Move On

Build ye houses, and dwell in them;
and plant gardens, and eat the fruit of them;
Take ye wives, and beget sons and daughters...
And seek the peace of the city whither I have caused you to be carried away captives, and pray unto the LORD for it:
for in the peace thereof shall ye have peace. Jer 29:5-7

What odd advice this is. These are the instructions God give to His people when they are about to go into captivity in Babylon. Jerusalem has been destroyed, and those people who are not captured will die of disease or famine. And God tells the remainder of the people to just go on with their lives!

And yet, what good advice this is. The captives have no choice about where they will live. They cannot go back to their old lives. Instead, they must go on; they must build new lives; they must plant, and grow crops and eat the harvest in a new land. They must raise families in a new place, different from where the parents grew up.

But the most extraordinary part of this advice is for the Israelites to seek the peace of the city and to pray for it. The city is the dwelling of their captors; the city of Babylon. They will live among their conquerors, and still they should pray for these people. But this is necessary if they are truly to build new lives. They cannot spend their energy seeking revenge or expecting a quick return to Jerusalem. So if they are to prosper, they must settle down and make new lives. They must move on to their new lives and seek peace.

Although these instructions are given to a nation just destroyed in war, it is applicable to our lives. Lives do not remain static, and when our lives do change, we must move on. In response to disappointment, loss, or sorrow, we must build new lives. We must plant where we are, and grow and harvest, not where we wish we were, but where we actually are. We cannot delay in building families because we are looking back to an old life. And wherever we are, we must seek the peace of that place. If we do this, we too will have peace. We too, must move on.