Jeremiah 16:13-15 “So I will throw you out of this land into a land neither you nor your ancestors have known, and there you will serve other gods day and night, for I will show you no favor. However, the days are coming…[when] I will restore them to the land I gave their ancestors.”
Doom loomed over Israel. They consistently rebelled against God, choosing instead to follow their own “evil hearts.” Their worship of false gods and blatant disregard for his moral standards had reached the tipping point. Jeremiah prophesied the astronomical consequence of their sin would be imminent exile from their homeland to a godless foreign nation. Even though they deserved such punishment, Jeremiah inserts an unexpected word…however….to show them their fate was not permanent.
Their time in exile was going to lead them to repentance and re-acknowledgement of the Lord as their God. They would once again find rest in Zion. The restoration would be so significant that it would serve as a new mile marker in their relationship with him. Before, the nation marked the exodus from Egypt as the sign of God’s faithfulness. Soon they’d refer to their return from Babylon as the mark of his renewed favor.
However. That 7-letter word made the difference between I-give-up disappointment and I-dare-you-to-believe hope. It intersected a path headed for destruction and redirected it to a road of restoration. It hailed the good news of redemption. Of sovereign love.
Of inevitability undone.
I admit it’s hard for me to look for the silver lining when things don’t turn out the way I’d imagined. I was the girl who thought if I didn’t marry my high school sweetheart, God must be calling me to be a nun (even though I wasn’t Catholic). However, the Lord had far better plans for my life. Some sentences aren’t ready for a period. Sometimes I need to trust him for a semicolon followed with a however.
Praise God for giving us howevers. Life might be squeezing in on us; however, God has a plan to bring good from our grief (Romans 8:28). You don’t see a way out; however, our way-making God has already laid a new path (Isaiah 43:19). Life in a fallen world will always be hard; however, nothing is too difficult for God (Matthew 19:26).
So don’t give up, child of God. A however might be right around the next sentence.