Numbers 13:3-16 Bible Study | Episode 758

September 4, 2024

Hope Alive: Applying God’s Word to Your Daily Life

Numbers 13:3-16 Bible Study | Episode #758

I am Chad Harrison, and I am the teaching pastor of Lake Community Church and had been serving as a pastor for 25 years. I'm also a practicing attorney. This podcast is designed to help you study God's word and find God's will for your life. The purpose of studying scripture is that you might know the character of Jesus Christ, and that you might see the world from the Father's perspective. That you gain wisdom that changes your life. I pray in the name of Jesus right now that God would open His word to you and allow you to see Him and to know Him. To know His will, that you might glorify Him and that you might walk in faith and power each day, especially today. In Jesus name.

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Transcript

This is Chad Harrison, and you're listening to hope alive, applying God's word to your daily life. Hi, this is Chad Harrison, and I am the teaching pastor of Lake Community Church and have been serving as a pastor for 25 years. I'm also a practicing attorney. This podcast is designed to help you study God's word and find God's will for your life. I pray in the name of Jesus right now that God would open up his word to you and allow you to see him and to know him and to know his will, that you might glorify him and that you might walk in faith and power each and every day, especially today, in Jesus name.

Well, good morning. Welcome to Lake Community Church's morning Bible study. We are in numbers, chapter 13. Numbers, chapter 13. And we are dealing with the spies being sent into the land. And today in the passage that we're dealing with, which is a fairly long passage. And the reason it's long is because it's a list. And it's a list of the names of the men, the twelve men who Moses picked to go into the promised land, to go into the land of Canaanite. God's promise to them as a land flowing with milk and honey and a land that he was going to give to them. Those were the two promises that God had given them and that they had known. Now, this is not promises from a God they didn't know. This is the promises from a God that they had spent two years getting to know in detail. He had delivered them out of Egypt with ten plagues that were miraculous, amazing, something that had not been done ever before. He delivered them out of Egypt. He brought them through the Red Sea. With the waters parted on both sides. He held back Pharaoh's army until they had gotten to the other side, then allowed Pharaoh's army to go into the Red Sea and destroyed Pharaoh's army there so that they would never be chased by anybody again. All right, so they did. They. They experienced that, by the way. They also experienced God over passing over them with the death angel when he killed the firstborn of all of Egypt. Firstborn children, firstborn animals, firstborn of everything he killed in Egypt. God delivered them from that. Then he brought them out into the wilderness, where we gave them water from a rock, where he gave them manna from heaven. He barked them out. And then he appeared to them on the mountain in fire and rumbling and thunder, and his presence was on top of that mountain the whole time they were there. Then he literally appeared to them in the tabernacle he appeared to them as smoke and fire. He appeared to them during the day as a pillar of a cloud by day, and then at night as a pillar of fire. He revealed himself to them many, many times. And in that process, he continually told them that he was going to fulfill his promise that he had given to Abraham, that he would give him a land flowing with milk and honey, and that that land would be an inheritance for them throughout the generations, and that he was going to guide his people into that land and. And they were going to be able to take it as their possession. Now, that's all the promises that God gave them, and that's all. Well, maybe not all, but most of the ways God revealed himself to them. And so now that they get to the promised land, God has given Moses a direction to pick twelve men to go and scout out the land so that they can know how they're going to enter the land and how they're going to take the land. He's giving them the. He's actually giving them some autonomy in this, in that he's giving them the ability to go and say, okay, we're going to go and do this and this and this. We're going to come in this way and we're going to take this area and this area and this area. He's given them an opportunity to take the promised land, which is exactly what he wanted them to do. He's going to give it to them. But remember, in order to have a gift, this is, this is, this is. Even in our modern law today, you've got to have intent, delivery, and acceptance. It's called Ada. In order for something to be a gift, there has to be an intent to give it, a delivery of it, and the acceptance of it after it's been delivered. You can't accept it before. You got to accept it after delivery. Okay? Intent, delivery, acceptance. Then you have a gift. God gave them the gift of the promised land. He intended it, you know that. All the way back to Abraham, he delivered it through Egypt, the Red Sea, the wilderness, all the way to the promised land. And now it was time for the children of Israel to accept it. It was time for them to be promoted. It was time for them to get their promotion, to get what God had promised them from way, way back, hundreds of years before, several hundred years before. If you go all the way back to Abraham, it's time for God to give them what he promised and for them to get their promotion. And so what happens is, it says in verse three, so Moses sent them from the wilderness of praying according to the command of the Lord. Notice God said, pick these men. All of them were heads of the children of Israel. Meaning they were people who had done things to put themselves in a position to be in leadership. They were. They were people who. Who had, who had performed, who had trusted, who had lived out a life that would have given them the right to be leaders. They. They were the leaders. They're the ones who God said, look, these are the. These are the ones. Moses pricked them out. These are the ones who are ready to be. Now, I want you to notice we're not just talking about for this event. We're talking about for history's sake. These twelve men are given the opportunity to be the leaders who spy out the land and prepare to take the promises of God, which has existed for almost a millennium, but at least several hundred years, to take the promises of God and enter the promised land. These are the ones. It's time. It's time for you to step up. It's time. It's super barrel Sunday. It's the last inning of the World Series. Are you following me? It is D Day. It's Invasion Day. It's time to. It's time where the heroes shine. This is the opportunity, and we have their names now. These were the names. From the tribe of Reuben Shamua from the tribe of Simeon Shaphat from the tribe of Judah caleb from the tribe of Issachar egal from the tribe of Ephraim Hoshea from the tribe of Benjamin palti from the tribe of Zebulun gadiel. From the tribe of Jodah Joseph. That is the tribe of Manasseh Gadi from the tribe of Dan Amiel and from the tribe of Ashere Sethur and from the tribe of Naphtali Nabi and from the tribe of gad gel gil. These are the names, verse 16 of the men who were sent to spy out the land. And Moses called Hoshea the son of Nun, Joshua. So we called him Hoshea earlier. Now we've got Joshua. Those are the names. It's almost like, it's almost like in the NcAA tournament for the national championship, you know, they're calling off the names of the players and, you know, the spotlight's on them and they're slapping the hands of their teammates and then they're going to shoot the other coach's hand. And this, I mean, this is it. This is the opportunity. They have risen to the position where they are being mentioned in a list in the Bible of the men who are going to take the gift of God that has been promised to the people of Israel through 6700 years, two to three times longer than our country has been a nation. This is the list. Only two of them will be mentioned again. Only two. Caleb and Joshua. Joshua gets mentioned twice in this passage because Moses calls him Joshua. The rest of them, you don't know them, you don't know who they are. Joshua gets mentioned many times because he has risen to the place where he ultimately has overtaken Aaron as the second leader of Israel. Aaron still affections as high priest, but the truth is Joshua is the leader. In fact, a book of the Bible, the 6th book of the Bible is going to be named after him because he's the one who leads the people into the promised land. Caleb is mentioned several times in scripture all throughout actually the histories. And the reason he's mentioned is he's. Cause Joshua is the younger man, Caleb is the older man, the man who was on up in his years, who is a man of faith. And he takes his possession by himself. Every other possession, all of Israel takes, the armies, take Caleb. He just leads his own tribe and takes his possession by himself. You know why? Because he trusts God. He trusts God. Twelve names mentioned. Twelve names. And I didn't even say that they were the son of somebody else because the reason I didn't say that is because they're going to really, in the truth, they're going to shame their father's name. I mentioned their father in relation to them. God does. But you know, we really kind of look at it and understand it. What they're about to do is shameful, very shameful. God didn't tell him to go in to spy the land so they could decide whether or not to take the gift of God that he had promised for several hundred years. He told them to go in to spy the land so that the, so they move properly and, and do this in an orderly and, and uh, and uh, um, well, proper way. He told them to go in and take the land because, you know, that's what they were always going to do. That's what they were supposed to do. Go and find out, is it a land flowing with milk and honeydeh? They're going to come back and say, yeah, it is. You know, God never mentions who lives there other than to say, you're going to drive them out. It's not, that's not an issue. That's not a problem. That's not something God is worried about. But these men are going to come back and they're going to give their report and their report's not going to be about how to do what God has told them to do. Their report is going to be based off of whether or not they want to do what God's told them to do. And they're not only going to give their report, but they're going to basically influence the people of Israel because they are the leaders of their tribes. They're going to influence the people of Israel to not go in, to not do what God has promised them to do, to not trust in God's word. They're going to influence people to do what is clearly against God's word and they're going to be forgotten for it. I say this all the time. The reason churches die is because one of two things, and usually both, they leave God's word or they fail to practice what they read. They leave, they leave God's word. They're not focused on God's word. They're focused on other things, peripheral things. Maybe some of them important things. Maybe they're focused on a certain ministry. Maybe they're focused on a certain gift. Maybe they're focused on a certain place in time that they have. And they're just trying to live up to the times and the seasons they're in. They're, they're, they're trying to do that. But they leave God's word as the preeminent, most important thing, the thing that has to be at the center. Because without God's word, the Holy Spirit can't really reveal anything to you like that. He can reveal to you God's existence in creation, but he can't resist reveal to you revelatory knowledge. He can't really teach you the fullness of God because Jesus is the fullness of God and he is the roadmap. So they can't do that. Holy spirit can't do that. And the second thing they do is they fail to practice what they read. And that primarily means they fail to love each other. They fail to love God and they fail to love each other. And those are the two things that God builds out of it. And we love God by keeping his commandments, by doing what he says, and we love each other by being self sacrificial toward each other, placing others best interest ahead of our own. That's what we do. That's how we do it. That's, that's, that's how church is done well. In any setting, no matter how many people you have, church has done well where God's word is preeminent where God's people love God and they obey by faith what God has shown them. They obey God. They obey his commandments, his teachings, to walk in trust of him, and they fail to love each other self sacrificially. That's how, that's how churches die. That's how dreams die. That's how visions die. That's how churches die. And you'll see it. You'll see it. You'll ask the question, what happened? Well, they don't have any more. They never had any more children. They don't have any young people. Why? Because they want their own ways rather than making sure that they do the things that are going to attract children. They love children, they love young people, but they won't own it my way. And I'm not really worried about trying to reach young people with the gospel, the good news of Jesus Christ. I'm going to feed myself. And, you know, whatever happens, happens. And what happens is, is you end up with a whole bunch of folks who are feeding themselves, or they decide for some reason that God's word's not true and they make excuses and they say that, you know, that's not, that's not what we're saying. Yeah, it is. Because if God's revelation about one thing is not true, why is his revelation about anything true? And so they leave God's word and then they die. And so what you have is you have people who are not listening to God, and yet people who, even if they hear God, aren't doing what he says, they're not living it out. And so there's death. There always is. That's, that's, that's the, that's the path to personal, um, separation from God. That's the path for churches to separate from God. That's just the way it works. And so these men, ten of them, decide that they're going to determine whether or not God's revelation to them, which has existed for 750 years, let's just say, give it a round number, might be eight, 8900, could be as low as 600, but let's just say 750 years, God promises to them, which he has lived up to in every way, bringing them to this position. They're no longer, his promises are no longer feasible, they're no longer possible, or no longer under their understanding, something that should be done. And. And so they reject God's promises. And by rejecting God's promises, they fail to love their neighbor, because the best thing for your neighbor to have is God. And so if I reject God so that he is no longer preeminent in what I do, then I am. I'm stealing my neighbor's chance to know God also through me. And so that's what they do. And that's exactly what happens here. Twelve names in the hat. Two names remembered forever. What's the difference between the two? Two took God's promises as if they were and are, and ever shall be. They accepted God's promises as if it's reality for today. And Tim tried to test and figure out whether or not they actually believed God. And turns out they didn't. Joshua and Caleb dressed them. Who cares? That's the way history always is, isn't it? It's the way history always is. Those who choose to step out in faith and choose to receive the promises of God and walk in the big things, their names are remembered and everybody else's is nothing. They get the promotion, the others don't. God is a promoting God. He's in the business of giving you promises and fulfilling them. He's in the business of glorifying himself with your life. He wants to do those things. But when the opportunity comes to walk in faith, you got it. You got to accept the intent and the delivery so that you can receive the fullness of the gift. You wouldn't have stayed this long had your heart desired to receive the fullness of the gift in this Bible study. And so I'd say to you, if you've reached this point in the Bible study, then the likelihood is, is that you're a gift receiving, power filled believer, truster in the eternal God. And congratulations.

As you go today. I pray that the Lord will bless you and keep you, that he'll make his face to shine upon you, and that he will give you hope and peace today. In Jesus name.