Sunday, June 6, 2021

Positioned for the Promise: Numbers 13 Part One

 Today is the sixth day of the sixth month of the year two thousand and twenty-one according to the Gregorian calendar. Moreover, according to the Jewish calendar, it is Sivan twenty-six in the year fifty-seven eighty-one.

I think that there is no irony concerning time and how it is orchestrated and synchronize to align itself in the civil calendar and Jewish calendar

Sivan is pronounced (seey-van). Sivan is the 3rd month of the Hebrew year. It originates from the Chaldee root, which means rejoices or "month of rejoicing"(Chabad.org). It also means covering.

Sivan also carries an implied meaning of newness or a new beginning. Consider the events in Numbers 13. Let us look a scripture (graphÄ“; graf-ay). The book of Numbers 13 lies to the root of a very pivotal decision for the children of Israel after they were delivered out of Egypt. If you can recall, when the Lord met Moses and commissioned him to be used of the Lord;; he gave him a promise.

…16Go, assemble the elders of Israel and say to them, ‘The LORD, the God of your fathers—the God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob—has appeared to me and said: I have surely attended to you and have seen what has been done to you in Egypt. 17And I have promised to bring you up out of your affliction in Egypt, into the land of the Canaanites, Hittites, Amorites, Perizzites, Hivites, and Jebusites— a land flowing with milk and honey’ (Exodus 3:17).

Now Moses and the children of Israel were at a crossroads. They were given a promise of a word of the God who delivered them. Now, they were going to be instructed to see the promise so that they could possess the promise. 

In Numbers 13, we see that the Children of Israel were camped in the Wilderness of Paran. Paran means "place of caverns," so they were in caves. God commanded Moses to send leaders of the tribes to seek out the land of 'Promise.' They obediently went and the assignment lasted 40 days. You will see how your ability to act or not act can contribute to your delay or disaster in possessing your promise.

Moreover, after 40 days the leaders came back with their report. The report embodied evidence, perception, position, and purpose.

When they returned from spying out the land, at the end of forty days, 26they came to Moses and Aaron and to all the congregation of the sons of Israel in the Wilderness of Paran at Kadesh, and brought back word to them and to all the congregation, and showed them the land’s fruit (Numbers 13:25)

 It is clear that based on the reports of the leader that the Children of Israel still had doubts about what God said he would do. It is also important that you be sober-minded about those that you chose to follow as leaders. It could cost you your promise and even more your life. 

The leader's belief can influence your ability to project you thinking to a belief in future of hope.

 You see evidence of this in Numbers 13:27

"They reported to Moses and said, “We went in to the land where you sent us; and it certainly does flow with milk and honey, and this is its fruit."

 "...Certainly, what God told you was true." In this statement, we see that ten of the leaders lacked the courage to go up and possess the land. It is pertinent to ask the question, "Why did Moses change Hoshea's name before he embarked on the journey to scout out the 'Promise Land.' It is my belief that the name change here aligned Joshua with the authority of God and putting on of the name Joshua was a mantling and positioning for executing the words of the Lord to acquire the promise.

Joshua was going to lead the new generation into the promised land and he was going to offload a performance of the power of the God He was named Joshua which means Jehovah is his help, or Jehovah the Saviour (Kind James Bible Dictionary).

Enterthebible.org gives analysis:

Moses sends "spies" into Canaan to investigate the land, to see whether it is "good or bad" (13:19). The land proves to be good, indeed. A single cluster of grapes requires two men to carry it on a pole between them! Pomegranates and figs abound as well. The story gives the name to the place to which the spies were sent: Wadi Eshcol ("eshcol" in Hebrew means "a cluster of grapes").

 There was a richness to be had in the 'Land of Promise.' Your ability to cross over to possess the promise is oftentimes misguided. However, you don't have to die in your wilderness situations. Life gets tough, as it oftentimes will but God is still your Jehovah Jireh (provider). He makes a way of escape and if you should hold fast to the Word of His Promise, great things will He cause you to possess.

Number 13 is so rich with encouragement and direction for you to walk into your promise therefore I admonish you to read it for yourself. The pinnacle of Israel's inability to possess the land was their disobedience. Unbelief will lead to disobedience which leads to dispossession and dis-position of Caanan. 'Dis' means to do the opposite of (Merriam Webster Dictionary).

In the 'Promised Life' they are things that await you which God longs for you to experience. Just as in Caanan... 

"grapes grow in beautiful clusters and correspond to tiferet (beauty), Figs correspond to netzach (endurance), which engenders longevity. The fig tree reflects everlasting fruitfulness as it has one of the longest periods of ripening, spanning more than three months, and Pomegranate, a very beautiful and majestic fruit, even has a crown. It corresponds to hod, which means majesty and glory. Hod is also related to the Hebrew word toda which means thanks and recognition."

 Position, Perceive, and Possess are three elements vital to living in God's Promise.

Work on the posture of your heart and let God heal, cleanse, and transform your heart so that you become positioned in your belief about who God is and what He can do. God tested Israel's leaders that even though they were able to see the promise they did not have to courage or endurance to go in a possess the promise. This leads me to my third point. Obedience is a state of being so that you can possess your inheritance. Obedience pleases God. A generation of defiant hearts died without entering into the promise, they saw the beauty, the richness, and wealth that awaited them but refuse to submit. Because God is God we know how this story ends. The generation that came after the forty years did not know God. Let that not be you today. Seek wise counsel so that you're positioned in what you perceive to possess your promise.

 

 



 

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