The Lord, Land and Men (Part B)

Some suppose that these Kenizzites joined the tribe of Judah and were not born into Israel and they were sort of a fruit from conviction.

They believed the God of the Jews and wanted to join up with them while in Egypt, much as Rahab did after they got out of Egypt into the Promised Land. I don't know that there's enough evidence for that because that's a name that you can attach to others. This is Cross-Reference Radio with our pastor and teacher Rick Gaston. Rick is the pastor of Calvary Chapel Mechanicsville. Pastor Rick is currently teaching through the book of Joshua.

Please stay with us after today's message to hear more information about Cross-Reference Radio, specifically how you can get a free copy of this teaching. But for now, let's join Pastor Rick in the book of Joshua chapter 7. Now, here's Pastor Rick in Joshua chapter 14 with a continuing study called The Lord, Land and Men. What does it mean to be a servant of God?

It's more than just standing out, handing out tracts somewhere. There's a lot more that's needed of God's people. And again, that's the divine directive to the tribes. And we move to verse 12. All the kingdom of Og, of Bashan, who reigned in Ashtaroth and Edriai, who remained of the remnant of the giants, for Moses had defeated and cast out these.

We pause there. So wait, wait, wait. Moses had already dealt with giants and won. So now coming to the promised land this time, they had more incentive. Caleb was there, part of that. We're going to get to Caleb in a little while. And Caleb, of course, when he says, give me the land that God has told me I can have, Caleb makes his choice. I want the land where the giants are. We'll cover that in a bit.

We better get rolling to it. And also, that would have, you know, after the Jews said, we can't take the promised land, then they go on to conquer giants outside the promised land. That's sort of a rebuke. And a lesson to those coming up. Verse 13, nevertheless, the children of Israel did not drive out the Gergeshites or the Maakathites. Does anybody have any water?

Water! But the Gergeshites and the Maakathites dwell among the Israelites until this day. So long after the compiler, the historian, puts this story together for us, he's saying, yep, they're still here.

We never got them out. And that's got to sting a little bit. But that's the facts. What are you going to do?

It's reality. Just make sure you try to be blameless before the Lord in the midst of those things as best we can. And what we cannot be blameless with, we seek that mercy. So the individual tribes now will have to drive out the various villages and cities that remain. Instead of it being a concerted effort with all the nation and all the force bearing down on cities such as Jericho and Ai, now it's tribal. They're going to get their territory and whatever Canaanites are in that land, you've got to get them out. And we'll get to some of that in the book of Judges. We'll return to that. Yeah, there are some that think, for example, the church is to do for them what they can do for themselves. We don't have a lot of that here.

We have people who've tried, but that's a sad way to go through life, shunting your responsibilities and trying to get it out of God's people. Again, they had become satisfied, so they stopped pressing. They were getting enough land to say, you know what, we could live kind of comfortable here in this valley. We've taken this plateau. Why fight anymore? Sit back and relax.

I'm sick of all the killing. Paul said, I pressed toward the goal for the prize of the upward call of God in Christ Jesus while he was in jail. He's still pressing. Beware that we don't ever think that we can be spiritually satisfied. I don't recall who coined this phrase, but God is easily pleased. He's never satisfied.

What a challenge. I mean, because, and it's right, it is true, the demands of life just don't allow us to catch a rest here. There's a rest that remains for the people of God in heaven. So tired of fighting as they were, wanting peace, it wasn't the right time. They stopped short of the commandment, of the directive from God. They lost the momentum.

The iron was hot. They had the nations of the land ready to be defeated and they backed off. They were saved, more than likely.

As a rule, they were saved. They felt safe, but then they were also satisfied at the wrong time. And that contributed to the lag and then the defeat and then the corruption and the checkered history of Israel. You know, when we went through kings and chronicles, how depressing it is, you get a good king, yeah.

And then all of a sudden, you know, the next one comes and the next two or three are just rotten. All of the north were terrible and it makes for heavy duty reading. Anyway, he says they dwell among the Israelites until this day, never fully purged. Verse 14, only to the tribe of Levi, he had given no inheritance. The sacrifices of Yahweh, God of Israel, made by fire are their inheritance and he said to them, as he said to them. Joshua chapter 18 verse 7 makes another comment on this.

The book of Joshua keeps putting this out there for us so we don't lose sight of it. He says, but the Levites have no part among you, for the priesthood of Yahweh is their inheritance. And Gad and Reuben and half the tribe of Manasseh shall receive their inheritance beyond the Jordan on the east, which Moses the servant of the Lord gave them. So God says to the Levites, the priests and the servants that are from Levi, descendants, you don't get an inheritance, I am your inheritance. Well, what's an inheritance? An inheritance, ideally, in usage of these passages, is a loved one leaving something for loved ones. And God says, well I'm not leaving you an earthly allotment, I'm leaving you with a spiritual one.

In that, they were unlike all the other tribes. And during the golden age of the priesthood, they took great honor in that, as they should have. When we get to Ezekiel, we find out that in the millennial kingdom, the priests and the Levites will have their allotment just outside Jerusalem. They'll be the priests and then they'll be the Levites and they'll have their pastures for the cattle, at least that's how it's presented to us. How much of that, some of it may seem symbolic, others seem literal, we'll be there to find out. You know, huh, look at that, well I got to get back to New Jerusalem, I'll see you guys later. Because New Jerusalem won't be the same thing as Jerusalem, two different entities.

We'll sort of be like a Shekinah, you know, hovering, heaven light. Anyway, they won't be scattered throughout the land as we find them in the book of Joshua, in the cities of refuge. They'll be centered on the place of worship and that's the idea for the Levite. They were to be centered on worship for the nation. Israel's not a church, it's a nation. The church models her assembly like we have after the Jewish synagogues that came after the captivity. But we take many lessons from them, but we have to make sure we understand Israel is Israel, the church is the church. And they're not the same thing, and the law of Moses for the righteous is irreconcilable with the law of the New Testament, the blood of the lamb.

Jesus Christ, not a bad lamb. Alright, so verse 15. Moses had given to the tribe of the children of Reuben an inheritance according to their families, we're on the east Jordan tribes now. Verse 22, the children of Israel also killed with the sword Balaam, the son of Beor, the soothsayer among those who were killed by them.

And so that's why we're considering in this approach of the word, the Lord, because he's overseeing all of it, and the land and the men. Now we come to Balaam, that enigma of the scripture in many ways. So after turning against God, what became of the sorcerer?

That's what he's telling us, we killed him. That's what happened to Balaam. He's remembered as a soothsayer, not a prophet of God. He was a prophet for a time there. Peter says he was an insane prophet.

What was his crime? He would go around saying sooth. God didn't tolerate soothsayers. I love that. I mean, it's just the most comical thing in the Bible. Don't be a soothsayer. Sooth.

Okay. So anyhow, it's not lost in the language. It's amplified. So it's echoing Deuteronomy 1810 where anyone who is into the spirits and spiritual realm trying to bypass God and tap into the unseen, they're forbidden. And in 2 Peter 2 16, Peter says the prophet was mad. So his sin, what was his sin? It wasn't like David's sin or even Solomon's sin.

No. Balaam's sin was the same sin as Lucifer's sin. They turned on God. That was the sin. I mean, you know, the flesh, there's nothing cute or funny about it, though I name it, my flesh is called Ollie. I love the fine mess you've gotten me into, Ollie.

Some of you might not know Laurel and Hardy, and you should know who they are. Anyway, coming back to this, Balaam turned on God just like Lucifer did. That was his crime. And in Balaam, Satan found a man that played games with God. That's what he did. He played, you know, the whole thing with the donkey talking to him. He's so insane with greed.

It's almost a caricature, but it really happened. And we are to learn that. And you may have come, I have come across really greedy people in life. They're drunk with greed. Everything to them is money and the prophet, not the prophets of God or anything like that, but the P-R-O-F-I-T. Money. And that was Balaam's, he was a prosperity teacher, and he's the one that said to Balak, you can't conquer their armies. I keep blessing them. Your swords are no good against them.

Use the women. And it began to work, and Phinehas, of course, jumps up and takes control, and he put an end to that. So God had not forgotten the terrible calamity that was brought upon his people by this fallen prophet, this insane prophet, the damage he caused.

And his ill-gotten gains, what did it get him? Death by sword. So again, we read verse 22, the children of Israel also killed with the sword. Balaam, the son of Beor, the soothsayer among those who were killed by them.

It had to take some pleasure putting that there. Verse 24, Moses also had given an inheritance to the tribe of Gad, to the children of Gad, according to their families. That's the easiest one to spell of all the tribes. Moses also had given an inheritance to half the tribe of Manasseh. It was for half the tribe of the children of Manasseh, according to their families. So that tribe, Manasseh, descendants of Joseph, had become so large, they were big enough to split and still remain sort of like Alaska. You know, you can take Alaska and cut it, or you could take Texas and put it in Alaska twice and still have some room left over for some other states. Certainly, Rhode Island, Delaware would be in that. Anyway, which, I don't know, I think about that when we come to the land allotments.

How did Delaware end up with such a small lot in the beginning like that? Well, the British. Anyway, verse 13, but to the tribe of Levi, Moses had given no inheritance. Yahweh, God of Israel, was their inheritance, as he had said to them. And so that is reinforced throughout, because they want to uphold their pastors. That's what the Levites were. These were their spiritual leaders appointed by God.

And I think it's quite nice to get that. You get a touch of that in Fiddler on the Roof, when they're introducing the village people, and they get to the rabbi. I don't know if it says it like that, but the beloved rabbi. The music changes and everything, and there's the rabbi.

It's nice to see a people like that. Now we're in Joshua chapter 14, for those of you who have little faith in us making it to chapter 14. Verse 1, these are the areas which the children of Israel inherited in the land of Canaan, which Eliezer the priest, Joshua the son of Nun, and the heads of the fathers of the tribes of the children of Israel distributed as an inheritance to them. Verse 2, their inheritance was by lot, as Yahweh had commanded by the hand of Moses for the nine tribes and the half-tribe. Half-tribe of Manasseh and of course all the rest.

Well there's a few interesting things here. It's kind of interesting that Joshua, the son of Nun, well then how did he get here? The prophet, the priest, and the elders are part of this land allotment. The government in this church is set up on a similar pattern, and we're good now, we're out of the clouds. The prophet, the priest, and the elders.

You know we have the pastor, and we have the board, and we have the pastors. And it's the same pattern of leaders, and here we see the priest, Joshua, and the tribal elders. They're responsible to have God speak to them, and then it moves out to the people and they establish the particular tribal allotment of the land. And again, ideally the inheritance is what you are rewarded by a loved one. A loved one rewarding a loved one, and of course God is the one that is assigning the inheritance to the various tribes.

Likely using the Urim and the Thurnim, the priest and the pouch. So these men were part of the decision making processes, but God was making the decision. All of it was referred to him through the leaders, and what this did is it took out any maneuvering, any just trying to get a bigger piece of the land. People, you know how we can be, we get competitive, we really want something, and we start becoming very carnal about it. Impulse and ambition begin to take over. Well this took all that out, and that's just great leadership.

Leadership takes away the problems as best it can, it reduces them. Proverbs 16 33, the lot is cast into the lap, but it's every decision is of Yahweh. Now that's sort of a set up for you, because I think many of you are familiar with that verse.

You might not have it memorized, but would you hear it? You say, I've heard that before, but I don't know if you've heard Jeremiah 10 23. It was a beautiful verse. Oh Yahweh, I know that the way of man is not in himself. It is not in man who walks to direct his own steps.

Is that not beautiful? The dependency on God? You just, you're going to make a mess of things, lean out on your own understanding, and all your ways acknowledge the Lord. And then the rest of that section in Proverbs 3 merits equal attention. Verse 3 now, for Moses had given the inheritance of the two tribes and a half on the other side of the Jordan, but to the Levites had given no inheritance among them.

So there it is again, you see that being enforced or emphasized. Verse 4, for the children of Joseph were two tribes, Manasseh and Ephraim, with the common lands for their livestock and their property. And verse 5 now, that was 4, this is 5, as Yahweh had commanded Moses so the children of Israel did, they divided the land. Again, they divided it according to God.

It was not something that they came up with. And if you are, let's say you are in the tribe of Dan and you see what your allotment is, you've got to be kidding me. This doesn't even make a street corner in Judah. Judah's got this humongous territory and we get this. You say, how is that fair?

Well, let's slow it down and think it through a little bit. What does it really matter? If you get 10 acres of land to farm or 20 acres of land, are you really saying, boy, my farm doesn't reach to Judah. And the guy in Judah, he's not getting all the land, he has his acreage to work, you're satisfied.

It's a tribal thing, it's not an individual thing. Acre is an acre, regardless of the tribal allotment. And, you know, you can marry somebody in Judah and, you know, move there. Why I'm bringing this up is because we're going to come to these allotments later in Joshua. What we have to walk away from, I think, is that God sets boundaries and that's what we have to work. And if you plow and work your field, that's what you're accountable for. God is not going to say, well, how come you didn't, you know, help your neighbor do his field better? You know, I mean, well, if he's in trouble, of course, it's different. But to learn to be satisfied and to live within our boundaries, the flesh hates that.

The flesh does not like boundaries. For instance, I think I've said this before, but I'll say it again. I never shop at Walmart and I never shop, well, I do sometimes, but that's for an example. But I'm not there at 3 o'clock in the morning and they're open 24 hours. But somehow I delight to know that I can go there at 3 o'clock in the morning.

There's not a boundary there. And if I want to. So, I don't know, do you feel, I sleep better at night knowing they're open. Well, if you, you know, you've got a child gets sick and you're out of bed or something, you're very happy. There's some 24 hour places to go to. In the old days, you had to wake somebody up.

Well, you still might when you go to war. If you've ever been there late, it is kind of spooky. It's kind of like, boy, this is like a back alley somewhere. There's nobody here. I get mugged.

That'd be terrible, mugged in sporting goods. But anyway, verse 6. Then the children of Judah came to Joshua in Gilgal, now that's their capital, where the shame was rolled away. So, it's not a little word.

I don't mean to stop half verse. Well, I do, but I try not to. Gilgal always meant something to them and it should always mean something to us. Maybe you have an event in your life where it sort of rolled away the shame.

Maybe it wasn't shameful to others, but to you. It was just something that, I wish this was gone. And that's what Gilgal was to Joshua. We finally got in the Promised Land. We no longer are people who are promised these great things and cannot touch them.

Well, now they've got them. So, verse 6. Then the children of Judah came to Joshua in Gilgal and Caleb, the son of Jephunneh, the Kenzanite, said to him, You know the word which Yahweh said to Moses, the man of God, concerning you and me in Kadesh Barnea.

Everything stops. Caleb's on the scene. We just were finished with Balaam. And on the other side, here's Caleb. This striking feature from the scriptures.

And the rest of this chapter focuses on him. Now, he's from the tribe of Judah and we'll get to their allotment in chapter 15, next opportunity. Some suppose that these Kenazites joined the tribe of Judah and were not born into Israel. And they were sort of a fruit from conviction.

They believed the God of the Jews and wanted to join up with them while in Egypt, much as Rahab did after they got out of Egypt into the Promised Land. I don't know that there's enough evidence for that because that's a name that you can attach to others. But that's one. Maybe your study bibles has that.

And if you leave it by my office, I can make corrections for you anytime. Anyway, Caleb is the center of attention, not the Kenazites anyway. But here he says, And Caleb, the son of Jephunneh, you know the word. He says to Joshua, Joshua, you were there.

And it's not a challenge. It's just the way Caleb is built, how he operates. You know the word which Yahweh said to Moses, the man of God. Just love hearing it come from a man like Caleb. Caleb has such respect, of course, from Moses concerning you and me in Kadesh Barnea. Verse 7, I was 40 years old when Moses, the servant of Yahweh, sent me from Kadesh Barnea to spy out the land and I brought back word to him. And here is another just a profound statement. As it was in my heart, I didn't lie to Moses. I told him what I felt. God promised us this land. It was flowing with milk and honey. I saw it with my own eyes.

That's the report I gave. God wanted us to go in and take it. I sided with God and that's what he's getting at. And so he says, I brought back word to him as it was in my heart. That's the kind of man he was, upright. He was a man of integrity, called it like he saw it. It's the kind of guy you would want as an umpire or not.

He keeps calling me out. I forgot we have a baseball deficient congregation that's been coming to my attention. We're working on it, one heart at a time.

It might take nine innings. All right, anyway, verse 8. Nevertheless, my brethren who went up with me made the heart of the people melt, but I wholly followed Yahweh my God. He's not boasting. He's just giving.

He's going back. This is what happened and every bit of it's true. In fact, this time it's scripture. He's quoting what's in the book of Numbers. He says, nevertheless, my brethren who went up with me made the heart of the people. So he says, I told what was in my heart and they told what was in their heart.

And that's life. You've got to choose what you're going to believe. The heart of a man like Caleb or the heart of a man like Balaam or the heart of the men like the other ten spies who overstepped. They weren't asked to say what their estimate, their military estimate. Moses should have said it. I would have loved if Moses said, well, and who made you a general to be able to tell if our forces can take it or not?

All they did was spread panic. Moses did not ask them to do that. He asked him to say if the land was everything God said it was.

God wanted to bring out twelve witnesses to his word and he only got two according to faith. So Caleb saw the jealousy of Miriam, Moses' sister, and God strike her with leprosy for a week. He saw the mole by women that Balak dispatched on the people of God. He saw the doubt of the spies.

And yet in all of that there's no indication of any interest on his part in lining up with any of those. When someone mumbled and grumbled against Moses as they seemed to do several times a day for forty years, Caleb wasn't with them. Thanks for tuning in to Cross Reference Radio for this study in the book of Joshua. Cross Reference is the teaching ministry of Pastor Rick Gaston of Calvary Chapel Mechanicsville in Virginia. If you're interested in more information about this ministry, please visit our website, crossreferenceradio.com.

You'll find additional teachings from Pastor Rick available there. We also encourage you to subscribe to our podcast. By doing so, you'll be notified of each new edition of Cross Reference Radio. Just search for Cross Reference Radio in iTunes, Google Play Music, or your favorite podcast app. You can also follow the links at crossreferenceradio.com. We're glad we were able to spend time with you today. Tune in next time to continue learning from the book of Joshua, right here on Cross Reference Radio.