you are. I’m going to tell you, this is the Lord speaking, “I want you to seek,” verse 7, “the peace of the city where I have caused you to be carried away captive.” This is like blessing your enemies. This is like Jesus saying, “You have heard that it was said, ‘You shall love your neighbor and hate your enemy. But I say to you, love your enemies.’” That’s what He’s saying, same God, same word of the Lord. You’re in a place that you feel uncomfortable, you feel like you’re surrounded by your enemies, and the Lord says, “Pray for them. Seek their peace. Bless the city that you’re in because, you know, “ . . . in its peace you will have peace.”

A lot of people are fleeing California these days. Did any of you hear Greg Laurie talk about this at the Harvest Crusade last week? Somewhere during the altar call as he was watching everybody come down to the field…how many of you watched or went to the Harvest Crusade? He said, “You know, a lot of people are fleeing California right now, but look at what God’s doing right here, right now.” I thought to myself, Yes, Pastor Greg. Amen. Be aware and see what is happening in the city now.

I live in Burbank, and a lot of my people in my church work in the entertainment industry. I have a lot of people in my church asking this question, “Why am I here? Why am I working on this reality tv show? Why am I doing these silly things? I feel trapped here.” A lot of people come to our city with dreams of impacting the entertainment industry for good and find themselves doing work that they’re not so proud of, yet God puts Christians there. We need Christians. We need salt and we need light in my city, but it’s always a struggle. People are like, “Why am I in beautiful downtown Burbank? Why am I surrounded by people that seem to be opposed to God and a whole industry at times that seems to be deliberately trying to tear our…just the moral fabric of our society apart, yet what happens is when people get hold of this verse, you gotta, “ . . . seek the peace of the city where I have caused you to be carried away captive, and pray to the LORD for it.” Start praying for the people that you work with and where God’s placed you, “ . . . for in its peace you will have peace.” We’re missionaries in Los Angeles.

I don’t know too much about Menifee. Does anybody ever wonder, “Why am I in Menifee? How did I land here? I need to get out of here. I need to flee California.” This is sort of in the air these days, yet as a pastor what I hear the Lord saying is that, you know what? You need to seek the peace of the city that God put you in. You need to minister to the people God’s put you around. If you’re going to find God’s plan for you, you might follow this advice that maybe you’re exactly where God wants you and maybe the people that are around you, those people that are driving you crazy at work and in your neighborhood or at school and you’re thinking, Why am I in Menifee? What does it even mean, “Menifee”? I don’t know.

But, I have been here enough, and I have visited this church enough to know one thing, God is working in Menifee! Now, that was very weak. I’m going to give you another chance. I was louder than all of you put together. That’s not right. I’ve been here enough to know one this is that God is working in Menifee! (Yelling, cheering, clapping) And, if we could hear this verse spoken into our hearts that even if you feel a bit uncomfortable with being here and you’re not so sure, you’re trying to find God’s plan for your life, maybe a part of it is to realize that God says, “I want you to seek the peace of the city that I carried…” and you may feel captive, you can own the whole verse, “I feel captive, trapped here,” but He says, “Pray to the LORD for it,” because “in its peace you will have peace.”

Minister. See it as a mission field. See it as an opportunity. Man, it’s possible that every single day there’s some opportunity for ministry everywhere you go. God, here, is saying to His people, “Don’t miss it. Don’t resist it. It’s a part of My plan for you, and you’ll be blessed in doing that.”

Verse 8, “For thus says the LORD of hosts, the God of Israel: Do not let your prophets and your diviners who are in your midst deceive you, nor listen to your dreams which you cause to be dreamed. 9 For they prophesy falsely to you in My name; I have not sent them, says the LORD.” There is such a thing as false hopes, false prophets. Here He’s warning, “Don’t be deceived by people that are telling you what you want to hear.” There are people that speak in the name of the Lord but they’re false prophets. They’re saying things…and He’s saying, the hard part about these verses is that He’s saying, “It’s what you wanted them to say. You caused these things. Your ear is itching, and those itching ears that Paul wrote to Timothy about in the last days is that you are listening and hearing what you want to hear.” That’s the horrible thing about a Google search is that you’re going to find what you want to find. Have you noticed this? It drives me crazy that I am going to find what I am looking for, and that’s a problem for my sin nature. Here He’s saying these false prophets, they’re like that. They’re saying what you want them to hear. In fact, we know exactly what they were saying.

Turn back, just a chapter, a page, to Jeremiah 28. Here’s an example. In fact, a very current, recent example for Jeremiah of the kinds of things the false prophets were saying. Jeremiah 28, I’m going to start reading there, verse 1. “And it happened in the same year, at the beginning of the reign of Zedekiah king of Judah, in the fourth year and in the fifth month, that Hananiah the son of Azur the prophet, who was from Gibeon, spoke to me in the house of the LORD,”—wow!—“in the presence of the priests and of all the people, saying, 2 ‘Thus speaks the LORD of hosts, the God of Israel,’”—notice he’s using the same formula, the same name of God that Jeremiah uses. He’s copying. He’s saying, “I have broken the yoke of the king of Babylon. 3 Within two full years I will bring back to this place all the vessels of the LORD’s house, that Nebuchadnezzar king of Babylon took away from this place and carried to Babylon. 4 And I will bring back to this place Jeconiah the son of Jehoiakim, king of Judah, with all the captives of Judah who went to Babylon,’ says the LORD, ‘for I will break the yoke of the king of Babylon.’”

I’m certain when Hananiah, the false prophet, spoke this word people cheered. I can hear their voices, “I’m gonna break the yoke of the king of Babylon.” I think the people went, “Yes!” but he’s the false prophet. Why? Because he contradicted the Word of the Lord. Jeremiah had already said in Jeremiah 25:11, that the captivity was going to be seventy years. Here, the false prophet said, verse 3, “Within two full years I will bring back to this place all the vessels of the LORD’s house.” That’s what they wanted to hear, “Don’t unpack your suitcases. Don’t build houses. Don’t plant gardens. Don’t give your sons and daughters in marriage, it’s just going to be two years. It’s gonna be quick. It’s gonna be easy. We’ll be right back where we were before.” That’s what they wanted to hear. It’s just not true.

I think a lot of times the false prophets are speaking that message. They’re speaking a message that’s saying, “This is going to be quick and easy, this lesson, this discipline. You don’t have to go through the hard way. You don’t need to learn anything. Just a couple of years, you know, you’re just going to turn around and go right back, right back to where you were.” The Lord said, “No. You’re not going to go back right to where you were. You need to learn the lesson.” This is a discipline from the Lord. It’s a seventy-year captivity, not two years.

I’ve been hanging out this summer with one of our missionaries at our church. His name is Marty. He went to Armenia seven years ago, and he’s a gifted guy. He’s been a very gifted missionary, but he hadn’t come back for seven years. The reason why is that he got married. He’s got two children, a little boy named Samma and a little girl named Dianna. They’re beautiful. As they’ve had to struggle through Covid, as they had to struggle through VISAs and things like that, they really didn’t have the freedom to come back and visit for seven years. This was the summer they got to come back, and the Lord opened the doors, so I’ve been spending time with him. One of the things that has really helped me is to get his perspective on ministry and commitment. There’s been nothing quick and easy about ministering in the country of Armenia down in the southern corner. He’s been on the border where they’ve had the wars, the Azerbaijan, and he’s been ministering to refugees and working in the church. God’s been using him in all these different ways, but none of it is quick and easy.

In fact, he told the story that just blew us all away, he was in our pulpit about a month ago. When his firstborn came along, his little boy Samma was born premature, and at that hospital where he was, they just didn’t really have the equipment that we would have to help that little guy survive. The day he was born, the doctor said, “You know, your little boy is going to die.” He kind of spoke a death sentence over this little boy, and my friend Marty didn’t believe it. He said, “I don’t think that’s true. That’s not what the Lord is ministering to me.” God gave him faith to believe that his little boy would be fine, that he would be healed and he would be whole. He talked about going home that night. He said, “I just laid down, I went to sleep. The Lord just gave me peace that my little boy was going to be fine.” It was so wonderful to have that little boy in our church to see, have our faith become sight, that God has touched that little guy.

As a premie, he has had some things he’s had to work through, and I would say nothing about his development is quick and easy. In fact, his younger sister is much bigger than him, four years later. But the faith that God gave him to say, “That’s not true. I’m going to keep my faith in God. I know what God has spoken to us,” and the Lord has blessed that little boy and their family. I thought, You know, nothing that he’s shared with me about the ministry there, none of it has been quick and easy. It’s all been longer periods of time and difficult.

But then, the fruit, the fruit of getting the roots down, and then ministering to the people, whatever the needs are. You get your roots down in the ground, and then the fruits will start to come up. He’s just described beautiful things that the Lord has done through his ministry. So much of it is just teaching people the Bible. There’s a famine for the Word of God in that land, and to open the Word and just to teach the Word and to give people the message of the grace that’s in the Lord Jesus. This whole summer we’ve been getting reacquainted and having him minister. But it’s so different than the quick and the easy. No, it’s been seven years of planting seed and plowing and watching God work, but boy the fruit is good. It’s really good.

You see, the false prophet is going to say, “You don’t have to struggle. This isn’t going to take long. This is going to be over in a minute—two years, that’s all. Don’t worry about it.” Yet, it’s completely false. It contradicted what the Lord had said.

You know, I find the Bible so realistic, genuine. When I read my Bible, it equips me to deal with trials and suffering. I don’t understand those that read the Bible and leave out the parts about trials and suffering because it’s so much a part of life. The Bible is equipping us to go through things and to watch God work. It’s the opposite of the quick and easy, but it’s the right way and it’s the way the Lord blesses and the truth of it is it’s going to be seventy years.

Flip back to Jeremiah 29:10, “For thus says the LORD: After seventy years are completed at Babylon, I will visit you and perform My good word toward you, and cause you to return to this place. 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.” That is God’s plan. That is God’s promise. He wants to give you peace. You know that word shâlôwm is talking about all of life. It’s health and wealth and security and blessing in every different way. God’s saying, “That’s what I’m thinking about, a future and a hope. It may not feel that way right now, but I have you where I want you. Be patient. Let Me do My work, but this is not going to be quick and easy, seventy years. That’s the time of the captivity.”

Can you go over to the book of Daniel, not far away, Daniel 9. If we had time, we could actually reference a bunch of different prophecies that are all coming together right at this moment in history. Daniel’s the one that sort of figured it out, and I find it so fascinating that Daniel was a student of the Bible and a student of prophecy and God showed him exactly what He was doing. Daniel 9:1, “In the first year of Darius the son of Ahasuerus, of the lineage of the Medes, who was made king over the realm of the Chaldeans—2 in the first year of his reign I, Daniel, understood by the books the number of the years specified by the word of the LORD through Jeremiah the prophet, that He would accomplish seventy years in the desolations of Jerusalem.”

Daniel was in the first group of the captives, but he was a young teenager. Now, he’s lived all the way through the seventy years. Now, he’s at least 80, anybody want to shout? Where are my 80-year-olds here, my eighty-somethings? He’s at least 80, maybe a little more, he realizes, he’s lived through the seventy years, and as a student of the Bible, he obviously had a copy of Jeremiah’s prophecies, and he’s reading it. He realizes, “I’m living in the time of the fulfillment of this prophecy.” He probably also had Isaiah, an Isaiah scroll. Isaiah actually predicted the name of the man that would, “ . . . let my people go.” Pharaoh in Egypt would not let his people go, but there would be another one named Cyrus that Isaiah named twice, Isaiah 44 and 45, that a man named Cyrus would actually be the one that God would use. It happened in history that Babylon fell and the Medes and Persians rose up and in that time God raised up this man Cyrus, so he puts together what Jeremiah said about the seventy years, he puts together what Isaiah said about a man named Cyrus, and he realizes, “I’m living now to see the fulfillment of God’s Word,” and he was aware “this is the time God is moving in my life.”

You know, this seventy years did some marvelous things. It’s a fact of history that from this time forward Israel was delivered from idols. Idols are what led them into captivity, and from the time of the exile forward, the Jewish people had been known as one of the most monotheistic cultures on the earth, they weren’t before then. They were constantly tempted to copy the nations around them and to adopt their gods, and it was a struggle and a battle. If you’ve read the Old Testament, you know that’s what brought them down. They forsook the Lord. They had other gods before Him. They made idols, and so they go into captivity.

The seventy years was mathematically determined. It had to do with Sabbath rests for the land, and so it was a justice. You didn’t have any Sabbath rests of the land for 490 years, so seventy years of captivity, a Sabbath in the land. But what happened through that discipline was that they were cured of idolatry, and they go back and restore Jerusalem. It all had to do with God setting things up for the first coming of Christ, Daniel seeing and understanding what God was doing and realizing, “This is the Lord preparing the way for Messiah. God is working in His people. He’s going to restore us back to Jerusalem. It’s going to be rebuilt, and Messiah will come like the prophets said.” He’s in sync and in tune with what God was doing in his lifetime.

It’s fascinating to think about this in light of the Second Coming of Christ. Is it possible to be living in the last days in studying the prophecies of the Bible and realize, “Hey, man, it’s happening?” If I give you a second chance on that one, too? Is it possible, like Daniel, not with the first coming but as a student of the Book and the last days to be reading the Book and studying and putting together the different prophecies of the Bible and to be suddenly aware that, you know what, these things are happening in my day, and the coming of the Lord is near! (cheering) That was impressive. That was wonderful. That by being a student of the Word he was aware of what God’s plan was, and then he became a part of it.

Notice what happens in verse 3, after he understands what the prophets were saying, that, “It’s happening now in my life.” Verse 3, it says that, “Then I set my face toward the Lord God to make request by prayer and supplications, with fasting, sackcloth, and ashes.” Daniel didn’t study the prophets and say, “Well, I’m going to get myself a cabin on a mountaintop and a bunch of water and supplies and to sit back and see this thing happen,” you know, “I’m just going to kick back now and God’s got this, and I’ll just watch it happen.” No, the response of Daniel to understanding the Word of the Lord was he began to pray.

If you’ve ever studied the book of Daniel, chapter 9 is Daniel’s prayer. There’s other prayers in the book of Daniel, but the bulk of chapter 9 is one of the most powerful prayers in the Bible. He’s moved to pray and ask God to work in his days and that he puts his heart out there that he’s confessing his sins and he’s praying and asking God to do everything that He wants to do, and he’s making himself available that God would use him.

You know, Daniel is one of my heroes. As he watches the rise and fall of nations, and he’s placed in places of authority, it’s like nations rise and fall in his lifetime, but he does not. He stays in the place that God wanted him. He continually somehow survives all of the firings and the cutbacks and the layoffs. Daniel, in God’s grace, God positioned him in the kingdom, in the place of authority in Babylon and later with the Persians. God kept His servant in a strategic place and didn’t allow him to go down with the rising and the falling of the nation because God was using him in that place. To me that’s fascinating.

When you watch our world today and you watch the risings and the fallings and you watch things just fall apart, you think, Where do I need to be, Lord? Where’s the safe place? It could be with employment or where you live. Again, those questions like, why am I here? What am I doing? If God wants to position you, if God want’s to put you in a certain place, where you live, or a certain place, where you work, and if He wants to keep you there, He’ll keep you there.

One of my elders works at Disney, and Disney loves layoffs. They do it continually. I’ve known him over twenty years and he’s never been laid off. It’s like God just keeps him there. People at his work at Disney call him pastor. God just put him there as a person that’s salt and light, and it’s not a very comfortable place to be. But, you know, if God wants you in a certain place like Daniel, if God wants to put you there, He puts you there and He uses you there. Daniel, his response to understanding what God was doing was, “I’m going to pray. I’m going to make myself available to be used by God in my generation.”

Now, go back to Jeremiah. We have one more thing, but it’s the same. It’s the same exact point, Jeremiah 29. What comes after the study of the Word and an understanding of the seventy years, and this is the end of our little letter that Jeremiah wrote, Jeremiah 29:12. Notice it’s exactly the same thing that Daniel did later. Jeremiah 29:12 says, “Then you will call upon Me and go and pray to Me, and I will listen to you. 13 And you will seek Me and find Me, when you search for Me with all your heart. 14 I will be found by you, says the LORD, and I will bring you back from your captivity; I will gather you from all the nations and from all the places where I have driven you, says the LORD, and I will bring you to the place from which I cause you to be carried away captive.”

It’s not enough just to know the Word and to be a student of the promises, to be aware that He’s got a plan to give you peace and a future and a hope, but that the response is then to begin to pray. Notice these words are strong, “ . . . call upon Me and go and pray to Me . . . seek Me and find Me,” verse 13, “ . . . search for Me with all your heart.” It’s like we need to be awake, “Lord, what is it that You’re doing in my life? What is happening today? What is it that is Your plan for me?”

If we kind of put this all together, if you’re wanting to find God’s plan for your life, you’re not waiting for “a good time,” it’s just now, right? If you’re trying to find God’s plan for your life, go ahead and settle down. Put some roots in where you are now. Just begin to be fruitful. Minister to the people that God has put right around. So often we’re waiting for something. “I’ll start getting active in the things of God when I am in a better place. I need to have a home,” or “I need to have a better job,” or “I gotta get outta here.” No, the Lord says, “Settle down. Plant your gardens. Be fruitful. Seek the peace of the city where I put you.”

Go ahead and just start now, and don’t be deceived by false prophets that are saying that, “This isn’t the right time,” or “This is going to be quick and easy.” No, you begin to invest your life and begin to do and then take up on the Word of God, be aware what the Bible is saying. Let God speak right into your situation right now, and as you understand it, pray about it, run with it. Ask God, “Open my eyes. Lord, show me what are the opportunities. What is Your plan for me,” not five years from now or ten years from now or twenty years from now, no. “What are You doing in my life today? What is immediately before me,” and like Daniel, say, “God, I’m available. You can use me. If you prompt me by your Holy Spirit to reach out or to minister to somebody, I’m going to seek the peace of the city that I’m in. I’m going to pray for it. I’m going to impact it.”

I’m not going to wait for some other thing and all the different things that are in our minds where we…somehow we miss the opportunities of God. We think of God’s plan for our life in some distant time or distant place or something maybe that you have dreamed up, an idea, and maybe that dream is from the Lord, but how do we get there? By obeying God today saying, “Lord, I see it. There’s a need for me to be about Your business right now.” Could we bow our heads, and we’ll pray together.