God answers all of our prayers, every single one of them. We do not utter one prayer that He does not hear or does not answer. He doesn’t always give me the outcome that I request. Yesterday, I proposed three possible reasons that God’s answer is not my desire. Today, we are going to look at the first one: God has a better plan.
Let’s take a passage that has become quite popular in the last few years and dissect it. Please stick with me. I don’t view this passage in the same light that it has been presented by many popular evangelists and authors in recent years.
“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 hope and a future.” Jeremiah 29:11
First, we need to look at the context of this passage. This scripture comes from a letter written by Jeremiah to the Israelites in exile. The Israelites had not been listening to God; He allowed them to be taken captive. In this letter, God tells them to settle in, to build houses and have children, they are going to live their lives there for a while. He goes on to say that in seventy years, He will fulfill His promise to return them to Babylon. Does that mean those seventy years were a breeze and nothing bad happened? I don’t think so. Just like our lives, I would imagine some people struggled with work, spouses and disrespectful children. I imagine there were some deaths during that time. That doesn’t negate the promise of God. His promise still stood.
So, is it possible to apply this scripture to our lives today? Of course it is. However, I don’t think it is responsible to use this scripture to say that God wants to give us all of the material things we ask for – that’s a prosperity gospel that the Bible doesn’t support. God does bless us richly, but material blessings are not His main concern.
I also don’t believe that we can use this passage to say that God won’t allow bad things to happen to us. Again, God is not a genie in a bottle. To say that God wouldn’t allow bad things to happen would be to say that God does not allow free will. Scripture does not support that.
Let’s bring this back to prayer and what it means for us. One of the reasons that God’s answer may differ from my request is because He has a better plan. If I pray for a job, and I don’t get it, that doesn’t necessarily mean that God has a better paying job lined up for me just around the bend. His better plan may mean that I stay where I am because that is where I can serve Him best. His better plan may be a job with a pay cut but an environment full of Christians who support and encourage one another. God’s plan for eternity is of greater importance than my comfort on this earth. His better plan may be something I never see and will not understand this side of Heaven, but I can trust that His plan is better.
I hear what you are saying, that passage clearly says, “I have plans to prosper you.” Yes it does. Let me share a story that might help you understand. I’m a high school Spanish teacher. When I was a beginning teacher, I made a huge mistake. My class walked in one day, and I said to them, “We are going to do something fun today.” You know where this is going. I had a fun activity planned that I couldn’t wait to start. They were going to be engaged and so much learning was going to take place. Guess what they heard! “Free day.” When they realized that I intended for us to do some learning, they didn’t think that was fun at all.
When God says, “prosper,” we often wait in anticipation for the material blessings to begin to pour down on us. As our Creator, He loves us very much. In that same way that we love to bless our children with things, I believe that God also loves to bless us in our earthly lives. Those blessings come in a variety of forms and aren’t always material things. Just know that God’s view of prosperity is eternal, not earthly.
We have to be just as careful with the second part of this scripture – “not to cause you harm.” I know that I repeated this passage several times to God after Joshua died. In fact, it might be fair to say that I spewed these words at God in my grief. I would cry out to Him, “You wrote the Bible. You are the One who said, ‘I have plans to prosper you and not to cause you harm.’ This hurts. This hurts worse than anything I have ever felt in my entire life. This feels like harm.”
As I wrestled with God over this passage, I know He heard every single utterance. He felt my pain. He longed to comfort me. And, then He lovingly brought me to the last part of this passage – “plans to give you hope and a future.” When God created Adam and Eve, He placed them in a beautiful garden. He gave them everything they needed. They ruined it pretty quickly. We live in a fallen world. God wants to give us hope, and He has because He sent His Son to die on the cross so that we would have a future with Him in Heaven. That’s the most important takeaway from this passage.
Our hope doesn’t lie in the things of this world or in our future here on earth. We aren’t staying here. We are all getting off this planet one way or another. Our ultimate destination will be standing in front of our Creator to be judged for how we lived while we were here. We will either hear, “Well done, good and faithful servant,” or “Depart from Me, I never knew you.” Just typing that last phrase is chilling. I do not want to hear God speak those words to anyone.
I don’t know what you are praying for today. I hope that you can trust God’s answer and continue to serve Him with every breath you have. His plan is far better than mine because it is grounded in my eternity, not in my earthly life.
With Eyes on the Cross 