“I know the plans I have for you,” declares the LORD, “plans to prosper you and not to harm you, plans to give you hope and a future” (Jer. 29:11).God is speaking to all people here about his plans for them. Many will think God’s plans for them is to harm them, to bring them to ruin, to destroy them. When we see God through sin we can only see the God of wrath. The righteous judge who will bring his condemnation down on us. We know this means all of our ways and thoughts are going to lead to our own ruin. Being sinful human beings we do not want to take the blam for this so we turn on God. We curse God demanding to know why his plan for us is so evil. Why God’s would want to do us harm? But in this we ignore what God says his planned for us. God has plans which in clude a future. A futurue which does not include just the next week, year or ninty years. God future for us is an eternal future. In the midst of our sins God has laid plans for us which he will carry out on our behalf. This plan is what the whole of scriptures is about. Scritpure lays out the plan of salvation which God has for all of us. We start in Gen. 3:15 with the promise of a seed, and offspring, who will crush the head of enemy Satan. We can move through the Old Testament and see over and over again the promise of the Messiah who will come and save his people from their sins. Finally, on the cross we see this plan carried out. Christ’s death on the cross finally gives us the future which God has promised here in Jeremiah. God then delivers this salvation to us through the Word, Baptism and the Lord’s Supper. Here the work of Christ on the cross is taken from the cross and given to each one of us. Here we are given the hope of knowing the plans for which God has for each one of us is forgiveness, salvation and life. Life eternal with God in heaven. Here is the future which God has planned for us.  Your servant in Christ,Pastor Welton