Caleb - A Different Spirit Series

Note: I used notes from Max Lucado's book Glory Days

Title: A Different Spirit

Theme: To show the importance of us being different.

Text: Joshua 14:6 – 15, Numbers 13, 14

Introduction

Last Sunday we looked at Joshua 9. Here God wrought and amazing miracle. We learn that it is ok to go boldly to the throne of Grace and ASK God. This is big challenge of our faith.

For the next few chapters we read of Joshua’s conquests, the kings he conquered and the land they possessed. In Joshua 13 God tells Joshua to begin to divide the Land. There is a plan here. It was now their purpose to take the land God has given them and if there was any resistence to conquer the people.

In Joshua 14 we are reintroduced to Caleb.

Joshua 14:5-15 As the Lord had commanded Moses, so the children of Israel did; and they divided the land. (6) Then the children of Judah (This is interesting because in chapter 7 of Joshua we learned of another man, Achan (selfishness, faithless, independence) , who was from the tribe of Judah. Yet as we will see his character was totally different from that of Caleb’s). came to Joshua in Gilgal.

And Caleb the son of Jephunneh the Kenizzite said to him: "You know the word which the Lord said to Moses the man of God concerning you and me in Kadesh Barnea. (7) I was forty years old when Moses the servant of the Lord sent me from Kadesh Barnea to spy out the land, and I brought back word to him as it was in my heart. (He was not speaking something to get the attention or favor of others, this was in his heart. You could not have convinced him of anything differently. This is true faith. Not just in the head but in the heart.)

Grasshopper Mentality

I. We are as strong as our faith will allow ourselves to be. (V.11)

Num 13:26-33 Now they departed and came back to Moses and Aaron and all the congregation of the children of Israel in the Wilderness of Paran, at Kadesh; they brought back word to them and to all the congregation, and showed them the fruit of the land. (27) Then they told him, and said: "We went to the land where you sent us. It truly flows with milk and honey, and this is its fruit. (28) Nevertheless the people who dwell in the land are strong; the cities are fortified and very large; moreover we saw the descendants of Anak there. (29) The Amalekites dwell in the land of the South; the Hittites, the Jebusites, and the Amorites dwell in the mountains; and the Canaanites dwell by the sea and along the banks of the Jordan." (30) Then Caleb quieted the people before Moses, and said, "Let us go up at once and take possession, for we are well able to overcome it." (31) But the men who had gone up with him said, "We are not able to go up against the people, for they are stronger than we." (32) And they gave the children of Israel a bad report of the land which they had spied out, saying, "The land through which we have gone as spies is a land that devours its inhabitants, and all the people whom we saw in it are men of great stature. (33) There we saw the giants [17](the descendants of Anak came from the giants); and we were like grasshoppers in our own sight, and so we were in their sight."

“If the Lord delights in us, then He will bring us into this land and give it to us, ‘a land which flows with milk and honey.’” —Numbers 14:8

“Only do not rebel against the Lord, nor fear the people of the land, for they are our bread; their protection has departed from them, and the Lord is with us. Do not fear them.” —Numbers 14:9

1Jn 4:4 You are of God, little children, and have overcome them, because He who is in you is greater than he who is in the world.

1 John 4:4 But you belong to God, my dear children. You have already won your fight with these false prophets, because the Spirit who lives in you is greater than the spirit who lives in the world.

Full Heart Toward God – No wavering

Nine times in this passage alone while speaking to Joshua he uses the phrase “the Lord”. He knew it was not on his own that he would accomplish this.

(8) Nevertheless my brethren who went up with me made the heart of the people melt, but I wholly followed the Lord my God.

Numbers 14:24 But My servant Caleb, because he has a different spirit in him and has followed Me fully, I will bring into the land where he went, and his descendants shall inherit it.