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Perception is my point of view!
Last week we dealt with the tongue…
I hope our perspective has changed.
What I say can stain me and others…
Remember it’s about a heart submitted to God or submitted to self
Today I want to deal with a stained perspective…
Imagine your glasses with a stain that effects your vision....
Then all of you came near me and said, ‘Let us send men before us, that they may explore the land for us and bring us word again of the way by which we must go up and the cities into which we shall come.’
Moses is reminiscing on events that have transpired..
Deuteronomy tells us that the people wanted to send spies into the land.
The promise Land.... - The land that was promised.
In Numbers we see that God allowed that to happen.
The Lord spoke to Moses, saying, “Send men to spy out the land of Canaan, which I am giving to the people of Israel. From each tribe of their fathers you shall send a man, every one a chief among them.”
“From each tribe of their fathers you shall send a man, every one a chief among them.”
Chief among them…
You would think this chief would be chosen because of their perspective!
Moses, sought to accomplish several goals in sending the twelve spies into Canaan.
He asked the spies to gather intel about the following:
⁃ whether the people who lived there were strong or weak, few or many (Numbers 13:18)
⁃ whether the land was good or bad (Numbers 13:19)
⁃ whether the cities were like camps or strongholds
⁃ whether the land was rich or poor (Numbers 13:20)
⁃ whether or not there were forests there
- Finally, Moses wanted some of the fruit of the land brought back to display (Numbers 13:20).
At the end of forty days they returned from spying out the land. And they came to Moses and Aaron and to all the congregation of the people of Israel in the wilderness of Paran, at Kadesh. They brought back word to them and to all the congregation, and showed them the fruit of the land.
They came to Moses and Aaron and to all the congregation.....
They bought back word and showed them the fruit of the land…
And they told him, “We came to the land to which you sent us. It flows with milk and honey, and this is its fruit. However, the people who dwell in the land are strong, and the cities are fortified and very large. And besides, we saw the descendants of Anak there.
They told him / We came to the land to which you sent us… - Perception
Flows with mil and honey (Hyperbole) - It was rich
This is the fruit - we have proof
The land is exactly what we need!
However!!!!
Lets take note:
The people who dwell in the land are strong!
The cities are fortified and very large
The Amalekites dwell in the land of the Negeb. The Hittites, the Jebusites, and the Amorites dwell in the hill country. And the Canaanites dwell by the sea, and along the Jordan.”
I believe the spies did a good job with the intel.
This is all that Moses asked for them to do.
But Caleb quieted the people before Moses and said, “Let us go up at once and occupy it, for we are well able to overcome it.”
Caleb quieted the people!
The information got the people stirred up…
Caleb perspective was…
“Let us go up at once and occupy it, for we are well able to overcome it.”
Then the men who had gone up with him said, “We are not able to go up against the people, for they are stronger than we are.” So they brought to the people of Israel a bad report of the land that they had spied out, saying, “The land, through which we have gone to spy it out, is a land that devours its inhabitants, and all the people that we saw in it are of great height.
And the tongue is a fire, a world of unrighteousness. The tongue is set among our members, staining the whole body, setting on fire the entire course of life, and set on fire by hell.
Our words have power!
Our words can stain our perspective
The men said..... We are not able to go up against the people…
They are stronger than we are…
They brought to the people a bad report.... They stained the people
And there we saw the Nephilim (the sons of Anak, who come from the Nephilim), and we seemed to ourselves like grasshoppers, and so we seemed to them.”
“And we seemed to ourselves like grasshoppers, and so we seemed to them.”
Their perspective caused them to have a grasshopper point of view!
Their words became a fire.....
“Yet you would not go up, but rebelled against the command of the Lord your God. And you murmured in your tents and said, ‘Because the Lord hated us he has brought us out of the land of Egypt, to give us into the hand of the Amorites, to destroy us. Where are we going up? Our brothers have made our hearts melt, saying, “The people are greater and taller than we. The cities are great and fortified up to heaven. And besides, we have seen the sons of the Anakim there.” ’
Then all the congregation raised a loud cry, and the people wept that night. And all the people of Israel grumbled against Moses and Aaron. The whole congregation said to them, “Would that we had died in the land of Egypt! Or would that we had died in this wilderness! Why is the Lord bringing us into this land, to fall by the sword? Our wives and our little ones will become a prey. Would it not be better for us to go back to Egypt?” And they said to one another, “Let us choose a leader and go back to Egypt.”
Our words become flesh....
But my servant Caleb, because he has a different spirit and has followed me fully, I will bring into the land into which he went, and his descendants shall possess it.