Burunche’s Blog

Deuteronomy 3:12 – 22 “So at that time we took possession of this land. To the Reubenites and Gadites I gave the land beyond Aroer along the Arnon Valley, and half the hill country of Gilead, along with its cities. To the half-tribe of Manasseh I gave the rest of Gilead and all of Bashan, the kingdom of Og. (The entire region of Argob, the whole territory of Bashan, used to be called the land of the Rephaim.) Jair, a descendant of Manasseh, took the whole region of Argob as far as the border of the Geshurites and Maacathites. He renamed Bashan after himself, Havvoth-jair, by which it is called to this day.

To Machir I gave Gilead, and to the Reubenites and Gadites I gave the territory from Gilead to the Arnon Valley (the middle of the valley was the border) and up to the Jabbok River, the border of the Ammonites. The Jordan River in the Arabah bordered it from Chinnereth (Sea of Galilee) to the Sea of the Arabah (the Salt Sea ) with the slopes of Pisgah to the east.

At that time I commanded you: “The LORD your God has given you this land to possess. All your men of valor are to cross over, armed for battle, ahead of your brothers, the Israelites. But your wives, your children, and your livestock—I know that you have much livestock—may remain in the cities I have given you, until the LORD gives rest to your brothers as He has to you, and they too have taken possession of the land that the LORD your God is giving them, across the Jordan. Then each of you may return to the possession I have given you.”

And at that time I commanded Joshua: “Your own eyes have seen all that the LORD your God has done to these two kings. The LORD will do the same to all the kingdoms you are about to enter. Do not be afraid of them, for the LORD your God Himself will fight for you.”

Moses is continuing to describe the conquest of the land east of the Jordan River that is modern – day Syria. At the time of Moses, the land had such rich grazing that the Reubenites, the Gadites, the tribe of Manasseh, asked for that land as a possession because they had large flocks and herds. In exchange, these tribes promised that even though their families would remain east of the Jordan, they would accompany the rest of the Israelites as they moved westward to conquer Canaan. Although the map shows the Jordan River between what is now known as the Sea of Galilee and the Dead Sea, the Jordan actually has its origins on the slopes of Mount Hermon in the far north. Several streams emanate from the slopes of Mount Hermon to come together to form the Jordan River, flowing southward into the Sea of Galilee and then on to the Dead Sea.

APPLICATION: The key verses in this entire passage are verses 21 – 22: “And at that time I commanded Joshua: “Your own eyes have seen all that the LORD your God has done to these two kings. The LORD will do the same to all the kingdoms you are about to enter. Do not be afraid of them, for the LORD your God Himself will fight for you.”

By this point, Moses has led the Israelites for nearly forty years; he has faced anarchy, death threats, the descent of his followers into idolatry, and other problems too numerous to count. Moses realizes that it is Joshua who must lead the Israelites across the Jordan to conquer the rest of the land. Moses is passing on his hard – won knowledge to Joshua. What has kept Moses going all these years is the memories of what God has already done for the Israelites and his continued worship of the Lord.

Think about it! When the Israelites threatened to stone Moses and Aaron, Moses reminded himself of the night of the Exodus and how God totally annihilated the most powerful army in the world before Moses’s eyes. When the Israelites complained about their struggles in the wilderness, Moses remembered the miraculous manna and quails. And throughout all the wanderings of the Israelites, God continued to accompany them, manifesting Himself as a pillar of cloud by day and a pillar of fire by night.

When you are bent on throwing a pity party, the last person you want around is somebody who is grateful! But self – pity really is of the devil. Self pity digs an ever – deeper hole. The only way out of such a hole is gratitude. And the surest means of operating gratefully is to remember what God has already done for you.

When we first came to Saboba in 1993, one friend taught us a song that sums up what we should be doing.

“When I think what the Lord has done,

He has done so much for me!

I will give my life to thee

As a living sacrifice.

I will give my life to thee

As a living sacrifice.”

PRAYER: Father God, thank You for all that You have done for us! We are alive, and we can read these devotionals. You have cared for us from our births even up to today. Lord, help us to remember all that You have done and that You are doing for us! Help us to be grateful and to praise you. For gratitude and praising You will lift us out of the deepest holes we can dig for ourselves. In the mighty Name of King Jesus. Amen.

Deuteronomy 3:1 – 11 “Then we turned and went up the road to Bashan, and Og king of Bashan and his whole army came out to meet us in battle at Edrei. But the LORD said to me, “Do not fear him, for I have delivered him into your hands, along with all his people and his land. Do to him as you did to Sihon king of the Amorites, who lived in Heshbon.” So the LORD our God also delivered Og king of Bashan and his whole army into our hands. We struck them down until no survivor was left.

At that time we captured all sixty of his cities. There was not a single city we failed to take—the entire region of Argob, the kingdom of Og in Bashan. All these cities were fortified with high walls and gates and bars, and there were many more unwalled villages. We devoted them to destruction, as we had done to Sihon king of Heshbon, utterly destroying the men, women, and children of every city. But all the livestock and plunder of the cities we carried off for ourselves.

At that time we took from the two kings of the Amorites the land across the Jordan, from the Arnon Valley as far as Mount Hermon— which the Sidonians call Sirion but the Amorites call Senir— all the cities of the plateau, all Gilead, and all Bashan as far as the cities of Salecah and Edrei in the kingdom of Og. (For only Og king of Bashan had remained of the remnant of the Rephaim. His bed of iron, nine cubits long and four cubits wide, is still in Rabbah of the Ammonites.) (Og’s bed was approximately 14 feet long and 6 feet wide (4.3 meters long and 1.8 meters wide).

Just how big was King Og of Bashan? Accounts claim that Og was probably at least 13 feet tall – that’s like putting two huge pro basketball players, one on top of the other. Were there really giants? Possibly. Although there have been tantalizing reports of the finding of giant skeletons, many of these “finds” have turned out to be fakes. But the phrase that argues for the truth of the story about King Og is this: “His bed of iron, nine cubits long and four cubits wide, is still in Rabbah of the Ammonites.” Quite evidently, Moses feared that later generations would refuse to believe just how BIG Og really was, so he included the information regarding Og’s bed as a reference.

No matter the size of King Og, he was certainly bigger than any of his subjects or any of the Israelites. The Amorites had a reputation as fierce fighters in addition. It is interesting that God had the Israelites tackle Sihon before they attacked Og. Presumably, Sihon was a normal – sized man and therefore less intimidating. Once the Israelites realized that God really WAS helping them, they could build on their defeat of Sihon to wipe out Og and his sixty villages with all their people.

Where was Bashan? The Encyclopedia Britannica tells us that “Bashan was located in what is now Syria. Bashan was the northernmost of the three ancient divisions of eastern Palestine, and in the Old Testament it was proverbial for its rich pastures and thick forests. In New Testament times, Bashan numbered as one of the great granaries of the Roman Empire.”

APPLICATION: Procrastination is one of the most seductive temptations that many of us must face. We can make up our minds to do anything….. if we only can wait until tomorrow. But the longer we put something off, the larger the problem looms. Wait long enough, and your small problems may truly look like giants.

King Og may have been one of the largest giants that the Israelites had or face. The important word here is “face.” Rather than sit in the tents and whine about how big Og was and how terrible he might be, the Israelites simply went out and attacked. And once the Israelites had killed Og, the rest of the Amorites were probably demoralized and much easier to defeat.

Giant problems confront all of us. As I am writing, several of my friends are coping with family members with daunting health problems. In one case, the family must move a beloved relative into hospice; in another a faithful husband is driving eighty miles round – way several times a week to encourage his wife and to make sure that her rehabilitation after a major illness goes smoothly. One wife is waiting to hear how much brain damage her husband’s MRI will reveal after he has had several seizures. But in all these cases, my friends are facing the giants. When we face giants, we at least have an accurate idea of their size. When we try to avoid giants, we automatically inflate their images in our minds.

May we look to God to help us as He did the Israelites! And may we continue to face our giants, rather than running away from them.

PRAYER: Father God, thank You for loving us and for caring for us! Help us to realize that You are always there to support us and that when we are doing Your will, we can rest assured that You will give us strength and courage that we do not have by ourselves. In the matchless Name of King Jesus. Amen.

Deuteronomy 2:24 – 37 (God continues His instructions to the Israelites) “Arise, set out, and cross the Arnon Valley. See, I have delivered into your hand Sihon the Amorite, king of Heshbon, and his land. Begin to take possession of it and engage him in battle. This very day I will begin to put the dread and fear of you upon all the nations under heaven. They will hear the reports of you and tremble in anguish because of you.”

So from the Wilderness of Kedemoth I sent messengers with an offer of peace to Sihon king of Heshbon, saying, “Let us pass through your land; we will stay on the main road. We will not turn to the right or to the left. You can sell us food to eat and water to drink in exchange for silver. Only let us pass through on foot, just as the descendants of Esau who live in Seir and the Moabites who live in Ar did for us, until we cross the Jordan into the land that the LORD our God is giving us.”

But Sihon king of Heshbon would not let us pass through, for the LORD your God had made his spirit stubborn and his heart obstinate, that He might give him into your hands, as is the case this day.

Then the LORD said to me, “See, I have begun to deliver Sihon and his land over to you. Now begin to conquer and possess his land.”

So Sihon and his whole army came out for battle against us at Jahaz. And the LORD our God delivered him over to us, and we defeated him and his sons and his whole army.

At that time we captured all his cities and devoted to destruction the people of every city, including women and children. We left no survivors. We carried off for ourselves only the livestock and the plunder from the cities we captured.

From Aroer on the rim of the Arnon Valley, along with the city in the valley, even as far as Gilead, not one city had walls too high for us. The LORD our God gave us all of them. But you did not go near the land of the Ammonites, or the land along the banks of the Jabbok River, or the cities of the hill country, or any place that the LORD our God had forbidden.”

If the name “Amorites” sounds familiar, it should. Remember the conversation between God and Abraham back in Genesis 15? God told Abraham that Abraham’s descendants would not return to the Promised Land for several generations because “the iniquity of the Amorites was not yet complete.” Actually, Abraham was friends with some of the Amorite chiefs and they behaved honorably. But evidently over the years, the Amorites became far more corrupt and now God was choosing to end their existence as a people. (In fact, the Amorites were never completely wiped out but the survivors were eventually incorporated into the culture of Israel.)

The two main chiefs of the Amorites were Sihon and Og. This passage describes the complete destruction of Sihon along with all his people, including women and children. At first we are horrified at this idea; however, God has given the Amorites hundreds of years to repent and behave righteously. Evidently, the Amorites have merely gone from bad to worse. It’s possible that even the children were dedicated to demons from the womb.

The Israelites blew their first opportunity to conquer the Promised Land and paid dearly for their cowardice and unbelief. But this time, the Israelites moved forward in faith; and when they did, God went before them and “put the dread and fear of them on all the nations under heaven.” And in fact, the nations did hear the reports of the Israelites and they did tremble in anguish because of them.

The most amazing thing was Moses’s description: “From Aroer on the rim of the Arnon Valley, along with the city in the valley, even as far as Gilead, not one city had walls too high for us. The LORD our God gave us all of them.”

We don’t know the height of all of these city walls; however, the walls of ancient Jericho were built on an earthen embankment that supported a stone retaining wall 12 – 15 feet high. On top of the stone retaining wall, stood another wall made of mud bricks 6 feet thick and 20 – 26 feet high. Together these two walls combined to form a fortification 32 – 41 feet high. (https://www.israel-a-history-of.com/walls-of-jericho.html) Assuming that some of these other city walls were equally massive, Moses’s assertion is even more impressive.

APPLICATION: So many times we frighten ourselves by anticipating problems. The ten spies who spread fear about the giants in the Promised Land made no allowance for the might of the God who had already delivered them and protected them. Once the Israelites began following God’s orders regarding the conquest of the Amorites, God began moving. Rumors about the ferocity of the Israelites spread throughout the region, demoralizing their enemies.

Perhaps you have been contemplating something you know that God wants you to do but that you are afraid to do. Don’t make the same mistakes the Israelites made: they defeated themselves before they faced the first enemy. Go forward and make a start, trusting that God will reward acts of faithfulness.

PRAYER: Father God, thank You that when we follow Your orders, You will help us to do exploits. Thank You for loving us, for caring for us, and for strengthening us to carry out Your will. In the mighty and precious Name of Jesus. Amen.

Deuteronomy 2:16 – 23 “Now when all the fighting men among the people had died, the LORD said to me, “Today you are going to cross the border of Moab at Ar. But when you get close to the Ammonites, do not harass them or provoke them, for I will not give you any of the land of the Ammonites. I have given it as a possession to the descendants of Lot.”

(That too was regarded as the land of the Rephaim, who used to live there, though the Ammonites called them Zamzummites. They were a people great and many, as tall as the Anakites. But the LORD destroyed them from before the Ammonites, who drove them out and settled in their place, just as He had done for the descendants of Esau who lived in Seir, when He destroyed the Horites before them. They drove them out and have lived in their place to this day. And the Avvim, who lived in villages as far as Gaza, were destroyed by the Caphtorites, who came out of Caphtor (a part of Egypt) and settled in their place.)

Remember the horror stories the ten spies brought back about the giants in the Promised Land? Those were the stories that cost the Israelites 38 more years of wandering until all the fighting men of that generation had died. Why did God insist on waiting until all of the fighting men had died? Any one of those men, had he been courageous, had the potential to rally the people and to confront the ten spies and call them out for their cowardice. But the fighting men stayed in their tents, refusing to take any risks. As long as one of those faithless men remained, he still had the potential to discourage the younger generations.

God had already told the Israelites that He has chosen them for a special purpose, to demonstrate His Glory and His Holiness to the nations. But look at the information in this passage. God is now warning the Israelites to leave the Ammonites alone because He has given that land to the Ammonites as a possession. We also find that originally the land of the Ammonites also contained giants, Rephaim, or Zamzummites. “But the LORD destroyed them from before the Ammonites, who drove them out and settled in their place, just as He had done for the descendants of Esau who lived in Seir, when He destroyed the Horites before them. They drove them out and have lived in their place to this day. And the Avvim, who lived in villages as far as Gaza, were destroyed by the Caphtorites, who came out of Caphtor and settled in their place.)”

Wait a minute! These verses mean that God was not only guiding and protecting the Israelites, who were presumably worshiping Him, but also helping the Ammonites, who were descendants of Lot as well as helping the descendants of Esau? That’s correct. While the Israelites were quaking in their tents in fear of giants in Canaan, God was already destroying similar giants and enabling the Ammonites and Esau’s descendants to drive them out and conquer the lands God had allotted to them.

God chose Israel because He wanted to demonstrate to the world what could happen if a people were completely dedicated to Him. But God did not hate the Ammonites or Esau’s descendants. God had promised Abraham in Genesis 15:4 that Abraham’s descendants would be as numerous as the stars in the sky, and that promise extended to Esau’s descendants. Even though Lot was only Abraham’s nephew and a greedy one at that, God was still blessing Lot’s descendants because of Abraham.

APPLICATION: Did the Israelites realize that God had already destroyed giants for other tribes? Who knows? They had been out in the desert, so perhaps they didn’t have that information. But there is no record of hesitation on the part of the Ammonites or the descendants of Esau. When these groups saw an opportunity to defeat the giants, they took it.

Sometimes we want to believe that God is particularly favoring one nation over others. But John 3:16 tells us that “God so loved the WORLD, that He gave His only begotten Son…” Truly, God was not only guiding the Israelites but also guiding other nations as well, even though those nations did not truly know Him.

If we honor God in our lives, God will help us. But there will still be giants. There will always be giants. And we must always realize that God’s love for the world is a global one. God will guide any nation as much as they will allow Him to do so. At the same time, nations that shun the One True Living God and insist on idolatry will eventually fall, consumed by their own wickedness. May we follow hard after God all the days of our lives and may we intercede for all the nations of the world. For it is God’s will that

”…the earth will be filled with the knowledge of the glory of the LORD as the waters cover the sea.” (Habakkuk 2:14)

PRAYER: Father God, thank You that You have good plans for the whole world! Lord, let the knowledge of Your Glory fill the world, so that people in every nation will praise Your Holy Name. In the matchless Name of King Jesus. Amen.

Deuteronomy 2:1 – 15 “Then we turned back and headed for the wilderness by way of the Red Sea, as the LORD had instructed me, and for many days we wandered around Mount Seir. At this time the LORD said to me, “You have been wandering around this hill country long enough; turn to the north and command the people: ‘You will pass through the territory of your brothers, the descendants of Esau, who live in Seir. They will be afraid of you, so you must be very careful. Do not provoke them, for I will not give you any of their land, not even a footprint, because I have given Esau Mount Seir as his possession. You are to pay them in silver for the food you eat and the water you drink.’”

Indeed, the LORD your God has blessed you in all the work of your hands. He has watched over your journey through this vast wilderness. The LORD your God has been with you these forty years, and you have lacked nothing.

So we passed by our brothers, the descendants of Esau, who live in Seir. We turned away from the Arabah road, which comes up from Elath and Ezion-geber, and traveled along the road of the Wilderness of Moab. Then the LORD said to me, “Do not harass the Moabites or provoke them to war, for I will not give you any of their land, because I have given Ar as a possession to the descendants of Lot.”

(The Emites used to live there, a people great and many, as tall as the Anakites. Like the Anakites, they were also regarded as Rephaim, though the Moabites called them Emites. The Horites used to live in Seir, but the descendants of Esau drove them out. They destroyed the Horites from before them and settled in their place, just as Israel did in the land that the LORD gave them as their possession.)

“Now arise and cross over the Brook of Zered.” So we crossed over the Brook of Zered.

The time we spent traveling from Kadesh-barnea until we crossed over the Brook of Zered was thirty-eight years, until that entire generation of fighting men had perished from the camp, as the LORD had sworn to them. Indeed, the LORD’s hand was against them, to eliminate them from the camp, until they had all perished.”

Thirty – eight years! After the Israelites failed to enter the Promised Land according to God’s orders, they wandered in the wilderness for thirty – eight years until the entire generation of fighting men had died, leaving only Joshua and Caleb among the living.

If you look at the map, you will realize that the Israelites were following the King’s Highway north until they crossed the Brook of Zered, also known as the Zered River. As the Israelites traveled, God gave them very specific instructions about how to behave towards the tribes they were to encounter, including ordering payment of silver for food and water. After watching all the fighting men who had rebelled against the Lord die off, their children and grandchildren were ready to follow God’s orders VERY carefully!

APPLICATION: What must the younger Israelites have thought as they watched the older fighting men die off one by one? The fate of these men must have served as a graphic illustration that God really was not kidding when he gave instructions. These deaths might also have served as a lesson for the next generations so that they would faithfully follow God’s orders.

What must these fighting men have thought as they watched one another die? Were their hearts still hardened or did they repent in tears, begging the Lord to save their descendants from a similar fate?

Jesus once quoted a parable to his followers that “The fathers have eaten sour grapes and the children’s teeth have been set on edge.” We must always remember that we are not merely living for ourselves, but also for those who come after us.

Steve Green has a song entitled “May All Who Come Behind Us Find Us Faithful. The words can serve as our prayer for today:

We’re pilgrims on the journey Of the narrow road,
And those who’ve gone before us Line the way.
Cheering on the faithful, Encouraging the weary,
Their lives a stirring testament To god’s sustaining grace.
O may all who come behind us Find us faithful,
May the fire of our devotion Light their way.
May the footprints that we leave, Lead them to believe,
And the lives we live Inspire them to obey.
O may all who come behind us find us faithful.

… Surrounded by so great A cloud of witnesses,
Let us run the race Not only for the prize,
But as those who’ve gone before us. Let us leave to those behind us,
The heritage of faithfulness Passed on thru godly lives.
After all our hopes and dreams Have come and gone,
And our children sift thru all We’ve left behind,
May the clues that they discover, And the mem’ries they uncover,
Become the light that leads them, To the road we each must find.

O may all who come behind us Find us faithful.

Deuteronomy 1:34 – 46 “When the LORD heard your words, He grew angry and swore an oath, saying, “Not one of the men of this evil generation shall see the good land I swore to give your fathers, except Caleb the son of Jephunneh. He will see it, and I will give him and his descendants the land on which he has set foot, because he followed the LORD wholeheartedly.”

The LORD was also angry with me on your account, and He said, “Not even you shall enter the land. Joshua son of Nun, who stands before you, will enter it. Encourage him, for he will enable Israel to inherit the land. And the little ones you said would become captives—your children who on that day did not know good from evil—will enter the land that I will give them, and they will possess it. But you are to turn back and head for the wilderness along the route to the Red Sea. ”

 Defeat at Hormah (First told in Numbers 14:40-45)

“We have sinned against the LORD,” you replied. “We will go up and fight, as the LORD our God has commanded us.” Then each of you put on his weapons of war, thinking it easy to go up into the hill country. But the LORD said to me, “Tell them not to go up and fight, for I am not with you to keep you from defeat by your enemies.” So I spoke to you, but you would not listen. You rebelled against the command of the LORD and presumptuously went up into the hill country. Then the Amorites who lived in the hills came out against you and chased you like a swarm of bees. They routed you from Seir all the way to Hormah. And you returned and wept before the LORD, but He would not listen to your voice or give ear to you. For this reason you stayed in Kadesh for a long time—a very long time.”

The Israelites have gotten themselves into a really deep hole with only one way out: repentance. Unfortunately, repentance does not appear to be in their vocabulary. God has already told the Israelites that nobody in this present generation of adults, including Moses, will enter the Promised Land and that they need to go back to the wilderness along the same route they have taken from the Red Sea. Suddenly, these same people who totally refused to obey God now want to do their will in God’s Name, despite the fact that He is warning them that it will be a disaster.

The Israelites try to take on the Amorites without God’s protection and suffer a resounding defeat. Once defeated, the Israelites return and weep before the Lord, but He is not listening. Why not?

APPLICATION: There’s a country Gospel song that says, “Too much thunder, and no enough rain. Too many programs and not enough praying.” The story of the first generation of Israelites to escape from Egypt is really a sad one. After a miraculous deliverance and continued miracles along the way, these people are poised to enter the Promised Land… until they listen to a bunch of frightening reports. Suddenly, they forget everything God has done and the way God has protected them. Then when it’s too late to salvage the situation, they sit down and weep buckets of tears. At no point is there any indication that these Israelites are actually repenting, only that they are hoping that if they cry long enough, they will get their own way. Why doesn’t God listen to all these lamentations?

1. If the Israelites are seriously repenting, there should be a record of their leaders going to Moses and begging him to intercede with God on their behalf. No such intercession has been made.

2. God has already laid down regulations regarding offerings for sin and for repentance. The Tabernacle and the Levitical priesthood are already in place; however, there is no record of any such offerings being made, despite the fact that the Israelites have grieved God their Protector.

3. There is no record of the Israelites fasting or giving up any of the small idols that they may still have been hauling around as spiritual insurance. The Israelites seem to feel that they are clean enough, not realizing that disobedience and rebellion are two of the biggest sins of all.

We read these accounts and feel a bit smug. After all, we have never behaved like this. But have we? Have there been times in our lives when we have truly blown it and failed to follow God’s will for our lives? At that point, have we truly repented or have we merely felt sorry for ourselves as we have been stuck with the results of our own disobedience?

Whether or not we choose to accept it, God’s ways are still righteous and just. Truth is not relative and God’s Will is the only safe guide for our lives. God has promised in Psalm 32:8, “I will instruct you and teach you in the way you should go; I will counsel you with my loving eye on you.”

The first rule of holes is: If you find yourself in a hole, stop digging! If you will stop and look up, God will be there to help you. But as long as you try to do it yourself, the hole will only get deeper!

PRAYER: Father God, thank You for loving us and for caring for us. Help us to constantly look to You for guidance, being assured that You will graciously give it. In the mighty Name of King Jesus. Amen.

Deuteronomy 1:19 – 24 “And just as the LORD our God had commanded us, we set out from Horeb and went toward the hill country of the Amorites, through all the vast and terrifying wilderness you have seen. When we reached Kadesh-barnea, I said: “You have reached the hill country of the Amorites, which the LORD our God is giving us. See, the LORD your God has placed the land before you. Go up and take possession of it as the LORD, the God of your fathers, has told you. Do not be afraid or discouraged.”

Then all of you approached me and said, “Let us send men ahead of us to search out the land and bring us word of what route to follow and which cities to enter.” The plan seemed good to me, so I selected twelve men from among you, one from each tribe. They left and went up into the hill country, and came to the Valley of Eshcol and spied out the land. They took some of the fruit of the land in their hands, carried it down to us, and brought us word: “It is a good land that the LORD our God is giving us.”

Things appeared to be going great! Only a few months after the Red Sea crossing and the issuing of the Ten Commandments, the Israelites now stood on the eastern border of the Promised Land. Commendably, the leaders asked permission to send spies into the land so that they would know the roads to follow and the cities that they should approach first. Sounds fine, right? And the spies returned with an absolutely enormous bunch of grapes as well as lots of other fruit. Numbers 13:23 tells us, “When they reached the Valley of Eshkol, they cut off a branch bearing a single cluster of grapes. Two of them carried it on a pole between them, along with some pomegranates and figs. (“Eshkol” means “cluster.”)

At that point, Moses was probably really relieved! Everything was going to work out and the Israelites were going to enter their inheritance just as God had promised…. or would they? Problem was, while two of the spies, Joshua and Caleb, brought great reports, the other ten guys were such cowards that they were day – glow yellow!

v. 26 – 33 “But you were unwilling to go up; you rebelled against the command of the LORD your God. You grumbled in your tents and said, “Because the LORD hates us, He has brought us out of the land of Egypt to deliver us into the hand of the Amorites to be annihilated. Where can we go? Our brothers have made our hearts melt, saying: ‘The people are larger and taller than we are; the cities are large, with walls up to the heavens. We even saw the descendants of the Anakim there.’” (Anakim were giants similar to Goliath.)

So I said to you: “Do not be terrified or afraid of them! The LORD your God, who goes before you, will fight for you, just as you saw Him do for you in Egypt and in the wilderness, where the LORD your God carried you, as a man carries his son, all the way by which you traveled until you reached this place.”

But in spite of all this, you did not trust the LORD your God, who went before you on the journey, in the fire by night and in the cloud by day, to seek out a place for you to camp and to show you the road to travel.”

O.K. Let’s look at this situation. God delivered the Israelites from slavery in Egypt, totally annihilating the most powerful army in the world in the process. Then God carried the Israelites through the wilderness “just as a man carries his son.” God even appeared as a pillar of cloud by day and a pillar of fire by night, thus ensuring that nobody would sneak up and attack the Israelites while they were asleep. When the Israelites were hungry and thirsty, God provided for them miraculously. And yet after all these miracles, these people were sitting in their tents grumbling. Notice also the nature of their complaint: ”Our brothers have made our hearts melt!”

APPLICATION: One of the most difficult things in the world is to take responsibility for your own feelings, rather than blaming everything on someone else. Many people grow up in dysfunctional families; in these situations, it is routine for family members to say things like, “You made me cry!” “You made me angry.” “You offended me!” The plain fact is that the whole universe tilts on the axis of free will. God has given us the ability to choose, and that includes the ability to choose whether or not we will cry, become angry or become offended. One famous Christian teacher has described a program in which she took part. One speaker got up and severely criticized the host pastor while the pastor was sitting there on the platform with him. This teacher reports that she could hear the host pastor muttering under his breath, “I will NOT become offended! I will NOT become offended!” When we allow others to control our feelings, we give them power over us that should never be theirs.

Joshua and Caleb did the best they could to convince their fellow Israelites not to listen to the ten spies who were nay – sayers; unfortunately, they failed. As a result of unbelief, those grumbling in their tents eventually died off without ever entering the Promised Land. God knew that it was going to take men and women of faith to conquer Canaan. No cowards need apply.

This present age is one full of fears. If you choose, you can receive a steady stream of negativity from cell phones, tablets, etc. But you have a choice: You can listen to the fear – mongers or you can listen to God. Is God’s leading always safe and trouble – free? Absolutely not! Follow God’s guidance and sooner or later, you will encounter giants. But remember that the same God who has protected you all these years is still going before you and will help you conquer those gigantic problems. You have a choice: choose to believe God and to follow Him or remain in your present situation, grumbling because you have listened to someone else’s fears.

PRAYER: Father God, thank You for loving us and for caring for us. Thank You that when You lead us into difficult situations, Your provision is already there. Help us to follow hard after You all the days of our lives. In the mighty Name of King Jesus. Amen.

Deuteronomy 1:9 – 18 “At that time I said to you, “I cannot carry the burden for you alone. The LORD your God has multiplied you, so that today you are as numerous as the stars in the sky. May the LORD, the God of your fathers, increase you a thousand times over and bless you as He has promised. But how can I bear your troubles, burdens, and disputes all by myself? Choose for yourselves wise, understanding, and respected men from each of your tribes, and I will appoint them as your leaders.”

And you answered me and said, “What you propose to do is good.”

So I took the leaders of your tribes, wise and respected men, and appointed them as leaders over you—as commanders of thousands, of hundreds, of fifties, and of tens, and as officers for your tribes. At that time I charged your judges: “Hear the disputes between your brothers, and judge fairly between a man and his brother or a foreign resident. Show no partiality in judging; hear both small and great alike. Do not be intimidated by anyone, for judgment belongs to God. And bring to me any case too difficult for you, and I will hear it.” And at that time I commanded you all the things you were to do.”

You might remember the story from Exodus 18:13 – 26. Jethro, Moses’s father – in – law, visits the Israelite camp and sees that Moses is wearing himself out. In the absence of other leaders, Moses is trying to settle everybody’s disputes and spending his entire day doing so. The Bible records that 600,000 men left Egypt; since most of these men would have wives and children, there were probably over two million people in the camp. No wonder that Moses was becoming tired! Sorting out the problems of so many people was exhausting, not to mention that it left Moses no time for the actual work to which God had called him. Each time Moses was about to go be with God, there was probably somebody pulling on his sleeve and demanding attention! But Moses had gotten so deeply embroiled in these situations that he saw no way out… until Jethro, a leader in his own right, gave Moses a workable plan.

APPLICATION: There are several lessons that we can glean from this story.

1. Always make sure that the responsibilities you are assuming are the ones God wants you to assume. Some of us are highly responsible people and will shoulder any load that comes along. Recently a friend told me about her experiences as a supervisor in a weight loss program. My friend didn’t feel particularly called to this position, but nobody else seemed to want it. Bad move! As soon as my friend began this work, crazy things began to crop up – she got wrong information about meeting times, her car nearly ran out of gas, etc. Finally, my friend went back and prayed about this, at which point, the Lord showed her that things weren’t working because He didn’t want her to do this job in the first place. My friend gratefully bowed out, leaving the job for someone else of God’s choosing. Now notice that my friend failed to pray in the beginning and that she later got clear permission from God to quit. Sometimes God does call us to tough jobs, but when He calls, He will also confirm that call for us.

2. Never assume that you are the only one who can do a particular job or that you are the best person for that job. Moses probably began sorting out problems because he was the leader. But the talents that go to make up an effective pioneering leader are not necessarily the same talents that will make an able negotiator. Men and women with a pioneering spirit are forging ahead and continually searching for new challenges; however, they also may not be patient, flexible, or accommodating. Having a constant vision can lead to single – mindedness that does not admit alternative solutions. For years I was the only doctor at our mission hospital and I bore the brunt of leadership with a few other leaders. Later I was relieved to pass that burden on to those who might have a broader vision.

3. Realize that leadership is dynamic and that you should always be developing more leaders. As long as Moses was the only one solving problems, there was no scope for anyone else to develop leadership qualities. But do the math: 600,000 men – 600 commanders of thousands, 6,000 commanders of hundreds, 12,000 commanders of fifties, and 60,000 commanders of tens = 78,600 men who were now elevated to various levels of leadership as judges. You might argue about the math, but the idea is still the same. Suddenly, instead of behaving like so many small children, these men had to assume new responsibilities and wrestle with the problems that had plagued Moses. Hopefully, these men would gain new respect and compassion for Moses and would also begin to develop as leaders. All these men also would serve as officers for their tribes, thus helping the tribes come together as cohesive units. God was preparing this leadership organization so that when He gave His commands on Mount Sinai, Moses would have an effective means of transmitting those commands to the people.

At some point, we all face the same choices that Moses did: delegate or become exhausted and burn out. It is NOT God’s will for us to burn out by assuming work that was never ours in the first place. May God help us to discern His perfect will for our lives!

PRAYER: Father God, thank you for loving us and for caring for us. Help us to always seek Your guidance so that we will only take up the jobs You have for us and not something else. In the matchless Name of King Jesus. Amen.

Deuteronomy 1:1 – 8 “These are the words that Moses spoke to all Israel in the wilderness east of the Jordan—in the Arabah opposite Suph—between Paran and Tophel, Laban, Hazeroth, and Di-zahab. It is an eleven-day journey from Horeb to Kadesh-barnea by way of Mount Seir. In the fortieth year, on the first day of the eleventh month, Moses proclaimed to the Israelites everything that the LORD had commanded him concerning them. This was after he had defeated Sihon king of the Amorites, who lived in Heshbon, and then at Edrei had defeated Og king of Bashan, who lived in Ashtaroth.

On the east side of the Jordan in the land of Moab, Moses began to explain this law, saying: The LORD our God said to us at Horeb: “You have stayed at this mountain long enough. Resume your journey and go to the hill country of the Amorites; go to all the neighboring peoples in the Arabah, in the hill country, in the foothills, in the Negev, and along the seacoast to the land of the Canaanites and to Lebanon, as far as the great River Euphrates. See, I have placed the land before you. Enter and possess the land that the LORD swore He would give to your fathers Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, and to their descendants after them.”

We are beginning a study of the Book of Deuteronomy. In this book, Moses summarizes the wanderings of the Israelites for forty years as well as recapitulating the major teachings God has given them. Remember that in the beginning, the Israelites were supposed to enter the Promised Land a few months after leaving Egypt. But when ten of the twelve spies sent to report on the land brought back the frightening information about giants in the land, the Israelites refused to enter, despite assurances from Joshua and Caleb that God would help them defeat any giants. The ten men who had misinformed the Israelites immediately died, and God told the rest of the Israelites that they would never enter the Promised Land because they had refused to believe Him; only their children would enter. But the Israelites changed their minds and tried to enter on their own, resulting in a resounding defeat. The story is told in Numbers 13 and 14. It was this refusal to believe the Lord that forced the Israelites to continue traveling in the wilderness outside the Promised Land for forty years, enough time for all the unbelievers to die off.

After the Israelites went in circles in the wilderness for a long time, God finally gave them the release to move northward so that they could eventually enter the Promised Land. Nobody knows the actual location of those wanderings, so this map represents an educated guess.

APPLICATION: Many times, we feel as if our lives are going in circles and we aren’t making any progress. We might wonder what God’s will and purposes are for our lives.

The first question we need to ask ourselves is this: have we learned everything we are supposed to from our current situation? God kept the Israelites in the desert so that He could train them to become warriors and so that He could train them in His statutes. God knew that if the Israelites were unprepared physically and spiritually when they entered Canaan, they would never conquer the people who were already there and they would also immediately revert to idolatry. As is obvious in the Book of Judges, many of the Israelites quickly turned away from God once they encountered the fertility cults of the Canaanites.

A second question is this: are we refusing to change because we are afraid? Have we become so comfortable that we are unwilling to take a risk, even though doing so might bring us into a far better way of life spiritually? It’s easy to allow the familiar to act as an anchor, weighing us down.

A final question we must ask is this: if we leave our current way of life, where are we going? Change merely for the sake of change might lead to disaster. Are we changing because God is leading us or are we changing because we are bored?

May God help us so that as we make changes, we allow Him to lead us! Only when we follow God’s leading will we find His Promised Land.

PRAYER: Father God, thank you for loving us and for caring for us. Help us to learn everything you want us to from our present situations. Help us to be willing to change when you say so and not to hold back. Thank you that Your plans for us are to give us a future and a hope. (Jeremiah 29:11) In the matchless Name of King Jesus. Amen.

2 Corinthians 5:17 “Therefore if anyone is in Christ, he is a new creation.a The old has passed away. Behold, the new has come!”

Philippians 3:13 – 14 “Brothers, I do not consider myself yet to have laid hold of it. But one thing I do: Forgetting what is behind and straining toward what is ahead, I press on toward the goal to win the prize of God’s heavenly calling in Christ Jesus.

Ephesians 4:31-32 “Get rid of all bitterness, rage and anger, outcry and slander, along with every form of malice. Be kind and tender-hearted to one another, forgiving each other just as in Christ God forgave you.”

When I was fifteen, we moved from a big old farm house to a small one. But there was a problem. My dad carefully planned the move and lined up family friends to help us…he just neglected to inform my mom or us kids. We went to school that morning as usual; but when we got off the school bus that night, we found out that during the day, the friends had shown up and had packed up EVERYTHING in the house and had sent it over to our new place. When I say they packed everything, I mean literally EVERYTHING, including our garbage and a number of things that we intended to give away or to get rid of. Because we moved from a large house down to a small one, much of our stuff wound up in boxes in a store room and in the detached garage next to the house. For months we had to wade through those boxes to find the things we really needed. We finally got rid of a lot of things two years later when a tornado came through and shredded the garage and its contents. That disaster certainly simplified things, but I don’t recommend it as a way of sorting things out!

The big problem with that move was that Dad didn’t give the rest of the family time to sort things out or to pack things. This mean that we wound up with all kinds of garbage, the kind of stuff one accumulates in 19 years in a big old farm house. And we neither wanted most of that stuff or needed it. Our friends were trying to be helpful, but they saddled us with our garbage, whether we wanted it or not.

Fast forward several years. Bob and I had served one term in Saboba and had then come to the U.S. so that I could do my Master’s degree in Public Health. Our first term in Saboba was quite difficult. We had very little to work with, and when we had been there a year, a small tribal war broke out. But the worst part was the lack of compassion from those who were our bosses. By the time we left in June 1996, we had been badly hurt by these people. When we returned to Ghana in 1998, we worked at a different clinic and then at a Catholic hospital in northern Ghana. In the meantime, the hospital at Saboba lost its doctor and community leaders begged us to come back. We weren’t very sure we wanted to come back. We loved the people of Saboba, but the same supervisors who had given us a tough time were still in authority.

When we prayed, God told us He wanted us to return to Saboba, BUT there were conditions! The only way we could return to Saboba was if we were able to conquer our bitterness from the way we had been treated the first time. God told us that if we didn’t get rid of our bitterness, He couldn’t use us.

We returned to Saboba in February 2004, and for several months we had to confess Ephesians 4:31-32 several times a day as well as putting on the armor of God several times a day. Ever since that experience, we have continued to practice reciting those verses whenever we have found ourselves in a situation in which we have been tempted to become bitter.

What is the point of these stories? Your church is moving into a new building. That is wonderful! But the question is this: What are you taking into the new building? Are you only taking the furnishings and the musical instruments, or are you carrying bitterness and resentment into the new place?

Our constant prayer for the AG Hospital, Saboba is that it will be a place of God’s praise, a place of God’s glory, a place of health, a place of help, a place of hope, a place of healing, and a place of Shalom. This is our prayer for you as you move into your new building. But if you don’t leave all the bitterness and resentment and personality conflicts behind, you will contaminate your new building.

God’s question for each of us is this: What kind of garbage are you carrying with you? To God, those of us who are hauling around bitterness and resentment are just as stinky as somebody who is dragging around a Hefty bag full of rotting garbage. If you were moving into a new home, you wouldn’t bring garbage from your old house with you. Why bring emotional/mental/spiritual garbage into your new church? You want your new church to be so full of the Holy Spirit that if someone sets a toe on the church property, they will be overcome by the Holy Spirit. You don’t want anything to grieve the Holy Spirit or to obstruct Him from moving.

Prayer: Father God, help us to get rid of all our garbage! Let this new church mark a new beginning for everybody in the congregation. And let Your Holy Spirit have full control in this church. In the mighty and precious Name of King Jesus. Amen.