Exile
/For thus says our God: Only when Babylon’s seventy years are completed will I visit you. -Jeremiah 29:10
In an unusual twist, for the next three Sundays, our first reading will be the same each week - Jeremiah 29:10-14. It’s the passage we’ve chosen as our focus for the giving season at St. James this year, which we’re naming “A Future with Hope.” The passage centers around the themes of exile, return and God’s plans for us going forward.
We are certainly well acquainted with the feeling of exile these days after a year and a half of pandemic life. We find ourselves wondering: When, oh when, will things return to normal? Will anything ever be the same? And we still have no clear answer. We hear Jeremiah’s prophecy to the exiled Israelites, “Only when Babylon’s seventy years are completed will I visit you.” Seventy years? In other words, exile is not over yet and there’s a long way to go. But that’s not what any of us want to hear.
How are we being called to live in a time of exile? How can we function day to day when the future is so unknown and the way so unclear? It’s like we’re wandering around in the desert with no oasis in sight. We pine for the past and often dread the future. We could complain about the discomfort exile is causing and seek someone to blame. But our faith asks us to practice hope instead. We’re called to lean into the hope of God - accepting that there is a really long view beyond our vision, and that we can trust that God has it in hand. We’re called to trust that as long as we stick close to Christ and each other we’ll be led forward step by step through even the valley of the shadow of death.. We believe that we can live fully and abundantly, right where we are, no matter the circumstances with God’s help. It’s can be really tough in exile. But with God nothing is impossible. We already have a future with hope.
The healing team and I had a bible study on Sunday on the story about Elisha and the Shunammite woman (2 Kings 4:8-37). The Shunammite woman keeps attesting that “It is all right,” even as she is struck by tragedy. She is grieving, she is terrified, she is struggling, but under it all, she trusts that God is there. Our church is a community of faithful friends that remind us that despite the chaos and turmoil our world is going through, in God it is all right. That, in the famous words of St. Julian of Norwich, “All shall be well, and all shall be well and all manner of things shall be well.” And as long as we strive to love one another as Christ loves us, it will be all right.
How have you felt exiled in the past few years? How have you dealt with the continuing disappointments caused by the pandemic’s persistence and the many life altering changes it has wrought? How has St. James helped you get through this rough time day to day?
