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The Old Testament book of Numbers offers a powerful life lesson about your vision. Just under a year after leaving Egypt, the children of Israel arrived at the border of Canaan, the Promised Land.
God instructs Moses to select 12 proven leaders (one from each tribe) to survey the land and report their findings.
God spoke to Moses:
“Send men to scout out the country of Canaan that I am giving to the People of Israel. Send one man from each ancestral tribe, each one a tried-and-true leader in the tribe.”
Numbers 13:1-2 The Message
Pay attention to the second verse’s phrase: “each one a tried-and-true leader in the tribe.”
The leaders were selected, instructed to “scout out the country,” and sent off.
For forty days they traveled the length and breadth of the Canaanite land reaching as far as the Mediterranean Sea.
Upon their return, Moses gathered the people to see and hear their reports.
After forty days of scouting out the land, they returned home.
They presented themselves before Moses and Aaron and the whole congregation of the People of Israel in the Wilderness of Paran at Kadesh. They reported to the entire congregation and showed them the fruit of the land.
Then they told the story of their trip:
The only thing is that the people who live there are fierce, their cities are huge and well fortified. Worse yet, we saw descendants of the giant Anak.
Amalekites are spread out in the Negev; Hittites, Jebusites, and Amorites hold the hill country; and the Canaanites are established on the Mediterranean Sea and along the Jordan.”
Caleb interrupted, called for silence before Moses and said, “Let’s go up and take the land – now. We can do it.”
But the others said, “We can’t attack those people; they’re way stronger than we are.”
They spread scary rumors among the People of Israel. They said, “We scouted out the land from one end to the other – it’s a land that swallows people whole. Everybody we saw was huge.
Numbers 13:25-32 The Message
Pay attention to this phrase in verse 32: “They spread scary rumors among the People of Israel.”
The backstory
God raised Moses to deliver his people, Israel, from Egyptian bondage and bring them into a land of promise.
God said, “I’ve taken a good, long look at the affliction of my people in Egypt. I’ve heard their cries for deliverance from their slave masters; I know all about their pain.
And now I have come down to help them, pry them loose from the grip of Egypt, get them out of that country and bring them to a good land with wide-open spaces, a land lush with milk and honey, the land of the Canaanite, the Hittite, the Amorite, the Perizzite, the Hivite, and the Jebusite.
Exodus 3:7-8 The Message
The leaders and all of Israel heard this promise but did not believe it.
It did not deter God from continuing to unfold his plan of deliverance.
According to the biblical account in the Old Testament book of Exodus, 600,000 men, plus women and children, marched out of Egypt. Conservative accounts suggest over one million people followed Moses into the wilderness.
About 11 months later, they are standing on the border of the land promised to give them.
The report
Twelve “tried-and-true leaders” (one from each tribe) crossed the border to gather information about the land of promise.
Ten of those leaders reported,
“The only thing is that the people who live there are fierce, their cities are huge and well fortified. Worse yet, we saw descendants of the giant Anak.
Amalekites are spread out in the Negev; Hittites, Jebusites, and Amorites hold the hill country; and the Canaanites are established on the Mediterranean Sea and along the Jordan.”
And they continued:
“But the others said, “We can’t attack those people; they’re way stronger than we are.”
They spread scary rumors among the People of Israel. They said, “We scouted out the land from one end to the other – it’s a land that swallows people whole. Everybody we saw was huge.”
Only two of the leaders saw something different.
“Caleb interrupted, called for silence before Moses and said, “Let’s go up and take the land – now. We can do it.”
“Not one of you will enter the land and make your home there, the firmly and solemnly promised land, except for Caleb son of Jephunneh and Joshua son of Nun.”
Numbers 14:30 The Message
Ten of the “tried-and-true” leaders saw giants, while the two righteous leaders saw God’s promise.
What does it mean?
A position of leadership does not mean they are a righteous leader. These ten leaders heard the same God’s promise in Exodus chapter three of A Promised Land. However, they (like millions of others) did not believe it.
They did not take it to heart and chose to believe what they “saw” over what God “said.”
They “spoke” discouraging words because of what they “saw.” And those words resonated with a million other people who did not believe.
A brief rabbit trail
The distance from Egypt to the Canaan border is about 380 miles (613km). It took one million people about 11 months to walk that distance.
This means a little over one year after hearing God’s promise to give them land; they are standing on the border about to cross into it.
It further means that each step of the millions they took did nothing to encourage them to believe in God’s promise.
This is why they so quickly embraced the negative report of the ten leaders.
The righteous leaders
Joshua and Caleb saw the same things the other ten leaders saw, yet they returned to say, “Let’s go up and take the land – now. We can do it.”
What is the difference?
The difference is that a year earlier, when Moses spoke God’s promise, it struck a heart cord that grew with each step they took toward the promised land.
Can you imagine their excitement standing there with the other leaders about to set foot in the land God promised to give them?
Imagine their increased blood pressure as they look at the sights while thinking, “This is ours?”
Can you imagine the adrenaline pumping through their veins as they waited to tell their brothers and sisters the good news of their journey?
I believe this is why, “Caleb interrupted, called for silence before Moses…” He was bursting at the seams to tell his story, and could no longer stay quiet after hearing the other leaders.
What do you see when you look at life?
Joshua and Caleb saw possibilities because they believed what God said. Their hearts were conditioned to embrace God at his word, and every step towards his promise impassioned them to continue.
The result was they lived in the promised land.
The other leaders closed their hearts—for any number of reasons—and it prevented them from embracing God’s promise. They spoke their negativity, which affirmed what a negative majority held to be true.
The result was death.
Tell them, As I live – God’s decree – here’s what I’m going to do:
Your corpses are going to litter the wilderness – every one of you twenty years and older who was counted in the census, this whole generation of grumblers and grousers.
Not one of you will enter the land and make your home there, the firmly and solemnly promised land, except for Caleb son of Jephunneh and Joshua son of Nun.
Numbers 14:28-30 The Message
You must remember the words of wise Solomon in the Old Testament book of Proverbs.
The tongue can bring death or life;
those who love to talk will reap the consequences.
Proverbs 18:21 The New Living Translation
A close personal relationship with the Godhead provides you a living hope. It is a living anticipation full of expectation of something good happening.
A close personal relationship with the Godhead is a journey. I invite you to follow along. As I learn, I will pass it along so you, too, can learn. I hope that as you learn, you can pass it along so that I (and others) might learn.
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