Yet the Redeemer is strong: the LORD Almighty is his name, He will vigorously defend their cause so that he may bring rest to their land, but unrest to those who live in Babylon.
~ Jeremiah 50:34
Hi James and Ellen –
Would you to like to know what you will be doing when you are as old as your dad and ma? Would you like to know what the world will be like when you get to be as old as your grandpaa and grandmaa? When grandpaa was your age, he did not know what he would do when he got big. If grandpaa’s dad and ma had told grandpaa when he was your age that he would be a missionary one day and that he would live in Bolivia for ten years and in Guatemala for over six years, he would not have had a clue what they were saying. The only place that grandpaa knew anything about when he was a kid was right around where he lived with his dad and ma. When grandpaa was about your age Ellen, an awful war ended. People were very happy when World War II finally came to an end. World War II made a lot of families very sad when these families had a family member killed during the fighting. Your dad wanted to be a soldier. Your dad had to have all his hair cut off when he joined the marines. It is good to be a soldier. A soldier’s commitment is to protect his or her country. Most guys and gals though think that wars are bad. When God allowed bad to have an active role on planet Earth, guys, gals and kids began doing bad things. Because God always allows bad to be an influencer on planet Earth, God knows that every single guy, gal and kid will at times go whacky and do something bad. Each big person – and each kid, who God chose and who He designed a life plan for before He created planet Earth has a moment in their lives when God will lead them to realize their badness so that He might direct them to know what it is to live with hope. The day that a big person – like grandpaa, or a kid – like you, is led by God to want to always do good instead of wanting to always do bad, God adopts the big person – or the kid, into His growing family of adopted kids. Even though God never stops thinking of His adopted kids as being absolutely perfect, God never stops reminding them to tell Him that they are sorry for having again done something bad – just like your dad and ma asks you to tell them that you are sorry when you have gotten in trouble with them again.
God uses the Bible to tell its’ readers what He is going to allow to unfold on planet Earth. God has the Bible teach what the future is going to be like. Something that God teaches through the Bible is that He is always going to allow warring. Per what the Bible says, there will always be countries and/or people groups that will do everything possible to completely wipe out other countries and/or people groups. God over four thousand years ago explicitly directed a couple – Abram and Sarai, to move from Mesopotamia – which was where they were living, to a small country called Canaan. The countries of Syria, Iraq and Iran today make up what was once known as Mesopotamia. Israel’s land area today was once Canaan. After Abram became settled in Canaan, some Mesopotamian kings got together to do a raid in Canaan. These kings and their conscripts stole animals from the people who were living in Canaan. These bad guys also took with them Abram’s nephew – Lot, who had moved to Canaan with Abram. When Abram found out what the Mesopotamia kings and their recruits had done, he followed the bad guys until he caught up with them. Abram won the ensuing fight against these bad guys – rescuing Lot and taking back all the animals that had been taken. Grandpaa thinks that because of what Abram did to the Mesopotamia kings, that this is one of the reasons that especially Iraq and Iran have an inherent, deep seated DNA driven hatred for Israel today. Israel, Iraq and Iran are always in the news. Israel is the good country; Iraq and Iran are the bad countries.
Even though God allowed the country which is now Iraq to exist, God was not happy with the country. When Abram was alive, the Mesopotamia region – which is now Iraq, was known as Babylonia. God had guys – who were called prophets, for years tell everyone who lived in Israel and in Babylonia what was going to happen in the future. Hardly anyone ever believed what God had these guys prophesy. Have your dad or your ma show you on a map where Israel and where Iraq are. Iraq and Israel are not very big countries to have gotten the kind of attention that they have gotten over the 4000 years or so of their existence. One of the prophets – Jeremiah, in Jeremiah 50, talks about how God sees Israel as the good country and how He sees Babylonia as the bad country. Jeremiah explains how God will one day finally have enough of Babylonia being bad. God wanted His people – who were the guys, gals and kids who lived in Israel, to know Him better. This is one reason God allowed Babylonia to be for years really mean to the guys, gals and kids who were living in Israel. Jeremiah says in verse 34 that “Yet the Redeemer is strong: the LORD Almighty is his name, He will vigorously defend their cause so that he may bring rest to their land, but unrest to those who live in Babylon”. Babylon was Babylonia’s capitol. The older you get the more bad things you will see and hear about taking place everywhere. It is sometimes easy for a kid to forget that he or she has more than one father. Every kid has an earthly dad. Every kid also has the prospect of having a heavenly Father. God is the heavenly Father. God is who Jeremiah says is strong. God will always fight for the guys, gals and kids who He has adopted. These guys, gals and kids are those who know they have more than one father. At the same time, the guys, gals and kids who do not know that they have more than one father, will never be happy. These guys, gals and kids will always try to make those who are happy unhappy. The peace that is to be pursued is not found from not having wars; real peace comes from knowing that God as the heavenly Father takes care of His children. No one needs to ever wonder about the future. What God had Jeremiah write would happen to Babylon happened.
Jeremiah 50
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