The Right Voice
Numbers 13:30
Woodlawn Baptist Church
November 11, 2007
Last week I spoke to you about fear, and as I did, many of you said that God spoke to you about your own fears. Remember that the people of Israel responded to God’s instructions to take Canaan with fear: fear of the giants, the fortified cities, the powerful and numerous enemies, but mostly just fear that they didn’t have what it took to do what God said. We looked at John 10, where Jesus said that He came to give us abundant life, and we saw that abundant life is directly tied to the absence of fear. Jesus said that His sheep hear His voice, and they follow. Do they follow because they don’t have fear? Not at all, but rather they follow because they trust the voice of the One who calls.
Israel missed God’s greatest blessings to them: the Promised Land, but most importantly, the life He desired for them as they lived out His will for them. They missed abundant life simply because they weren’t listening to His voice. Because they listened to all the wrong voices, they spent their lives in the wilderness, eventually dying there, never knowing the real blessings of God.
I know that kind of fear. I know what its like to miss out on God’s blessings because I listened to the wrong voices. I’ve listened to the wrong voices in my marriage: voices like pop culture, friends without a biblical worldview, and more. I’ve listened to those same wrong voices as I’ve tried to raise my children. Consider just one example in the area of discipline. Go to the magazine stand and you’ll find a 101 ways to discipline a child, and none of them have to do with a rod. Which voice will we heed?
There are countless examples of this. Many of you expressed last Sunday how good it was to recognize your own fears and see how they cause you to miss out on abundant life. It’s more than fear of heights, or spiders, or small places. The real fears we must face are the fears like the fear of failing or the fear of rejection; the fear of criticism or the fear of being alone. Do you remember the fear God spoke to you about? Get that fear fixed in your mind again today. I shared with you some observations about fear.
1. Fear always has a “but.”
2. Fear looks for the obstacles
3. Fear focuses on the difficulties
4. Fear spreads like wildfire
5. Fear doesn’t listen to reason
6. Fear demoralizes and immobilizes us
7. Fear says “if only”
8. Fear says “we can’t”
9. Fear longs for the comfort of yesterday
10. Fear will cause us to act foolishly
11. Fear of this sort is offensive to God
Fear is one of our basest emotions, perhaps the most troubling emotion we experience, but God never intended for us to live or operate that way in our marriages, our jobs, in our other important relationships, nor here in our church.
Last week I left you with that one idea – that God never intended for us to live or operate in fear mode. I suspect that you don’t want to live or operate that way either. Imagine the liberty of being free to love your spouse without fear of him or her leaving you. Imagine the freedom that comes when you don’t fear losing your job. How would your life be different if those fears were gone? How liberating would it be to not worry what others think about you? To act without constantly looking over your shoulder? To do a thing without worrying whether you’ll fail? Pretty sweet, huh? But knowing you don’t have to fear and knowing God does not want you to fear isn’t enough. What does He want? Thankfully we’re not left to wonder.
We’re going to go back and reconsider the same two passages we read last week and see exactly what God does want, and we’ll find it exemplified in the life of Caleb.
Read Numbers 13:25-14:10 and make comparisons between the fear of the people and the faith of Caleb.
So how did Caleb respond? He does his best to reason with the mob and make the appeal for immediate obedience. “Let’s go at once! We can conquer it!” But not only that, when Israel refused, he was torn up about it. He fell to the ground in grief, tore his clothes, appealed to them again and pleaded with them not to rebel against God.
Now Caleb saw the same giants, the same fortified cities, the same powerful enemies that the other spies saw, but his response was absolutely different. In fact, Numbers 14:24 tells us that Caleb had a different attitude, or another spirit about him than did the rest of Israel, and what was the result of that different attitude or spirit? Read verse 24 with me.
“But my servant Caleb has a different attitude than the others have. He has remained loyal to me…he has followed me fully, so I will bring him into the land he explored. His descendants will possess their full share of that land.”
Verse 30 tells us the whole nation of Israel would die in the wilderness, but Caleb would get the land. Verse 38 says it again. Chapter 26:65 does too. In fact, look at a couple of other verses with me and I want you to listen for two important phrases.
• Numbers 32:11-12
• Deuteronomy 1:35-36
Did you hear them? Caleb wholly followed the Lord, and the Lord gave to him, or blessed him. That’s significant! And can you imagine what a long 40 years it must have been for him to wander around in the wilderness, knowing that this nation of people who responded in fear had kept him from receiving that gift even sooner? But I’ll tell you, Caleb only grew more resolved with age. Look with me at what Caleb, now an 85 year old man tells his friend Joshua.
Read Joshua 14:7-12. How could this man wholly follow the Lord so confidently all those years? How could he, in spite of the might and power of his enemies, in spite of his age, in spite of all the obstacles, speak with such faith? It is because of what we learned in John 10. Look at it one more time with me.
Jesus was speaking in response to the Pharisees who had just excluded a man from their synagogue for believing in Jesus. In spite of any fears he may have had, the man had chosen to side with Jesus. The Pharisees are confounded, and they question Jesus. It is in response to that that Jesus launches into this story about sheep and their shepherd. He said in verses 1-5 that some would call to the sheep, but their voices were strange. It is in that context that Jesus said “the thief just comes to steal and to kill and to destroy. I came that they might have life, and have it more abundantly.” He is the Good Shepherd. He’s the One who loves the sheep: who has given His very life for the sheep. That’s why He could say in John 10:27, “My sheep hear my voice: I know them, and they follow me.”
Don’t lose sight of this: there are plenty of voices calling for our devotion. There are countless voices calling for us to follow them, to follow their advice, to follow their counsel, to follow their leadership. Abundant life though is found in Jesus. If you want real life, abundant life, God’s blessings, then make sure you’re following Jesus. Make sure you’re hearing the right voice.
How is it that when a mob of 2 million says we can’t take the land, 2 men said they can? They were hearing the right voice, and they wholly followed that voice.
Today there are many voices calling for your attention. Some of you are in some pretty troubled marriages, and according to the Scriptures some of God’s greatest blessings are to be found in healthy, wholesome marriages. If that’s what you want, make sure you’re hearing the right voice.
You Jr. High and High School students are in some of the toughest years of your life right now. There are voices telling you its okay to have sex right now, or that homosexuality is okay, or that there’s nothing wrong with two people living together if they’re in love. Those voices are crying out for your hearts and minds every day, but God’s greatest blessings aren’t found there. Abundant life is found somewhere else. Make sure you’re hearing the right voice.
Some of you really struggle on the job. Your pay is low, you’re not appreciated, maybe there’s no room for advancement or you feel like nobody cares how you do your job. You know the voices that call out to you: so what if you take a longer break? Or if you take care of personal business on their time, or if your performance isn’t your very best, they don’t give a rip anyway. But God does. Abundant life is found in having integrity, in working like you’re working for Him, in being the employee Jesus would be. Every day His voice calls out for you to follow Him on that job. Make sure you’re hearing that voice.
How many believers spend their lives worrying whether they’re liked or not? Accepted or not? And so they follow the wrong voices, constantly trying to perform, trying to be what their world wants them to be: shorter, taller, skinnier, bigger, stronger, faster, better. Countless hours are wasted, never to live again if they were ever really lived in the first place worried with what anyone thinks of your frizzy hair, straight hair or missing hair; your zits, the clothes you wear or can’t afford to wear; what you drive, where you live, what kind of phone you carry or how much you can text. Can I remind you of something? Those are all the wrong voices.
I don’t know what your particular situation is. I’ll not try to guess. But you know. And you know whether you’re really hearing the voice of the Good Shepherd calling out for you to follow Him to a better place. Sure it’s not as easy. There may be problems. It may take all your will to do it, but there’s abundant life across that river. Remember Caleb – he wholly followed the Lord, and the Lord gave…
If you’ve never trusted Christ as your Savior, the world says to you that all roads eventually get you to heaven. But they don’t. There’s only one way – and that’s through Jesus Christ. His voice is calling to you today to repent of your sin and put your faith in Him. His voice is calling out to you today that no matter how screwed up your past might be, He paid the price to forgive you of that past. His voice is pleading with you today to receive the love He longs to share with you, to accept the sacrifice He made for you, to believe the gospel that He is for you. The world says all of that is foolish. Jesus said He’s the only way. Make sure you’re hearing the right voice.
Put yourself in Israel’s shoes. The way looks scary. It looks impossible. But if we’re hearing the right voice today, no matter what your fear is, like Caleb, you too can wholly follow the Lord. And just as sure as you can follow, I believe God will bless.
