Caleb

Transcript

So I wanted to test your minds a little bit this morning with this verse that's up on the board. Of whom was it said, My servant blank, because he had another spirit with him, or a different spirit, and hath followed me fully. There's more to it, but if I put it there, it would give it away. So just think of it. You don't have to yell out an answer, but just think of who you might think that is. And then I'm going to, Brother Rich already saw this, but these were my heroes growing up. I was a big Batman and Robin fan as a young kid, and I don't know if Dad remembers, but on one Christmas of birthday they bought me a Batman replica figure. And he was probably four feet tall, and he was my best friend for like three or four years. But I put them up there, not to reminisce on Batman and Robin, but just to say, in life and in the Bible, there are many dynamic duos, aren't there? And I put up a list of just a few of the dynamic duos that I could, you know, came to the top of my head. You know, many of them did great things. I don't know why Jezebel and Ahab came to my mind, but they did. I mean, they were a dynamic duo, but for the wrong reasons, as we all know. But these people all did wonderful things. And for the most part, there was a Batman and there was a Robin, if you think about it. And the Batman, in most of the narratives, did all the great things, was the hero, so to speak, and the Robin is kind of in the background. And I say that because the individual I'm speaking of could be considered a Robin. He was more in the background, but he has some awesome things to tell us in Scripture. So the question is – and I'm going to give you a few hints, just because I'm a nice guy. So our mystery guest saw the worst of times and the best of times. And I already gave it away. I didn't mean to put he. I shouldn't have put the he, because it could have been a woman as well, but I gave it away, so it's narrowed it down for you. He was a slave in Egypt and knew all about the pain and the toil living under the yoke of the Egyptians, witnessed God's judgments, the crossing of the Red Sea, and Moses descending Sinai.

One of the first to see the land of Canaan, that should really narrow it down, if you haven't already figured it out. He was 40 years old the first time he's mentioned in Scripture.

Though no fault of his own, he had to spend 40 years in the wilderness watching as his generation all died because of their mistrust of the Lord, often hidden behind his more famous friend, who we already mentioned, the Batman, so to speak, compared to this gentleman's Robin. And we're speaking of Caleb. Anyone figure it out that it was Caleb? You can brag. No? I ran this by my son, and yeah, he, you know, Chris, not to pick on you, but he didn't get it until toward the bottom of the clues. So yeah, Caleb, somebody who we read about every time the readings come to numbers, right, in Joshua? Yeah. And Joshua was the Batman, you know, the more famous of the two, but there's Caleb in the background. And with every good Batman, there are times when a Robin is needed to pull through, to help and save Batman. It's very few. If you watch the old Batman series that I watched with Adam West, usually it was Batman coming to the rescue, but there were one or two episodes where it was something that Robin did that was the storyline. And we're going to see that here in our study today of Caleb. So as great as the things that Joshua did, we're going to look at Caleb. We'll mention Joshua a little bit because it's hard not to because they're kind of connected to each other, aren't they? So we're going to look at Caleb and see what lessons from his life and from what we read of him in Scripture that we could apply to our own. So Caleb, you know, we read the verse from Numbers 14 that he had another spirit in him, okay, or a different spirit. And what I'd like to talk about today is what makes up, what qualities of Caleb help make up that different, that another spirit. And I came up with four or five different ones. We'll look at them. Hopefully we'll get through them all today of qualities that Caleb possessed that make up the different spirit. Okay, so the first one that I came up with was he was a different type of servant. And if you want to follow along in your Bibles will mainly be in Numbers 13 and 14 and will also be in Joshua a little bit as well for reference. So he was a different kind of servant. And to set the setting, okay, the children of Israel, if my timeline's correct, had been on the move toward the promised land for about 15 or 16 months. And can you imagine, and I can only liken it to a couple of things, you know, besides awaiting the kingdom now. But as a child, when your mom and dad say, guess where we're going next year? And you're like, we're going to Disney World for two weeks. And that anticipation, you know, you guys can all think of your own examples where you've had great anticipation for something to happen that's going to happen in the future. And that's really what I can liken this to. Can you imagine after the time they spent in Egypt moving through these last 15, 16 months and now they're on the edge of the promised land? The thrill, the excitement must have been amazing, you would think, right? The promises they've been promised are coming to pass and everything's going great. I mean, that's the only thing I can liken it to is, you know, a trip to Disney World or something to that effect. They had to have been excited. But if we set the scene, if you remember back in Numbers 12, before we're told that they were on the edge in the wilderness of Paran, and I put up an image there of the wilderness of Paran where they were, you know, to me, if you're in an area like this, bone dry, arid, and then you're told you're going into a land flowing with milk and honey, you would think you'd be jumping off the walls, right? But in Numbers 12, we read the account of Miriam and Aaron where they basically come out and say, what's so great about Moses? We're equal to Moses. Why aren't we being treated like Moses? You know, Miriam, God curses her with leprosy. And, you know, everything you don't need before a big trip, so to speak, had happened in previous chapters. And we know throughout the journeys, the grumbling and the complaining and the, you know, what was us attitude that the children of Israel had. And to have two of the three leaders basically try to overthrow the one, Moses, couldn't have been a good thing. It really couldn't have been. So that kind of sets the scene for what we're introduced to in Numbers Chapter 13. So God instructs Moses, and you read of this in the first 16 verses, where he instructs Moses to send out one man out of every tribe. And a key verse in this is in verse two, and I do want to read verse two. So I'm in Chapter 13 of Numbers, and this is God says, send thou men that they may search the land of Canaan, which I give unto the children of Israel, which I give. It's a done deal. All right. You probably recognize that verbiage, the same that he uses in Joshua, when Joshua is told in Conquer the Land, it's yours. All you have to do is listen to me, believe in me, and go in and take it. Okay. And brothers and sisters, that's a beautiful thing because we're given the same thing. Right? We're told the same thing. Whosoever believeth in him shall have eternal life. It's the same thing for us that's given to them. All right. So it's a done deal. Just go in and take the land. You know, I'm with you. As long as I'm with you, don't fear anything. Well, the twelve go out. All right. They go out throughout the land, and they spy out the land. And before they went out, though, one thing I did want to mention was, you know, these twelve were not just picked nilly-willy. All right. These twelve had to have qualities about them that Moses, because Moses, God says, Moses, you pick out the twelve. So they had to have special qualities about them that Moses would trust, you know, leadership qualities, you know, lack of fear because of the land that they were going into, the ability to be a leader, you know, a leader of men, and wisdom, you know, the ability to discern situations, whether it be good for the people or whether it is not good. So, you know, he just didn't pick men out of a hat. You know, it was done with care, prayer. I'm sure a lot of thought and prayer went behind his decisions on who to pick. So one of the men, and we mentioned him earlier, was Joshua. He was one that was picked out to lead, to go into the land, and he's first introduced back in Exodus 17. In here, in the account we read in Numbers, his name, Oshua, is used. But if you go back into the account in Exodus where

Moses sends him out to fight the Amalekites, we won't look that up. But his name, Joshua, is used. But it's not until here in Numbers where we're told that Moses changes his name to Joshua. And if you remember, brothers and sisters, his name, Oshua, means salvation, okay? But Moses changes it to Joshua, which means Yahweh saves. And that's why his name is used back in Exodus, because it's not about Joshua. It's not about Moses. It's all about God. You know, God is our salvation. He's our rock. Brother Chris.

In this year's Cycling Through Numbers and Reading Through, something jumped out to me that might be impactful for what you're discussing. But prior to this, their cousins Esau and Moab have already dispossessed the giants in Mount Seir and amongst the Ammonites. And so, you know, it's that much more of a failing on Israel's part where they're not able to go in and do this when their cousins have already accomplished this themselves. And so I think to the spirit, I think the distinction may be the spirit that Esau and Moab wasn't in the spirit that God saves. Perhaps it was by the might of their own arm, but God is trying to develop something different in his people, a spirit of faith in God's deliverance rather than themselves. So when you get into Joshua, meaning Yahweh saves, it kind of gave me that idea. No, that's a good point, too, Brother Chris. Thank you for bringing that up because I didn't have that in my notes, so I appreciate that. Thank you. Anything else? Okay, good. So I want to read, if we can, because I just found this psalm to really reflect the mindset of Caleb and of Joshua and of many others, too, that we read about. And I hope and pray that I can apply this in my life as well from Psalm 130, starting at verse 6. Now, I think this is probably a psalm of David while he was under distress, probably fleeing from Saul. I'm not 100% sure, but this is what the psalm says in verse 5. And that's a great summary of Caleb and Joshua and so many of those that we read about. So I just found that a very appropriate verse for Caleb and the mindset and the spirit that he had and what we're going to see as we continue looking at him here. So what are we told about Caleb? We're told that he's the son of Jephunneh from the tribe of Judah. His name means dog, and I didn't know that until now, but how appropriate because when you read of Caleb throughout Scripture, he's more than a dog. He's not a gentle little, I don't know what's a gentle little dog, a Chihuahua or something like that. Caleb's a pit bull. He really is. He seems like a really tough guy.

So his name means dog. In Numbers 32, we're told that his father was a Kenazite. And before doing this research, I heard the phrase Kenazite. Truthfully, I didn't know what it meant, so I did a little research on it. And they go back to the time of Abraham. We read about them in Genesis 19. And the Kenazites seem to be a wild clan of people. I don't want to say vagabonds, but they tend to move within all the other groups. So some of them interdispersed with the Edomites, some with the Canaanites, and then others within the tribe of Israel. They kind of merged in on their own. And in fact, you don't read about them at all in the account in Joshua 3, where it's talked about the conquest of the peoples and the nations. They're not there. So I think that over time, they became dispersed within all these other groups. You know, they were kind of, from what I could see, they weren't well-respected people and somewhat considered, I don't want to say lazy, but they kind of lived off of others. So, you know, they weren't well-respected. And I'll just leave it at that. So his father was a Kenazite, which was interesting. So that means his mother had to be from the tribe of Judah, an Israelite. So he was kind of – I'm not saying this in a bad way – but, you know, he was a mixed bag. He was a combination of different peoples. He wasn't what we'd say a true Israelite, maybe. I don't know, but it's interesting. They mention it quite a few times that his father was a Kenazite. Okay? So he has that as his background as well. So he was, in that respect, a little different maybe than the other 11 that were sent out from the other tribes. I put there his spouses and his sons, and we won't get into it. But one interesting thing later on in Joshua 15 is he gives his daughter, his daughter Akish, to Othniel. And if you remember, Othniel was the first judge of Israel. So that was kind of interesting. So I didn't do the great research that Brother Duncan did in his Wednesday night class. That was fabulous. And, you know, I could have dug a little deeper into this, but I wanted to get out the aspects of Caleb more than researching his family. So, as we mentioned, they're on the edge. They're in the wilderness of Paran. And if you can see the map, under Qadish Barneyer, the wilderness ascending right under that is Paran. And we already showed that it was a pretty barren place. We look at, if we go back into Numbers 13, and we get into what they saw when they were in the land. Okay? And they spent 40 days. And if you look at the map, I hope you can see it, but there's a red line from Qadish Barneyer, and it goes all the way up to Rahab. And Hebron is somewhat in the middle, and that's the area expanse that they traveled in 40 days to spy out the land. That's very interesting. That's a lot of walking and a lot of ground that they covered. But they spent the 40 days, and in Verse 26 of Chapter 13, we get to their report. In Verse 25, they returned from searching of the land after 40 days. So in, what, eight verses from Chapter, Verse 17 to 25 is 40 days worth of searching. And then in Verse 26, it reads, And they came to Moses and to Aaron and to all the congregation of the children of Israel under the wilderness of Paran to Qadish and brought back word unto them and to all the congregation and showed them the fruit of the land. All right. It sounds great, right? Everything's starting off great. And they told them, they said, We came unto the land whither thou sentest us, and surely it floweth with milk and honey. And they brought back the grapes from the valley of Sukkot, and everything perfect. You could just imagine if you were one of the children of Israel hearing this report, you know, you've waited all this time to get into the land. The spies come back and they say, It's true. It's true. Everything that God said about the land is right. It's true. Whoo-hoo. We're going in. But the people are strong. The people are strong. They dwell on the land and the city's a wall. They're very great. Moreover, we saw the children of Anak there. The Amalekites dwell in the land of the south, and the Hittites, the Jebusites, the Amorites dwell in the mountains, and the Canaanites dwell by the sea and by the coast of Jordan. Oh. Why did you have to tell me that? I was all excited, ready to go. And it's an amazing thing. You know, everything was just like God had told them. Okay? But how quickly they forgot upon hearing this, all the great things God had done for them. You know, leaving Egypt, crossing the Red Sea, the commandments, the water, the manna, everything. And it didn't matter. It didn't matter anymore that the land was flowing with milk and honey. All they heard was, the giants are there. The Amalekites are there. All these people are there. They're all walled cities. That's all they heard. And, you know, it's easy for us to condemn them, isn't it? But, you know, in our own lives, there have been times, I'm sure each and every one of us have lived by sight rather than by faith. And that can be a tough thing sometimes for us to overcome because what you see, and unfortunately we've seen many, some of our brothers and sisters, turn away from the truth because they are living by sight. You know, they see, well, you can't prove that this happened. Well, we're not proving it. It's faith that, you know, they live by sight. And that's what's happening here. It's a sad thing that happened. But then we're introduced to our Batman, Caleb. And it's funny to me here, and I don't know a reason yet. I don't know, but, you know, in the past it was always Moses, right? When the children of Israel went a bad report, when they grumbled, complained, Moses would say something, but Caleb jumps in. And this is where I think the pit bull that Caleb is. He wasn't waiting for Moses if Moses was going to say something. Caleb was going to speak his mind. He had been out there with them. He saw the same things, all right? He's been through everything they have. And Caleb steps right in. And I can just picture it. As soon as the ten had finished their report, I could see Caleb, if he was in the background, maybe pushing himself to the front. And in verse 30, he stills the people before Moses and says,

brothers, countrymen, we shouldn't wait. Let's go.

Let us go up at once and possess it, for we are all well able to overcome it.

What are we wasting time here worried about, the people and the land? God has told us what he's going to do for us. Let's go. I think it's just great. And then we read on that, you know, and Caleb's a great example, you know, how tough it is, you know, I think of what he did. You know, at this point you've got the ten with their great report turning into a negative report. The people probably starting to get riled up because of the report. And he steps in. And I think at times, and we've probably all dealt with this within our friends out in the world or our work peers, you know, where conversations get to certain topics, how easy it is for us to melt into that topic. Let's say it's politics. You know, they tell you don't talk politics at work. People talk politics at work. They do. And it gets so tough sometimes when one side is for one group and one is for another. And it can be easy. Sometimes it's easier for us to say, you know, kind of be on the edge, not, you know, lean one way or the other, but not to come totally out and say, you know, God's ruling in the kingdoms of men where I come from. You know, I'm not concerned over which political party is doing what. You know, it's all by divine hand. That's tough to say nowadays. It's easier just, yeah, Dad, Dad's smiling. He's got his hand up. Yeah, Pop? Oh, hold on, Dad. He's going to give you the mic. What we see here is a test of faith. God sent out these men to test their faith. There were 12 men. They were leaders of their tribes. God was testing them. They had been aware of all the miracles and all the

wonderful things that God had done for them, delivering them out of the land of Egypt. They knew this, and only two of them, only two of them had the faith to believe that God could overcome any obstacle that they might face going forward. So it was deliberately done by God to test their faith. And there was the other 10 lacked faith in God. That's what it was all about. Yeah. Oh, you're right, 100%. Thanks, Dad. Yeah. Yeah. And unfortunately, what we see is that the 10 influenced everybody else, unfortunately. So, and that's, you know, one thing I noticed, you know, I wrote with Caleb. He stood up with a truthful message despite what his peers were saying and how much of a pit bull he was. If we skip down to verse 31 and finish off chapter 13, you know, it tells us the lack of faith of the 10, as Dad brought up. The men that went up with him said, We are not able to go up against the people. No mention of God anywhere in this. We can't do it. We. For they are stronger than we, and they brought up an evil report of the land through which they had searched under the children of Israel, saying the land through which we have gone to search it is a land that eateth up the inhabitants thereof, and all the people that we saw in it are men of great stature. And once again, we saw the giants, the son of Anak, which come of the giants, and we were in our own sight as grasshoppers in their sight. Not one mention of God and what he would do. And this is one of the differences between them and between Caleb. So we already talked about this, but they had all seen the same thing. Mark? Yeah, Chris? If, while you have that thought, if we introduce, and I appreciate you bringing to my attention to make me aware that Caleb means dog, but if we think of dog in the sense of Gentiles, because the Jews often look at Gentiles as dog, you know, even the dogs eat the crumbs that fall from the table. So not only do we have the lesson that the glory of Moses would fade, and he wouldn't bring him into the land, but our Lord Jesus would bring us into the land, but that Caleb or the Gentiles would be the first to accept this. We're seeing a further foreshadowing of not just Moses and Jesus, but the Gentiles as well. That's a great point, Chris. Yeah, definitely. Yes, yes.

So, you know, so we get into Chapter 14, and the first thing we read, that all the congregation lifted up their voice and cried, and the people wept that night. And this goes back to what Dad said about their lack of faith. Can you imagine if you were Caleb or Joshua looking

out amongst the thousands of people, and it doesn't say, you know, it says all the congregation, not just a few, all of them, lifted up their voices and wept? That had to be so discouraging, didn't it? It had to open for those two to see in witnesses. And then it goes from weeping to revolt. All the children of Israel murmured against Moses and against Aaron, and the whole congregation said unto them, Would God that we had died in the land of Egypt, or would God we had died in this wilderness? And wherefore hath the Lord brought us under this land to fall by the sword, that our wives and our children should be a prey? Were it not better for us to return to Egypt? And then they say, let us make a captain and let us return to Egypt. Revolt. And Moses and Aaron were told in verse six, verse five,

that Moses and Aaron fell on their faces before all the assembly of the congregation of the children of Israel. And they started trying to think. They fell on their faces. So to me, they fell prostrate on the ground, facing the people. My first inclination was they did this maybe out of fear of the revolt that was about to take place. But the more I think about it, the more it probably makes more sense, and maybe you guys have your own thought, that they fell prostrate because they were fearful of the Lord's punishment. They knew what the Lord would probably do when they fell on their faces in a plea to God for the people, even though it's not said. So I tend to lean to the second one more than that they were fearful of the people. Maybe a combination of both. I know I would probably have been afraid if thousands of people were revolting against me. So that would be natural to be afraid. But that's what it says. So it doesn't say they said a word, though, does it? It's that they fell on their faces before the people. And then we get to verse six.

And verses six through nine basically where Caleb and Joshua stand and plead with them, if God be for us, who can be against us?

Joshua the son of Nun and Caleb the son of Jephunneh, which were of them that searched the land. They rent their clothes. And they spake on all the company of the children of Israel, saying, The land which we pass through to search it out is an exceeding good land. And if the Lord delight in us, then he will bring us into this land and give it to us, a land which floweth with milk and honey. Rebel not ye against the Lord. You're not rebelling against Moses, my friends, you're rebelling against God. Neither fear ye the people of the land, for they are bred for us. Their defense is departed from them, and the Lord is with us. Fear them not. So what made such a drastic difference between the ten and the two? And time goes by so fast. We'll probably close on this slide, but it comes down to one thing, doesn't it?

They had different visions. The Psalm 130 that I read was a vision of God and his promises and his word and his truth. And that's what Caleb and Joshua had, that vision. The ten had a different vision. And this is number two of what made have Caleb have a different spirit, was he had a different vision. You know, the ten, and I like this phrasing, the ten compared themselves to the problem. Remember when we read it? We, we, we, we can't do it, we can't do it, we can't do it. They compared their strength to the problems in front of them. Whereas Caleb and Joshua compared the problem to the promises. They looked to God, the rock of their salvation. They didn't look at their own strength. They looked in turn to God. And you, you think of David and Goliath, Jesus in the cross. And this verse from Proverbs 29, Where there is no vision, the people perish. Now these people might have had a vision, but it wasn't a real vision, it was just scared. It was a scared vision. You can't do it.

Joshua and Caleb had a vision. It's the vision that we have. That's why we don't fear. When things go on in the world around us, and the horrible news of the day, and nation warring against nation, and horrible things that go on around us, we can not fear, because we know that God is in control. And that's what Joshua and Caleb were able to do in a very trying time, right? Very trying circumstances for them. And I've kindly already mentioned that. And we'll end here, because, you know, I was one of the brothers that came out and said we need to end our classes at 10.15, just to give everyone time. And it wouldn't look good if Brother Mark went past 10.15. So we'll end here, and it's a great place to end. And we'll pick this class up at another time, because there's quite a few more things I'd like to talk about with Caleb. But I think this is the perfect spot for us to end by looking at Hebrews chapter 12. And you all know this verse so well, but it speaks of our vision. Looking unto Jesus, the author and finisher of our faith, who for the joy that was set before him, the joy that was set before Caleb of the land flowing with milk and honey, Jesus saw a greater joy, didn't he, eternal life, the kingdom, endured the cross, despising the shame, and is set down at the right hand of the throne of God. And Caleb shows that quality here. He put up with the people, the threats. He and Joshua, because of the joy that was set before them for what God had promised them, and they had faith in those promises. So we'll leave off here with Caleb. We've looked at his – he had another spirit, a different spirit, and that was made up of being a different type of servant and a different type of vision. Those are two of five parts that made Caleb have this different spirit within him.