Reporting on the Promised Land

Text Numbers 13 Time 17/06/12 Place Childs Hill Baptist Church

Numbers 13 tells us how at this point spies were sent into the Promised Land to spy it out in preparation for their entry. Twelve men went in, one from each tribe. The operation took six weeks and when they returned all the spies agreed that the Promised Land they were about to enter was flowing with milk and honey. However, the disagreement came over whether they could take the land.

Once again, it seems rather remote from our situation and circumstances today in so many ways but the moment we stop and think about it connections are obvious. We also have been commanded to enter a Promised Land, a land full of good things, flowing with milk and honey and yet a place where fighting is necessary in order to occupy. I am talking about being a Christian and what is involved. How we handle this matter is very important.

1. Recognise the need to explore the Christian life and report back

The account we have here is also found in Deuteronomy 1. The main difference is that whereas in Deuteronomy we get the impression that this was instigated by the people, here in Numbers we are told that The LORD said to Moses, Send some men to explore the land of Canaan, which I am giving to the Israelites. From each ancestral tribe send one of its leaders. It was not only then something the people wanted to do but was done (3) at the LORD's command. This factor shows that when some people suggest that they should not have wanted to explore the land but should have simply trusted God for the future, they were wrong. It is a fatal mistake to suppose that human instrumentality means God cannot be involved. An obvious example would be the clearly very human way the Bible has been written. The fact that it is so human does not preclude God being its author any more than the very humanness of Jesus Christ precludes him from being God.

So, the people did indeed say Let us send men ahead to spy out the land for us and bring back a report about the route we are to take and the towns we will come to. (Deuteronomy 1:22) but it was by this means that God himself said to Moses, Send some men to explore the land of Canaan, which I am giving to the Israelites.

Those chosen were all leaders of the Israelites though not the people mentioned earlier in the book. They are listed in verses 4-15. None of them are ever mentioned again in Scripture, except for Joshua and Caleb. As ever, the Bible rings true to life. Most people who rise to some prominence in their lifetimes are soon forgotten.

Now their job was to go ahead, spy out the land and then bring back a report about the route we are to take and the towns we will come to. There is a similar task to be done today by people with regard to the Christian life. Exploring comes naturally to most. Put a crawling baby down in a strange room and most will soon start to explore. The exploring instinct is in us all to a greater or lesser extent. We are not all Ranulph Fiennes or Bear Grylls but we like to look into certain things, to investigate, to explore. If you are a Christian, if you know what it is to be united to Christ and trusting in him then you have an obligation to look at your life and what is involved and report back to others. You need to be able to explain how to become a Christian and what it is like to be one. Obviously it is a job that some will be better at than others and those who are preachers have a special responsibility in this area but we should all be able to do it to some extent.

I think the trick is to learn from what others have said but to make it your own. So when you ask me about the route a person is to take to become a Christian, I would say that you know there is a God, although you keep trying to suppress the fact. That God is not silent but has spoken in his Word, the Bible. I would urge you to read the Bible or to listen to it being read. Listen to those who can explain how to be a Christian. Whatever happens, you need to think about all you've done and see your sins. Go to God and ask him to forgive you those sins and indeed all your sins for the sake of Jesus and the way he has died in the place of sinners so there can be forgiveness. Don't rest until you are sure all your sins are forgiven.

Or if you say, what is it like to be a Christian? I would say that there are great joys but there are difficulties too. It is not always easy but God will help you to fight against sin successfully if you look to him.

2. Consider how to explore the Christian life

In verses 17-20 Moses gives his spied a list of questions to answer. When Moses sent them to explore Canaan, he said, Go up through the Negev (the southern desert) and on into the hill country. See what the land is like and whether the people who live there are strong or weak, few or many. 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 in it or not? He also said Do your best to bring back some of the fruit of the land. (It was the season for the first ripe grapes.)

So their task was manifold – to see in general What the land is like. That included

1. Whether the people who live there are strong or weak, few or many.

2. What kind of land do they live in? Is it good or bad?

3. What kind of towns do they live in? Are they unwalled or fortified?

4. How is the soil? Is it fertile or poor? Are there trees in it or not?

Now something similar is needed today. There need to be evangelists and apologists and plain straightforward witnesses who can answer the questions people are asking about the Christian life. What is it like to be a Christian? Are the arguments for atheism and unbelief many or few, strong or weak? What is it like to be a Christian – is it a good thing or a bad thing? What is it like? Is it safe or is it dangerous? How does it work out? Is it easy to grow as a Christian or not? What features should one expect to see?

These are the sorts of things people want to know. Somehow we need to get them across. We need to deal with the arguments for atheism and unbelief, of which there are not that many and mostly quite weak. Also, the strength of indwelling sin – sometimes stronger than we think. We need to explain what it is like to be a Christian – what a good thing it is and how little there is to be said against it. We need to show what it is like. It is the safest way to live though inevitably it has its dangers. We must show how it works out. We must explain how Christians can grow in grace. We need to point out features such as growing holiness that one should expect to see.

Of course, we must do all this with one eye on the Christian life as it is being lived now and as it has been lived by believers in the past but also another eye on the Scriptures that set out so clearly how the Christian life is to be lived.

3. Consider the work of exploring the Christian life

Verses 21-24 describe how they went up and explored the land from the Desert of Zin as far as Rehob, toward Lebo Hamath. It is difficult to be sure exactly where these places are. As instructed they entered the land in the south and went up through the Negev and came to Hebron, where Ahiman, Sheshai and Talmai, the descendants of Anak, lived. (Hebron had been built seven years before Zoan in Egypt – there is some pride here. Hebron is 7 years older than a leading Egyptian city) We are told that when they reached the Valley of Eshchol, they cut off a branch bearing a single cluster of grapes. Two of them carried it on a pole between them, I was so huge along with some pomegranates and figs. That place was called the Valley of Eshchol because of the cluster of grapes the Israelites cut off there.

They pretty much did what Moses commanded, it would seem. There was no fault there or any real differences among the spies. The real difference was in the way that things were reported. That suggests that for us too this is where the difference will often come. Undoubtedly, some talk about being a Christian who have never actually become Christians. You need to watch out for that. However, much more often the conflict will be between those who are Christians and either do or do not, as it were, report on the Christian life in the way they should. For various reasons believers can say misleading things about the Christian life and so cause harm.

Perhaps the bunch of grapes reminds us of the power of actually living as a Christian. A picture paints a thousand words they say and certainly to see a Christian living a truth out is likely to have more effect than any number of words.

4. Realise that there is a good and a bad way of reporting on the Christian life

We read in verses 25 and 26 that At the end of forty days they returned from exploring the land. They came back to Moses and Aaron and the whole Israelite community at Kadesh in the Desert of Paran. There they reported to them and to the whole assembly and showed them the fruit of the land.

We are told in verse 27 that They gave Moses this account: We went into the land to which you sent us, and it does flow with milk and honey! Here is its fruit. They were unanimous on the matter of how good the land was. That is not surprising because it was.

In a similar way, I don't think I've ever heard someone arguing that it is ever better not to be a Christian. The verdict is unanimous – always better to be a Christian than not.

No, the conflict is over how one then describes becoming a Christian, as here. Here we see first how the majority say, yes, the land is very attractive But (28, 29) the people who live there are powerful, and the cities are fortified and very large. We even saw descendants of Anak there. The Amalekites live in the Negev; the Hittites, Jebusites and Amorites live in the hill country; and the Canaanites live near the sea and along the Jordan. In other words, we can never live in this wonderful land because the inhabitants are too many and too strong for us.

It is only Caleb (and Joshua we learn elsewhere, born in Egypt as Hoshea – he saves but called 'The LORD saves' by Moses) who counteract this attitude. In verse 30 we read how Caleb silenced the people before Moses and said, We should go up and take possession of the land, for we can certainly do it. However, they are countered by the others who say (31ff) We can't attack those people; they are stronger than we are. These latter people spread among the Israelites a bad report about the land they had explored. They said, The land we explored devours those living in it. “They'll eat us alive!”. 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. Clearly gross exaggeration.

Now it is all too easy for Christians today to do something similar and so discourage people from ever thinking of coming to Christ.

Different people will be negative in different ways, of course. At one extreme there are people who say that there is no such thing as a free offer of the gospel. It isn't true that just anyone can come to Christ. You have to feel a sense of sin first and be burdened by it. Then you can seek him. But no, anyone can come. All who call on the name of the Lord will be saved.

At the other extreme are those who, while they say anyone can come, they also give the impression that it then all depends on us. We need to work hard to keep ourselves in the faith and to live the sort of life that is pleasing to God. Certainly we must work hard but it is God who saves us. We don't save ourselves.

Some just have a very negative way of talking about being a Christian. The emphasis seems to fall on how hard it is and the trouble involved rather than the joy it brings and the way God continually sustains. Are we negative in that way? We must be very careful that we are not. I think that is one of the main lessons of this passage – how a lack of faith can set back the work of God like nothing else. Let's not do that.