I Beg Your Pardon. I Never Promised You A Hanging Garden.

[Apologiaphoenix]

Are we misreading the verse?

Link

[mikewhitney]

I sometimes get flack when I try to remind people to examine a text in light of the people being addressed.

[mikewhitney]

I sometimes get flack when I try to remind people to examine a text in light of the people being addressed.

Or people just give me a blank look, as if I were talking about some esoteric concept.

[Christianbookworm]

The prophet books scared me for a moment as a girl, until I realized that it wasn't directed to me! Reading comprehension is important.

[KingsGambit]

The prophet books scared me for a moment as a girl, until I realized that it wasn't directed to me! Reading comprehension is important.

They should still bother us, but not in the intense personalized manner you're talking about.

[Christianbookworm]

They should still bother us, but not in the intense personalized manner you're talking about.

Yeah, it still is awful what happened to the people as a result. Seige war fare is horrible. And the spiritual adultery is heartbreaking.

[mikewhitney]

Jesus had been sent to stop this cycle of spiritual adultery. He was sent with the gift of eternal righteousness to those who call upon him.

[One Bad Pig]

I somewhat disagree with your point here. As God is faithful in his covenants, and the faithful Christian is party to a covenant with God, yes the passage applies to faithful Christians undergoing difficult times. God is faithful to those who are faithful (and even those who are faithless for a time but return to the faith). Even if we're going through hard times, God is faithful and will reward us for remaining faithful to Him - whether in this present life or in the life to come. While the verse is not literally about us, I see no problem with using it to encourage a brother or sister in the faith who is going through hard times.

[Apologiaphoenix]

My problem with it is it takes one snippet and ignores the rest. The principle can be better illustrated in other passages, like Romans 8.

[KingsGambit]

I somewhat disagree with your point here. As God is faithful in his covenants, and the faithful Christian is party to a covenant with God, yes the passage applies to faithful Christians undergoing difficult times. God is faithful to those who are faithful (and even those who are faithless for a time but return to the faith). Even if we're going through hard times, God is faithful and will reward us for remaining faithful to Him - whether in this present life or in the life to come. While the verse is not literally about us, I see no problem with using it to encourage a brother or sister in the faith who is going through hard times.

I think the general principle can be used for individual encouragement but in my experience it more often seems to be presented as a blanket promise (like one sermon I saw a couple years ago that presented it as such a promise applicable for all Christians). I agree with Nick that it hardly seems necessary when Romans 8 is also available.

[Christianbookworm]

The school of hard knocks is also a part of God's plan, right?

[One Bad Pig]

My problem with it is it takes one snippet and ignores the rest. The principle can be better illustrated in other passages, like Romans 8.

My problem with your problem is that it can be equally applicable to taking a snippet of Romans 8 and ignoring the rest. The resolution is not to use another passage, but to look at the current passage in context.

[Apologiaphoenix]

Right. Romans 8 in its entirety is answering about who will deliver from the body of death. It's about the victory that all Christians have in Christ and the relevant part I'm referring to is "All things work together for good to those who love the Lord." That is the recipients. Those who love the Lord.

We're not the recipients in Jeremiah 29.