Going to the Promised Land?

I think everyone, deep inside, is looking for the promised land. It's a place we dream of, a place where home means is more than a mortgage and community is more than a stop on the career path. For some it is a metaphor for heaven, a place we only realized upon death; for others it is an illusion meant to keep people chasing the wind but at least giving them something to chase in life. As for me, well I really do believe in the Promised Land as a place promised by God where we live by "faith and not by sight" [2 Cor 5:7]. Its not geographical, because that would be far too limiting, it is spiritual because it exists in the poorest neighborhoods and yet evaporates in the most elegant penthouses. M.L. King saw glimpses of it in marches in Alabama; Mother Teresa fought for it on the streets of Calcutta, John Wesley found it in London, and Jesus taught about it in Galilee. The Promised Land is a place where everyday is an adventure, routine is replaced by discovery, and where one time slaves find a renewed sense of purpose. But here's the catch, and it's a big one -- you have to want it. I know it sounds too simple, but most people won't give up their addiction to the present in order to find the future. Countless millions of good church going folks are gazing across a river wondering what's on the other side with absolutely no intention of going over to find out. Even though the God of Abraham, Isaac, Jacob, and Jesus commands them to cross. Here we sit, surely this is close enough. See most of us are content to stay in Egypt, living and dying as slaves to cultural expectations never tasting the freedom on the other side of the river. Thoreau once wrote, "Most men live lives of quiet desperation, going to the grave with the song still in them."  To cross the river means to risk it all, and that takes a deeper faith. The Church is a Body of Believers united by their gratitude for God's grace and commitment to live in the Promised Land of faith. We can either be the church Jesus always intended and share our discovery with others, or we can be Egyptians in Christian clothing and slowly fade into the sands of time. Are you going to the Promised Land? How will you get there?