Jeremiah 29:11 in context
Jeremiah 29:11 is part of a letter the prophet Jeremiah sent to Jews who had been carried into exile in Babylon. God promises them “plans for your welfare and not for harm, to give you a future with hope.” The “you” in Hebrew is plural, addressed to the whole people, and the verse before it says the return will come only after seventy years. It promises that God will stay faithful to them through a long exile and bring them home.
For surely I know the plans I have for you, says the Lord, plans for your welfare and not for harm, to give you a future with hope.
Jeremiah 29:11, NRSVUE
Jeremiah 29:11 is one of the most loved verses in the Bible, and if you have held on to it in a hard season, you have held on to something true. Read in its setting, a letter to Jews exiled in Babylon, the verse is a promise that God keeps faith with God’s people through long years of loss and will bring them home. That promise is strong enough to bear the weight of a real life, including the parts that do not go as planned.
What does Jeremiah 29:11 say?
For surely I know the plans I have for you, says the Lord, plans for your welfare and not for harm, to give you a future with hope.
Jeremiah 29:11, NRSVUE
The word translated “welfare” is the Hebrew shalom, which means peace, wholeness, and well-being together. The King James Version translates the verse, “For I know the thoughts that I think toward you, saith the Lord, thoughts of peace, and not of evil, to give you an expected end.” The “future” is the Hebrew acharit, the outcome or end of a thing, and the “hope” is tiqvah.
Who was Jeremiah 29:11 written to?
The letter opens by naming its readers:
These are the words of the letter that the prophet Jeremiah sent from Jerusalem to the remaining elders among the exiles and to the priests, the prophets, and all the people whom Nebuchadnezzar had taken into exile from Jerusalem to Babylon.
Jeremiah 29:1, NRSVUE
The next verse explains that this happened after King Jeconiah, the queen mother, the court, and the city’s skilled workers had been taken away (Jeremiah 29:2). That deportation took place in 597 BCE, about ten years before the Babylonians destroyed Jerusalem and its temple. The people reading Jeremiah’s letter had lost their homes, their land, and their king, and they were living as foreigners in an empire that had conquered them. God’s promise came to people in grief.
Why do the seventy years matter?
Some prophets were telling the exiles that they would be home soon. In the chapter before, a prophet named Hananiah announced in the temple that God would bring the exiles back “within two full years” (Jeremiah 28:1–4). Jeremiah’s letter warns against such voices: “Don’t let your prophets who are among you and your diviners deceive you” (Jeremiah 29:8).
Then comes the verse just before the famous one:
For thus says the Lord: Only when Babylon’s seventy years are completed will I visit you, and I will fulfill to you my promise and bring you back to this place.
Jeremiah 29:10, NRSVUE
Seventy years was a lifetime. Most adults who heard the letter read aloud would die in Babylon. Shemaiah, a prophet among the exiles who opposed Jeremiah, complained that Jeremiah had written to them, “The captivity is long” (Jeremiah 29:24–28). So the “plans” of verse 11 included a long exile, and the promise was that God would carry the people through it.
Later biblical writers saw the promise fulfilled when Cyrus, king of Persia, conquered Babylon and allowed the exiles to return. The books of Chronicles and Ezra both present these events as fulfilling “the LORD’s word by Jeremiah’s mouth” (2 Chronicles 36:21; Ezra 1:1).
What did God tell the exiles to do while they waited?
Before the famous promise, Jeremiah’s letter gives the exiles instructions that surprised them. God told them to settle down and build a life in the land of their captivity:
Build houses and live in them; plant gardens and eat what they produce.… But seek the welfare of the city where I have sent you into exile, and pray to the Lord on its behalf, for in its welfare you will find your welfare.
Jeremiah 29:5, 7, NRSVUE
The word “welfare” in verse 7 is shalom, the same word as in verse 11. God’s plans for the exiles’ shalom were bound up with their work for the shalom of Babylon, the very city that had conquered them. They were to pray for their neighbors and seek their good. Waiting on God, in Jeremiah’s letter, looks like planting gardens and praying for the city. For more on how Scripture treats foreigners and exiles, see What does the Bible say about immigrants?
Is the “you” in Jeremiah 29:11 plural?
Yes. In Hebrew, the pronouns in Jeremiah 29:11 are second person plural. In the American South one might say, “I know the plans I have for y’all.” God was addressing the whole community of exiles, and the promise concerns the future of the people of Israel.
The verses that follow are also plural, and they show that the heart of the promise is a restored relationship with God:
Then when you call upon me and come and pray to me, I will hear you. When you search for me, you will find me; if you seek me with all your heart, I will let you find me, says the Lord.…
Jeremiah 29:12–14, NRSVUE
Is Jeremiah 29:11 a promise for me?
Yes, in the way it was meant. Christians have always read the promises God made to Israel as words that also speak to the church, and through the church to each believer. Jeremiah 29:11 tells you that God’s intentions toward God’s people are for their good, that exile and loss do not have the last word, and that God can be found by those who seek him.
The verse does not promise that you personally will get the job, recover quickly, or avoid suffering. The first people to hear it were told to expect seventy years of exile. If you are going through a long season of loss, the verse may fit your life more closely than it fits the life of someone for whom everything is going well, because it was first spoken to people like you. For the related question of whether God plans each event in your life, see Does everything happen for a reason? and Why does God allow suffering?
How should Christians read Jeremiah 29:11 today?
Read it with the whole letter. Pray it as a congregation as well as alone. Let it give you patience in hard years and a reason to work for the good of the place where you live, even if you never chose to live there.
Another verse written after the fall of Jerusalem, in the Book of Lamentations, says the same thing in other words: “It is because of the LORD’s loving kindnesses that we are not consumed, because his mercies don’t fail. They are new every morning. Great is your faithfulness” (Lamentations 3:22–23). Paul makes a similar promise to the church in Romans 8:28, and like Jeremiah, he makes it to people who are suffering.
If you are waiting on God in a long exile of your own, you can take Paul’s blessing for the church in Rome as a prayer for yourself:
Now may the God of hope fill you with all joy and peace in believing, that you may abound in hope in the power of the Holy Spirit.
Common questions
Is Jeremiah 29:11 a promise for me?
It was first a promise to the Jewish exiles in Babylon as a people, and the “you” is plural. Christians rightly read it as a word about God’s faithfulness to all of God’s people, including you. It promises God’s faithfulness in hardship, and it does not promise that any one person will avoid hardship or reach a particular goal.
Who was Jeremiah 29:11 written to?
It was written to the Jews whom King Nebuchadnezzar of Babylon had taken into exile from Jerusalem, along with King Jeconiah, the royal court, and many skilled workers (Jeremiah 29:1–2). Jeremiah sent the letter from Jerusalem.
What are the seventy years in Jeremiah 29:10?
Jeremiah said the exiles would come home only when Babylon’s seventy years were completed. The number meant a whole lifetime, so most adults who heard the letter would die in Babylon. Later biblical writers saw the promise fulfilled when King Cyrus of Persia let the exiles return (Ezra 1:1).
What does the King James Version say in Jeremiah 29:11?
The King James Version reads, “For I know the thoughts that I think toward you, saith the Lord, thoughts of peace, and not of evil, to give you an expected end.” The word translated “peace” is the Hebrew shalom. Many modern translations say “plans” instead of “thoughts” and “welfare” instead of “peace.”
