Courageous Caleb

Introduction

How would you describe yourself? Would you describe yourself as being brave? I venture to say that most of us probably wouldn’t. We can remember times in which we were afraid, maybe during a hurricane. And so we might be a little hesitant to describe ourselves as being brave. But you might be surprised. And so let me rephrase the question. When did you most demonstrate bravery? What’s one time in your life that you can look back and say, I was brave then? Think about that. I thought about that this week in preparation for this lesson and tried to think of maybe my bravest moment in life. And as I thought of a few, I thought, no, that was probably my dumbest moment in life. But one came to mind and kept sticking out when we lived in Missouri.

I preached for the church there in Joplin, and this is going to maybe expand your understanding of what a preacher’s job description is, because we had a couple that went to church with us there in Joplin, and the husband was out of town, and the wife called the husband in a panic because she had discovered, and I’ll let you guess how she discovered that they were a family of skunks living under the house. In Missouri and other parts of the country, a lot of the houses, particularly older houses, have a crawl space. And if you’re familiar with the crawl space, you can open up a little door there and literally, that’s where it got its name, crawl under the house and access the plumbing and electricity.

And skunks had found their way into that crawl space. And if you know anything about skunks, you know two things. One is they stink, and two, once they find a place, they kind of make it home. And they had made their home under their house, and so she called her husband in a panic. There’s skunks under the house. I can smell them. What do I do? And his reply was, call Ken. I don’t know why. And so I went and I crawled under the house, looking for skunks. Now, I’ll let you judge whether this was dumb or brave, but I considered it pretty brave. As I crawled and began to examine, I had two things in my hands. I had a flashlight and a broom handle.

Because we all know broom handles are effective in killing skunks. And so I crawled all under that house, and I was rewarded for my bravery when I discovered that there were no skunks under the house, thankfully. There’s times in which we’re called upon, and we might surprise ourselves just how brave we can be under certain circumstances. Now, this morning I’m not going to talk to you about physical bravery, but about spiritual bravery. Would you turn with me in the Old Testament to the book of Numbers, chapter 13? I want us to talk and look at an example of bravery. As we look at the example of the courageous Caleb, let’s set the historical setting in Numbers chapter 13. The descendants of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob, have sojourned in Egypt for hundreds of years, and they have grown in this incubator to become large enough to be that promised nation that God had promised Abraham.

And it’s now time to bring them out of Egypt and into that land that He has promised them. And Moses leads them for about two years in the wilderness, and they are on the precipice of receiving the promised land. Before they receive, you know the story. Before they go into the promised land, they are to send in spies, and so they choose twelve men who will go and spy out the land. They’re just going to give a report as to what they see in this land. Two of those spies, we remember the names, don’t we? Joshua and Caleb, and isn’t it interesting? We have no recall of the ten other names who gave that negative report. These twelve spies go into the land, and they all agree on these points.

It’s even better than what God promised. And let’s just pause there. Won’t that be our declaration when we walk into heaven? It’s even better than what God described. It truly is a land flowing with milk and honey. We would be so blessed to live there, but it’s occupied now. And in this land, flowing with milk and honey, there are great fortified cities. And their people, their men who are soldiers, who are bigger and mightier than we are.

And for the last two years, they’d been skilled in walking. But other than that, they had no military training. They were not prepared to overtake a fortified city and to fight these mighty men, the residents of Canaan. And so you know infamously, ten of these spies said, We can’t do it. It’s impossible. But we remember not those ten men, but the two. And this morning we want to highlight one of those. Read with me, will you, in Numbers 13, begin in verse 17. So Moses sent them to spy out the land of Canaan and said to them, Go up this way into the south and go up to the mountains and see what the land is like. Whether the people who dwell in it are strong or weak, few or many, whether the land they dwell in is good or bad, whether the cities they inhabit are like camps or like strongholds, whether the land is rich or poor, or whether there are forests there or not, be of good courage, and bring some of the fruit of the land.

Now the time was the season of the first ripe grapes. Skip down to verse 31. Or in fact, excuse me, verse 30, it says, Then Caleb, ten of the spies had come back and said, We can’t do it. The people, surprisingly, began to murmur and complain. And Caleb, verse 30, quieted the people before Moses and said, Let us go up. Let us go up against the people, for they are stronger, or let us go up and take possession, for we are well able to overcome it. But the men had who had gone up said, We’re not able to go up against the people, for they are stronger than we, and they gave the children of Israel a bad report of the land, which they had spied out.

Skip down now to chapter 14. And in verse 24. God, in now declaring that this generation, because of your fear, because of your lack of faith, you will not go into the land. God adds this, chapter 14, verse 24. But my servant Caleb, because he has a different spirit in him and has followed me fully, I will bring him into the land where he went, and his descendants shall inherit it. You’re not going in, God said. But Caleb is.

And then the reclosing of the Red Sea. God, at every juncture in their about two-year journey through the wilderness, had declared himself mightily that Mount Sinai, he shook the mountain when he gave them the law. He fed them miraculously. The heavens just opened, and some bread-like substance just rained down, and they were able to pick it up and eat. And when they got hungry for meat, birds just fell from the sky, like the bread fell from the sky, and they just picked it up and ate. When they got thirsty, out of a dry rock, water would just spring forth so that they could drink. God had demonstrated powerfully that he was with them, that he would fight their battles, that he would deliver them, that he would even part the water so that they could walk through.

1. His Confidence Was in God

They could have looked at that. Or, as the ten spies chose to do, they could look at what was in front of them. The fortified cities, the mighty men of the land. And so the choice was what would we look at? Would we look at what God has done and promised to do for us? Or will we look at the physical obstacles, the things of this world that are intended to intimidate us and to strike fear in us. Caleb had a different spirit. And let’s look at some of the things that gave Caleb this courage. The first thing that I want us to note is that his confidence was not in him and Joshua, and not even in Moses and the children of Israel. His confidence was in God.

Look in Numbers chapter 14, this time and in verse 8 at what Caleb says. Joshua and Caleb spoke to the people, and they said in verse 7, the land we pass through to spy out is an exceeding good land. 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. The ten spies said, and they were right in this regard, they said, we can’t take this land. And again, they were right about that. I don’t know of any military strategist or historian who would say that the children of Israel who had no military training and probably very few weapons, and if they had weapons, they wouldn’t have known how to use them, had the ability to enter into that land and defeat standing armies and destroy fortified cities.

They couldn’t have.

Because his confidence lay not in his own abilities, but in God. If we’re to have spiritual courage today, in a world that cares little for God, and seems to be drifting, who am I kidding? Running away from God. And anything godly and righteous, if we’re to have a different spirit within us and demonstrate any kind of courage and true spiritual bravery, it’s going to be because our confidence is in God, not in ourself. It’s God who dwells within us. Look at the New Testament example of that. Hold your finger there in Numbers and go to Philippians chapter 4. And notice where the apostle Paul’s confidence resided. Philippians chapter 4. We know this text. But Paul is going to talk about his ability to be able to live in a time in which he didn’t have the things of this life.

Notice what he says. Let’s begin reading Philippians 4, verse 10. But I rejoice greatly in the Lord that now at last your care for me is flourished again. The euphemism there, your care for me was your money. They had sent to Paul’s needs, and I’m glad that it’s flourished again, though you surely did care, but you lacked opportunity. He goes on to say, verse 11, not that I speak in regard to need, for I’ve learned in whatever state I am to be content. I know how to be abased, and I know how to abound. Everywhere in all things I’ve learned both to be full and to be hungry, both to abound and to suffer need. Pause there. Paul says, I’m glad you were able to supply my needs, my financial needs.

But he says, I’ve learned how to do without. And I’ve learned how to have more than I need. And up until this point, it might sound like almost some kind of stoic self-sufficiency. I’ve learned. I can do without. I can do with more than enough. I’ve done this. And up until this point, you might say, Paul’s kind of patting himself on the back and saying, I’ve done this, I’ve pulled myself. But Paul’s not through. The most memorized verse in all of the book of Philippians follows when he says in verse 13, I can do all things through Christ, who strengthens me. Paul isn’t saying, I’ve learned, I’m doing this on my own, I’ve experienced this, this, I can get through this. Whether you sent this financial need or not, I would have been all right because I’m Paul.

No, I can do all things through Christ who strengthens me. We need to understand the element of faith that involves our trust and our confidence in God. Faith involves knowing that there’s a God up there, even though we can’t see it. Faith involves us believing that he will reward us. Faith involves our obedience. But we need to also grasp this concept that faith, true Christian faith, involves having confidence that God will do what he says he will do, and that God is with us, and we can do it all through him. We say sometimes that we’ve read the last chapter of the book, and we know how this story ends. And so we can have confidence. Caleb had confidence, not because he thought he and Joshua and Moses and the children of Israel could conquer those fortified cities and great people.

2. He Was Willing to Be Used

He had confidence because God said so. Caleb also had a different spirit because he was willing to be used. Go back with me to our text. Look in Numbers chapter 13, the beginning of the chapter. This is in the selection of the twelve spies. Why were these twelve men chosen? Moses, God says to Moses, Numbers 13, verse 2, send men to spy out the land of Canaan, which I’m giving to the children of Israel. From each of the tribes of their fathers, you shall send a man, every one a leader among them. Now all twelve of these men, even the ten who gave the bad report, were chosen because they had already established themselves as leaders.

And he says of those five and the two talent men who were commended for their activity, that he says they had been faithful in a little, and then he would reward them with greater things.

Demonstrating the capacity to be willing to be used in the kingdom for God’s purposes does not go unnoticed by God. The stories of the Old Testament heroes, the stories of numerous, not just the parable of the talents, but numerous of Jesus’ parables demonstrate the fact that our willingness to be used in the kingdom of God gains the attention of God. That tells me something. That tells me that I need to be the one who steps up and who is willing to be used. The attitude of the prophet, here am I, send me, should be the attitude of every one of us as spiritual leaders of our own spiritual lives. Here am I, use me, God. Caleb had this different spirit because he was willing to be used, because he had confidence in God.

3. He Completely Obeyed God

He was not intimidated by the obstacles that were placed before him. And lastly, he was courageous and demonstrated this different spirit because he completely obeyed God. You know, Moses’ commission was rather simple and straightforward.

Go and report on the condition of the land. Nowhere in their instructions were they told to offer their opinion about whether or not the land could be defeated. Just tell us what you see. Again, in Numbers 14, verse 24, God said of Caleb, my servant Caleb, because he had another spirit within him and has followed me fully. Him I will bring into the land whereunto he went, and his seed shall possess it. We have no right to alter God’s commands, to change God’s commission to us in any way. We’re to have confidence in God. We are called upon. We are standing before our own Jordan River. Lying before us is an intimidating world. A world full of hatred and vitriol. A world despite their claims for themselves, a world that is completely intolerant of us and the God we serve.

Conclusion

A world that will gladly shout us down and defeat us by any means possible. If we sent spies into this land, we would come back saying they have great fortified cities. And they’re mighty and they’re big and intimidating. Who among us will be a Caleb? And not look at the obstacles and the intimidation before us, but who will remember God? And with the words of the apostle, we’ll say, I can do all things through Christ who strengthens me. And if God be for us, who can be against us? In a time of intimidation, in a time of shirking, God is looking for spiritual leaders. God’s looking for the Calebs among us. Will you be brave? Will you stand up and remember God? One act of courageousness is for you to name the name of Christ in obedience, to come to Him, to step out this very hour and say, I will follow Jesus.

Here am I, Lord. Send and use me. Would you render obedience to the gospel this morning? Would you stand up and be brave and say, I will follow you? Can we help you in that? Can we encourage you in that in any way this morning? Let it be known as we stand and as we sing. How would you describe yourself? Would you describe yourself as being brave? I venture to say that most of us probably wouldn’t. We can remember times in which we were afraid, maybe during a hurricane. And so we might be a little hesitant to describe ourselves as being brave. But you might be surprised. And so let me rephrase the question. When did you most demonstrate bravery? What’s one time in your life that you can look back and say, I was brave then?

Think about that. I thought about that this week in preparation for this lesson and tried to think of maybe my bravest moment in life. And as I thought of a few, I thought, no, that was probably my dumbest moment in life. But one came to mind and kept sticking out when we lived in Missouri. I preached for the church there in Joplin, and this is going to maybe expand your understanding of what a preacher’s job description is, because we had a couple that went to church with us there in Joplin, and the husband was out of town, and the wife called the husband in a panic because she had discovered, and I’ll let you guess how she discovered that they were a family of skunks living under the house.

In Missouri and other parts of the country, a lot of the houses, particularly older houses, have a crawl space. And if you’re familiar with a crawl space, you can open up a little door there and literally, that’s where it got its name, crawl under the house and access the plumbing and electricity and skunks had found their way into that crawl space. And if you know anything about skunks, you know two things. One is they stink, and two, once they find a place, they kind of make it home. And they had made their home under their house, and so she called her husband in a panic. There’s skunks under the house. I can smell them. What do I do? And his reply was, call Ken. I don’t know why.

And so I went and I crawled under the house, looking for skunks. Now, I’ll let you judge whether this was dumb or brave, but I considered it pretty brave. As I crawled and began to examine, I had two things in my hands. I had a flashlight and a broom handle. Because we all know broom handles are effective in killing skunks. And so I crawled all under that house, and I was rewarded for my bravery when I discovered that there were no skunks under the house, thankfully. There’s times in which we’re called upon, and we might surprise ourselves just how brave we can be under certain circumstances. Now, this morning I’m not going to talk to you about physical bravery, but about spiritual bravery. Would you turn with me in the Old Testament to the book of Numbers, chapter 13?

I want us to talk and look at an example of bravery. As we look at the example of the courageous Caleb, let’s set the historical setting in Numbers chapter 13. The descendants of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob, have sojourned in Egypt for hundreds of years, and they have grown in this incubator to become large enough to be that promised nation that God had promised Abraham. And it’s now time to bring them out of Egypt and into that land that He has promised them. And Moses leads them for about two years in the wilderness, and they are on the precipice of receiving the promised land. Before they receive, you know the story. Before they go into the promised land, they are to send in spies. And so they choose twelve men who will go and spy out the land.

They’re just going to give a report as to what they see in this land. Two of those spies, we remember the names, don’t we? Joshua and Caleb. And isn’t it interesting? We have no recall of the ten other names who gave that negative report. These 12 spies go into the land, and they all agree on these points. It’s even better than what God promised. And let’s just pause there. Won’t that be our declaration when we walk into heaven? It’s even better than what God described. It truly is a land flowing with milk and honey. We would be so blessed to live there, but it’s occupied now. And in this land, flowing with milk and honey, there are great fortified cities. And their people, their men who are soldiers, who are bigger and mightier than we are.

The children of Israel at this time had been skilled in basically just two things. And being slaves in Egypt, they were skilled at making bricks. And for the last two years, they’d been skilled in walking. But other than that, they had no military training. They were not prepared to overtake a fortified city and to fight these mighty men, the residents of Canaan. And so you know infamously, ten of these spies said, we can’t do it. It’s impossible. But we remember not those ten men, but the two. And this morning we want to highlight one of those. Read with me, will you, in Numbers 13, begin in verse 17. So Moses sent them to spy out the land of Canaan and said to them, Go up this way into the south and go up to the mountains and see what the land is like.

Whether the people who dwell in it are strong or weak, few or many, whether the land they dwell in is good or bad, whether the cities they inhabit are like camps or like strongholds, whether the land is rich or poor, or whether there are forests there or not, be of good courage, and bring some of the fruit of the land. Now the time was the season of the first ripe grapes. Skip down to verse 31. Or in fact, excuse me, verse 30. It says, Then Caleb, ten of the spies had come back and said, We can’t do it. The people, surprisingly, began to murmur and complain. And Caleb, verse 30, quieted the people before Moses and said, Let us go up. Let us go up against the people, for they are stronger.

Or let us go up and take possession, for we are well able to overcome it. But the men had who had gone up said, We’re not able to go up against the people, for they are stronger than we. And they gave the children of Israel a bad report of the land which they had spied out. Skip down now to chapter 14. And in verse 24. God, in now declaring that this generation, because of your fear, because of your lack of faith, you will not go into the land. God adds this, chapter 14, verse 13. But my servant Caleb, because he has a different spirit in him and has followed me fully, I will bring him into the land where he went, and his descendants shall inherit it.

You’re not going in, God said. But Caleb is.

The plagues upon the children of Egypt. He had delivered them miraculously through the parting and then the reclosing of the Red Sea. God, at every juncture in their about two year journey through the wilderness, had declared himself mightily that Mount Sinai, he shook the mountain when he gave them the law. He fed them miraculously. The heavens just opened, and some bread like substance just rained down, and they were able to pick it up and eat. And when they got hungry for meat, birds just fell from the sky, like the bread fell from the sky, and they just picked it up and ate. When they got thirsty, out of a dry rock, water would just spring forth so that they could drink. God had demonstrated powerfully that he was with them, that he would fight their battles, that he would deliver them, that he would even part the water so that they could walk through.

They could have looked at that. Or, as the ten spies chose to do, they could look at what was in front of them. The fortified cities, the mighty men of the land.

Would we look at what God has done and promised to do for us? Or will we look at the physical obstacles, the things of this world that are intended to intimidate us and to strike fear in us. Caleb had a different spirit. And let’s look at some of the things that gave Caleb this courage. The first thing that I want us to note is that his confidence was not in him and Joshua and not even in Moses and the children of Israel. His confidence was in God. Look in Numbers chapter 14, this time and in verse 8 at what Caleb says. Joshua and Caleb spoke to the people, and they said in verse 7, the land we pass through to spy out is an exceeding good land.

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. The ten spies said, and they were right in this regard, they said, we can’t take this land. And again, they were right about that.

And if they had weapons, they wouldn’t have known how to use them, had the ability to enter into that land and defeat standing armies and destroy fortified cities. They couldn’t have.

To have to take the land. Caleb had the courage and the different spirit within him because his confidence lay not in his own abilities, but in God. If we’re to have spiritual courage today, in a world that cares little for God, and seems to be drifting, who am I kidding? Running away from God. And anything godly and righteous, if we’re to have a different spirit within us and demonstrate any kind of courage and true spiritual bravery, it’s going to be because our confidence is in God, not in ourself. It’s God who dwells within us. Look at the New Testament example of that. Hold your finger there in Numbers and go to Philippians chapter 4. And notice where the apostle Paul’s confidence resided. Philippians chapter 4. We know this text.

But Paul is going to talk about his ability to be able to live in a time in which he didn’t have the things of this life. Notice what he says, let’s begin reading Philippians 4, verse 10. But I rejoice greatly in the Lord that now at last your care for me is flourished again. The euphemism there, your care for me was your money. They had sent to Paul’s needs, and I’m glad that it’s flourished again, though you surely did care, but you lacked opportunity. He goes on to say, verse 11: not that I speak in regard to need, for I’ve learned in whatever state I am to be content. I know how to be abased, and I know how to abound. Everywhere in all things I’ve learned both to be full and to be hungry, both to abound and to suffer need.

Pause there. Paul says, I’m glad you were able to supply my needs, my financial needs. But he says, I’ve learned how to do without. And I’ve learned how to have more than I need. And up until this point, it might sound like almost some kind of stoic self-sufficiency. I’ve learned. I can do without. I can do with more than enough. I’ve done this. And up until this point, you might say, Paul’s kind of patting himself on the back and saying, I’ve done this, I’ve pulled myself. But Paul’s not through. The most memorized verse in all of the book of Philippians follows when he says in verse 13, I can do all things through Christ, who strengthens me. Paul isn’t saying, I’ve learned, I’m doing this on my own, I’ve experienced this, this, I can get through this.

Whether you sent this financial need or not, I would have been all right because I’m Paul. No, I can do all things through Christ who strengthens me. We need to understand the element of faith that involves our trust and our confidence in God. Faith involves knowing that there’s a God up there, even though we can’t see. Faith involves us believing that he will reward us. Faith involves our obedience. But we need to also grasp this concept that faith, true Christian faith, involves having confidence that God will do what he says he will do, and that God is with us, and we can do it all through him. We say sometimes that we’ve read the last chapter of the book, and we know how this story ends.

And so we can have confidence. Caleb had confidence not because he thought he and Joshua and Moses and the children of Israel could conquer those fortified cities and great people. He had confidence because God said so. Caleb also had a different spirit because he was willing to be used. Go back with me to our text. Look in Numbers chapter 13, the beginning of the chapter. This is in the selection of the 12 spies. Why were these 12 men chosen? Moses, God says to Moses, Numbers 13, verse 2, send men to spy out the land of Canaan, which I’m giving to the children of Israel. From each of the tribes of their fathers, you shall send a man, every one a leader among them. Now all twelve of these men, even the ten who gave the bad report, were chosen because they had already established themselves as leaders.

I think of Jesus telling the parable of the talents. And he says of those five and the two talent men who were commended for their activity, that he says they had been faithful in a little, and then he would reward them with greater things. Demonstrating the capacity to be willing to be used in the kingdom for God’s purposes does not go unnoticed by God. The stories of the Old Testament heroes, the stories of numerous, not just the parable of the talents, but numerous of Jesus’ parables demonstrate the fact that our willingness to be used in the kingdom of God gains the attention of God. That tells me something. That tells me that I need to be the one who steps up and who is willing to be used.

The attitude of the prophet, here am I, send me, should be the attitude of every one of us as spiritual leaders of our own spiritual lives. Here am I, use me, God. Caleb had this different spirit because he was willing to be used, because he had confidence in God. He was not intimidated by the obstacles that were placed before him. And lastly, he was courageous and demonstrated this different spirit because he completely obeyed God. You know, Moses’ commission was rather simple and straightforward.

Go and report on the condition of the land. Nowhere in their instructions were they told to offer their opinion about whether or not the land could be defeated. Just tell us what you see. Again, in Numbers 14, verse 24, God said of Caleb, my servant Caleb, because he had another spirit within him and has followed me fully. Him I will bring into the land whereunto he went, and his seed shall possess it. We have no right to alter God’s commands, to change God’s commission to us in any way. We’re to have confidence in God. We are called upon. We are standing before our own Jordan River. Lying before us is an intimidating world. A world full of hatred and vitriol. A world despite their claims for themselves, a world that is completely intolerant of us and the God we serve.

A world that will gladly shout us down and defeat us by any means possible.

If we spent sent spies into this land, we would come back saying they have great fortified cities, and they’re mighty, and they’re big and intimidating. Who among us will be a Caleb and not look at the obstacles and the intimidation before us? But who will remember God? And with the words of the apostle will say, I can do all things through Christ who strengthens me, and if God be for us, who can be against us? In a time of intimidation, in a time of shirking, God is looking for spiritual leaders. God’s looking for the Calebs among us. Will you be brave? Will you stand up and remember God? One act of courageousness is for you to name the name of Christ in obedience, to come to Him, to step out this very hour and say, I will follow Jesus.

Here am I, Lord, send and use me. Would you render obedience to the gospel this morning? Would you stand up and be brave and say, I will follow you? Can we help you in that? Can we encourage you in that in any way this morning? Let it be known as we stand and as we sing.