Wednesday, November 18, 2009
Session 16: The Spies Enter the Promised Land
A day late and a dollar short. Well, it is Wednesday morning and I am just now doing the blog. I hope your week is going great. It is the season of thankfulness and I want to challenge each of you to find something each day that you are thankful for. I am thankful for each of you and the great job that you do in teaching our youth. We have had several visitors over the past few weeks. I hope each of you are making sure that we contact them the same week that they visited your class. We were challenged this past Sunday during the workers meeting to make the visitors a priority. Are you? I sure hope so! What about the lesson? Did anything stand out to you while studying? I hope your students are learning valuable lessons as we teach them each week. Thanks for blogging!
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I didn't get a chance to blog last week - sorry. When teaching last week about the 10 Commandments, we got into an interesting discussion that I would like to share. The children of Israel had been in bondage for 400 years and suddenly had their freedom! They were unprepared to handle that freedom, however. This led to a discussion about kids going off to college and suddenly having "no rules" and how some go buck wild. Briana and I tried to impress upon them that the rules that their parents impose are actually for their good, not to harm them, just as the rules that God gave to Moses were for His children's good, not their harm. It was a really good discussion! Looking forward to this week as well!
This lesson has lead me to ask myself do I allow fear to stop me from entering into God’s will in my life and if so at what cost?
I deleted my post because after hearing Bro Brad speak on the book of Judges tonight, I realized it was pretty lame. So let me tell you what he said that I thought was good;
The promise land is not a picture of heaven like most people think. It is a picture of Christians living a victorious life here on earth until the return of Christ. But, just like the Jewish people who did not totally drive out the foreigners from the promise land, when we don't mortify and kill sin in our lives it will end up leading to the chastening by the Father just like the Jews.
I'm reaching here, but the spies saw the evil in the land and 10 thought they could not defeat it, they were too comfortable where they were at. But Caleb and Joshua knew that if the Lord was with them they could. So whats my deal? Am I unsure if the Lord is with Me?
I think that it is easy for us to "talk about faith" but when we are put in a real life situation, we crumble. I know I can offer you encouragement and tell you it will all be ok and at the same time, if the situation was involving me, I would be shaking. I think we really don't have "strong faith" in the Lord. We have not witnessed Jesus in the flesh as many did when He walked on earth. Therefore, as a result, we forget that He is THE Miracle worker and we should have strong faith in HIM.
This lesson spoke to me. I wonder how tempted Jacob and Caleb were to just go with the flow. I wonder if they considered just changing their opinion. I wonder how often my initial conviction is slanted or changed altogether based on the feelings of a majority. Perhaps, the majority can become a minority after listening to the opinion of someone of influence. So often, the crowd does what is evil and what is wrong. The fact that "everyone else is doing it" does not make it right. It is God who decides what is right and what is wrong, not the crowd. The key question is not "What do my friends do?" but "What does God’s Word say?" or "What has God told me to do?" The "majority" may vote wrongly, and the "minority" who are defeated in the vote may prove to be right in the end. We must always follow the Lord in doing right, and doing right is not usually the popular thing to do.
OFTEN THE CROWD IS WRONG
In the days of Noah, the crowd perished and only eight survived (Genesis 7:13,21–23; 1 Peter 3:20).
After the flood, the crowd wanted to build a city and a tower, and they did not want to fill the whole earth even though God told them to do this (Genesis 11:1–9; compare 9:1,7).
In the days of Abraham, the crowd wanted to worship idols, including Abraham’s family (Joshua 24:2).
In the days of Moses, the crowd worshipped the golden calf (Exodus 32).
In the days of Joshua and Caleb, the majority of the spies were afraid to conquer the land (Numbers 13-14). The majority did not believe God.
In the wilderness, the overwhelming majority of Israelites dropped dead (Numbers 14:29,30,32; Hebrews 3:17–19; 1 Cor. 10:5).
In the days of Samuel, the majority of Israelites wanted a king so that they could be like all the other nations (1 Sam.8:4–7).
In the days of King Saul, the entire Israelite army was afraid of giant Goliath (1 Samuel 17:11,24), but one young boy dared to be different (1 Samuel 17:32).
In the days of Elijah, there were 450 prophets of Baal and only one prophet of the LORD (1 Kings 18). God was with the one and God was against the 450.
In the days of Micaiah, there were 400 false prophets and only one true prophet (1 Kings 22).
In the days of Daniel, the crowd bowed down to the giant golden statue of King Nebuchadnezzar, and only 3 others refused to do so (Daniel 3).
Jesus said that the majority (the crowd) is headed for hell and the minority is headed for heaven (Matthew 7:13-14).
It was the crowd that yelled "Crucify Him!" (Matthew 27:22–23 and see how Pilate followed the crowd in Mark 15:15).
In the days of the Reformation, the majority of the religious people in Germany did not understand that salvation was not by works. Martin Luther stood alone with God (God plus one is a majority!).
In the days of the man of sin (the Antichrist), the crowd will follow the beast (Revelation 13) and will take the mark of the beast. The minority will follow Christ even if it means being killed for their faith.
Results are in! The "tentative" dates for the cruise are the week of Jan. 11. Please set these dates aside. We will book the trip closer to the dates to take advantage of lower prices.
Destination results...not important
How long to stay...4-5 days
How much to pay...under $300.00
Cruise line...not important
Who is going...anybody that wants to
Please feel free to ask any questions you may have. I'm excited already!
John, may I use your sermon sometime? Man that thing will preach. That has me fired up!
John, I read your post, then after reading what Billy thought of it, I went back and read it in a sing song, fall and rise style with a "haaaggh!"(kinda clearing throat sound) in between each example. And he is right, it will Preach!
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