In 597 BC, Babylonian armies besieged Jerusalem and took a large portion of its people into exile. This Babylonian exile was both a dark age in the history of God’s people and an apt metaphor for our own era.
The environment of Jerusalem was like a greenhouse—a controlled, familiar environment where the worship of God and the patterns of life under his reign were normalized. It was set up for the people to grow and flourish as God’s children, even though the results of this were mixed. Babylon, however, was like a wild field. Negative influences were everywhere, threatening to draw the people into idolatry or simply just distract them away from following the Lord. It was hostile, chaotic, uncontrollable.
But plants can take root and flourish even in wild fields, and the words God spoke through Jeremiah were meant to encourage this. Rather than try to recreate Jerusalem, they were to embrace their setting, create homes and gardens and raise families, and, perhaps surprisingly, contribute to Babylon’s peace and prosperity. They were, to use a phrase inspired by Jesus’ prayer in John 17, to be “in the world, but not of the world.” They could be faithful to God and keep their eyes fixed on him even within Babylon’s swirl of hostility and temptation.
This sounds a lot like life in our own wild field, doesn’t it?
The modern Western world has been described as “post-Christian.” In earlier generations, Christianity was largely seen as positive, and a Judeo-Christian worldview shaped our cultural norms, patterns, and even language. It was a lot like the “greenhouse” of Jerusalem. But cultural winds have shifted. Christianity is increasingly seen as negative, alternative worldviews are shaping our collective consciousness, and Christian language, norms, and patterns of life are either rejected or viewed as foreign and bizarre. Christians in this world are always, to a degree, like the exiles in Babylon, but in settings like ours this is especially true.
Too often our mentality, whether in how we approach ministry or engage culture, is to “recreate Jerusalem.” Christian cultural engagement is often to attempt to exert influence politically or socially, to control those environments. And Christian ministry often seeks to build a greenhouse—to remove people from their environment and plant them in a place that, however well-intentioned and designed for them to meet God and flourish, is unfamiliar and uncomfortable to them. We want them to come to us rather than going to them.
The “in the world, but not of the world” approach is far more effective, and relevant, for our own flourishing and for influencing people toward Jesus in our modern-day Babylon. We have an invitation, like the Jewish exiles, to seek the good of the city through serving, praying, showing grace and love, living as engaged and loving neighbors, and, every time the wild winds cause us to brush against the other plants in the field, pursuing authentic relationship and having meaningful conversations that show people how good Jesus is. Each of these relationally inviting, Jesus-laden interactions is an opportunity for a gospel seed to fall to the ground and perhaps take root.
Prayer: Lord, help me to embrace the reality that I am an alien and stranger in this world, and an ambassador sent by you into it. I pray for boldness to radically love all those around me, to pursue their good and that of our shared community, and for intentionality in every interaction—that all my words and actions would clearly point them to Jesus. Amen.
Throughout this Day: Ponder these questions and, as you do, take whatever steps of faith God may lead you to: What am I doing, in an effort to minister to others or influence my culture, that could be characterized as “recreating Jerusalem?” How might a “wild field” mentality influence me to change those approaches? What people do I regularly interact with, and how can I pursue authentic relationship and meaningful conversation with them in ways that show them Jesus? (For training in this, Cru’s CoJourners material is excellent: https://www.cru.org/us/en/train-and-grow/share-the-gospel/evangelism-principles/cojourners.html