IBS Application for Jeremiah 31:2-3

“Thus says the Lord: ‘The people who survived the sword found grace in the wilderness; when Israel sought for rest, the Lord appeared to him from far away. I have loved you with an everlasting love; therefore I have continued my faithfulness to you.’”

I know that this is perhaps a little different from my typical choice of passage, but it is nonetheless the passage that has spoken the most to me recently. I will do my best to communicate why.

I am a bit fuzzy on the details of which specific instance of people being in the wilderness God is referring to in the first verse here, but for the purposes of what I got out of it, it makes little difference. The point is that God is saying to Israel that being in the wilderness was grace to them. I believe that a similar point can be made in regards to our lives; the spiritual deserts in our lives are not always bad for us. God can do amazing things through dry seasons and times that we spend in “the wilderness”. Lately, I’ve found that the most grace I’m given is received in the midst of times I spend in “the desert”.

Secondly, God is always faithful to appear in the midst of our troubles. We see this in how it is declared that the Lord appeared to Israel from far away when they needed rest. It goes on to say that because God loves Israel with an everlasting love, He will not cease to continue being faithful to them. Again, this is applicable to our own experience. How often is it that when we are in the most need of aid, God always shows up at the exact moment we need it? It is as if He appears on the top of a nearby hill as we do battle with our foes, on a war horse with a great host of forces from heaven to surround and destroy our enemies for us. And this always happens when the battle seems so dire. But He always finds us and rescues us from trouble.

It is because He loves us that He will always be faithful to us. It is no small thing to think about how often He has shown the world grace even before the Incarnation, and to see how much more grace has been poured out on our account by His own blood when Christ came down here and died for us all. If He, having established so many prophecies and plans in preparation of the coming of Christ and fulfilling each and every one of them, all on our behalf, why would He cease to remain faithful to us now? Indeed, in seeing how He comes to us when we need Him in the midst of our troubles, we see His faithfulness and His love on display.

I believe that what stands out to me the most here is what God declares about His faithfulness and His love here. It is because He has loved us first that He continues to be faithful, even when we are disobedient and unfaithful to Him. I have done all sorts of things that only prove that I am incapable of being faithful to anything except unfaithfulness apart from Him, yet He still loves me with a love that never dies, and He continues to go on fulfilling the promises He’s made me as a result of His love for me. That is a truth that absolutely breaks me.


Knowing that in the day of trouble, and even in my faithlessness, that I can still call upon Him and know that He will come to my rescue as He promised He would do for Israel is the most uplifting thing I’ve heard all week. As such, my application will be to give thanks to the Lord for His faithfulness and His love over the next couple of days, and continue to pour out my cries for help to Him in this time, when I so desperately need Him to be near to me and know that He is here when I call upon Him.

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