{"id":8176,"date":"2020-05-04T16:54:17","date_gmt":"2020-05-04T20:54:17","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/blogs.faithlafayette.org\/church\/?p=8176"},"modified":"2020-05-04T16:54:17","modified_gmt":"2020-05-04T20:54:17","slug":"blessings-from-the-exile","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blogs.faithlafayette.org\/church\/blessings-from-the-exile\/","title":{"rendered":"Blessings from the Exile"},"content":{"rendered":"

In 2008, the Navy sent our family on what we expected to be a grand adventure. We had orders to serve for two years in Naples, Italy. In our minds, we would be following the Griswold Family on our way\u00a0to<\/span>\u00a0a European Vacation that would build memories for a lifetime. \"\"With our four kids and a ton of luggage, we landed in Naples not knowing anyone and not knowing enough of the language\u00a0<\/span>to\u00a0<\/span>even get ourselves from the airport<\/span>\u00a0to a hotel<\/span>. We were very thankful for the families at our new command who blessed us and welcomed us. The adventure had begun. You could say we were praising God as we though<\/span>t<\/span>\u00a0about His promise\u00a0<\/span>when He said<\/span>,<\/span>\u00a0\u201cI know the plans I have for you<\/span>\u2026\u201d<\/span>\u00a0(Jer<\/span>.<\/span>\u00a029:11)<\/span>\u00a0\u00a0<\/span>\u00a0<\/span>\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

I am confident you can already see my problem. My plans looked great to me, but my plans were not God\u2019s plans.\u00a0I may have been looking\u00a0forward to my\u00a0\u201cEuropean Vacation,\u201d but\u00a0God\u2019s will for our time overseas had a far different purpose.\u00a0The\u00a0verse that I wanted to claim for myself from Jeremiah held a very different meaning\u00a0to its first readers.\u00a0The plan in Jeremiah\u00a029:11 began with 70 years in Babylon,\u00a0far from the familiar living of Jerusalem. God\u2019s plan for our family did not last 70 years, but it did include a time\u00a0far from the familiar living to which we were accustomed.\u00a0As such, today when I look back on our tour in Italy, my wife and I refer to it\u00a0affectionately\u00a0as\u00a0our exile.<\/span>\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

\"\"Let me explain. We spent the first eight weeks with our family of six in a small two-bedroom hotel room with a kitchen barely capable of cooking for all of us at one time. Our inability to speak Italian meant that we were at the mercy of our local hosts in guiding us to housing. After several trips with a guide driving 160 kph, yes, 100 mph, with my family in the van across the Neapolitan countryside, we chose a home to rent in a small community 40 minutes away from the US Naval facilities. The good news was that we were homeschooling the kids. The bad news was that we would be searching the internet using dial-up (if you remember the soothing sounds of the computer modem connecting). <\/span><\/p>\n

\"\"The good news was that we were all together. The bad news was that we could barely travel anywhere together because a family of six was considered enormous in Italy. The good news was that our Honda Mini Van arrived after three months. The bad news was that it might as well have been a full-sized Hummer as we could barely fit down many of the beautiful Italian winding streets. Oh, and did I mention the trash strike?<\/span>\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

I can see things very differently today, but at the time I could only think about how hard things were and how slow it was to make anything happen. It felt as if every ounce of convenience had been stripped away from our lives and the difficulty meter had been cranked to an 11.\u00a0\u201cFor I know the plans that I have for you\u2026\u201d My plan was an adventure with the world as the classroom for our kids. God\u2019s plan was quite different.<\/span>\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

\"\"After we finally\u00a0got past\u00a0the challenges of\u00a0setting up a home and\u00a0learning to live in circumstances vastly different from our old home in Virginia, God continued to turn up the dial. About the time we had settled, God let us know that\u00a0He was increasing our tribe once again. We were expecting #5 and due to health concerns, we were limited\u00a0even\u00a0further,\u00a0causing us to stay at home\u00a0far away from the things that were familiar to us.\u00a0Every time I tried to\u00a0get control of something to restore some level of \u201cnormalcy,\u201d I found again and again that I could not get what I wanted just because I wanted it.\u00a0I was frustrated and I would remain that way until I stopped\u00a0trying to do it on my own.\u00a0<\/span>\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

\"\"The testimony of what God did for us in the months to come could fill pages upon pages. To keep it simple, the closeness of our living, without the pressure reliefs which we relied on in the past, brought my own life, my marriage,\u00a0and my family from a simmer to a\u00a0boil. The idols of my heart began to fall off the shelves day after day causing me to first react in ways that raised the heat particularly for my wife.\u00a0By God\u2019s grace,\u00a0only under these circumstances\u00a0did\u00a0I begin to see the idols\u00a0on which\u00a0I had been relying. With convenience stripped away, my idols could no longer satisfy.<\/span>\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

The reason I can speak affectionately about our time in Italy is because of the work that the Lord did in my heart during these years.\u00a0Only after I could see the darkness in my own heart,\u00a0did\u00a0He open the door\u00a0to recognize and resolve hard issues that had been barriers between myself,\u00a0my wife,\u00a0and my family.\u00a0After\u00a0God\u00a0showed me\u00a0where my path was leading,\u00a0He opened the doors for us to recognize parenting issues\u00a0and marriage issues\u00a0that we needed to change to prevent greater issues within\u00a0our\u00a0family. Most importantly,\u00a0only\u00a0after\u00a0He showed me my self-reliance and desire for convenience,\u00a0did\u00a0God demonstrate\u00a0to me my far deeper need for\u00a0Him.<\/span>\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

\"\"<\/p>\n

Are you in \u201cExile\u201d?<\/span>\u00a0<\/span><\/h2>\n

As you look at your circumstances today, are you feeling like you are in exile? Do you feel as though you have lost the connections and conveniences that provided\u00a0<\/span>comfort, j<\/span>oy<\/span>,<\/span>\u00a0and peace in the past? I imagine that this may be the case for many of us today. I do not tell the story of our\u00a0<\/span>\u201c<\/span>European vacation<\/span>\u201d gone bad<\/span>\u00a0<\/span>as a<\/span>\u00a0badge of honor or\u00a0<\/span>because we did so many things right, but rather to reflect on the goodness of God as\u00a0<\/span>H<\/span>e walked with us in our \u201cexile.\u201d One day when we look back on these days of \u201cexile\u201d into our homes, will we look back to tell stories of how hard it was for us? Or will we be sharing a testimony of God\u2019s goodness especially in a time<\/span>\u00a0when<\/span>\u00a0we had very little.<\/span>\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

I can see the goodness of God\u2019s plan for our family in Italy, but it was hard to see at the time.\u00a0\u00a0Today as\u00a0we\u00a0look at\u00a0our\u00a0family\u2019s\u00a0second exile\u00a0with the whole family packed into the house\u00a0again,\u00a0based on the \u201cstay-at-home\u201d order, I\u00a0am still uncertain\u00a0as\u00a0to\u00a0the nature of God\u2019s plan for our family.\u00a0But\u00a0God has enabled us to respond differently because we can trust in the goodness of His plan even when we cannot see the outcome.\u00a0In order to\u00a0consider how we can see the blessings of\u00a0exile;\u00a0we need to look at\u00a0how God called His people to live during an exile.<\/span>\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

When God sent word to the exiles in Babylon, before He said,\u00a0\u201cI know the plans I have for you\u2026\u201d, He\u00a0told\u00a0them up front that their exile would last 70 years before\u00a0the promised restoration.\u00a0With that promise in mind, the\u00a0exiled people of Israel had a choice. They could choose to bide their time and gut it out,\u00a0waiting for\u00a0the promised restoration,\u00a0or they could follow God\u2019s word\u00a0guiding them on how to live even in a time of exile.<\/span>\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

If we choose the first, it\u00a0would\u00a0look a lot like my early months\u00a0in Italy. I lacked contentment and peace because I was continually fighting for the\u00a0conveniences and perceived needs that I had lost. During this time, I was missing the blessings of\u00a0what God wanted to do in my life.\u00a0\u00a0<\/span>\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

Instead, Jeremiah\u00a0told Israel to build houses, plant gardens,\u00a0and grow their\u00a0families.\u00a0God was\u00a0calling\u00a0the exiles to be a blessing to the people of Babylon.\u00a0In other words, live contently and love those around you.\u00a0Only\u00a0after\u00a0I chose to be content in my circumstances\u00a0was I able to receive the blessings that came in a deeper relationship with God, a stronger marriage,\u00a0and greater joy in our family.<\/span>\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

Jeremiah\u2019s exhortation to the exiles from Jerusalem can also guide us to how we\u00a0might find the blessings in the exile\u00a0of COVID-19\u00a0as compared to simply gutting it out.\u00a0God called Israel to\u00a0live life and seek to be a blessing to those around them, including their captors. How can we do that\u00a0with COVID-19 as our captor?<\/span>\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n