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I. Report on the Exploration of Canaan (13:1-14:10) 1. What did God command Moses to do (13:1,2)? What kind of men did Moses select to become spies, and what instructions did he give them (3-20)? Where did they explore, and how did they know it was the land flowing with milk and honey (21-24)? 2. When they returned, how did they give their report about the land (25-27)? What did they say would make it difficult to take possession of the land (28,29)? 3. How did Caleb silence the restless people (30)? What sort of bad report about the land did the other spies give (31,32a)? How did they compare themselves to the inhabitants of the land (32,33)? Why do you think their outlook was different, although they had seen exactly the same things and been in the same situations? 4. How did the people respond when they heard this fearful report (14:1-5)? Why did the people listen more closely to ten negative reports than to Caleb’s report? What kind of faith did Caleb and Joshua plant in the people (6-9)? II. God judged the unbelief of the Israelites (14:11-38) 5. How did God tell Moses he would reveal his wrath against the rebellious Israelites (11,12)? In what way did the Israelites’ unbelief show contempt for God? How earnestly did Moses intercede in prayer on the Israelites’ behalf, that they might be saved (13-19)? 6. How did God answer Moses’ prayer (20)? Nevertheless, how did God say he would punish the rebellious Israelites (21-38)? Who alone did God promise he would bring into the land to possess it (24,31,38)? * How must we view college campuses all over the world? What does God desire for us?

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Thank God for blessing 2008 Purdue SBC international so abundantly. To hear of God’s love and see God’s work throughout the world was so good and moved our hearts. We felt that the conference was like a part of the kingdom of God. Now we came to our real life and our mission field. As you know our Christian life is a spiritual battle even in the midst of God’s abundant grace. At the conference we thought about love, particularly God’s love. Today’s passage teaches us faith. Love and faith go together. Those who live in God’s love can have faith in God. Today’s passage vividly describes that faith means surviving and conquering, and unbelief means death. The Book of Numbers records the history of Israel from just before they started out at Mt. Sinai (Num 1:1) until they arrived at the plains of Moab during their 40 year journey. The Book of Exodus records their journey from the time they left Egypt until they reached Mt. Sinai. Leviticus is a record of all kinds of laws they received during the one year at Mt. Sinai. Deuteronomy is a record of three sermons of Moses while they were in the plains of Moab. Numbers includes various events that occurred during their journey from Mt. Sinai to the plains of Moab by the Jordan across from Jericho. With this history as background, the theme of the Book of Numbers is that God’s people must trust God’s promise and live by faith in order to enter the Promised Land. Especially, in this passage, the event in Kadesh Barnea describes the theme very clearly. Through this study, may we have eyes of faith to see our mission field of campus God promised to give us so that we may step into and conquer the Promised Land. First, a bad report of ten unbelieving tribal heads (13:1-33). Look at verses 1 and 2. Two years after they left Egypt, the people of Israel arrived at Kadesh Barnea, the border of Canaan. “Yah, finally, this is the land of Canaan!” Canaan was the land of promise that they had always dreamed of. Looking at the land from Kadesh Barnea, their hearts must have been beating hard at the thought and hope that they would soon conquer the land and create a new history. On the other hand, they might have had some fear, wondering, “Will we be able to conquer the land of Canaan?” To this people of Israel, God commanded, “Go up and take possession of it…Do not be afraid; do not be discouraged” (Deut. 1:21b). But the Israelites insisted on exploring the land of Canaan first. Moses accepted their request and inquired of the Lord, and the Lord told him to go ahead and let them do it. So in the desert of Paran, Moses selected twelve men, the leaders of the tribes of Israel. What did Moses ask them to do as he sent them to Canaan? Look at verse 18. “See what the land is like and whether the people who live there are strong or weak, few or many.” He asked them to find out basically about the land and the people. About the land it is asked for detailed information (with seven questions): “What kind of land do they live in? Is it good or bad? What kind of towns do they live in? Are they unwalled or fortified? How is the soil? Is it fertile or poor? Are there trees on it or not?” Then Moses said to them, “Do your best (Be of good courage) to bring back some of the fruit of the land.” (It was the season for the first ripe grapes.) They went up and explored the land from the south of Canaan to the north, Hamath, thoroughly during forty days. On the way back, they visited Hebron where their ancestor, Abraham had lived. Also, when they reached the Valley of Eschol, they cut off a branch bearing a single cluster of grapes and two men carried it on a pole between them, along with some pomegranates and figs. Then they came back to Moses and Aaron and the whole Israelite community at Kadesh in the Desert of Paran, carrying the single cluster of grapes as Moses had told them. There they reported before all, “We went into the land to which you sent us, and it does flow with milk and honey! Here is its fruit.” All the twelve explorers were one in this report, and the people were so excited to go and see the land flowing with milk and honey. Then how was the report going? Sadly, there was a transition in their report: “But the people who live there are powerful, and the cities are fortified and very large. We even saw descendants of Anak there…” Their report was factual, but a negative spirit was there. At this moment all the people’s excitement vanished. The report was like throwing cold water on the burning exited hearts of the people. Their faces became dark and hardened, and here and there were sounds of sighing and despair, and a wave of unbelief began to rise among them. At this Caleb, sensing crisis, stood up and silenced the people before Moses and said, “We should go up and take possession of the land, for we can certainly do it.” Then the sighing and despairing hearts of the people began to be subsided, and they were about to side with Caleb who had faith and conviction. However, at this time of restoration of people’s hearts the ten head of the tribes came forward and said, “We can’t attack those people; they are stronger than we are.” What a terrible reverse! They seemed to undo what Caleb had said. And they spread among the Israelites a bad report about the land they had explored. Their factual report turned into a bad report made up by their own fixed negative opinion. They said, “The land we explored devours those living in it. All the people we saw there are of great size. We saw the Nephilim there (the descendants of Anak come from the Nephilim). We seemed like grasshoppers in our own eyes, and we looked the same to them.” This is really a bad report. Out of fear they completely denied who they were. They were God’s people, who had been delivered from the bondage of slavery in Egypt and made the glorious Exodus, crossed the Red Sea, and drunk from the rock, and experienced so many miracles of God. God chose them to be the people of a kingdom of priests and a holy nation. They were people of God’s promise. What a precious and great people incomparable in this world! But they neglected all the grace of God and forgot the precious words of God’s promise. They completely denied who they were and said, “We seemed like grasshoppers in our own eyes, and we looked the same to them.” It was treating God with contempt. Then what happened to the crowd of people? 14:1 says, “That night all the people of the community raised their voices and wept aloud.” It is surprising that now all the people of the community sided and banded together with the unbelieving reporters and wept aloud the whole night. We see the power of unbelieving and negative influence. Faith-influence is hard, but unbelief-influence is so easy. The unbelieving influence is like a rapidly spread contagious disease. All the Israelites grumbled against Moses and Aaron, and the whole assembly said to them, “‘If only we had died in Egypt! Or in this desert! Why is the LORD bringing us to this land only to let us fall by the sword? Our wives and children will be taken as plunder. Wouldn’t it be better for us to go back to Egypt?’ And they said to each other, ‘We should choose a leader and go back to Egypt.’” The succeeding record of God’s response toward this people, called wicked community, was striking. God’s punishment came upon them. He said, “Not one of them…not one of them will ever see the land…No one who has treated me with contempt will ever see it…In this desert your bodies will fall—every one of you twenty years old or more who was counted in the census and who has grumbled against me. Not one of them will enter the land…I will surely do these things to this whole wicked community, which has banded together against me…They will meet their end in the desert; here they will die.” Then what happened to the ten heads of tribes? It is written in verses 36-37: “So the men Moses had sent to explore the land, who returned and made the whole community grumble against him by spreading a bad report about it—these men responsible for spreading the bad report about the land were struck down and died of a plague before the LORD.” It is hard to believe that such an event as this happened in history. To our surprise, this event occurred after their liberation from the bondage of Egypt and glorious Exodus. St. Paul wrote the meaning of this event: it is an example to keep us from setting our hearts on evil things as they did (1 Cor 10:6). We learn a clear lesson that unbelief really grieves God and spreads so rapidly and brings even the whole community to terrible destruction. It will be better to die with faith than to live with disbelief. Second, the report of Caleb and Joshua. We remember Caleb’s words, “We should go up and take possession of the land, for we can certainly do it.” As for Caleb, he had no choice between “going up” and not “going up” before God. They had to go and fight and take possession of the land. He had no compromising spirit with his mission at all. And then he said, “…for we can certainly do it.” How could he be so full of confidence and conviction of victory? More of his report comes. When the whole Israelite assembly wept aloud all night and grumbled against Moses and Aaron, who consequently fell face-down in front them, Joshua and Caleb tore their clothes and said to the entire Israelite assembly, “The land we passed through and explored is exceedingly good. If the LORD is pleased with us, he will lead us into that land, a land flowing with milk and honey, and will give it to us. Only do not rebel against the LORD. And do not be afraid of the people of the land, because we will swallow them up. Their protection is gone, but the LORD is with us. Do not be afraid of them.” It was their heartfelt plea to the whole community of God. One clear point they make is “If the LORD is pleased with us, he will lead us…give it to us.” Sometime we think that pleasing God is to do a great work. But Joshua and Caleb said, “Do not rebel against the LORD.” Not rebelling against God seemed to be a small matter. But it can be critically pleasing to God in a certain situation. And then they said, “Do not be afraid of the people of the land.” Fear never pleases God. But not being afraid pleases God. And then they said, “…we will swallow them up…the LORD is with us.” In KJV, it is written, “…they are bread for us…” No one is afraid of bread but enjoys it. How could they have such an overflowing sense of victory and conviction? It was because of their faith that “the LORD is with us.” When they looked back at how God led them thus far, it was undeniable that God was with them. There were numerous evidences. The faith of God’s being with them gave them the assurance of victory: “they are our bread”; “we will swallow them up.” In 14:24 God said of Caleb, “…my servant Caleb has a different spirit and follows me wholeheartedly…” While others followed God half-heartedly, he followed God whole-heartedly. While others had the spirit of timidity, fear and despair, he had the fighting spirit, and challenging, pioneering and conquering spirit. We are reminded of 2 Timothy 1:7, “For God did not give us a spirit of timidity, but a spirit of power, of love and of self-discipline.” God is with his chosen people. This is one important message of the Bible. Our conference title was “God so loved the world…” God’s love was like the love of the Father who welcomed his home-coming prodigal son with the best celebration and restored him with a full sonship. God’s love is that his Son Jesus came to seek and save what was lost, like Zacchaeus. Jesus declared, “…this man, too, is a son of Abraham.” In God’s love the Samaritan woman became a heavenly princess. In God’s forgiving love through his Son’s crucifixion and his prayer on the cross, we were assured anew that we are children of God, newly made objects of God’s love in the grace of our Lord Jesus Christ. God loved us and made us his glorious children through his Son. This is what we are in Christ. God loves us and nothing can separate us from the love of God. God’s loving us definitely means “God is with us.” The great conference is over. Still, God is with us. Paul said Romans 8, “If God is for us, who can be against us?” (8:31). God’s being with us and for us makes us undefeatable. God’s being with us is everything for victory. When we look back our lives and God’s ministry here, it is so evident that God is with us. In his love and being with us God had a clear purpose. He wants us to be good fighters, pioneers and conquerors of the world. Especially he wants us to pioneer all the campuses of the world with the gospel of our Lord Jesus Christ. Through our 2008 Purdue SBC we could see how God was working for world campus evangelization through our missionary coworkers throughout the world (Europe, CIS, Latin America, Africa, Asia, Oceania and Middle East). We felt that God is accomplishing his will of world salvation through us. We heard the message that the gospel must first be preached to all nations and then our Lord Jesus will come again. And we heard the message, “Open your eyes and look at the fields! They are ripe for harvest.” “At the name of Jesus every knee should bow…and every tongue confess that Jesus Christ is Lord.” We were surprised that about 500 people made a decision to be missionaries. He wants his people to be history-makers in this generation. What a grace it is that we are members of this glorious people of God for world mission. We have God’s promise given to us very personally. God loves us and he loves the world including all the campuses of the world, of course including U of T. In his love we can say, “The LORD is with us; they are our bread; we can swallow them up; we can pioneer our campus.” In this grace of God’s love and his being with us we can be pioneers and challengers again and again and finally pioneer God’s given and promised campus as a part of world campus evangelization. Thank God for teaching us anew that faith in God is truly a matter of surviving and dying, and it is a matter of swallowing or being devoured. May God help us to hold firmly his undeniable grace and be assured that God is with us and swallowing faith and spirit for our lives and our mission field U of T.

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