What is keeping you out of the Promised Land? - Pastor Gino Bryant

Hebrews 4 says there is still a promise of entering God’s rest, and that promise is not just heaven one day, but a promised land before heaven. God saves with purpose. God gets ahold of a person for a reason, and Christ has an inheritance, a place of victory, a place where life starts accomplishing the most good for God.

The text looks back at Israel in the wilderness and says the word did not profit them because it was not mixed with faith. Israel heard Moses, saw the Red Sea open, saw water come from the rock, but still could not believe God for the next step. The promised land had fruit, milk, and honey, but it also had giants. The rest of God does not mean no battles. The rest of God means learning how to fight in His way, with His weapons, under His leadership.

The wilderness mentalities kept Israel stuck, and those same mentalities can still keep people out of what God has promised. “Don’t make me wait,” “I deserve better,” “it’s too hard,” “I can’t,” “it’s someone else’s fault,” “nothing ever changes for me,” and “I’m not worthy” all come from faulty understandings of God. God does not call His people into promise so He can drop them. God calls, provides, protects, corrects, and prepares. The wilderness becomes the place where God works on the heart so the blessing does not destroy the person who receives it.

God’s true identity has to be known apart from bad representatives. Pharaoh was a slave driver, but God is not Pharaoh. God is a Father, a Husband, a protector, a provider, and a covenant keeping God. Israel misunderstood His protection, His provision, His timing, His desire for their freedom, His hatred for sin, His absolute strength, His call to obey, His jealousy for their love, and His desire to bless them.

Sin is not just breaking a rule. Sin is missing the mark, falling short of created purpose, and giving Satan access. Obedience is not God trying to control or ruin somebody’s fun. Obedience is God drawing a person deeper because He has a harvest attached to the instruction.

God wants love, not cold obligation. God wants His people to fall over themselves with thankfulness because He has been good. The jail cell bars can disappear, but the person still has to get out. God sets free, strengthens the backbone, and calls His people to stop blaming, complaining, and remaining, and to move forward by faith into the promised land.

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Key Takeaways

• 1. Faith must mix with the word Hebrews says Israel heard the word, but the word did not profit them because it was not mixed with faith. A promise can sit right in front of a person and still remain untouched if the heart only treats it like a good story. Faith reaches out and says, “That is for me, and God is able to bring me into it.” [04:37]
• 2. The promised land includes warfare The promised land has milk and honey, but it also has giants that must be faced. God’s rest is not escape from every battle, but confidence in His nearness, His weapons, and His victory. Fulfillment often comes on the other side of learning how to stand, fight, and keep posture in Christ. [09:10]
• 3. Blame never creates overcomers Blaming and fault finding shift attention away from repentance, adjustment, and growth. The wilderness mentality looks for someone else to accuse, but faith asks where the heart must change and where obedience must begin. Overcomers are formed when responsibility replaces accusation and prayer replaces complaint. [18:02]
• 4. Waiting intertwines the heart with God Waiting on God is not passive complaining with religious words added to it. Waiting on God means putting life into His arms, trusting His timing, and listening for His next instruction. In the waiting, motives get revealed, healing can happen, and righteous solutions begin to come forth. [41:10]
• 5. God’s correction aims at blessing God’s call to obey is not control, manipulation, or the stealing of joy. Every nudge of the Holy Spirit carries a blessing, a harvest, and a deeper invitation into Him. Quick obedience honors the King of glory because His instructions are always connected to life.
  
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Youtube Chapters

• [00:00] - Welcome
• [00:38] - Israel’s Misunderstandings In The Wilderness
• [03:59] - Hebrews 4 And Entering God’s Rest
• [08:03] - The Word Of God Cuts Deep
• [09:10] - The Promised Land Has Battles
• [12:16] - Wilderness Mentalities That Keep People Stuck
• [19:30] - Faith Goes To War For Promises
• [21:50] - Worthy In Christ, Not Personal Merit
• [26:07] - God Prepares Hearts For Blessing
• [30:50] - Knowing God’s True Identity
• [36:31] - Understanding God’s Timing
• [44:15] - God’s Hatred For Sin
• [46:58] - Breaking The Grasshopper Syndrome
• [48:37] - Obedience Brings A Harvest
• [54:11] - Freedom From The Jail Cell

Bible Reading

Hebrews 4:1-12
“Therefore, since a promise remains of entering His rest, let us fear lest any of you seem to have come short of it. For indeed the gospel was preached to us as well as to them; but the word which they heard did not profit them, not being mixed with faith in those who heard it. For we who have believed do enter that rest, as He has said: ‘So I swore in My wrath, “They shall not enter My rest,”’ although the works were finished from the foundation of the world. For He has spoken in a certain place of the seventh day in this way: ‘And God rested on the seventh day from all His works’; and again in this place: ‘They shall not enter My rest.’ Since therefore it remains that some must enter it, and those to whom it was first preached did not enter because of disobedience, again He designates a certain day, saying in David, ‘Today,’ after such a long time, as it has been said: ‘Today, if you will hear His voice, Do not harden your hearts.’ For if Joshua had given them rest, then He would not afterward have spoken of another day. There remains therefore a rest for the people of God. For he who has entered His rest has himself also ceased from his works as God did from His. Let us therefore be diligent to enter that rest, lest anyone fall according to the same example of disobedience. For the word of God is living and powerful, and sharper than any two-edged sword, piercing even to the division of soul and spirit, and of joints and marrow, and is a discerner of the thoughts and intents of the heart.” [03:47]

Numbers 13:31-33
“But the men who had gone up with him said, ‘We are not able to go up against the people, for they are stronger than we.’ And they gave the children of Israel a bad report of the land which they had spied out, saying, ‘The land through which we have gone as spies is a land that devours its inhabitants, and all the people whom we saw in it are men of great stature. There we saw the giants (the descendants of Anak came from the giants); and we were like grasshoppers in our own sight, and so we were in their sight.’” [47:09]

Exodus 14:11-12
“Then they said to Moses, ‘Because there were no graves in Egypt, have you taken us away to die in the wilderness? Why have you so dealt with us, to bring us up out of Egypt? Is this not the word that we told you in Egypt, saying, “Let us alone that we may serve the Egyptians”? For it would have been better for us to serve the Egyptians than that we should die in the wilderness.’” [33:22]

Psalm 78:19-20
“Yes, they spoke against God: They said, ‘Can God prepare a table in the wilderness? Behold, He struck the rock, So that the waters gushed out, And the streams overflowed. Can He give bread also? Can He provide meat for His people?’” [34:23]

Observation questions

1. In Hebrews 4, what are the two reasons given that kept the earlier people from entering God’s rest, and what does the passage say the word of God does in the heart? [07:32]
2. In Numbers 13:31-33, what details are emphasized in the bad report, and how did the spies describe themselves before the giants?
3. In Exodus 14:11-12 and Psalm 78:19-20, what kinds of statements did Israel make when pressure rose, and what do those statements reveal about how they viewed God? [34:16]
4. What are some wilderness mindsets that were named that can keep a person stuck, even after God has already brought them out of bondage? [12:31]

Interpretation questions

1. Hebrews 4 says the word did not profit them because it was not mixed with faith. What does it look like for a person to hear God’s word but not really combine it with faith in daily life? [04:39]
2. If the promised land includes giants as well as milk and honey, how should God’s “rest” be understood? Why is rest not the same thing as having no battles? [09:10]
3. Israel often reacted as if God had brought them out only to fail them. How can painful experiences with bad authority figures distort a person’s view of God’s heart? [30:57]
4. If sin is more than rule-breaking and is described as missing the mark and giving the enemy access, how does that change the way obedience should be viewed? [44:54]

Application questions

1. Which wilderness voice shows up most easily in this season: “don’t make me wait,” “it’s too hard,” “I can’t,” “it’s someone else’s fault,” “nothing ever changes for me,” or “I’m not worthy”? What has that voice been doing in the heart? [13:23]
2. God’s rest includes trusting Him in the middle of conflict, not running from every conflict. What battle right now needs a different posture—not panic, not passivity, but faith-filled steadiness? [06:39]
3. Blame never creates overcomers. Is there any place where responsibility has been pushed onto another person, a past wound, or a hard circumstance? What might repentance, adjustment, or honest prayer look like there? [18:02]
4. Waiting on God is not passive frustration; it is putting life into His arms and listening for His instruction. Where is there a need to stop forcing an outcome and begin waiting on God in a more surrendered way? [41:10]
5. Being “not worthy” can quietly keep a person from receiving what Christ has made available. Where has shame, failure, or an old story been talking louder than what Christ says now? [23:05]
6. Every nudge toward obedience carries a blessing and a harvest. Has there been a recent instruction from the Lord that has been delayed, ignored, or argued with? What would quick obedience look like this week? [48:37]
7. Freedom can be offered, but a person still has to walk out of the cell. Where have the bars already fallen away, yet there is still a temptation to stay in the same old place mentally, emotionally, or spiritually? [55:29]