Where is Your Promised Land?

I don't know for sure about the rest of the world, but in the Deep South, Heaven is often referred to as The Promised Land. You've heard it before, from sermons to gospel lyrics -- “crossing over” the Jordan into the Promised Land, what a glorious day it will be, we’ll see Jesus face to face when we get to The Promised Land.

Well, folks, this is a prime example of beliefs we accept without question, and repeat without thinking it through. I'm excited to present to you this truth: the Promised Land is not Heaven,

"WHAT?!" (I can hear you from here.) Sorry grandparents, but the legendary Promised Land was never the perfection of Heaven.

Just look at what God said about the Promised Land (Canaan):

As soon as all the kings who were beyond the Jordan in the hill country and in the

lowland all along the coast of the Great Sea toward Lebanon, the Hittites, the Amorites,

the Canaanites, the Perizzites, the Hivites, and the Jebusites, heard of this, they

gathered together as one to fight against Joshua and Israel. - Joshus 9:1

And I will set your border from the Red Sea to the Sea of the Philistines, and from

the wilderness to the Euphrates, for I will give the inhabitants of the land into

your hand, and you shall drive them out before you. - Exodus 23:31

Little by little I will drive them out from before you, until you have increased and

possess the land. - Exodus 23:30

Joshua 12 lists most, if not all, the nations the Israelites had to defeat to take possession of Canaan, the Promised Land. There were as many as 33 nations to be subdued and vanquished. God even said He left them there for the Israelites to practice warfare on (Judgese 3:1-2), because that generation had never waged war, and they were to become mighty warriors.

How many enemies will we have to run out of Heaven? See where I'm going here? Heaven cannot be the Promised Land if the Promised Land has enemies to be defeated. Our enemies are on this side of Heaven, and they are not human. Spiritual warfare is your job once you get saved. Remember,

For we wrestle not against flesh and blood, but against principalities, against powers,

against the rulers of the darkness of this world, against spiritual wickedness in high places. 

- Ephesians 6:12

My thoughts: your Promised Land is wherever you are when you know you're within God's will for your life. It's where the enemies that only you can defeat with God's leading are waiting for you, but so is your milk and honey. And those enemies are for you to cut your teeth on as preparation for more powerful future enemies, which you will also defeat.

The Promised Land, then, is not only a place of battle but a place of great victories and celebrations, of reaping the spoils of war and taking back what the enemy stole from you. It is a place where God goes before you and makes a way where there is no way.

Your Promised Land is God's purpose for your life, and nowhere is more perfect a place to live than right in the middle of God's will. That's a Promise.

Kemala