“People are really into themselves” a student told me as I tried again to bridge the differences in our ages.  It is no surprise that the name for the most popular use of internet technology is myspace. 

What helps people be more interested in others than themselves, or as interested in how a 500 year old event happened as much as today’s, or an artist to disregard what people think and create rather merely be another consumer?

There must be an interest in things outside our selves, and to get there, a view of things that makes that matter.  So when the market-driven Christian church made bank popularizing Jer.29:11 because the wave of self-interest was ‘going that direction anyway,’ it was unfortunate.  Today a writer or teacher can make a disaster out of Jer. 29-33 but be a best-seller.

Let’s think about Jer. 29-33 more than just as an example.  This is where God tells Israel what it’s new destiny and mission will be after the trauma of captivity.  In order to do that, He must rename things.  He even renames himself in order to make the point:  THE LORD OUR RIGHTEOUSNESS.  This is the Christ event, in a word, and is the basis for forgiveness for our sins, and this message is the new plan and vision for Israel—to be its envoys.  That destiny, mission and vision are revolutionary.

Naming things has always been a pivotal moment.  Man called her Woman when he awoke to find her--a burst of excited delight.  He named her Eve because life comes from her role as mother.  

So much for Jer.29:11 being about a better life for you, a problem fixed, a great job, a new romance.  It is shear junk-theology (that makes a ton of money) to teach that.  But there is a historic plan for you to enter in on.  The same plan as that which was offered to Israel in the first apostolic message after the dramatic day of Pentecost:  the times of refreshing.  God values your ability to plan and execute, so long as it is within His.  That’s exciting enough to buoy you up on those days when fulfilling the plan will be work, study, hardship, opposition.

Perhaps “interplan” is a good enough name for that, I’m not sure.  The materials here will help ground you in the real task.  That is not the “selling” of the Christian message.  Instead, it is to saturate yourself in its objective meaning, in this way of seeing, which may once again upend the world around you.  “You cannot give something you do not already have.”—H. Thielicke in CHRIST THE MEANING OF HISTORY.  That is far different from giving to narcissists more of what they already have!