Foreordained Promised Land

There's beauty in foreign lands

Each favored, by God, uniquely

Still...America forever stands

Divinely for rights of liberty

It's destiny was foreordained

In our Father's eternal plan

Prophets of old foresaw it, too

So preserved to one day expand

Joseph's tribe was to became a fruitful bough

By a well whose branches would run over

Foreordained, some to be endowed

Bound in the everlasting Hills forever

Lehi, a prophet from a then wicked holy land

Journeyed in the wilderness and then by sea

With his family they fashioned a ship by hand

And sailed where they could live righteously

Oft God blessed them with prosperity

And then, in pride, they went their own way

To then cycle back with humility

Finally to die off leaving their record for our day

Too, Christopher Columbus was compelled much

By the Holy Spirit to cross this deep vast ocean

Who worked to gain the trust of Queen Isabella

While being prepared by God for this destination

The came the Pilgrims seeking a place

To establish and protect religious freedom

And thus many more came here to raise

Their families as reformers freed from oppression

Thus it was by divine intervention 

America was preserved for its destiny

For the coming forth of the constitution

Guaranteeing for all life, liberty

And the pursuit of happiness 

Acting on the dictates of their conscience 

Discerning and applying moral agency

Each for their own eternal futurity

Here, where the everlasting gospel could flourish

Restored for the Latter-Day, by Jesus Himself

To act in authority with a prophet through which

Lehi's records were given their story to tell

That Jesus appeared to them after being crucified

He taught them and they received the ordinances of the gospel

They were a second witness that He had lived and died

This, their promised land, was set apart to make this possible

And the promise remains marvelously true once more

As we are to prepare for a second coming of the Lord

[Verse 1]

There's beauty in foreign lands

Each favored, by God, uniquely

Still...America forever stands

Divinely for rights of liberty

Its destiny was foreordained

In our Father's eternal plan

Prophets of old foresaw it, too

So preserved to one day expand

[Pre-Chorus]

Joseph's tribe was to become

A fruitful bough by a well

Whose branches would run over

Bound in the everlasting Hills forever

[Chorus]

Foreordained, foreordained

Set apart for this day

To carry His light brightly lit

Unto lands near and far away

[Verse 2]

Lehi, a prophet from the then wicked holy land

Journeyed in the wilderness and then by sea

With his family they fashioned a ship by hand

And sailed where they could live righteously

Oft God blessed them with prosperity

And then, in pride, they went their own way

To then cycle back with humility

Finally to die off leaving their record for our day

[Pre-Chorus]

Too, Christopher Columbus was compelled much

By the Holy Spirit to cross this deep vast ocean

Who worked to gain the trust of Queen Isabella

While being prepared by God for this destination

[Chorus]

Foreordained, foreordained

Set apart for this day

To carry His light brightly lit

Unto lands near and far away

[Verse 3]

Then came the Pilgrims seeking a place

To establish and protect religious freedom

And thus many more came here to raise

Their families as reformers freed from oppression

Thus it was by divine intervention

America was preserved for its destiny

For the coming forth of the constitution

Guaranteeing for all life, liberty

[Chorus]

Foreordained, foreordained

Set apart for this day

To carry His light brightly lit

Unto lands near and far away

[Verse 4]

Here, where the everlasting gospel could flourish

Restored for the Latter-Day, by Jesus Himself

To act in authority with a prophet through which

Lehi's records were given their story to tell

That Jesus appeared to them after being crucified

He taught them and they received the ordinances of the gospel

They were a second witness that He had lived and died

This, their promised land, was set apart to make this possible

[Chorus]

Foreordained, foreordained

Set apart for this day

To carry His light away

Discerning and applying moral agency

Restored for the Latter-Day

Foreordained, foreordained

Preparatory for the Lord

Thoughts were from a talk by Elder Tanner

Given in 1976- as a Bicentennial message. 

This was the summer before i started middle school. We traveled across America and I learned about our history and the lives of our founding fathers. Not knowing that in college I would learn all that this song tells. It is true! 

https://x.com/PeacemakingSt/status/2073018493318910067?s=20

Genesis 49:22 Joseph is a fruitful bough, even a fruitful bough by a well; whose branches run over the wall: 

Moses