Is the American Dream the Promised Land?

We all have dreams. Over time our unrealized dreams seem distant and unattainable, maybe even impossible?  The long wait can bring us to a place of desperation and we may wonder does anyone care about my situation or about me? Although our dreams might be altruistic to us where do our dreams come from or for whom are our dreams for?

For a variety of reasons many have been confused between the biblical ‘Promised Land’ and the ‘American Dream.’ Over the centuries many have thought that America was the Promised Land, a land flowing with milk and honey, a place of fulfilled promise, a place of opportunity.

The biblical narrative is often related to the immigrant story in the founding of the United States.  Our forefathers rightly envisioned America as a land of religious freedom, opportunity, hope, and the pursuit of happiness from which we benefit today.

The idea that America is a kind of Promised Land is understandable, yet many people inside or outside the church have mistaken America for the biblical Promised Land. The view that America is the Promised Land of ultimate opportunity has become a pretext for the American entitlement of happiness.

There is ultimate joy in following Christ, but that is different than making the pursuit of happiness our priority.

If we think that we are entitled to happiness then we should get what we want when we want it.
Could it be that the American Dream has shaped our church identity, practice and vocation more than anything else? Our consuming habits are just another step toward the Promised Land. Christian consumers in the United States are virtually indistinguishable from the culture at large. 

As Mark Labberton said, “The intertwining of Promised Land assumptions and consumer opportunities easily becomes a powerful economic, social and spiritual engine. Promised Land hopes fires American consumerism, and puts the “buyer” in the controller’s seat with expectations and demands, largely for personal ends.”

This approach makes pragmatic sense if you believe you’re in the Promised Land and assume it exists for your benefit, you simply take what’s available, which is what you see everybody else doing. This can be seen in the cheapened view of relationships today in discarding a relationship for a new and improved one.

The concept of the Promised Land is a strong narrative in the Hebrew Scriptures.
The premise of the Promised Land defined Israel’s identity, but it was not meant to be a place to simply pluck God’s benefits. It was rather where God’s people were to thrive in the grace of ‘living out the call’ to be God’s people.  Israel’s blessing from ‘the land flowing with milk and honey’ was the encouragement along the path of living according to God’s ways, not because they were entitled to it.

Our lives are not lived out in the midst of idealism, but in the midst of the real world as it is.Promised Land spirituality expects it all and expects it now. Another Promised Land assumption is that following God’s way is to get away from what is undesirable and separate ourselves from experiences of pain, to leave suffering behind and move on into our rightful place. Escaping pain is neither reality nor God’s way.

Jesus says to all His disciples, “Take up your cross and follow me.” If we want to truly follow Him we need to start where we are, not where we wished we were whether it’s at work, home or in our neighborhood. As Christ followers we are to follow Him and live according to God’s ways regardless of what that may include. Rest assured in knowing that there will come a day when "there will be no more pain and no more sorrow and He will wipe away every tear." Revelation 21:4