SPEAKER_02: Hello everyone, I'm Dr.
SPEAKER_02: Steve Holt.
SPEAKER_02: I want to welcome you to the Road Church Podcast.
SPEAKER_02: Each week we go into God's Word.
SPEAKER_02: We teach chapter by chapter and verse by verse.
SPEAKER_02: We are here to build the Kingdom of God revolution through empowering people to change the world.
SPEAKER_02: So we pray this will minister to you at your heart level and change your life.
SPEAKER_02: We're in Joshua again, you guys.
SPEAKER_02: Listen, I have I have battled the last couple weeks with the last part of Joshua, and I was looking back over my notes when I've taught it before, and I'm gonna go with my custom that I've used in the past, and that is we're going to zip past the last chapters because let me just give you, if you're if you're a note-taker, let me give you some of the statistics of the last part.
SPEAKER_02: But the word inheritance over the next 10 chapters is used 49 times, and dividing up by lots is used 22 times.
SPEAKER_02: So what they would do, men and women, is they would take a box, and in the box were the names of the tribes, and in another box was the parcels of land.
SPEAKER_02: And so they would pray and they trusted.
SPEAKER_02: This is before the Holy Spirit came.
SPEAKER_02: The Holy Spirit's there, but the but the coming of the Holy Spirit, like we see at Pentecost, would be in the future.
SPEAKER_02: So they're not working with the same power that we have today.
SPEAKER_02: So they use lots at that time.
SPEAKER_02: And you even see it in Acts chapter 1.
SPEAKER_02: In Acts chapter 1 with the early church, they drew lots to pick Matthias to be one of the twelve.
SPEAKER_02: So very similar thing happening then.
SPEAKER_02: This was a custom in Israel.
SPEAKER_02: So they'd pull out, you know, they would pull out one of the tribes, and then they'd pull out the parcel land, they'd match them together.
SPEAKER_02: And that's how they were allocating land.
SPEAKER_02: Joshua was over that.
SPEAKER_02: Well, in chapter 13, it speaks of the inheritance of Reuben, Gad, and the half tribe of Manasseh on the east side of the Jordan River.
SPEAKER_02: And there's a lot I can say about that, but I've got so much to cover on something else, I'm not going to cover that.
SPEAKER_02: Now, chapter 14 onward to 24, which is the end, is all about the allocation of land where in some cases the tribes just didn't take the whole land.
SPEAKER_02: They never took the full inheritance that God had given them.
SPEAKER_02: And I don't, it doesn't tell you why.
SPEAKER_02: Lack of faith, fear, not being equipped.
SPEAKER_02: We have no idea.
SPEAKER_02: But the bottom line is that that whole second part, that big part, is all about the different tribes and stuff, and we're not going to cover that, okay?
SPEAKER_02: You can read it on your own.
SPEAKER_02: If you like looking at names and trying to figure out how to say them, then man, I just anoint you with power from the Holy Spirit.
SPEAKER_02: I don't have the anointing.
SPEAKER_02: But anyway, it is the inspired word of God, but I'm just thinking what's best for our congregation.
SPEAKER_02: So let me say, I'm going to talk about Caleb today.
SPEAKER_02: Okay, this is fascinating.
SPEAKER_02: This the spirit of Caleb is fascinating.
SPEAKER_02: And there's so much here.
SPEAKER_02: And then next week, I'm going to conclude Joshua with the legacy of Joshua.
SPEAKER_02: I just thought, you know, how many of you care about your legacy?
SPEAKER_02: I care about my legacy.
SPEAKER_02: And probably as you're younger, if you're younger, maybe, I don't know, how do you define that?
SPEAKER_02: Let's just say 45 and below.
SPEAKER_02: You're probably not thinking about, you're not thinking about your legacy yet.
SPEAKER_02: But something happens when you get into your 50s and your 60s, and some of you are in your 70s, maybe even 80s, you think about that occasionally.
SPEAKER_02: Well, you should be thinking about it.
SPEAKER_02: Because sometimes we find ourselves in a world in which we're more concerned about our resume than our legacy.
SPEAKER_02: And I'm telling you, your legacy is more important than your resume.
SPEAKER_02: And when you're younger, you're thinking, resume, you know, I want to make an impact.
SPEAKER_02: I've got a vision, and all that's beautiful.
SPEAKER_02: But here we see Joshua, who had a great resume, by the way, and what a worshiper and a warrior he was.
SPEAKER_02: I thought we should cover, do a good job with Joshua next week.
SPEAKER_02: So we're going to cover Joshua and his legacy from the book of Joshua.
SPEAKER_02: But today, I want to talk about cultivating the spirit of Caleb.
SPEAKER_02: Write that down.
SPEAKER_02: Cultivating the spirit of Caleb.
SPEAKER_02: He's really unique because there's only a few people in the Bible where the scriptures actually speak to the spirit of a man.
SPEAKER_02: And David is spoken of, and he's a heart, he has a heart after God.
SPEAKER_02: That's the unique kind of, I mean you could almost say the epithet over David if he had a heart after God.
SPEAKER_02: You see in the book of Daniel, it says that Daniel had an excellent spirit.
SPEAKER_02: But we're going to see that there's something unique about Caleb.
SPEAKER_02: And I was telling some of the staff before I came in, I have really struggled the last two weeks getting ready for this message because there's so much stuff.
SPEAKER_02: And really, what I'm going to cover today is so, I don't know, it's the irreducible minimum.
SPEAKER_02: It's the irreducible minimum.
SPEAKER_02: Someday in the future, when it's the right timing of the Lord, I want to do like a three-part series on Caleb.
SPEAKER_02: Because there's just so much stuff here.
SPEAKER_02: So if I seem like I'm speaking fast and going fast through it, it's because I am.
SPEAKER_02: Because I'm trying to cover just a few points, but there's so much here in this passage about Caleb.
SPEAKER_02: So let's let's let me give you a quick overview because some of you may not come out of a strong Bible background.
SPEAKER_02: You may not know the Old Testament very well.
SPEAKER_02: But when the Israelites are first coming to Canaan, okay, they've escaped.
SPEAKER_02: God gave them a way out through the Red Sea out of Egypt.
SPEAKER_02: They now come across the Sinai Peninsula, that area.
SPEAKER_02: They come to Canaan, and Joshua asked, this was his first mistake, by the way, in leadership, is he asked the tribes to find the leaders from their tribes to be spies.
SPEAKER_02: Okay, let me just say something about that.
SPEAKER_02: The leader should decide who the leaders are, okay, because they're the ones who carry the responsibility and the weight of the kingdom for that particular area.
SPEAKER_02: And Joshua learned it the second time.
SPEAKER_02: We saw that when we studied the first few chapters of Joshua, Joshua decided who the spies were, and there weren't twelve, but there was just a few.
SPEAKER_02: And I think it was two that went in.
SPEAKER_02: But anyway, so he sends them out, they go in, they come back, and you remember the story?
SPEAKER_02: So all ten spies go, man, the promised land is surely flowing with milk and honey.
SPEAKER_02: It is so fertile.
SPEAKER_02: And they brought out some of the fruit and everything from their trip, but then they say, we can't do it.
SPEAKER_02: There's no way we can go out there, and I'm going to read it in just a second.
SPEAKER_02: How we can take this land, except Joshua and Caleb.
SPEAKER_02: And so of the 12 spies, 10 are negative and fearful about going in, but only Joshua and Caleb stand up and say, we can take it.
SPEAKER_02: So turn your Bibles to chapter 14 of Joshua.
SPEAKER_02: Chapter 14 of Joshua.
SPEAKER_02: And we're going to pick it up at verse 6.
SPEAKER_02: Chapter 14, verse 6.
SPEAKER_02: And I'm calling this cultivating the spirit of Caleb.
SPEAKER_02: Then the children of Judah came to Joshua and Gilgal, and Caleb, the son of Jeffnah, the Kennesite.
SPEAKER_02: So he's not even a Jew, you guys.
SPEAKER_02: He's not even a born Israeli Jew.
SPEAKER_02: He's from a tribe called the Kenesites.
SPEAKER_02: He said, I want to, I kept saying, like, when I was practicing with Liz, I practiced sermons with Liz.
SPEAKER_02: And she goes, that's so lame.
SPEAKER_02: A lot.
SPEAKER_02: Okay.
SPEAKER_02: So you don't even know how lame my sermons are until they pass through the filter of Liz Holt.
SPEAKER_02: But anyway, I said it this way.
SPEAKER_02: You know the word which the Lord said to Moses.
SPEAKER_02: She goes, You sound like you're some old guy.
SPEAKER_02: And I go, Well, he's 85 years old.
SPEAKER_02: And she goes, Yeah, but read down the passage.
SPEAKER_02: She hasn't even read it.
SPEAKER_02: She just remembers these things.
SPEAKER_02: She said, Well, read down the rest of the passage.
SPEAKER_02: He said he's just as strong as he was when he was 40.
SPEAKER_02: She goes, So say it like a normal person at 40 years old would say it.
SPEAKER_02: I said, All right, so I will.
SPEAKER_02: I'm not 40, but I'm going to say it.
SPEAKER_02: Because I'm as strong as I was when I was 40.
SPEAKER_02: Alright?
SPEAKER_02: You know the word which the Lord said to Moses, the man of God concerning you and me in Kadesh Barnia.
SPEAKER_02: I was 40 years old when Moses, the servant of the Lord, sent me from Kadesh Barnea to spy out the land, and I brought back word to him as it was in my heart.
SPEAKER_02: Now, right there is a whole sermon.
SPEAKER_02: There is so much in this passage.
SPEAKER_02: But listen to what's happening.
SPEAKER_02: Remember what I said earlier?
SPEAKER_02: That the lots were set up through the allocation of the land for the inheritance of the tribes based on two boxes.
SPEAKER_02: So Joshua, and this is the picture of.
SPEAKER_02: He's got Joshua, he's probably got his leadership team around him, and he's getting ready to do it again, like he's doing throughout the rest of the book.
SPEAKER_02: And then here comes, here comes Caleb.
SPEAKER_02: Here's what Caleb's saying.
SPEAKER_02: Use a theological term.
SPEAKER_02: Screw that system.
SPEAKER_02: Okay?
SPEAKER_02: I'm not gonna take your lots out of a box.
SPEAKER_02: Moses told me that I get that mountain, I get Hebron, so when are you gonna allocate it to me because I'm ready to go?
SPEAKER_02: And it seems like everybody shut up.
SPEAKER_02: Like nobody says anything here.
SPEAKER_02: And as far as we know, through the whole book, nobody but Caleb says it that way.
SPEAKER_02: He basically commands Joshua to give him the land that Moses promised him.
SPEAKER_02: He has something in his heart, down deep in his heart, that he is not going to put up with some kind of compromised allocation of his inheritance.
SPEAKER_02: He wants it all, you guys.
SPEAKER_02: That's an attitude.
SPEAKER_02: There's an attitude in this.
SPEAKER_02: So now I want you to keep your finger in Joshua 14 and turn to the left and come to Numbers.
SPEAKER_02: Come to Numbers.
SPEAKER_02: Just keep going to the left until you come to Numbers 13.
SPEAKER_02: And I felt like I'd be doing a disservice if we didn't look at Numbers 13.
SPEAKER_02: While you're turning there, I want you to look up on the screen and look what the Lord says about Caleb.
SPEAKER_02: This is from Numbers 14, 23.
SPEAKER_02: This is what the Lord says about Caleb.
SPEAKER_02: None of those who rejected me will see the promised land.
SPEAKER_02: But my servant Caleb, because he has a different spirit, he has a different spirit in him, and follow me fully, I will bring into the land where he went.
SPEAKER_02: Now, what is he talking about?
SPEAKER_02: This different spirit.
SPEAKER_02: So look at Numbers, look at Numbers 13, because what God is saying about Caleb is from what he does right here.
SPEAKER_02: So it's in, let me just say this.
SPEAKER_02: It's in points in our life, and it might be our marriage, it might be in your job, it might be with a friend or a relationship.
SPEAKER_02: It's in conflict that you find out who you really are.
SPEAKER_02: Okay, when everything's going your way, and everything is successful and effective and you're joyful, that's great.
SPEAKER_02: I mean living that, but that's not normal life.
SPEAKER_02: We think that's normal.
SPEAKER_02: I want to challenge us that failure, brokenness, conflict, that's normal.
SPEAKER_02: That's the normal Christian life.
SPEAKER_02: So here we're gonna see a little bit about what's in this guy.
SPEAKER_02: What is this different spirit?
SPEAKER_02: Look at verse 28 of Numbers 13.
SPEAKER_02: So they've gone in, they've seen the land, and they say it's it's man, it's flowing with milk and honey, very positive, and then there's this nevertheless in the New King James Version, which is what I use.
SPEAKER_02: Nevertheless, this is the other spies talking, the other ten, the people who dwell in the land are strong, the cities are fortified and very large.
SPEAKER_02: Moreover, we saw that the descendants of Anak, that's the Nephilim, and we've talked a lot about the Nephilim.
SPEAKER_02: Some say it's Nephilim or Nephilim, or these are giants, these are half demonic, powerful figures from what we read about in Genesis chapter 6.
SPEAKER_02: Is the descendants of Anak there?
SPEAKER_02: The Amalekites dwell in the land of the south, and that's where they're going to try to go in, and that's the part we've been studying here in our study of Joshua, is dealing with the Amalekites.
SPEAKER_02: The Hittites, the Jebusites, and the Amorites dwell in the mountains, and the Canaanites dwell by the sea and along the banks of the Jordan.
SPEAKER_02: Write this down, this is really important.
SPEAKER_02: That's the normal human spirit.
SPEAKER_02: The way that they're describing the situation is normal.
SPEAKER_02: That's normal.
SPEAKER_02: Look, they've got giants, they're half demonic.
SPEAKER_02: We can't take them on.
SPEAKER_02: We're just grasshoppers in our own sight.
SPEAKER_02: We can't take on fortified cities where they have 16-foot thick walls and 25 feet high walls.
SPEAKER_02: How are we gonna deal with that?
SPEAKER_02: They got the high ground.
SPEAKER_02: They're all up in the high ground.
SPEAKER_02: All the forts are on the high ground, all the cities are on the high ground.
SPEAKER_02: How are we gonna take that?
SPEAKER_02: Listen, everybody, that's the normal spirit of a human being.
SPEAKER_02: That's the way we are.
SPEAKER_02: We look at the problems, we focus on the problems, and then we don't do anything.
SPEAKER_02: Some might call it the paralysis of analysis.
SPEAKER_02: And so we look at something and we keep thinking about it, we keep thinking about it, and our faith just plummets.
SPEAKER_02: Right?
SPEAKER_02: Anyone like that?
SPEAKER_02: Okay, the rest of you are liars because you know you are.
SPEAKER_02: Okay, so that's the normal human spirit.
SPEAKER_02: But this is something different about Caleb.
SPEAKER_02: He has a different spirit.
SPEAKER_02: Look at verse 30.
SPEAKER_02: Then Caleb quiets the people before Moses and says, Let us go up at once.
SPEAKER_02: Let's go.
SPEAKER_02: I don't, he does not deny.
SPEAKER_02: He saw the same stuff that they saw.
SPEAKER_02: He knows that the fortifications are huge.
SPEAKER_02: He knows that the cities are large.
SPEAKER_02: He knows that their warriors are strong.
SPEAKER_02: He knows that the descendants of Anak are there.
SPEAKER_02: He's not denying that.
SPEAKER_02: He just says, let us go up at once and take possession.
SPEAKER_02: This guy's like a take no prisoners attitude.
SPEAKER_02: And we are well able.
SPEAKER_02: We're well able to overcome him.
SPEAKER_02: We can take these guys.
SPEAKER_02: That's a different spirit.
SPEAKER_02: What is going on here?
SPEAKER_02: I want to cultivate the spirit of Caleb in my life.
SPEAKER_02: I want us to be a church, the road church that cultivates the spirit of Caleb.
SPEAKER_02: And the first thing I want to say is urgent obedience.
SPEAKER_02: Write down urgent obedience.
SPEAKER_02: That's actually in the Hebrew what different means.
SPEAKER_02: So when I was studying Hebrew and I was looking at different, it means urgent obedience.
SPEAKER_02: Listen to this.
SPEAKER_02: It also means meditation and lingering.
SPEAKER_02: Now, that almost seems like they're opposites.
SPEAKER_02: But here's what some of the commentators say, and I agree with this.
SPEAKER_02: It's through meditation, it's through lingering.
SPEAKER_02: The word you'll see a lot in English for this word, different, is lingering in the promise of God that then gave Caleb urgent obedience.
SPEAKER_02: Do you linger?
SPEAKER_02: You know what that requires?
SPEAKER_02: That requires that in your day, with all the challenges that are before you in your day, that at some point you linger.
SPEAKER_02: You linger with God's word.
SPEAKER_02: You linger with promises that God has given you.
SPEAKER_02: Raise your hand right now if you feel like you've got a promise from God that you're waiting on.
SPEAKER_02: It hasn't happened yet, but you feel like you've heard from God.
SPEAKER_02: Almost everybody in the room.
SPEAKER_02: I think God would call us with the spirit of Caleb, linger on that.
SPEAKER_02: Write it down in your journal, wherever you want, or a card, or whatever you want to put it on.
SPEAKER_02: But you need to take time, men and women, maybe every day, maybe that's not possible, but a few times a week where you just linger there and you say, God, you promised me that when that child was born, this was the calling on his or her life.
SPEAKER_02: And I don't see it right now.
SPEAKER_02: I feel like the devil's in the details and he's messing stuff up.
SPEAKER_02: And God, right now, I cry out for the promise you gave me when that child was born that you would fulfill your calling in that little child's life.
SPEAKER_02: Or you fulfill that calling in that young adult's life now.
SPEAKER_02: I'm not gonna let the devil win.
SPEAKER_02: I'm not gonna let demons win.
SPEAKER_02: I'm gonna fight for my child.
SPEAKER_02: I'm gonna fight for that job.
SPEAKER_02: I'm gonna fight for that vision you gave me.
SPEAKER_02: Does that make sense?
SPEAKER_02: So that's what I see.
SPEAKER_02: That's what I see in the spirit of Caleb is that he's got urgent obedience to a promise he's been lingering on.
SPEAKER_02: Man, that just fires me up.
SPEAKER_02: Fires me up.
SPEAKER_02: And even as Liz and I have had issues in our marriage and stuff like that, we've we've always gone back to what God said to us earlier, and we've kicked the devil's butt.
SPEAKER_02: And in working on things, developing new skills, working on how we can maximize our communication, our relation with each other, and it's been powerful because God's been showing up.
SPEAKER_02: So here's the deal: this is really important.
SPEAKER_02: You cannot have urgent obedience if you haven't lingered.
SPEAKER_02: Let me just say it another way.
SPEAKER_02: You cannot have urgent obedience in a crisis if you don't linger in the promise of God in peace.
SPEAKER_02: That's really important.
SPEAKER_02: In other words, if you're not building up your spirit with this passion for the promise God's given you, the mountain that He's put in your heart, when there's no fight.
SPEAKER_02: When the fight comes, you're toast.
SPEAKER_02: You start doubting everything.
SPEAKER_02: You start, you just fall apart.
SPEAKER_02: That's what the other ten squads are doing.
SPEAKER_02: Remember, I said that's the that's the natural human spirit.
SPEAKER_02: What we're talking about here is the supernatural Holy Spirit in Cal.
SPEAKER_02: This is what David.
SPEAKER_02: So David shows up with some with some cheese and crackers from Jesse for the men in the Valley of Elah, and he hears Goliath taunting the people of God, and he gets ticked.
SPEAKER_02: He really gets upset.
SPEAKER_02: And the reason he gets upset is because he's been lingering in the presence of God as a shepherd, and something in him rises up and says, That's not right.
SPEAKER_02: Give me that giant.
SPEAKER_02: It's Daniel who had an excellent spirit, the book of Daniel says.
SPEAKER_02: It's him dealing with Nebuchadnezzar and Darius at different times, where they came into these challenges about worshiping idols and eating food that was uh that had been sacrificed to idols and what they were going to do.
SPEAKER_02: He was ready for the crisis because he had meditated in peace.
SPEAKER_02: So, guys, whatever your view of eschatology is about the coming of the Lord and the second coming of Christ, and are we in the last days?
SPEAKER_02: By the way, we are in the last days.
SPEAKER_02: Well, you mean like on our lifetime is Christ is coming?
SPEAKER_02: I'm not saying that.
SPEAKER_02: I'm saying we're in the lastter days.
SPEAKER_02: Tomorrow will be more last days than today.
SPEAKER_02: So we're always in last days, okay?
SPEAKER_02: And the book of Acts says we're in the last days.
SPEAKER_02: We've been in the last days for 2,000 years.
SPEAKER_02: Whatever your eschatological views are, it doesn't matter to me.
SPEAKER_02: Here's what matters: are you ready for the crises that is coming your way?
SPEAKER_02: You are going to go through spiraling, you're going to go through crisis, you're going to go through difficulty.
SPEAKER_02: I want you to normalize that.
SPEAKER_02: I want you to not be oh shocked.
SPEAKER_02: Maybe it's like, well, here it goes, because James says, Count it all joy.
SPEAKER_02: Peter says, count it all joy.
SPEAKER_02: We go through various trials.
SPEAKER_02: The testing of our faith produces endurance.
SPEAKER_02: Let endurance have its perfect result that I can be perfect and lacking in nothing.
SPEAKER_02: So it seems like James and Peter and the apostles.
SPEAKER_02: Had normalized suffering.
SPEAKER_02: We normalize no suffering because we're so blessed in this country with the way we live.
SPEAKER_02: I mean, you realize that you can actually almost go through your entire life every day, 24-7, you know, 168 hours in a week, and the temperature never really changes.
SPEAKER_02: It's about, what, 69 degrees?
SPEAKER_02: 69 to 72.
SPEAKER_02: Do you realize how unique that is in culture?
SPEAKER_02: Just that one thing?
SPEAKER_02: When we go hunting, we're hunting elk or deer or grew up in the wilderness, you know, it's like, whoa, it's cold.
SPEAKER_02: Woo! It's cold.
SPEAKER_02: It's cold at 4 o'clock in the morning.
SPEAKER_02: It's 10 degrees.
SPEAKER_02: Oh, it's snowing.
SPEAKER_02: Oh, I'm uncomfortable.
SPEAKER_02: Hello?
SPEAKER_02: That's the way most of the world still lives, and that's the way even most Americans have lived in history.
SPEAKER_02: And so we live this comfortable life and we normalize that.
SPEAKER_02: But then if something becomes uncomfortable, we don't know what to do.
SPEAKER_02: And yet the apostles tell us, the New Testament tells us, normalize that.
SPEAKER_02: Have a different spirit, men and women.
SPEAKER_02: Have a spirit of urgent obedience because you've been meditating on the promises of God.
SPEAKER_02: So turn back now to Joshua chapter 14, if you would.
SPEAKER_02: And we're going to go through the passage some more.
SPEAKER_02: By the way, I wrote and rewrote this message like too many times.
SPEAKER_02: And I keep cutting out stuff because it's like, oh no.
SPEAKER_02: I can't say that.
SPEAKER_02: There'll be no time.
SPEAKER_02: Alright, so verse 8.
SPEAKER_02: Look at verse 8.
SPEAKER_02: So, nevertheless, my brethren who went up with me made the heart of the people melt.
SPEAKER_02: I like, I like the honesty of Caleb.
SPEAKER_02: He takes no responsibility for what these people did.
SPEAKER_02: So they're all dead anyway, so it doesn't matter.
SPEAKER_02: But maybe some of the relatives are still hanging out.
SPEAKER_02: But he says, they made the people's heart melt, but I underline this.
SPEAKER_02: I wholly followed the Lord my God.
SPEAKER_02: So Moses swore on that day, saying, Surely the land where your foot has trodden shall be your inheritance and your children's forever.
SPEAKER_02: Because you have wholly followed the Lord my God.
SPEAKER_02: Oh man, there's so much here.
SPEAKER_02: Cultivate the spirit of Caleb, be wholehearted.
SPEAKER_02: This guy is wholehearted.
SPEAKER_02: He's not halfway.
SPEAKER_02: There is no, guys, there is there is no germ of compromise anywhere in the bloodstream of Caleb.
SPEAKER_02: He is not going to compromise.
SPEAKER_02: He is wholehearted.
SPEAKER_02: And that's what Jesus is looking for.
SPEAKER_02: He says, love the Lord your God with all.
SPEAKER_02: Not halfway, not partly, with all of your heart.
SPEAKER_02: That's a good word.
SPEAKER_02: He says, all of your soul, all of your mind, all of your strength.
SPEAKER_02: That's the greatest commandment.
SPEAKER_02: What does that sound like to you?
SPEAKER_02: That sounds kind of like wholehearted.
SPEAKER_02: In other words, everything you are, physically, mentally, emotionally, and spiritually, go after me.
SPEAKER_02: Follow me.
SPEAKER_02: It's a follow me spirit.
SPEAKER_02: That's what Caleb has.
SPEAKER_02: He has a follow-me spirit.
SPEAKER_02: And I like what I like the most about the way he says it is look at verse 8.
SPEAKER_02: I wholly followed the Lord, my God.
SPEAKER_02: In my study Bible, I circled that.
SPEAKER_02: That's the thing that jumped off the page to me that he had a personal relationship with God.
SPEAKER_02: This is not religious stuff.
SPEAKER_02: This is not about being a Jew.
SPEAKER_02: He's not even a Jew.
SPEAKER_02: He's not an ethnic Jew.
SPEAKER_02: He's a Kennethite.
SPEAKER_02: So he has he's he's a proselyte.
SPEAKER_02: I mean, he came in and somewhere as a slave, probably.
SPEAKER_02: He came in, became a part of the slaves in Egypt.
SPEAKER_02: He wears the scars.
SPEAKER_02: You're gonna find out soon.
SPEAKER_02: He's 85 years old, and he's got jagged scars from the whips of Egypt on his back at 85 years old.
SPEAKER_02: He's a Kenizite.
SPEAKER_02: And you know, how many of you discovered just in your journey, and it's so many of you in this room, this is your story.
SPEAKER_02: When someone who's not come out of Christianity, they haven't come out of a church background or anything like that, and then they get radically saved, they're more fired up than you are, who kind of grew up in the church.
SPEAKER_02: Now you're more stable, maybe in some ways, because of the beauty of being in the culture of Christianity.
SPEAKER_02: That's kind of my background.
SPEAKER_02: Liz came out of a divorce, her family with her mom and dad got divorced, and so when she came in, she came in kind of street smart.
SPEAKER_02: And I kind of came in naive.
SPEAKER_02: I just thought everybody's great.
SPEAKER_02: I still think everybody's pretty great.
SPEAKER_02: And then she's she's like, I can't believe you thought that person was great.
SPEAKER_02: You know?
SPEAKER_02: Because she's street smart, she's been through so much stuff in the background of her story.
SPEAKER_02: So some of you, you see someone, they come out of a hugely, and we have people coming out of prostitution in this church.
SPEAKER_02: We have people coming out of lifestyles that are interesting, we have people that have that have been in prison that are in this church.
SPEAKER_02: We have all kinds of people, okay?
SPEAKER_02: They're some of the best believers.
SPEAKER_02: Because they're really fired up, because they're wholly committed to the Lord.
SPEAKER_02: They don't know any other way than be wholehearted.
SPEAKER_02: We learned sometimes in the church, oh, this is what you do at church.
SPEAKER_02: This is what you say, church.
SPEAKER_02: And so we've become professional Christians and they're fired up disciples.
SPEAKER_02: Which would you rather be?
SPEAKER_02: Do you want to be a professional Christian or a fired up disciple?
SPEAKER_02: A fired-up disciple is wholehearted.
SPEAKER_02: Caleb is fired up.
SPEAKER_02: He's ready to go.
SPEAKER_02: And he sees things from the perspective of being wholehearted with his God.
SPEAKER_02: This is a personal thing to him.
SPEAKER_02: So this is why Jesus said, follow me.
SPEAKER_02: He didn't say follow the Ten Commandments.
SPEAKER_02: He didn't say follow the Jewish tradition.
SPEAKER_02: He didn't say follow the ritual.
SPEAKER_02: He said, follow me, and I will make you fishers of men.
SPEAKER_02: Follow me, and I'll make you fishers of men.
SPEAKER_02: Take up your cross and follow me.
SPEAKER_02: Not take up your cross and be a really, really good person.
SPEAKER_02: Take up your cross and never make any mistakes.
SPEAKER_02: Take up your cross and be holy.
SPEAKER_02: Is holiness important?
SPEAKER_02: Yes, it is.
SPEAKER_02: But it all starts first with follow me.
SPEAKER_02: You see, see, Joshua's got a follow me spirit.
SPEAKER_02: He says to the rich young ruler, sell all you have and follow me.
SPEAKER_02: So Jesus' mantra was follow me.
SPEAKER_02: So, church, do you have a follow me spirit in you?
SPEAKER_02: That's the different spirit.
SPEAKER_02: It's urgent obedience because you're a follower.
SPEAKER_02: You follow Jesus.
SPEAKER_02: And I and I hate to say that, but I hear more sometimes about fearing God than following Jesus.
SPEAKER_02: You follow Jesus, you'll fear God.
SPEAKER_02: But you can fear God and not follow Jesus.
SPEAKER_02: I know, I know some people that are so religious it's thick.
SPEAKER_02: Like when they walk in rooms, like that guy's got a really religious spirit.
SPEAKER_02: I better not say anything negative about myself, or I'm like condemned to hell or something.
SPEAKER_02: Okay?
SPEAKER_02: Anybody like that?
SPEAKER_02: You have your friends like that?
SPEAKER_02: It's like you're like, whoa, you better, you better be clean, you better be good, because they've got, I don't know, what would I call it?
SPEAKER_02: Kind of a religious radar for sin.
SPEAKER_02: And they never sin.
SPEAKER_02: They never sin.
SPEAKER_02: Alright?
SPEAKER_02: Jesus called them hypocrites.
SPEAKER_02: We all sin.
SPEAKER_02: We all have to confess our sin sometimes.
SPEAKER_02: We have to get before the Lord and get right because we mess up.
SPEAKER_02: But what I'm talking about is a personal relationship that Caleb had that's a follow-me spirit.
SPEAKER_02: And as I was working on this, I couldn't help but remember the great hymn, I've decided to follow Jesus.
SPEAKER_02: Here's the three stanzas.
SPEAKER_02: I have decided to follow Jesus with no turning back.
SPEAKER_02: No turning.
SPEAKER_02: I don't know why they call it I have they I have decided to follow Jesus as a title.
SPEAKER_02: The title should be no turning back.
SPEAKER_02: It's repeated so many times.
SPEAKER_02: So I've decided to follow Jesus, no turning back.
SPEAKER_02: If no one joins me, still I will follow me spirit.
SPEAKER_02: The cross for me, the world.
SPEAKER_02: No turning back, no turning back.
SPEAKER_02: That's Caleb.
SPEAKER_02: This is Caleb's theme song.
SPEAKER_02: I have decided to follow Jesus.
SPEAKER_02: It's David's theme song as he goes into the Valley of Elah to take on Goliath.
SPEAKER_02: He's risking everything, and you know what?
SPEAKER_02: He doesn't care.
SPEAKER_02: You know, David would, his conscience would have bothered him if he walked away from the fight.
SPEAKER_02: He wants to go into the fight because he wants to take on that heathen there.
SPEAKER_02: Verse 10.
SPEAKER_02: And now, behold, the Lord has kept me alive, as he said, these 45 years.
SPEAKER_02: Ever since the Lord spoke this word to Moses while Israel wandered in the wilderness, and now here I am this day, 85 years old.
SPEAKER_02: As yet I'm as strong this day as on the day that Moses sent me.
SPEAKER_02: Just as my strength was then, so now my strength for war.
SPEAKER_02: God, he wants to fight, man.
SPEAKER_02: He wants to battle, both for going out and for coming in.
SPEAKER_02: Now, therefore, give me this mountain.
SPEAKER_02: Thirdly, give me this mountain attitude.
SPEAKER_02: It's vision.
SPEAKER_02: Caleb has a vision.
SPEAKER_02: And because of that vision, that vision has actually made him more youthful.
SPEAKER_02: How many of you know people that when they retire, their life just goes downhill physically and emotionally?
SPEAKER_02: They have to have no vision, they have no reason for living.
SPEAKER_02: Church, keep your vision.
SPEAKER_02: The spirit of Joshua is give me this mountain at 85 years old.
SPEAKER_02: Give me this mountain at 85 years old.
SPEAKER_02: This is another one Liz and I were cracking out.
SPEAKER_01: Give me this mountain.
SPEAKER_02: She goes, That's not Caleb.
SPEAKER_02: That's the dumbest thing I've ever heard.
SPEAKER_02: It just said that he's like he's 40 years old.
SPEAKER_02: Give me this mountain.
SPEAKER_02: Do you have vision?
SPEAKER_02: Without a vision, the people are unrestrained.
SPEAKER_02: Without a vision, the people perish, some translations say.
SPEAKER_02: You will perish in your spirit if you don't have some kind of vision.
SPEAKER_02: And age has nothing to do with it.
SPEAKER_02: So here's what's interesting about Caleb.
SPEAKER_02: His feet for 45 years are on the east side of the Jordan River, but his heart isn't.
SPEAKER_02: His heart is in the promised land.
SPEAKER_02: His feet may be firmly planted here, but his heart is somewhere else.
SPEAKER_02: He's thinking of the mountains of Hebron.
SPEAKER_02: This is why I named our property in Black Forest, Hebron Woods, because of David and because of Caleb.
SPEAKER_02: The spirit there.
SPEAKER_02: And I've been thinking about it, I've been praying about it, I've been meditating on it, I've been dwelling on it with an urgent obedience.
SPEAKER_02: Give me Hebrew.
SPEAKER_02: I demand, Lord, that you give me the vision that you gave me.
SPEAKER_02: You gave me that vision.
SPEAKER_02: Now if you're if you're, you know, in some kind of la land living in a vision that God never gave you, you better figure that one out.
SPEAKER_02: But if God has spoken to you, don't give up.
SPEAKER_02: Don't quit.
SPEAKER_02: Statistics show that the most successful years of one's life are between 60 and 70 years old.
SPEAKER_02: And the second most productive are between 70 and 80 years old.
SPEAKER_02: That's pretty cool.
SPEAKER_02: He left school in seventh grade and worked several jobs, often quitting in anger or getting fired.
SPEAKER_02: At the age of 40, he ran a small gas station and opened a small restaurant in the apartment next to the station.
SPEAKER_02: In 1952, at the age of 62, Colonel Harlan Sanders opened the first Kentucky fried chicken and the rest is history.
SPEAKER_02: She quit school at the age of 16 and worked with a local dressmaker.
SPEAKER_02: She was in her 40s when she started writing.
SPEAKER_02: But it wasn't until she was in her 60s that she wrote Little House in the Big Woods.
SPEAKER_02: And she began to gain a following.
SPEAKER_02: Over the next decade, Laura Ingalls-Wilder continued to write The Little House in the Prairie Book.
SPEAKER_02: He was in his 40s when he found his voice as an activist.
SPEAKER_02: He was arrested on numerous occasions and eventually spent 27 years in prison.
SPEAKER_02: But while in prison, he studied law.
SPEAKER_02: And after his release from prison, Nelson Mandela continued speaking out and was elected as his country's president at the age of 76.
SPEAKER_02: Vision.
SPEAKER_02: Don't let age get in the way of the vision that God has for you.
SPEAKER_02: Many haven't.
SPEAKER_02: I love these words in the Psalms.
SPEAKER_02: Those who are planted in the house of the Lord shall flourish in the courts of our God.
SPEAKER_02: We say it again.
SPEAKER_02: Those who are planted in the house of the Lord shall flourish in the courts of God.
SPEAKER_02: The idea of flourish is always green.
SPEAKER_02: God wants you to flourish in the fertility that He has for you.
SPEAKER_02: No matter what your age.
SPEAKER_02: Because if you have a vision, church, if you keep having a vision for the kingdom of God and the coming of the kingdom of God, and your impact for the kingdom of God and your unique calling for the kingdom of God, it's going to keep you young.
SPEAKER_02: You will flourish in the courts of God.
SPEAKER_02: He who dwells in the secret place of the most high shall abide under the shadow of the Almighty.
SPEAKER_02: So I think of that.
SPEAKER_02: I think, you know, we're dwelling in the relationship of the Most High, but our shadows on the ground.
SPEAKER_02: So where our feet are doesn't matter.
SPEAKER_02: What matters is where is your heart.
SPEAKER_02: You say, well, look, I've been sick all my life.
SPEAKER_02: I've never seen anything happen, but I feel like God told me I could be healed.
SPEAKER_02: I've always had this dream to do that, maybe from the Lord, you know.
SPEAKER_02: And your feet may be firmly planted in pain, hurt, and disappointment.
SPEAKER_02: But where's your heart?
SPEAKER_02: Where's your heart?
SPEAKER_02: Where's your vision?
SPEAKER_02: Caleb.
SPEAKER_02: Caleb is on the east side of the promised land.
SPEAKER_02: But his heart's always been for Hebrew.
SPEAKER_02: His heart was in the promised land.
SPEAKER_02: And then lastly, let me finish up with this.
SPEAKER_02: For you heard in that day how the Anakim were there, and that the cities were great and fortified.
SPEAKER_02: It may be, I like the way he said that, it just might be that the Lord will be with me, and I shall be able to drive them out as the Lord said.
SPEAKER_02: He's being like overly humble for Caleb.
SPEAKER_02: He knows he's going to drive them out.
SPEAKER_02: And Joshua blessed him and gave Hebron to Caleb, the son of Jephna, as his inheritance.
SPEAKER_02: Hebron therefore became the inheritance of Caleb, the son of Jephana, the Kennesite, to this day, because he wholly followed the Lord God of his.
SPEAKER_02: Now, don't miss this, verse 15.
SPEAKER_02: Don't miss this.
SPEAKER_02: This is really important.
SPEAKER_02: Kind of a parenthetical part.
SPEAKER_02: And the name of Hebron formerly was Kurjath Arba.
SPEAKER_02: Arba was the greatest man among the Anakim.
SPEAKER_02: And then the land had rest from war.
SPEAKER_02: Cultivating the spirit of Caleb is to fight and win giants.
SPEAKER_02: You gotta have a war mentality as a Christian.
SPEAKER_02: Everybody look at me.
SPEAKER_02: You have to have a warfare mentality as a Christian.
SPEAKER_02: This is the problem with the health and wealth gospel that we need to be careful of.
SPEAKER_02: Am I for health?
SPEAKER_02: Absolutely.
SPEAKER_02: We're big on health at this church.
SPEAKER_02: And we believe God can heal any disease.
SPEAKER_02: I believe in you guys being successful, and I would love to have hundreds of millionaires for the kingdom of God in this church.
SPEAKER_02: But if you make that your goal, instead of Jesus, you're in big, big trouble.
SPEAKER_02: It's an idol.
SPEAKER_02: It's an idol in your life.
SPEAKER_02: But listen, when God gives you a vision, you're gonna have to fight for it.
SPEAKER_02: You're gonna have to battle, man.
SPEAKER_02: And there's some big, big, mega big giants out there.
SPEAKER_02: And it sounds like this was kind of the mother of the giants, this guy Arba.
SPEAKER_02: And so Caleb's like, oh man, I can't wait to take on this 10-foot giant.
SPEAKER_02: And I have this feeling that Caleb was about five foot six.
SPEAKER_02: I don't know why I think that.
SPEAKER_02: Okay, about five foot six.
SPEAKER_02: And he's got his sword, and he's he's gnarly, man.
SPEAKER_02: On his back, scars from Egypt as a slave.
SPEAKER_02: On the front, scars from many battles.
SPEAKER_02: He's been in.
SPEAKER_02: You read about him in the first five books of Moses.
SPEAKER_02: So he he scarred on both sides, man.
SPEAKER_02: And for him, a fight is like normal.
SPEAKER_02: This is normal stuff.
SPEAKER_02: He's gonna go in and he's gonna take it and he's gonna take it from Arba.
SPEAKER_02: He's gonna take it from a Nephilim.
SPEAKER_02: He's been thinking about that a long time, 45 years ago.
SPEAKER_02: I want to cut the head off a nephiline.
SPEAKER_02: What do you think about that, Joe?
SPEAKER_02: What do you think about that, Larry?
SPEAKER_02: Let's go in there and let's just take them all out.
SPEAKER_02: He's like, uh, get back to the meal, Caleb.
SPEAKER_02: No, I just I woke up last night and I saw myself just why taking the head off Arba.
SPEAKER_02: I want to rename that place.
SPEAKER_02: What are your giants?
SPEAKER_02: What are the giants?
SPEAKER_02: What are the Arbas?
SPEAKER_02: What are the Nephilim in your life?
SPEAKER_02: I want to challenge you to have that spirit of Caleb, that different spirit, that urgent obedience, that follow Jesus' spirit, that wholehearted perspective to life and having a vision, and lop the head off that giant and walk in freedom, and walk in joy.
SPEAKER_00: Thank you for listening to the Road Church Podcast.
SPEAKER_00: We pray today's message has empowered you to make a difference in your world.
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