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“The Facts”
About fifteen months earlier, Israel had left Egypt. Tents dot the desert of Paran, close to the border of Canaan. Everyone is excited to know about the land that is soon to be their home. At God’s direction, 12 explorers are chosen. Caleb is to represent Judah as one of the 12 who will conduct a fact-finding mission to Canaan. The spies spend forty days exploring the land, and finally they return and prepare to give their report.
Read Numbers 13:26–14:2. What lesson can we learn about living by faith and not by sight from this account?
The spies bring along something that they can see, smell, and taste. Although the twelve spies were all exposed to the same facts, they come to very different conclusions.
Ten of them interpret the fertile land and great cities to mean that they are doomed, that there is no way these wandering ex-slaves can take the land. Conveniently, they seem to forget that they would not be standing on the border of the Promised Land if it were not for the miracles of the plagues in Egypt, the crossing of the Red Sea, the water from a rock, and the daily manna that they received for more than a year. God did all these things for them, and now, for some reason, they fail to trust Him and His promises, going by what they see instead of what God has promised. How easy for all of us to do the same thing!
What we see, and how we interpret what we see, can have very direct personal consequences. Our interpretations of “facts” form the building blocks of our daily decisions, and these “facts” so often interact with our emotions. The idea that we can believe whatever we like without those beliefs affecting who we are and what we do is a myth.
Facing the “facts” without God’s Word will lead to interpretations that point away from God and toward faithlessness. Facing the facts with God will lead to evidence that will help us to trust God and strengthen our faith in Him.
Why is it so easy to live by sight and not by faith? When was the last time you faced something similar to what we have read today? How did you respond, and what did you learn from your response and all that followed afterward about trusting in God and in His promises, despite the “facts”?
| SUNDAY | October 3 |
About fifteen months earlier, Israel had left Egypt. Tents dot the desert of Paran, close to the border of Canaan. Everyone is excited to know about the land that is soon to be their home. At God’s direction, 12 explorers are chosen. Caleb is to represent Judah as one of the 12 who will conduct a fact-finding mission to Canaan. The spies spend forty days exploring the land, and finally they return and prepare to give their report.
Read Numbers 13:26–14:2. What lesson can we learn about living by faith and not by sight from this account?
The spies bring along something that they can see, smell, and taste. Although the twelve spies were all exposed to the same facts, they come to very different conclusions.
Ten of them interpret the fertile land and great cities to mean that they are doomed, that there is no way these wandering ex-slaves can take the land. Conveniently, they seem to forget that they would not be standing on the border of the Promised Land if it were not for the miracles of the plagues in Egypt, the crossing of the Red Sea, the water from a rock, and the daily manna that they received for more than a year. God did all these things for them, and now, for some reason, they fail to trust Him and His promises, going by what they see instead of what God has promised. How easy for all of us to do the same thing!
What we see, and how we interpret what we see, can have very direct personal consequences. Our interpretations of “facts” form the building blocks of our daily decisions, and these “facts” so often interact with our emotions. The idea that we can believe whatever we like without those beliefs affecting who we are and what we do is a myth.
Facing the “facts” without God’s Word will lead to interpretations that point away from God and toward faithlessness. Facing the facts with God will lead to evidence that will help us to trust God and strengthen our faith in Him.
Why is it so easy to live by sight and not by faith? When was the last time you faced something similar to what we have read today? How did you respond, and what did you learn from your response and all that followed afterward about trusting in God and in His promises, despite the “facts”?
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