Daily Devotions
Jeremiah
"And you will seek Me and find Me"
Text: Jeremiah 23:13
SEEKING AND FINDING GOD
The 70 years in Babylon will be a trying time for all Captives. But these years could prove to be the turning point for the people in captivity. They should plan to seek and to find the LORD in new-found faith!
“Then you will call upon Me and go and pray to Me,
and I will listen to you.
And you will seek Me and find Me,
when you search for Me with all your heart.
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.”
Jeremiah 29:12-14
1. “Then you will call upon Me and go and pray to Me, and I will listen to you”
a) There will be distress and difficulty in Babylon.
b) Hopefully, the people would do the following:
i) To call upon the LORD.
ii) To pray to Him humbly.
c) The LORD’s promise.
i) He will listen to their prayers.
ii) He will respond appropriately.
2. “And you will seek Me and find Me, when you search for Me with all your heart”
a) Their efforts to seek God would not be in vain.
b) The LORD would allow Himself to be found.
c) But they must be sure that they search for (seek) God with all their heart.
d) This word from the LORD reminds us of what Moses had said to Israel.
“And the LORD will scatter you among the peoples,
and you will be left few in number
among the nations where the LORD will drive you.
And there you will serve gods, the work of men’s hands,
wood and stone, which neither see nor hear nor eat nor smell.
But from there you will seek the LORD your God,
and you will find Him if you seek Him
with all your heart and with all your soul.”
Deuteronomy 4:27-29
3. “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”
a) The Promises of the LORD are precious indeed.
i) He will be found by the genuine seekers.
ii) He will bring them back to Judah from Babylon.
iii) Not just from Babylon, but from other countries where they were scattered.
b) The challenge to all the Captives.
i) To recall all that the prophets had spoken.
ii) To repent and to return to the LORD.
iii) To find faith in the LORD their God.
iv) To believe that God would give them a future in their own homeland.