Transition from Promise to Possession

Challenges in the Lord allow us to look ahead and grow more each day in His Spirit… or to give up, lower the banners of faith in Christ, and cast His promises aside. Each day brings its own concerns. God’s promises are not a catalog of empty and meaningless expressions. They were recorded in His Word so that you and I may rekindle our hope in Christ each day; they are immutable and eternal like their Creator. God promises His people a complete inheritance, a spiritual land where the pasture of His grace abounds and the aimless, unfaithful wandering devoid of purpose comes to a definitive end. The only condition for you to set out confidently on your journey is obedience: keeping His law, meditating on it so as to put it into practice and so that your life may attain true prosperity. Your prosperity depends on your relationship with God. To possess the promise is to conquer it, to fight for it, to enter the battlefield where He accompanies and blesses you if you are strong and courageous; it is there that He spares no effort in renewing the bonds that perhaps you extended to Him one day and forgot the next because of the excesses and follies that life and the fallen world impose upon us.

We must take the leap into transition, innovation, and transformation. Joshua’s name was Hoshea, which means “salvation.” There he was as Moses’ minister during the 40 years of adventures in the wilderness, the training ground where God tested the will and courage of many of His brave men. There he learned of God’s promise that they would possess and take ownership of the land He had set aside as an inheritance for His people. Before he died, Moses changed his name and called him Joshua, which means “Jehovah is salvation,” as though announcing that Savior who was to come to lead His church into the heavenly Canaan in accordance with the promise of eternal life.

We are more like Hoshea than Joshua, and that is why we need a transition. We must cross our own Jordan, confident that God will be with us and will never abandon us. We must become, once and for all, servants and soldiers in the invincible hosts of the Lord of Glory. He has given you a mission and has promised not to abandon you in the endeavor and to give you all the territory your feet can reach. He does not assure you that there will be no dangers, disappointments, frustrations, falls, heartbreaks, or betrayals, but He does promise you, “I will be with you; I will not leave you nor forsake you.” Do you know what this means? First of all, it means that He will be present (“…I will be with you”) in His mission, in your personal battle, in that through which He wants you to glorify Him. It means that you will receive instruction in everything you do (“…I will not leave you”), which guarantees not only that you will have His company, but also that He will tell you everything you have to do. Finally, the Lord concludes with this beautiful assertion, “…nor will I forsake you,” as if saying to you: I will fight before you; the battle is Mine as well; success is guaranteed because I am directing and participating personally in this contest. “What are My conditions?” asks the Lord:

1. Be strong and courageous! And that requires obedience. I will not pour out My promises from heaven as I cause the morning dew to appear: it requires you to be obedient and exert yourself. Your obedience magnifies My name and brings about My intervention on your behalf.

2. Listen to My voice! Seek in My Word the instruction you need; keep it in your heart, memorize it, meditate on it so that you can apply it to your situation, and exalt it so that things may go well with you and you may prosper.

3. Speak to Me! Although I know your struggles and concerns, I want to hear them from your own lips. Your sincere prayer will always be a pleasing fragrance to My senses. I will answer you according to My will.

4. You need to be renewed! My true disciples are not conformists but tireless conquerors, because they are filled with the transforming Spirit of My Father. Possess the land, the blessing I have promised you! Win it in the battle of faith. Make the transition from passivity to activity. “I will be with you; I will not leave you nor forsake you.”

We give thanks to God for His promises. Joshua made the transition; he became the obedient servant who led his people to conquer the Lord’s promise. He was no longer Hoshea, son of Nun, whom Moses sent to explore the land of the Negev (Numbers 13:16–17), but an enterprising man, a conqueror, and a doer of the Word of God.

You too, brother and sister, can be one. Do not forget that in your heart there is one—thousands of arteries—through which flows the same blood of Joshua’s lineage, that of the incomparable, great, powerful, and sublime Redeemer.

Recommendation for further reading on the subject: “Transitions—God Will Speak to You Through Your Efforts,” a sermon by Dr. Roberto Miranda.