The Blessing of Wholehearted Faith
Caleb the son of Jephunneh was one of the twelve Israelite spies that Moses had sent into Canaan to investigate the land and gather intelligence about their potential enemies. When the spies returned, only two of the twelve came back with a...
faith-filled glowing report about victory. The other ten brought back fear and dread. One of the two men of faith was Caleb.After receiving his
positive intelligence report, Moses - led by God
- made a promise to Caleb, "Look Caleb, when we take the land, you can
have that territory that you spied out. That's yours." Because of his faith and because he wholly
followed the Lord, he was given a special promise from God.
It
is now forty-plus years later and Caleb remembers this promise. So Caleb came
to Joshua, and he said, "Hey Josh, remember when you and I spied out the
land, when we came back and gave our report to Moses, and Moses promised me
that I could have for my family, the territory that we spied out? Now look I'm
eighty-five years old, but I'm just as strong as the day that we spied out the
land. I want your permission now to go
down and take that land that was promised to me.”
I
love the grit of this old fellow. Eighty-five years old, he says, "Man,
I'm ready to go to battle. I'm ready to take that land that God had promised to
me, that Moses promised that I could have. I want your permission now to go
down and take it." So Joshua gave Caleb the permission to go down the area
of Hebron, and those areas around Hebron, the areas that were promised to him.
So Caleb went down and conquered that area around Hebron. Afterwards, Joshua blessed Caleb by granting
him title to the land he was promised.
Verse
14 tells us the reason that Caleb received this special allotment of land –
because he wholly followed the LORD, the God of Israel. Caleb was tenacious in his faith and
obedience to the Lord. He was never half-hearted
or lukewarm in his faith. He “wholly”
followed his God. And the reward for his
wholehearted faith was that God kept the promise he had made years earlier.
How’s
your faith today? Is it half-hearted or
lukewarm? Are you bringing back reports
of fear and dread? If so, it’s never too
late to turn back to the Lord and to begin following Him with your whole
heart. God promises a special blessing to
those who wholly follow Him.
No comments:
Post a Comment