08/28/2026
Today's reading is Jeremiah 33-37.
Here is my takeaway. What is yours?
There are many Bible verses that are regularly quoted by Bible believing people who do not take the time to think about the context in which those verses are found. As such, they miss some of the richness of the Bible. For instance, consider this verse from today's reading:
"Call to Me and I will answer you, and I will tell you great and mighty things, which you do not know." (Jeremiah 33:3)
Some people have affectionately referred to this verse as God's telephone number.
What does this verse mean? it is merely an Old Testament version of James 1:5?
"But if any of you lacks wisdom, let him ask of God Who gives to all liberally and without reproach, and it will be given to him."
Well, kind of, but there was some stuff going on in Jeremiah's day that makes the connection between the two even stronger than one might imagine.
Whenever you read a verse, you need to consider the context. Normally, this can be found by reading the paragraph before the one the verse is in, the paragraph the verse is in, and the paragraph after the paragraph the verse is in.
Here is what that would look like for this verse:
Then the word of the LORD came to Jeremiah the second time, while he was still aconfined in the court of the guard, saying,
2 “Thus says the LORD who made the earth, the LORD who formed it to establish it, the LORD is His name,
3 ‘Call to Me and I will answer you, and I will tell you great and mighty things, which you do not know.’
4 “For thus says the LORD God of Israel concerning the houses of this city, and concerning the houses of the kings of Judah which are broken down to make a defense against the siege ramps and against the sword,
5 ‘While they are coming to fight with the Chaldeans and to fill them with the corpses of men whom I have slain in My anger and in My wrath, and I have hidden My face from this city because of all their wickedness:
6 ‘Behold, I will bring to it health and healing, and I will heal them; and I will reveal to them an abundance of peace and truth.
7 ‘I will restore the fortunes of Judah and the fortunes of Israel and will rebuild them as they were at first.
8 ‘I will cleanse them from all their iniquity by which they have sinned against Me, and I will pardon all their iniquities by which they have sinned against Me and by which they have transgressed against Me.
9 ‘It will be to Me a name of joy, praise and glory before all the nations of the earth which will hear of all the good that I do for them, and they will fear and tremble because of all the good and all the peace that I make for it.’
New American Standard Bible: 1995 Update (La Habra, CA: The Lockman Foundation, 1995), Je 33:1–9.
First, notice that the setting is that Jeremiah is in prison. Why was he in prison? He was in prison for speaking the word of the Lord.
We also see from the context that Nebuchadnezzar's army was surrounding Jerusalem after victories in surrounding cities and countries. God had already told Jeremiah that Jerusalem would fall.
So, here is Jeremiah's dilemma:
Would they leave him in prison to die of starvation? Would they kill him as they were being invaded because he had been the voice of God to tell them it was coming? Would the Babylonians kill him to save them the trouble of feeding him when they took over? Would he die in a fire as they burned the house to the ground?
All this and more could have been going through his mind and heart. God knew that and how did God respond? He did not chide him for the fears or doubts. He invited him to pray and promised to answer.
God went further to remind Jeremiah of the hope that God had promised all throughout the writing. He was going to punish the sin, that was sure, but He was also going to reclaim and restore.
These things were great and Jeremiah had no way of seeing what this might look like or how it would come about, but God was promising it would.
Now, for us today. The context says that when we face trials for standing up for Jesus, we can know for sure that God is still in control, that He has a plan, that He has not forsaken us, that we can pray, and that one day, we will see how God worked it all out.
Now, is that how you have seen people use this verse?
There is no reading for tomorrow as this is a Monday through Friday reading plan. Monday's reading, Lord willing, will be Jeremiah 38-41.
