If God Promised It Yesterday, Are You Confident It Applies Today?

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Eliminate the Insecurity by Analyzing His Promises With 3 Questions

Years ago, I had a friend who often quoted a verse in the Bible saying, “All of the promises of God are yea and amen.” This was a loose paraphrase of 2 Corinthians 2:20. When he quoted it, people would respond enthusiastically, lifting their hands to God, praising and shouting. We all like the idea that every promise in God’s Word can be counted on and applied to us. But is that true? Can we be confident in every promise in God’s Word?

Don’t let me scare you away. Don’t think I am going to dispel everyone’s faith in God’s Word! I am not. But I am going to share a method I learned for analyzing every promise of God to see if it applies to us. Using this method, we can be confident that many of God’s promises from yesterday are applicable to us today. But if our analysis establishes that the verse does not apply to us today, we can study it further to glean a biblical principle from the promise.

What is a promise? It is “a declaration or assurance that one will do a particular thing or that a particular thing will happen.” (Google Dictionary, accessed June 24, 2021, promise definition – Google Search.) When we read the Bible and find God declaring that He will do something or that some event will happen, that is a promise of God. We find such promises throughout the old and new testaments. Some of them are wonderful promises, and some are terrifying promises, but they are promises, just the same.

Ask 3 Questions to Analyze the Application of God’s Promises to You

Let’s start with the three questions and then use a silly example. Then we will analyze a more complex example of a promise many people cling to in difficult times in their lives. Again, I am not going to strip you of your faith in this precious promise. Instead, I am going to help you gain confidence in applying it to your life. I will do so by comparing it to a contrasting verse.

Here are the three questions:

1. Is the promise universal or individual?
2. Is the promise for the present time?
3. Is the promise conditional or unconditional?

The promise we will use for our silly example appear in Luke 1:31 and 35. In verse 31 the angel Gabriel proclaimed to a virgin named Mary that she would conceive a child and name Him Jesus. In verse 35, Gabriel explains she will get pregnant by the Holy Ghost coming upon her. These are promises because someone is proclaiming what will happen in the future.

Why is this a silly example? Because no woman in her right mind today would claim a promise that she would become pregnant by the Holy Ghost. Why not? Let’s look at the three questions to find out.

1. Is the promise universal or individual? This promise is obviously for a single individual, Mary.
2. Is the promise for the present time? No. According to Galatians 4:4, God sent His Son when the fulness of time had come. It was a single point in time God had prepared for this great event. The promise is not meant to be applied to us today.
3. Is the promise conditional or unconditional? This promise was conditional and Mary had already met all of the conditions before the promise was made – she was a virgin who was favored by God.

This promise clearly does not apply to us today. Although I have never heard anyone seriously claim as their own this promise of a miraculous virgin birth, I use it today only as an obvious example of how this analysis works and that we can apply it to every promise we find in the Bible.

Analyzing Two Contrasting Promises

Many of us when going through difficult times in our lives, cling to God’s promise in Jeremiah 29:11. The most popular version of this verse, which often appears in greeting cards and on plaques, is the New International Version: “‘For 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.’”

We like this promise of prosperity and hope, don’t we?  We often encourage ourselves and others with these words. But do they apply to us today? Answering the three questions will help us find out.

1. Is the Promise universal or individual?  According to Jeremiah 29:4, God, speaking through the Prophet Jeremiah, is speaking to “all that are carried away captives, whom I have caused to be carried away from Jerusalem unto Babylon.” This is not a universal promise.  It is spoken to a specific group of people. 
2. Is the Promise for the present time? Jeremiah 29:10 explains it will occur after 70 years of captivity in Babylon. It is not for our time.
3. Is the Promise conditional or unconditional? Jeremiah 29:12-13 provides the conditions: crying out to God, seeking Him, and searching for Him with all of your heart. It is a conditional promise.

At the risk of absolutely discouraging you from claiming this promise for yourself, this promise is not for us, for today, or without conditions.  But don’t be disheartened yet.  Remember, even if a promise is not specifically for us, we can glean from the principle established by the promise. We can glean a principle established by this promise by contrasting it with another message given to the Jews by Jeremiah.

Jeremiah 44:27, 29 reads, “Behold, I will watch over them for evil, and not for good: and all the men of Judah that are in the land of Egypt shall be consumed by the sword and by the famine, until there be an end of them . . .And this shall be a sign unto you, saith the Lord, that I will punish you in this place, that ye may know that my words shall surely stand against you for evil[.]”

This is not a promise people claim for themselves. Why?  Because it is not encouraging, it is spoken to a specific group of people at a specific time and it is the result of the people’s behavior.  No one wants to apply this promise to their own or a loved one’s life. But we can contrast this with the Jeremiah 29:11 promise and glean a biblical principle to apply to our own lives.

Like Jeremiah 29:11, this promise was given to a specific group of people.  God, through the Prophet Jeremiah, was speaking to the Jews that were dwelling in the land of Egypt (Jeremiah 44:1).  The promised action would occur at a specific time, which is after God gave the king of Egypt into the hand of his enemies (Jeremiah 44:30).  The condition, or the behavior that would cause this to happen, is that the Jews would continue burning incense to other gods in Egypt (Jeremiah 44:8). 

This promise was a warning for the Jews that God would punish them by setting His face against them and they would be consumed by sword and by famine and would become an execration (detestable thing), an astonishment, a curse and a reproach (Jeremiah 44:11-14).

It is important to note how the Jews responded to Jeremiah, and I paraphrase: “We are not going to listen to you.  We will do whatever we want, burning incense to the queen of heaven, pouring out drink offerings to her, making her cakes and worshipping her.”  (Jeremiah 44:16-19.)

Because the Jews did not hearken to God’s warning and insisted they would continue worshipping other gods, God promised them He would watch over them for evil, and not for good, and that they would be consumed by the sword and the famine (Jeremiah 44:26-27).

These two promises are almost exact opposites. To one group of Jews (those who involuntarily went into captivity in Babylon), God promised thoughts of peace, and not of evil, and to give them hope and a future. To the other group of Jews (those that voluntarily returned to Egypt), God promised to watch over them for evil, not for good, and to make an end of them.

We can glean a biblical principle by contrasting the reactions of the people. The Babylonian captives met the conditions for the Promise. They cried out to God, sought Him, and searched for Him with all of their heart. The Jews in Egypt, even after being warned through a prophet, boldly declared they would not listen to him and would continue doing as they wanted.  The boldly declared to a man of God that they did not care about what he had to say. 

Lest we think this is an Old Testament principle only, let’s consider Peter’s teaching in 2 Peter 2. Peter explained there were people in the church who were denying the Lord’s work (2 Peter 2:1). They were active in the church, yet walking after the flesh in the lust of uncleanness, despising authority, being self-willed and not afraid to speak evil of the godly authorities God had placed over them and the godly teachings (2 Peter 2:10). They spoke evil of the things they didn’t understand and Peter promised they would perish in their own corruption (2 Peter 2:12). They would be paid back with harm for the harm they had done. Doesn’t this sound like the Jews in Egypt that boldly declared they would not listen to the man of God and would continue doing as they wanted?

Applying a Biblical Principle

I am not sharing this to discourage you from applying the beautiful promise in Jeremiah 29:11 to your life.  We generally claim this promise when we are going through very difficult times or are struggling with major life decisions. But we need to apply it not as a promise to us, but as a biblical principle.

There are conditions for applying this promise. When we reach for this promise, we must first ask ourselves if we are crying out to God, seeking Him, and searching for Him with all of our hearts.  If so, we may claim the principle that God has plans to prosper us, not harm us, and give us hope and a future.

On the other hand, if we search our hearts and find that although we walk among His Church, we also walk after the flesh, lust for ungodly things, despise authority, act according to our own wills, and speak against the godly authorities God has placed over us, then Jeremiah 29:11 does not apply to us. Instead, we must acknowledge the warning of Jeremiah 44:27 and 29: God will watch over us for evil, not good, allowing us to be consumed by our own evil lusts and ungodly conduct and we will ultimately be punished accordingly.

If you find you relate more to the Jews who voluntarily returned to Egypt or the people Peter spoke of in 2 Peter 2, I encourage you to cry out to God, repent, seek Him, search for Him with all of your heart. God is faithful to forgive you.  He will forgive and will restore you to the promises of God.

We can confidently apply God’s promises and principles to our lives. We can have confidence in His promises, especially when we take the time to analyze them to determine if they apply to the Church universally, for all time, and without conditions. If we determine otherwise, we can still have confidence in the biblical principles the promises establish.

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