by Elder Peter Lim

Most San Diegans know what a privilege it is to live here in America’s Finest City. Currently we are experiencing mid 70s and even 80 degree temperatures in early January while the rest of the country is “enjoying” much colder temperatures. We have nice beaches, good Mexican food, decent city life without LA’s traffic jams, and a pretty good professional football team. It’s easy to consider ourselves fortunate that we live here. We might even say that there is no better place on Earth to live. But for a Christian, these factors are insignificant reasons for living where we live. Don’t get me wrong. I appreciate and even enjoy all these attributes of San Diego. However, when someone who claims to be a Christian elevates such superficial reasons to live at a particular location above spiritual considerations, priorities are misplaced. Before we consider the weather, we need to consider what kind of ministry we hope to have. Before we look at the size of houses we can afford or what salary we can hope to command, we need to consider how we can get plugged into a good church that we can grow and worship in. When we consider what university to attend or send our children to, we must prioritize spiritual considerations above and beyond academic considerations. Unfortunately, many so-called Christians minimize their spiritual priority and elevate the prestige of academic institutions or their careers over their ministry. This misplacement of priorities often confuse their non-saved family members and weaker Christians into thinking that Christians think the same way as non-Christians.

This life that we live as Christians may or may not involve living in such a nice place as San Diego. Since our main goal as Christians on Earth is to evangelize, we must be willing to go anywhere the gospel needs to be preached. This may take us away from our beloved city to a dusty little town, freezing cold cities where they speak an impossible to learn language, and maybe humid jungles where people have yet to hear the message of Jesus’ atoning work. But wherever we are on Earth geographically, as long as we are doing the Lord’s work spreading the gospel, it’s the same path that leads to Heaven. This road is not always easy nor comfortable nor even desirable for our fleshly sensibilities. Our way of thinking and the priorities that we have will be foreign to the world around us. In fact, God tells us to expect the world to hate us. (1 John 3:13) One sure way to know whether we are on this road that leads to heaven is if the world sees any difference in our priorities. It is this priority of the gospel that could possibly cause us to consider Haiti or Bangladesh or Afghanistan to be the best place on Earth to live. As long as we are involved in evangelism, that is the best place on Earth to be because God is being glorified.

This article started out with the impression that I was talking about geography. For a Christian, it’s not about that at all. It’s about the place of blessing that God has placed us in. This road can be anywhere on Earth. Rightly did Steven Curtis Chapman sing about this very road:

Somebody told me that this path that leads to heaven
Will not be the easy way
Well I found that to be true
Oh, but I also found, I found out there’s

CHORUS
No better place on earth than the road that leads to heaven
No other place I’d rather be