The True Prophet
Exiles • Week 4
The Lies We Believe in Exile
Life in exile is filled with competing voices. In Jeremiah 29, false prophets were telling God’s people what they wanted to hear, but God was calling them to trust His truth, reject the lies, and live faithfully in Babylon while waiting for home.
Exile is not only difficult because of what is lost. It is also difficult because of the voices that begin competing for our trust while we wait.
In Jeremiah 29, God’s people are living far from the promised land. They are in Babylon, surrounded by a different language, different gods, and different ways of life. They are tired, homesick, confused, and vulnerable to voices that promise relief without repentance, identity without God, and hope without truth.
Jeremiah is writing to remind them that God is still on the throne, His plans are still good, and His people must not allow Babylon’s loudest voices to define reality for them.
The lies that shaped the garden still try to shape God’s people in exile.
We live between the already and the not yet.
God’s people in Babylon had known the promised land and the temple, but now they were waiting to return home. In a similar way, followers of Jesus live in the already and the not yet.
Jesus has already come. He has died, risen, ascended, and reigns as King. And yet we do not yet experience the fullness of heaven on earth. We still live in a world marked by suffering, sin, confusion, and longing.
Israel had the memory of the promised land and the temple. We have the memory of an empty tomb.
The Lord is with us here, and yet here is not our home.
Lie 1: God is not good.
The first lie goes all the way back to Genesis 3. The serpent does not begin by denying God’s existence. Instead, he questions God’s character. He mocks God’s word in order to make Eve wonder whether God is withholding something good from her.
The false prophets in Jeremiah’s day were doing something similar. They were not openly rejecting Yahweh. They were claiming to speak in His name while distorting His word. Their message sounded comforting, but it quietly undermined God’s truth.
The same lie still works its way into our hearts today. When prayers seem unanswered, when relationships fracture, when suffering comes, or when life does not unfold the way we hoped, the question can begin to form quietly within us: Is God really good?
- We may stop praying honestly because we are afraid of disappointment.
- We may reach for immediate pleasure because God’s way feels too slow.
- We may withhold forgiveness because control feels safer than trust.
- We may build our own comfort because we are unsure God will provide.
The danger is often subtle. We may never say out loud that God is not good, but we can begin to live as though His goodness is not trustworthy in the places where we feel most vulnerable.
Lie 2: Your identity is found somewhere other than God.
The second lie is about who we are. In the garden, the serpent promises Eve, “You will be like God.” But this was a promise of something she already possessed. Adam and Eve were already made in the image of God.
The serpent was a creature, not the Creator. He had no power to give Eve the identity, worth, and purpose that only God could give. Yet he tempted her to look to creation instead of the Creator for what only God could provide.
For the exiles, the temptation was to become more Babylonian than faithful. For us, the temptation is to allow culture to form us more deeply than Christ.
Culture often gives us two main options for identity. The traditional view says to look around—to family, tribe, nation, role, or community. The modern view says to look within—to desire, feeling, and self-expression. But the gospel gives us a better way: look up.
True identity is not found by looking around or looking within, but by looking to the Creator who made us and redeemed us.
Only God can give an identity strong enough to hold us through the highs and lows of life. In Christ, we are not left to define ourselves by performance, approval, politics, sexuality, consumerism, success, failure, or shame. We are given a name, a place, and a purpose by the One who made us.
Lie 3: You need to save yourself.
After Adam and Eve believe the serpent’s lie, they recognize their nakedness and sew fig leaves together. They try to cover their shame with the work of their own hands.
That same impulse appears in Jeremiah 29. Jeremiah tells the exiles that their return will take time and that they are called to build, plant, and live faithfully in Babylon. But the false prophets want a faster way. They want to take salvation into their own hands and promise a return God has not promised.
We know that instinct too. We become our own functional saviors.
- When we fail, we try to earn our way back into God’s goodness.
- When we are confronted, we defend, justify, and lawyer our way out.
- When life feels unstable, we grasp for control instead of surrender.
- When we feel exposed, we cover ourselves rather than receive grace.
But God reminds His people in Jeremiah 29: “I am the one who knows, and I am witness.” He sees truly. He knows fully. And His people do not need to save themselves because salvation belongs to Him.
The tyranny of small decisions
The lies of exile rarely take root all at once. Often, they grow through small decisions that slowly move our hearts away from God.
One small compromise does not feel catastrophic. One more evening lost to distraction, one more morning without prayer, one more moment of comparison, one more choice to avoid repentance or ignore God’s word may not seem significant on its own.
But over time, small decisions form us. They either help us remember the goodness of God or make us more vulnerable to the lies of Babylon.
What we do with the small moments shapes what we become in exile.
Jeremiah calls us back to the garden’s original purpose.
The false prophets were borrowing from the serpent’s lies, but Jeremiah was calling God’s people back to God’s original design. Build houses. Plant gardens. Be fruitful. Multiply. Seek the good of the city.
In other words, live faithfully where God has placed you, and trust Him with the rest.
This is not passive waiting. It is a life shaped by the prayer Jesus taught us: “Your kingdom come, your will be done, on earth as it is in heaven.” God’s kingdom is displayed through the faithful, ordinary, Spirit-shaped lives of His people in the places they have been planted.
The judgment of false prophets becomes hope.
At first, the judgment on the false prophets in Jeremiah 29 sounds harsh and unsettling. But within the larger story, it becomes a strange kind of hope. God names the lies and deals with the voices that are destroying His people.
God does not leave His people drowning in competing voices forever. He tells the truth. He exposes deception. He silences what leads His people away from life.
That is good news because God is committed to making His people more like Jesus. And what He begins, He promises to complete.
Jesus is the true and better prophet.
Our hope is ultimately not found in our ability to be perfect exiles. We fail. We believe lies. We drift through the tyranny of small decisions. We forget God’s goodness, question our identity, and try to save ourselves.
But the gospel tells us that God’s judgment does not fall on those who belong to Christ, because judgment has already fallen on Jesus in our place.
The false prophets were taken outside the city and judged. Jesus, the true and better Prophet, was also taken outside the city and killed—not for His own lies, but for ours. Where Jeremiah warns of judgment, Jesus bears judgment. Where Jeremiah pleads, Jesus pays the price.
We do not earn our homecoming because Jesus, the faithful exile, has already secured it for us.
Because of Jesus, we can resist the lies of exile with confidence. We know God is good because the Son gave His life for us. We know our identity is secure because in Christ we are called sons and daughters of God. We know we do not need to save ourselves because from the cross Jesus declared, “It is finished.”
Here is not our home, but the One who is our home is here with us.
Reflection Questions
- Where am I functionally living as though God is not good, even if I would never say that out loud?
- What small decisions are currently shaping me either toward trust in Jesus or away from Him?
