This will be your land, with its boundaries on every side. Numbers 34:12

The boundaries that God described, enclosed an area that was considerably smaller than what he promised Abraham. “On that day the Lord made a covenant with Abram and said, ‘To your descendants I give this land, from the Wadi of Egypt to the great river, the Euphrates’” (Genesis 15:18).

The area of land delineated in this chapter is like the ‘first fruits’ of what God was planning to give the Israelites if they’d been obedient. But even at the height of Israel’s political power, in David’s and Solomon’s time, the Israelites never possessed all that God promised.

The land was God’s gift to Israel, but the people had to occupy it. “Take possession of the land and settle in it, for I have given you the land to possess” (Numbers 33:53). God expected his people to be obedient, to believe his promises, and to enlarge their boundaries until they attained to the whole measure of the fullness of God’s plans.

And we are to do the same—God gives us gifts, yet we have to be obedient, believe his promises, and enlarge our vision of what God can achieve. So that “. . . we all reach unity in the faith and in the knowledge of the Son of God and become mature, attaining to the whole measure of the fullness of Christ” (Ephesians 4:13).

God has so much more for us. He equips us so that we will accomplish great things in his kingdom, more than we can even imagine (1 Corinthians 2:9). Yet this is a huge challenge because it requires us to take steps of faith, trust his enabling and believe God’s promises.

Let’s seek to fulfil all God intends.