Greetings in Christ Jesus, Fellow Soldiers.
When God told Abram to leave his old country behind and travel to the promised land of Canaan, Abram followed by faith. Notice, however, that God didn't bless Abram because he walked by faith. Abram walked by faith because God blessed him. What a great reminder to us that our salvation not start with a decision to choose God, but with God's eternal choice of us. When we believe in Christ, it is because God called us to faith by His Spirit in the Gospel of Jesus Christ, as with Abram.
If the story of Abram going to Canaan was merely a story of his faithful following of God, it would be a pretty short story. But God tells us in Hebrews 11 that Abraham was not simply looking toward the earthly promised land of Canaan, but a heavenly city, whose builder and maker is God.
This points us to a great truth concerning the promised land in the Old Testament: It was never meant to be permanent, but was a giant pointer to the true, permanent, heavenly promised land. The exodus from slavery in Egypt illustrates our exodus from slavery to sin. The inheritance of the promised land of Canaan illustrates our inheritance of the eternal promised land of heaven.
But how would Abraham or you or me inherit that heavenly promised land? The reality is that man could not even be obedient enough to stay in the earthly promised land--that is why the old people of Israel were exiled. Their sin earned their banishment from the promised land. This, of course, illustrates what mankind's sin earns--banished from the heavenly promised land. The Old Testament prophets continually make this point--they connected God's judgment of Israel with man's final judgment (i.e, Joel 1-2), and then pointed eyes toward the promised One who could merit heaven.
So how did Abraham inherit the heavenly promised land? The key is found in God's promise in Genesis 12 that "Your offspring will inherit the land." Who was Abraham offspring? Over the course of history, God's people always understood that to mean them, and they were right. But Paul also tells us in Galatians 3 that it refers to Christ, and he was also right.
The reality that God's promise concerning an offspring was always intentionally left vague in order to encompass both the offspring (Jesus) and the offsprings (us). When we're told in Gen. 3:15 that there would be hostility between the seed/offspring of Eve and the serpent and that the seed/offspring of Eve would crush the head of the serpent--that promise concerns both Christ and us in Him.
This taps into the great biblical doctrine of our union with Christ. What is said of Christ can be said of us because we are so tightly bound to Him by grace through faith. When Satan strikes the heel of Eve's seed (us), he is striking the heel of our Savior, Jesus. When Jesus crushes the head of the serpenet, we crush the head of the serpent. We die with Christ, are raised with Christ, and are even now already seated in the heavenly realms with Christ (Eph. 1).
Abraham would inherit the heavenly promised land because his offpring, Jesus Christ, would inherit the land for him. And because, in Christ our firstborn brother, we are all God's offpsring, we inherit that heavenly promised land in Him and with Him.
So if God's earthly gifts are meant to point our eyes to the greater heavenly realities, than why are our eyes so often distracted and obsessed with earthly things. As John Calvin reminds us, our hearts our idol factories. With Abraham, let us once more lock our eyes on city that awaits us and the Savior who earned it and find once more that this world is full of God's gracious gifts, not idols of eternal worth. Let us look to heaven, and find our identity and hope anew in Jesus Christ through whatever earthly circumstances we pass through.
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