A Future And A Hope

Well, good morning and happy feast! It's wonderful to be able to communicate in the languages God has given us and even new ones that have been created so that we can maintain the relationships God's given us, and it's wonderful to be here. Thank you, Teresa, for I still lost where she went, but thank you for that beautiful music. I couldn't help but smile because it fits so wonderfully with the topic that God has inspired for me to share today. We do have a great God who looks after his people, who provides for our needs, and part of that is what we're celebrating here today as we enjoy his feast of tabernacles. There's no need for me to tell you that the year 2020 has been unlike any year that we've ever experienced in our lives. The events this spring caught us off guard completely. It knocked us back. I think each one of us could say it knocked us back a couple of feet. We took a couple steps back and had to replant our feet into the ground, and then we continued forward with God's help. We went through a lot of unique experiences, unique to our own lives, unique to our own challenges. We also went through experiences that were common to each one of us sitting here. Church was paused. Every one of us started observing the Sabbath on the webcasts, on phone hookups. There's many things, and I don't want to spend a lot of time talking about these, but there's that toilet paper shortage. Never saw that one coming.

How did we battle through that and other challenges this spring and summer? How did we hang on?

What was it that kept us from unraveling back in March, April, and May? Obviously, we could each think of several aspects that would tie into our relationship with God to answer that question, but in thinking through this question for myself and coming up with my own answer, it came down to one word for me, hope.

Every person throughout this world places their hope on something. It's a universal thought or emotion that is part of our humanity, but the difference is where our hope is placed, because people place their hope on all sorts of things. People, we place our hope in people. We place our hope at times as part of humanity. People outside this room place their hope on politics, on who will be the next governor, who will be the next president to guide this nation through stormy weather. People place their hope in jobs. People place hope in money.

What's one of the somewhat comical aspects of going through this year in the spring and summer that we had is seeing those jokes and those memes on the internet about how bad 2019 was and how much people were looking forward to 2020. It's not looking too bad right now, is it, 2019? There are many things that people place their hope into, and since the first sin committed by mankind, man has continually searched for things or people to place their hope. And when one item or one person failed them, they look for the next. And then the next. And then the next. Because when you place your hope in people, things, physical aspects, they all end up eventually letting us down.

It's part of our, it seems hardwired into our nature to be a people of hope. And it should be an aspect for us as Christians as we have a hope unlike anything this world provides. Hope is woven all through the Bible from the beginning to the end, and it's an important part of the Feast of Tabernacles we are celebrating today. Some like titles for your messages. Today's title is a future and a hope. What is hope? In the New Testament, the Greek word for hope is elpis, which is E-L-P-I-S. It's used 53 times in the New Testament as hope. And what the definition for it is, an expectation of good. Joyful and confident expectation of eternal salvation. Or to anticipate. In a spiritual sense, it's the desire and expectation of something much greater than this physical life. Barnes notes on the Bible describes hope as this. Hope is a compound emotion made up of a desire for an object, that's part one, and an expectation of obtaining it. So you've got a desire for an object, and then you have an expectation of obtaining it, he says. If there is no desire for it, or if the object is not pleasant or indegreeable, there is no hope. If there is no expectation of it, but a strong desire, there is also no hope. According to Barnes notes, there must be these two components of an emotion in order to have hope in something. And for real hope, this expectation should be based on truth, not just hope that is empty or misplaced. Again, a desire for an object and an expectation of obtaining it. For example, I can hope to win the lottery, right? But is it realistic that if I played the games, I would win the millions of dollars? No, it's not reasonable. Well, let's say I did win, and that money came pouring in. Would that really fix my problems? Would that bring me a sense of internal peace that would last for my entire life? As the joke goes, I'd like to give it a try, but we realize the reality of winning the lottery is not something we can expect to obtain. And to have hope that it's going to fix our problems is not the truth of the matter.

There is a New Testament passage that speaks to the hope that we have in God and the power of this hope. It's in Hebrews 6, and we'll start reading in verse 10 as we open our Bibles this morning. Hebrews 6 and verse 10.

In my Bible and in another translation I looked at, this passage begins, or the heading in this Bible and another one, the different headings say one is titled, The Certainty of God's Promises. Another translation titles it's, God's Promises Bring Hope. Again, Hebrews 6 and verse 10. It says, He's saying God isn't going to forget everything that we've given up, everything that we have sacrificed, the choices we've made in life that maybe our neighbors chose differently, our co-workers chose differently, and we said, no, I've got to walk a different way. I've got to sacrifice in different ways. He's saying God's not unjust to forget your works and labor of love, but in verse 11 he says, Verses 11 and 12 from the New Living Translation, it's translated this way, Again, that's verses 11 and 12 from the New Living Translation. Going on in the New King James and verse 13.

We have, as an anchor of the soul, both sure and steadfast, which enters and which enters into the presence behind the veil, where the forerunner has entered for us, even Jesus, having become high priest forever according to the order of Melchizedek. Hope in God serves as an anchor to our lives. And how bad did we need that anchor this past spring and summer?

The truth of the matter is we're going to need that anchor for the rest of this year, for all of next year, for the next five years, 10 years, 20 years. As long as God continues to put life and breath in your physical body, you're going to continue to need this anchor of hope. Just like I will need this anchor of hope. There is an account in the book of Jeremiah where God's people needed and hope unlike any other times in their life. Our focus will be on Jeremiah chapter 29, but to understand the context, let's start in Jeremiah 17 and verse 5. Jeremiah 17 and verse 5.

Jeremiah 17 and verse 5. Thus says the Lord, Cursed is the man who trusts in man and makes flesh his strength, whose heart departs from the Lord. For he shall be like a shrub in the desert, and shall not see when good comes, but shall inhabit the parched places in the wilderness, and a salt land which is not inhabited. But on the flip side, verse 7, Blessed is the man who trusts in the Lord and whose hope is in the Lord.

For he shall be like a tree planted by the waters, which spreads out its roots by the river, and will not fear when heat comes. But its leaf will be green, and will not be anxious in the year of COVID, and will not be anxious in the year of drought, nor will cease from yielding fruit. The heart is deceitful above all things, and desperately wicked. Who can know it? I, the Lord, search the heart.

I test the mind, even to give every man according to his ways, according to the fruit of his doings. God gave this message to Jeremiah because the nation of Judah was about to receive punishment for their great transgressions of God's wall, and the rejection of him as their God. Many of us have studied God's words. We know the accounts of Israel. We know the accounts of the nation splitting, the northern tribes going one direction, the tribes of Judah having good and bad kings, the Asherah poles, the stone idols that they built, the worship of the false gods when the one true God wanted to be their God.

Yet, they got wrapped up in the physical of what the other nations had. They got wrapped up in the pagan aspects of worship. And in time, it drove them to the point that it could not go on any longer. And we're going to dive into an aspect of that as we continue through Jeremiah. Let's turn to chapter 22 and now verse 24. So, verse 22 and verse 24, As I live, again says the Lord, through Kaniah, the son of Jehoiakim, king of Judah, were the signet on my right hand, yet I would pluck you off, and I will give you into the hand of those who seek your life, and into the hand of those whose face you fear, the hands of Nebuchadnezzar, king of Babylon, and the hand of the Chaldeans.

So I will cast you out and your mother who bore you into another country, where you were not born, and there you shall die. But to the land to which they desire to return, they shall not return. Let's flip ahead to chapter 23 and verse 1. Woe to the shepherds who destroy and scatter the sheep of my pasture, says the Lord.

Therefore, thus says the Lord, God of Israel, against the shepherds who feed my people. You have scattered my flock, driven them away, and not attended to them. Behold, I will attend to you for the evil of your doings, says the Lord. But I will gather the remnant of my flock out of all countries where I have driven them, and bring them back to their folds, and they shall be fruitful and increase. And I will set up shepherds over them who will feed them, and they shall fear no more, nor be dismayed, nor shall they be lacking, says the Lord.

And then we get into a future day that we can look forward to as well here in verse 5 and verse 6. And look at who is referenced here. Behold, the days are coming, says the Lord, that I will raise to David a branch of righteousness. A king shall reign and prosper and execute judgment and righteousness in the earth.

In his days Judah will be saved, and Israel will dwell safely. Now this is his name by which he will be called the Lord, our righteousness. Continuing on chapter 24 and verse 1 now. The Lord showed me, and there were two baskets of figs set before the temple of the Lord. After Nebuchadnezzar, king of Babylon had carried away captive Jeconiah, the son of Jehoiakim, king of Judah, and the princes of Judah, with the craftsmen and the smiths from Jerusalem, and had brought them to Babylon. So this is the end of this nation. People have taken in captivity the leaders, those who are artists, those who were part of the princes and part of the kingly household.

Those were talents and gifts that could be utilized by King Nebuchadnezzar for his benefit. They were taken captive. They were being led away out of their homeland, out of what they knew and what was their comfort level. And in a similar way, as we've been able to still be part of this nation, our entire comfort level changed this past spring in what we went through. And so we have the account as they were carried away captive.

And he goes on in verse 2, he says, and he because he showed me these, there's these two baskets of figs again. And so verse 2, he says, one basket had very good figs, like the figs that are first ripe, and the other basket had very bad figs, which could not be eaten. So they were so bad. Then the Lord said to me, what do you see, Jeremiah?

And I said, figs, the good figs, very good and the bad, very bad, which cannot be eaten. They are so bad. Again, the word of the Lord came to me, saying, Thus says the Lord, the God of Israel, like these good figs, so will I acknowledge those who are carried away captive from Judah, whom I have sent out of this place for their own good.

That sounds weird, doesn't it? I gotta be led away captive? What? For my own good? That doesn't add up. That doesn't make sense. I don't like to be led away captive. I will acknowledge those who are carried away captive from Judah, whom I have sent out of this place for their own good into the land of the Chaldeans, for I will set my eyes on them for good, and I will bring them back to this land.

I will build them and not pull them down. I will plant them and not pluck them up. Then I will give them a heart to know me, that I am the Lord, and they shall be my people, and I will be their God, for they shall return to me with their whole heart.

Now, let's contrast this for a moment with the basket of bad figs. Here we see in verse 8, And as the bad figs, which cannot be eaten, they are so bad. Surely thus says the Lord, So will I give up Zedekiah, the king of Judah, his princes, the residue of Jerusalem, who remain in this land, and those who dwell in the land of Egypt. I will deliver them into trouble, into all the kingdoms of the earth, for their harm, to be a reproach, and a byword, a taunt, and a curse, in all places where I shall drive them. And I will send the sword, the famine, and the pestilence among them, till they are consumed from the land that I gave them, and their fathers. It's a horrible contrast if you're in that bad fig basket, those who were there. This past April, while we were mostly confined to our homes and our neighborhoods, these passages in Jeremiah started jumping out to me because of what is contained here, and how they had come to life in a way that they had never come to life for me before. Because here we have God's people, who he drew out of Egypt. He sent them and placed them into the Promised Land, gave them a future and a hope, and yet went off the rails, the nation did. And yet God says, I'm going to still hold to my promises. I'm still going to care for my people, and I'm not going to let them go. Sure, there's some bad ones that are going to have to suffer the consequences of their choices and their actions, but the good ones, they're also going to struggle, son. They're going to be led away captive. They're going to be impacted by the choice of the whole nation. Yet, I won't forget them. Yet, I have a plan to bring them back, to build them up. And so, as I read through Jeremiah the spring, chapter 29 jumped out to me, and I shared it with the congregations in Ann Arbor, Detroit, and Flint from my house, as some of the pastors had to do, staring at a little pinhole camera on my laptop.

But it was encouraging to me to be able to share chapter 29, which we will look at now. Because with this context built, what does God then instruct Jeremiah to send in written form and to notify his people who were led away captive from everything they knew, their normal lives, what they thought brought them happiness and joy? They were led away. And then God says, in Jeremiah chapter 29, in verse 1, we have this recorded. Now, these are the words of the letter that Jeremiah wrote. 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. God had previously, as we read, told Jeremiah he would look after those who were taking them away, even though their situation obviously looked dire to them. So Jeremiah then told them these words directly from God 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. Wow, that's a harsh God. Come on. God caused this, and now we're supposed to be okay with it. Notice, whom I have caused to be carried away from Jerusalem to Babylon. He tells them, in verse 5, build houses and dwell in them, plant gardens and eat their fruit. Take wives and beget sons and daughters, and take wives for your sons and give to your daughters to husbands, so they may bear sons and daughters, that you may be increased there and not diminished. And seek the peace of the city where I have caused you to be carried away captive, and pray to the Lord for it. Pray for this nation. Pray for your neighborhoods. Pray for your leaders. He's saying, pray to the Lord for it, for in its peace you will have peace.

That's... I don't know what was going through the minds of those carried away captive, but I have a feeling that their first reaction, because they had human nature like we do, would have been to fight. This is not right. I am God's people. This is not where I want to go. So what can we do to stir up strife? We've got to take a stand. We're going to fight against these rulers. We're not going to just go there peacefully. It would have been my thought.

But God is about to tell them this is all part of His plan, and it's going to be okay for them. He was planting seeds of hope for His people so they could rest securely on Him. Verse 10. For thus says the Lord, after 70 years are completed at Babylon, I will visit you and perform my good word towards you and cause you to return to this place. For I know the thoughts that I think towards you, says the Lord, thoughts of peace and not of evil, to give you a future and a hope. 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 caused you to be carried away captive.

Even when a situation looks incredibly bad, God's plans for His people will continue and progress forward because it's all according to His will.

Because of the events that you and I have gone through this past year, the spring, the summer, each of us, God's people, have been looking forward, so forward, to these holy days that we've been able to observe together this fall.

I couldn't help those who are from the congregations in southeast Michigan. They saw it firsthand. I couldn't help but be excited in the sermons I was sharing before the feast. There was joy to know that these days were approaching, that there were lessons that God wanted to teach us, to draw out, things that we could do, that we would be together. Some of us were strangers until this feast. Some of us were reunited with people we hadn't seen for a year, eight years, for someone that we saw on the opening night that we met right here eight years ago in Cincinnati for the feast, reunited first night. There was joy in our hearts as we kept the Feast of Trumpets and then the Day of Atonement. It was almost one year to the day with we got us in a weak difference that it was I was last at those congregations sharing an in-person sermon because we in the spring kept everything online. The joy for me I think got a little bit annoying for the congregation. I couldn't help it. I was excited and I still am.

We have yearned for these days, possibly unlike any other Feast of Tabernacles we have ever observed in our life. These days bring us comfort to have the normal aspects of drawing together and keeping God's feast days. Nothing can happen in the world that would cause God's feast day to skip on the calendar, right? I push all kinds of things off on my calendar because things come up in life. This has got to get moved. God's Holy Days don't get moved. Regardless of what goes on in life, regardless of how many challenges or trials we go through, God's Spring Holy Days, Pentecost, the Fall Holy Days still come at the same time on the calendar year after year, and it provides a stabilizing presence for you and me. We, if we can, draw together, we keep these days. At a minimum, personally, we reflect on these days and what they mean and what they hold to God. And then God, through His Spirit, builds us up so then we continue forward with whatever challenge lies before us. But like the feast has done every year that it's been observed, this feast of tabernacles will come to a close not too many days from now. We will return to our homes and to our normal lives. School will resume for our kids and those in college. Work will resume to those of us who are not able to enjoy the blessing of retirement just yet. And we have yet to see what this winter, the truth to be told, what this winter will bring with the election and the current pandemic.

The Life Application Study Bible says this about Jeremiah 29 in verse 11, which we recently read. It says, we're all encouraged by a leader who stirs us to move ahead, someone who believes that we can do the task he has given and who will be with us all the way. God is that kind of leader. He knows the future and his plans for us are good and full of hope. As long as God, who knows the future, provides our agenda and goes with us as we fulfill his mission, we can have boundless hope. This does not mean that we will be spared pain, suffering, or hardship, but that God will see us through to a glorious conclusion. A glorious conclusion awaits for you and me.

Again, after the feast, we will return to a world that is lacking hope. Like the Jews in captivity, a situation that appears to be negative and not something they wanted, we have a responsibility to continue forward in our own Christian walk. It would be nice, in a way, to be removed and placed on a hill, placed in a mountain, taken someplace far away, where we didn't have to be part of the society around us. We didn't have to have the news reports that we're seeing on a daily basis come in. We didn't have to have the uncertainty of what this nation's future holds. It would be nice to be removed from all that, but we haven't. In the prayer that Christ offered before His crucifixion, He prayed for His disciples and, in turn, for us, knowing, like the Jews in Babylon, His disciples and us would have to continue living in an imperfect world. Let's turn to John 17.

John 17 and verse 6. It would be nice to be removed, but it's not part of God's plan. Our Lord and Savior shared this in John 17, verse 6. I have manifested Your name to the men whom You have given me out of the world. John 17 is Christ's prayer to the Father prior to Him being arrested and went away. So as part of this prayer, He says, I have manifested Your name to the men whom You have given me out of the world. They were Yours. You gave them to me, and they have kept Your word. Now they have known that all things which You have given me are from You. For I have given them to them the words which You have given me. And they have received them, and they have known surely that I came forth from You, and they have believed that You sent me. All this information that Christ shared with the disciples, all this information that we have in our Bibles are for our benefit as it was for the disciples' benefit when Christ shared it with them. And so we have been given this. This is the knowledge directly from God to You, directly to You. We have here in our Bibles. Christ goes on in this prayer in verse 9, I pray for them. I do not pray for the world, but for those whom You have given me, for they are Yours, and all mine are Yours, and Yours are mine, and I am glorified in them. Now I am no longer in the world, but these are in the world, and I come to You, Holy Father, keep them, or keep through Your name those whom You have given me, that they may be one as we are. Verse 14, I have given them Your word, and the world has hated them, because they are not of the world, just as I am not of the world. I do not pray that You should take them out of the world, but that You should keep them from the evil one. They are not of the world, just as I am not of the world. Mr. Ekemos Sermanet, he talked about being that light taken out from underneath the basket to be seen so that we can help, we can serve. Our example goes forth. If God took the disciples away at this time and said, I've taught you all these things, now let's go live here, and you can live out your life away from others with the gospel message of being able to spread like it did. If God removed us out of this world and said, I'm going to go and protect you, my people here, I'm going to place you here, what would our example be to those who need a hope, who need life, the words of life, who need to know why are you not losing your mind when a pandemic is going on all around us? I don't understand it because my anxiety is here, my kids are going crazy, being taught at school at home, my finances are a wreck, why are you not losing your mind? We couldn't be that example if we were taken out of the world, so we are here. So, you and I today can obviously draw encouragement from the passage in Jeremiah 29 and John 17. As those called by God, He loves us deeply, and He wants us to continue our relationship with Him in the face of challenges we encounter in this physical world. But I'd like to go back to Jeremiah chapter 29 and look at it from another angle in relation to this feast of tabernacles that we are observing. Let's go back. Jeremiah 29 again. We're going to pivot just a little bit because in this letter to the exiles, there are three promises related to this feast of tabernacles. Three promises that we can draw from this that fit with these days that we are keeping as well.

We're going to stay in Jeremiah, but we're going to flip around. So, if you want to put your ribbon, I'm going to do that now. So that normally I tell everybody to do it, and then I forget to, and then I get lost. So I'm putting my ribbon in Jeremiah 29 now because we're going to stay here, but flip around some as well and come back. Three promises. The first being the promise of a return to God. The promise of a return to God or restoration to God. This is in Jeremiah 29 and verse 10. For thus says the Lord, after 70 years are completed at Babylon, I will visit you and perform my good word towards you and cause you to return to this place. I will bring you back, God says. I will cause you to return to this place. There is a future time when mankind will be given an opportunity to have a homeland in the kingdom of God. Just over, just a bit over two weeks ago, we observed the Feast of Trumpets, which pictures the return of our Lord and Savior as a conquering king. Jesus will establish his rule over the nations of the earth and everyone will become subject to him. In the video yesterday, Isaiah 9 chapter 9 verses 6 and 7 were referenced or read by Mr. Kubik. I will go ahead. You can put Isaiah 9 verse 6 and 7 into your notes. Since we turned there yesterday, I'll just read it. For unto us a child is born, unto us a son is given, and the government will be upon his shoulder, and his name will be called Wonderful, Counselor, Mighty God, Everlasting Father, Prince of Peace, of the increase of his government and peace. There will be no end upon the throne of David and over his kingdom to order it and to establish it with judgment and justice. From that time forward, even forever, the zeal of the Lord of hosts will perform this. God will return to this earth. Jesus Christ, as a conquering king, will establish the kingdom of God on this earth so that everyone could be invited to that kingdom to be united together with our Father, to understand, to be taught, to live a new life.

When this occurs, those living on the earth through the millennium will have an opportunity to have a homeland unlike any that they ever had. Let's look at Isaiah 2. Turn to Isaiah 2, verses 2-4.

Isaiah 2, verses 2-4.

Now it shall come to pass in the latter days that the mountain of the Lord's house shall be established on the top of the mountains, and it shall be exalted above the hills, and all nations shall flow to it. Many people shall come and say, Come, let us go up to the mountain of the Lord, to the house of the God of Jacob. He will teach us his ways, and we shall walk in his path. For out of Zion shall go forth the law and the word of the Lord from Jerusalem. He shall judge between the nations and rebuke many people. They shall beat their swords into plowshares and their spears into pruning hooks. Nations shall not lift up sword against nation, neither shall they learn war anymore. This promise of a return to God, of a restoration between humanity and God, is one of the aspects we can draw from Jeremiah, chapter 29. The second is the promise of future prosperity. The promise of future prosperity. Let's flip back to Jeremiah 29, this time in verse 11.

Jeremiah 29, verse 11. For I know the thoughts I think towards you, says the Lord, thoughts of peace and not of evil, to give you a future and a hope.

As a parent, as parents fill this room, one of the things we desire to give to our children are blessings and share in good for their future. We want them to succeed in life. We want them to be healthy and to have fun. We desire they finish school and continue with some sort of additional education for their careers. We hope they will find a spouse to love and to have their own children and to build a family. And we hope they will seek to build a relationship with our Heavenly Father and live according to God's Word. Our Heavenly Father is no different, wanting good for our lives and for all of those who He will give an opportunity to know Him. He's looking forward to the time when these blessings and opportunities will become readily available in the kingdom of God to all alive. And God will bring prosperity that has never been seen since the Garden of Eden back to this earth. Turn with me to Isaiah 35 and verse 1.

Just one book back in our Bibles, Isaiah 35 and verse 1. The wilderness and the wasteland shall be glad for them, and the desert shall rejoice and blossom as the rose. Here's that future prosperity being described here in chapter 35, verse 2. It shall blossom abundantly and rejoice even with joy and singing. I can't wait to see the wilderness start to sing, whatever that is going to look like. The glory of Lebanon shall be given to it, the excellence of Carmel and Sharon. They shall see the glory of the Lord, the excellency of our God. Strengthen the weak hands and make firm the feeble knees. Say to those who are fear-hearted, Be strong, do not fear. Behold, your God will come with vengeance, with the recompense of God. He will come and save you. And then a beautiful passage that we look so forward to, the healing, physical healing of people. Verse 5. Then the eyes of the blind shall be opened, and the ears of the deaf shall be unstopped. Then the lame shall leap like a deer, and the tongues of the dumb sing. For water shall burst forth in the wilderness and streams in the desert. The parched ground shall become a pool, and the thirsty land springs of water, and the habitation of jackals, where each lay, there shall be grass with reeds and rushes.

I think if God, I believe he stopped with some of these inspirational passages because we would need a whole other book of encyclopedia-length books to describe all that God is going to bring to this earth. Our minds can't handle it. I'm actually thankful God has not shown me more because I really think my mind would explode. It's a fun task to do, to think through what the kingdom of God is going to look like, to see animals that will live and roam the way that God intended them to be, to see gardens. I'm a gardener, small-scale gardener, and there's nothing worse than when the bugs eat your vegetables and your plants. My heart was dashed many years ago when I grew my first watermelon plant. It was beautiful. It was green. The leaves are going out, the vines, and all of a sudden there's this little, about softball-sized, watermelon growing. I was excited. We're going to have a watermelon for Kelsey, our daughter. And then one day, as I'm walking out to our garden, it looks wilted, and I'm struggling because I thought it had plenty of water. And as I walk up to it, the vine that was growing down the middle of these leaves was gone. The leaves were still there. That little softball-sized watermelon was still there, but the vine, something, had come along and eaten daintily. The vine, all the way, it was gone. No more watermelons. Heart was broken. I used to think those bug bunny cartoons were funny. When bugs would come and take all those carrots out of the garden, it wasn't funny anymore.

Imagine the gardens that will produce a crop that we can't even contain. We won't have storehouses big enough to contain it. And as it says in Scripture, the planters will run over those reaping because it's so abundant and it's happening so quickly. This renewal that God wants to bring this promise is a future prosperity that you and I will get an opportunity to be part of and to see with our own eyes. Can't wait. There's a third promise from Jeremiah chapter 29, and this is the promise of renewed accessibility.

Renewed accessibility. Promise of renewed accessibility. Let's go back to Jeremiah 29 and verse 12 again. Jeremiah 29 verses 12 and 13, 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 of your heart. This promise of renewed accessibility to God. Again, during the millennium, all life will have an opportunity to enter into a relationship with God and God will make himself available. Let's go back to Isaiah chapter 25 again. It's amazing how many of these future prophecies are recorded here in Isaiah in just a different chapter. It's Isaiah 25 and verse 1 this time.

Isaiah 25 and verse 1, O Lord, you are my God, I will exalt you, I will praise your name, for you have done wonderful things. Your counsels of old are faithfulness and truth. Verse 4, for you have been a strength to the poor, a strength to the needy in his distress, a refuge from the storm, a shade from the heat. These promises, again, that God will be this to people who've never had that relationship with him. Verse 6, and in this mountain the Lord of hosts will make for all people a feast of choice pieces, a feast of wines on the leaves, of fat things, full of marrow, of well-refined wines on the leaves. And he will destroy on this mountain the surface of all the covering the cast over all people, and the veil that is spread over all the nations, that veil that is so heavy, so dense, because they have been blinded by Satan. Society, our neighbors, our co-workers, our relatives, in some cases, blinded by this heavy veil that has been draped over this earth as they have been blinded by his truth. He says again in verse 7, and he will destroy on this mountain the surface of the covering cast over all the people, and the veil that is spread over all the nations. He will swallow up death forever, and the Lord will wipe away tears from all faces. The rebuke of his people he shall take away from all the earth, for the Lord has spoken. And it will be said in that day, Behold, this is our God. We have waited for him, and he will save us. This is the Lord. We have waited for him. We will be glad and rejoice in his salvation. And let's again turn back to Jeremiah, but this time, chapter 31. If you have your bookmark in 29, you're almost there. Jeremiah 31 verse 31. Behold, the days are coming, says the Lord, when I will make a new covenant with the house of Israel and with the house of Judah. Not according to the covenant I made with their fathers in that day that I took them by the hand to lead them out of the land of Egypt, my covenant which they broke, though I was husband to them, says the Lord. But this is the covenant I will make with the house of Israel after those days, says the Lord. I will put my law in their minds and write it on their hearts, and I will be their God, and they shall be my people. No more shall every man teach his neighbor and every man his brother, saying, Know the Lord, for they shall all know me, from the least of them to the greatest of themselves the Lord. For I will forgive their iniquity and their sin, I will remember no more. Another beautiful passage to be completely fulfilled in the future. Three promises. The promise of a return to God, of restoration to God. The promise of future prosperity. The promise of renewed accessibility. And then to emphasize the promise in verse 10 of Jeremiah 29, God again repeats the promise of restoration to him in verse 14. Jeremiah 29 and this time in verse 14. He re-emphasized this promise in verse 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 caused you to be carried away captive. On either end of these four verses that we have re-looked at this morning is captured a promise of restoration back to God.

This letter that the prophet Jeremiah was inspired to share with those exiled to Babylon gave them a sense of direction and hope that God was still with them even though the future looked bleak. The letter should do the same for us today as we continue forward in a society that continues to walk further away from God on a daily basis. But as we read, God continues to be directly involved in each of our lives and the direction our paths will go. And remember what he said in Jeremiah 29 verse 11, For I know the thoughts I think towards you, says the Lord, thoughts of peace and not of evil to give you a future and a hope. It's this hope that we have in God that brought us through the spring and through the summer and brought us to the Feast of Tabernacles. We can be together. We can rejoice right now, today, and the remainder of these days ahead because our hope is strong and secure. Ultimately, God has us in his hands. And at this Feast, it is the time to focus on his hope. Regardless of the situations that are going on around us, regardless of the situations that are affecting your life today, God's plan is bigger than anything in this world, and his plan will get us through anything that will come. As we wrap up, let's turn to Romans 5 and verse 1. Romans 5 and verse 1. We have a beautiful passage captured here by the Apostle Paul to give us a strength to go forward in the hope that we have in Christ.

Romans 5 verse 1, Therefore, have ye been justified by faith, we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ, through whom also we have access by faith into this grace in which we stand and rejoice in hope of the glory of God. And not only that, but we also glory in tribulations, knowing that tribulation produces perseverance and perseverance character and character hope. Now, sometimes I've read that passage and got to the hope part and felt a little like it was building up to something really cool. Hope, when I was younger, that kind of left an empty feeling like, oh, hope, yay, I'll have hope. But notice, I think Paul kind of figured that too, because notice the next verse, verse 5, Now hope does not disappoint, because the love of God has been poured out in our hearts by the Holy Spirit, which was given to us as we continue through our struggles, as we continue through our daily battles, as we continue through the things that we go through. They do build perseverance, and they build character, and they ultimately build hope. I didn't get that until I had to battle through some of our own challenges in life. I didn't get that the hope would be what I needed to move me forward, that when everything seems out of control, and I'm trying to continue to go forward in a strong way, that that hope would be that support that I needed to continue getting up daily and moving towards the kingdom of God.

And he goes on in verse 6, For when we were still without strength in time, Christ died for the ungodly. For scarcely for a righteous man will one die, yet perhaps for a good man someone would even dare to die. But God demonstrates his own love toward us, that while we were still sinners, Christ died for us. Much more than having now been justified by his blood, we shall be saved from wrath through him. For if we were enemies, for if when we were enemies, we were reconciled to God through the death of his Son, much more having been reconciled, we shall be saved by his life. And not only that, but we also rejoice in God through our Lord Jesus Christ, through whom we have now received the reconciliation. So we will go forward. We will continue to look to God for help. We will seek to allow his Spirit to work powerfully in our lives. And we will remember that we have a future and a hope. For one last scripture, turn with me to Romans 15 and verse 13. A few chapters forward. Romans 15 and verse 13. I want to make this a memory verse of mine. It's not yet. I don't have it word by word memorized. I want to make it one. Romans 15 verse 13. Now may the God of hope fill you with all joy and peace in believing that you may abound. And that word abound means to overflow, to have an abundance, to excel, to exceed, that you may abound in hope by the power of the Holy Spirit. What a beautiful passage that we're left with here in Romans 15 verse 13. You have a future and a hope. The world has a future and a hope. And may we continue to go forward in this hope that God has placed into our hearts. Have a wonderful rest of your feast of tabernacles.