Dissenting Hope (Numbers 13:1-2, 25-33; 14:1-10)

Would you please stand for reading of God's word this

morning? I'll be reading from the Book of

Numbers, chapters 13 and 14, beginning with 13 verse one.

Numbers 13 · chapter mention

The Lord spoke to Moses saying, send men to spy out the land of

Canaan, which I'm giving to the people of Israel.

From each tribe of their fathers you shall send a man, everyone,

a chief among them, and verse 25 At the end of 40 days they

returned from spying out the land, and they came to Moses and

errand into all the congregation of the people of Israel in the

wilderness of Peran and Kadesh. They brought back the word to

them, and to all the congregation, and showed them

the fruit of the land. And they told him, We came to

this land to which you sent us. It flows with milk and honey,

and this is its fruit. However, the people who dwell,

the land are strong, and the cities are fortified and very

large, and besides we saw the descendants of a knock there.

The Malachites dwell in the land of the Negam, the Hiptites, the

Jebbie sites, the Emirites dwell in the Hill Country, and the

Canaanites dwell by the sea and along the Jordan.

But Caleb quieted the people before Moses and said, let us go

up at once and occupy it, for we are well able to overcome it.

Then the men who had gone up with them said, we are not able

to go up against the people, for they are stronger than we are.

So they brought to the people of Israel a bad report of the land

that they had spied out, saying the land through which we have

gone to spy it out as a land that devours its inhabitants.

And all the people we saw in it are of great height.

And there we saw the Nephylene, the sons of Anak who come from

the Nephylene, and we seem to ourselves like grasshoppers.

So we seem to them chapter 14, verse one.

Then all the congregation raised a loud cry, and the people wept

that night, and all the people of Israel grumbled against Moses

and Aaron. The whole congregation said to

them, would that we had died in the land of Egypt, or would that

we had died in this wilderness? Why is the Lord bringing us into

this land to fall by the sword? Our wives and our little ones

will become a prey. Would it not be better for us to

go back to Egypt? And they said to one another,

let us choose a leader, and go back to Egypt.

Then Moses and Aaron fell on their faces before all the

assembly of the congregation of the people of Israel.

And Joshua the son of none, and Caleb, the son of Jafuna, were

with those among those who had spied out the land.

And they tore their clothes. And they said, all the

congregation of the people of Israel, the land which we passed

through to spy it out, is an exceedingly good land.

If the Lord delights in us, He will bring us into this land and

give it to us a land that flows with milk and honey only.

Do not rebel against the Lord, and do not fear the people of

the land, for they are bred for us, their protection is removed

from them, and the Lord is with us.

Do not fear them. Then all the congregations said

to stone them with stones, But the glory of the Lord appeared

at the 10th of meeting to all the people of Israel.

This is the word of the Lord. You may be seated.

As we continue our sermon series through the life of Moses.

We're turning from the Book of Exodus to the Book of Numbers.

And you might be wondering, well, what does the Book of

Numbers have to do with me? What relevance could it actually

have in my life? I don't know if you've actually

ever read the Book of Numbers. Maybe you've just kind of

skimmed it or speed through it in a Bible reading plan.

But I want you to know this morning that the Book of Numbers

has great application to our lives today in the original

Hebrew, The title for the Book of Numbers is In the Wilderness.

It's a much better title, you see, because the Book of Numbers

tells the story of the people of Israel as they wandered in the

wilderness between Mount Sinai and the Promised Land.

And in many ways, it's a cautionary tale about what

happens to an entire generation who failed to believe and trust

in the promises of God, a generation who didn't listen to

God and his promises and instead trusted in the lies and slanders

of an unbelieving culture. And just like Israel, we are

prone, prone to walk in a wilderness.

This part of our lives, in between what God has already

done and sending Jesus his death and resurrection for our

salvation and what he has not yet fulfilled in the last days,

we too Now we find ourselves in a wilderness.

And if we're honest, we spend most of our lives trying to

insulate ourselves from that wilderness, seeking comfort and

seeking ways to distract ourselves, trying to pretend

that life is not as difficult as it truly is.

But every once in a while, every once in a while, we are

confronted with the wilderness that we live in.

When we experience heartache and grief and loss and shame and

guilt and difficulty and strife, we are reminded that we too are

a wilderness people. And just like the people of

Israel, when we find ourselves and the wilderness, it is so

easy to become disoriented and to become lost.

And just like them, we are prone to believe the slanders of our

unbelieving age rather than trust and the promises of God.

And so this morning, as we continue our sermon series, The

Life of Moses, and we look at the Book of Numbers, this is

what I want you to know, that God has called us to a

dissenting hope. I want you to see what it looks

like to trust in His promises as we live life in the wilderness.

First wet thing I want to look at this morning, I want you to

look at the slander of unbelief, and I want you to look with me

at numbers 13, verse one. This is the central point to the

book of Numbers. This is the climax, Numbers 13

and 14. And verse one.

We're told that the Lord came to Moses and told him to send out

12 spies to go in to the promised land.

One spy representing each and every one of the 12 tribes.

And the people of Israel are now on the brink of entering the

promised Land. They are on the verge.

And I want you to consider all that has happened to bring them

this point. This is the same land that was

promised to Abraham when God made a covenant with him in

Genesis chapter 17. This is Genesis 17 verse 8.

Genesis 17 · chapter mention Genesis 17:8

Or God promised Abraham, I will give to you into your offspring

after you the land of your sojournings, all the land of

Canaan for an everlasting possession, and I will be there.

God. This is God's covenant with

Abraham, and I want you to think about all that has happened

between then and this point. All that God had done to bring

them to the edge of the Promised Land, the promise he gave to

Abraham, the call he gave to Abraham to sacrifice Isaac and

then providing a ram to die in his place.

All that the Lord did through Moses and rescuing the people of

Israel out of slavery and bondage in Egypt, sending the 10

plagues, rescuing them through the Passover, parting the Red

Sea, giving them the Law, forgiving them, and renewing His

covenant with him. Even after they worship the

golden calf, God has now brought them from that place of Mount

Sinai, now to the edge of the promised Land.

They're finally there, and so the Lord instructs them go and

spied out, go on a reconnaissance mission for 40

days and come back and report all that you see.

Verse 25. We're told at the end of 40

days, the spies return. Verse 26, they come to Moses and

Aaron and all the congregation, the people of Israel.

And they brought back a word to them, to all the congregation

and showed them the fruit of the land.

Now I want you to put yourself in their place.

If you are among the people of Israel that day, you've been

waiting for 40 days. With all that you've been

through, you're finally to the edge of the promised land.

You've been waiting for 40 days to hear what's it like?

Is it all that we hoped for? Is it a good land?

They're finally ready to hear what they've had to say.

Verse 27 And the spies tell them we came to the land which you

sent us, and it flows with milk and honey.

And this is its fruit. Can you imagine their

excitement? The land is good.

But then notice what they say in verse 28.

However, the people who dwell in the land are strong and the

cities are fortified and very large.

There's a couple things I want you to notice about their

report. First, I want you to notice what

the report says. The land is good and the people

are large. The land is good.

It's a good land. It offers a lot for us, but the

people are too large for us to be able to go in.

That's the other thing I want you to notice about the report

is what's not in it. Not once do they mention the

name of the Lord. Not once they say this is the

land that God promised to us. No, this is the land that Moses

you've brought us to. Not once they say the Lord is

with us and He will help us enter the land.

No, they say the the people are too large.

There's no the way that we can enter in.

Imagine the crowd, the people of Israel, what they must have now

thought from excitement to complete chaos and fear.

Evidently this is what happened because of what happens next.

In verse 30, we're told that Caleb quieted the people before

Moses and he said let us go up at once and occupy it, for we

are able to overcome it. Now this is what's going on

here. 12 spies go out on a reconnaissance mission to report

back about the land. 10 spies give a report that the land is

good, but the people are large. And now we're told Caleb, and

later we're told Joshua. Two of the 12 spies say no, no,

don't listen to them, The land is both good and the Lord is

with us. Listen to what Caleb says.

Again, verse 30. Let us go up at once and occupy

it, for we are well able to overcome it.

And what we see unfold is this debate between two sides.

A majority report, 10 spies saying the land is good but the

people are too large and we can't go in, we cannot go into

the promised land, we'll never make it.

And a minority report, a dissenting voice of just two

spies, Caleb and Joshua, saying no, don't listen to them.

We can go in, we are able to overcome it.

Verse 31 we're told. Then the men, that's the other

10 spies who had gone up with them said, we are not able to go

up against this people, for they are stronger than we are.

And then the report begins to take on a life of its own.

It almost becomes the stuff of legend.

Listen to what they say. Verse 32 So they brought the

people of Israel a bad report of the land that they had spied,

saying the land through which we had gone to spy it out as a land

that devours its inhabitants. And all the people that we saw

are of great height. And there we saw the Nephylene,

and we seem to ourselves like grasshoppers.

And so we seem to them. Now we have a lot of ground to

cover this morning. I wish we had a lot of time to

just park here. Let me just say a few things

about what's going on. Maybe you've heard this word

before. The Nephylene.

You're wondering, what on earth is this talking about?

Let me tell you why it matters. See the Nephelene we're told

about? Really.

An obscure spot in the Book of Genesis, Genesis 6 and the word.

Nephelene could be loosely translated.

Giants, men of great height. They were known as the men of

renown. The Bible tells us in Genesis 6

that they're the offspring of the sons of God and the

daughters of man. Now, what on earth does that

mean? Well, two basic theories.

One is that this is the offspring of angels and humans

that have produced giants. Have you never heard that

before? You're like, wow, the Bible is

amazing. And it is.

But there's another theory. Theory that says, no, the sons

of God, the daughters of man, is simply talking about believers

intermarring with unbelievers. And that's the nephleme.

Whatever the case may be, what we know is that they were of

great height, they were known as the men of renown, and they were

legendary. And so here we see the 10 spies

giving this majority report saying that's what we saw,

literally saying we can't go to the promised land because it's

filled with giants. That's going to make us feel

like grasshoppers. What I want you to see this

morning is how much they're beginning to allow their fear to

overtake them, are now exaggerating.

Surely they saw probably people bigger than them, and perhaps

they saw fortified cities, lots of people in them.

But now their fear has overcome them, you see, because the other

thing we know about the Nephilim is that they would have died at

the flood. They would have completely died

out. So what is it that they saw?

They saw fear, you see, and this is what fear does to us.

Fear is so closely associated with what we worship.

We tend to fear the things that we worship.

You think, well how could that be?

Well, the reason that we worship money is because we we also, we

are afraid of being uncomfortable and afraid of

having lack or or the reason that we worship other people

because we're afraid of what they think of us and how we are

seen in all these ways. When we fear other people or we

fear things, we fear these things, we fear these people and

we fail to fear and worship God. And that's exactly what happens

here. Ed Welch in a great titled book,

When people are big and God is small, it's literally what's

happening here. He says that fear of man is

always part of a triad that includes unbelief in

disobedience. And that's exactly what we see

happen here. Their fear becomes unbelief,

which gives rise to disobedience.

Look with me, Numbers 14, verse one.

Then all the congregation raised a loud cry.

The people wept that night, and the people of Israel grumbled

against Moses and Aaron. We've seen this word grumbled

over and over it again in the book of Exodus.

Here it is once more in the book of Numbers, they grumbled.

The word here is like a vote of no confidence against Moses and

against God. Once again they are denying that

God can take care of them and they are presupposing that they

know better. Look with me, verse 2.

The cold congregation said would that we had died in the land of

Egypt. How often have we heard the

people say this throughout the book of Exodus?

Every time they were hungry, every time they were thirsty in

the desert, they would grumble and complain and question God

and say, wouldn't it would have been better if we had just

stayed in Egypt? Wouldn't it be better if we go

back to slavery now? Notice they're adding on to

that, They say. Would it would be better if we

just died in this wilderness? It would be better for us to die

in the wilderness than to go into the Promised Land.

You hear? How deceived, how confused the

people of Israel are, how long they've been waiting to enter

the promised Land. And now they think it would be

better to die in the wilderness than they go in.

They continue verse 4. They say to one another, let us

choose a leader and go back to Egypt.

Make no mistake, this is mutiny. And at its core that's what

every single sin is. It's mutiny.

High treason against the king. This is outright rebellion.

Fear that became unbelief, that became disobedience that has

become rebellion. They've rejected God's covenant.

They've rejected the promised land.

The thing that I find most frightening about this passage

is not simply that they rebelled against God.

It's why do you notice they rebelled against the Lord?

Based on the report of 10 people, not one of them saw the

land for themselves. Not one of them saw that it was

good. Not one of them saw one of the

socalled giants. They had launched A rebellion

against Moses and against God based on the false testimony of

10 people. In chapter 13, verse 32, we're

told that it was a bad report. In Hebrew, the word for bad

report is the word for slander. In other words, it wasn't just a

bad report because it was inaccurate.

It was a bad report because it was slander.

It was 1/2 truth that become a lie.

Sure, maybe there were large people in big cities that were

all fortified, but their complete conclusion was

completely wrong. Good land, large people.

We can't go in. It was a lie.

They slandered the promises of God.

And what I want you to understand this morning is that

it took 40 days for that slander to reach the people of Israel.

It takes 40 seconds for us to be slandered today.

How many slanderous statements do we hear each and every day?

Bad reports about the world we live in.

Half truths that become a lie. So this morning I want to ask

you what lies are you believing? What slanderous reports are you

prone to believe? Half truths that become a lie?

Lies like the culture is winning, therefore the Church

must be losing. Lies like our country is falling

apart. Therefore the Kingdom of God

must be failing all forgetting the promise that Jesus said he

would build his church, the gates of hell will not prevail

against it, and that the Kingdom of God is here and now.

Perhaps for you it's the lie that you're worthless.

You don't amount to anything that because you continue to

fall into that besetting sin that you can't seem to shake,

that God is no longer with you and he will not equip you to

overcome the temptation that you face.

Perhaps others. For you is to lie that there is

nothing in this life except for disease and grief and cancer and

depression and anxiety and so why bother fighting anymore?

Each and every day we are inundated with slander and lies.

The question for us this morning is what report are you going to

believe? Because they're in the middle of

this majority report that slandered the promises of God.

There was a voice crying out in the wilderness, a dissenting

voice of hope that said God can be trusted.

So the second thing I want you to look at this morning, I want

you to see the dissension of hope.

Look with me at Numbers 14, verse five.

We're told that after the people rebel, Moses and Aaron fall on

their face, Joshua and Caleb tear their clothes.

This is an act of mourning. It's as if they are witnessing a

death before their eyes, and so they are grieving.

And in the midst of their grief, verse 7, Joshua and Caleb

courageously deliver a dissenting message that cut

right through the slander of the 10 spies.

They contradict everything they say, and they say in verse 7.

The land which we passed through to spy it out is an exceedingly

good land, and if the Lord delights in us, He will bring us

into the land and give it to us, a land that flows with milk and

honey. Notice where they begin, not

simply with the land, but with the Lord.

Why is the land good? Because the Lord has brought us

to it, and he will lead us in verse nine they continue.

Only do not rebel against the Lord, and do not fear the people

of the land, for they are bred for us, their protection is

removed from them, and the Lord is with us.

Do not fear them. Notice now the conclusion.

Yes, maybe the people are large, but the Lord is with us.

And where you say that the land will devour us, know this, that

with the Lord on our side, these giants that you speak of will

become bred for us. The Lord is with us.

He will lead us into the promised land.

He will be with us just as He is always been, because he is a

covenant, keeping promise, fulfilling God.

It's a dissenting message, a minority report, just two among

the 12. How would the people respond?

And hearing this dissenting message, this dissenting message

of hope, how will they respond? Verse 10, we're told.

Then the congregation said to stone them with stones.

So this is the question for you and me this morning.

Whose report are you going to trust as you walk through the

wilderness of life and you face griefs of many kinds and

difficulty and strife as you're confronted with the brokenness

and the wilderness of our world, and you hear half truths, lies

that slander, the promises of God.

What report will you believe? Because I want you to notice

something. Where did the slander come from?

Did it come from out there? No, it came from within the

camp. It came from among the people.

What report will you believe? We believe the majority that

slanders the promises of God and says we can't overcome because

it's all up to us and we'll fail.

We trust in the voice of the dissenting minority, the voice

of dissenting hope that says God is who he says He is.

His promises are true and they find their yes and Amen in Jesus

Christ. That's where I want to end this

morning. The power of God's promise to

look at this final section. I want you to get your Bible or

you can turn to a Pew Bible. You'll find them there in front

of you. You don't have a Bible this

morning. That's our gift.

You would love for you to take it with you.

This section is not printed in our bulletin.

I want you to see with your own eyes what happens next.

An incredible interchange between Moses and God.

Just as we're told that the people are about to stone Caleb

and Joshua, we're told that the glory of the Lord comes down.

And verse 11 we're told that the Lord says to Moses, how long

will this people despise me, and how long will they not believe

in me, in spite of all the signs that I've done among them?

I will strike them with the pestilence and disinherit them.

I will make of you a nation greater and mightier than they.

If you've been with us in our serious life of Moses, this

should sound familiar, because once again the people have

rebelled against God. And once again God has said, I

must pour out my judgment on unbelief.

And he said, well, does that make him cold and vindictive?

Know what makes him good and righteous?

He must judge sin. And the truth is, if we're

honest this morning, every single one of us fall into this

camp, prone to unbelief, prone to believe the slanders of our

unbelieving age. And so here it is God saying, I

must pour out my judgment. But then here comes Moses, the

great mediator of the people, the one whom God is called to be

a priest, to come and pray on the people's behalf.

Verse 17 Moses prays Now please let the power of the Lord be

great as you have promised. Notice what he says, Lord, Let

your power. Let your glory be great, just as

you promised, just as you said it would, he continues, praying.

Verse 18 The Lord is slow to anger and abounding and

steadfast love for giving iniquity and transgression, but

he will by no means clear the guilty.

Visiting the iniquity of the fathers and on the children to

the 3rd and the 4th generation, Moses praise the promises of God

back to him. The same promises we looked at

last week in Exodus 34. God's covenant promise to be

slow to anger in a bounding and steadfast love, but by no means

clear the guilty. And then in verse 19, Moses,

praise, please pardon the iniquity of this people

according to greatness of your steadfast love, just as you have

forgiven this people from Egypt until now.

And then notice what God says next.

Verse 20. Then the Lord said, I have

pardoned, according to your word, what just happened.

God seized the unbelief and rebellion of this people, and as

a holy and righteous judge says, I must pour out my judgment.

Then Moses praise the promises of God back to him, and notice

what God says. Then the Lord said, I have

pardoned according to your word, What is going on here?

Did Moses just change God's mind?

Can we, when we pray, change the mind of God?

It's one of the great questions of the Bible, one of the great

questions, The book of numbers, the book of X's The Great

Questions of Prayer. There's a couple answers to that

question. The first, I think, is good.

Good to a point. And the first says, well, what

we are seeing here is an anthropomorphism.

It's a good big Scrabble type word, right?

It It it simply means that what we're reading here is an

interchange from a human perspective of a human being

with God. And so it's ascribing to God

human language that we can understand what goes on in

prayer. And I think that's hopeful, but

only to a point, because it doesn't enable us to really

wrestle with what's really going on here.

I want you to notice what God says to Moses.

I have pardoned, according to your word, Whose word did Moses

pray? Was it really Moses's word?

No, no. He prayed God's word, Word for

word. Moses prayed the promises of God

back to him. In other words, what we are

seeing here is Moses being conformed to God's covenant

promise. We're seeing Moses trust fully

in the promises of God. CS Lewis put it this way.

Can we believe that God ever really modifies His action in

response to the suggestions of men?

For infinite wisdom does not need telling what is best.

Infinite goodness needs no urging to do it.

But neither does God need any of those things that are done by

finite agents, whether living or an animate He goes on to stay.

Instead, He allows soils and weather and animals and the

muscles, minds, and wills of men to cooperate in the execution of

His will. Or to put it more simply, and

I've always loved this from RC Sproul.

Prayer does change things, all kinds of things, but the most

important thing it changes is us.

So did Moses change God's mind? No.

No. Because Moses prayed his promise

and in response God carried out his promises to the very end.

God promises to be slow to anger and abounding and steadfast love

and mercy and by no means clear the guilty.

And that's exactly what happens. In verse 21, we read the

unbelieving people of God are now condemned to go back towards

Egypt and to now wander in the desert for 40 years before they

die in the wilderness, having never entered the promised land.

In other words, they got exactly what they asked for.

They asked to go back to Egypt, they asked to die in the

wilderness, and that's exactly what they got.

They refused God's covenant promise.

They refused to go into the promised land, and they wandered

in the desert for 40 years until they all died.

The 10 spies who delivered a slanderous report all died by a

plague. We're told to the end of chapter

14 that some of them decide to go into the promised land now

anyways, even on their own, even though God's not with them.

And they all die because they tried to do it on their own.

And you hear that and you say, okay, I hear that.

But where's the loving kindness? Where's the mercy?

Where's the pardon in that? I want you to look with me at

verse 24. God says, But my servant Caleb,

because he has a different spirit and has followed me

fully, I will bring into the land and to which he went, and

his descendants shall possess it.

The name Caleb means faithful. The name Joshua means savior,

even as God promised to pour out his judgment, as we've seen time

and time again that God saves through judgment.

He did it in Egypt and sending the Passover.

He's doing it here as he's sending his people to wander in

the wilderness for a generation, only now to save a remnant

through Caleb and Joshua, and the next generation to go into

the land and to inherit God's promises once and for all.

And many years later, he would send his own Son, Jesus Christ

to come and to bear the weight of all God's judgment for our

sin of unbelief, so that all who are faithful, all who believe in

God's promises fulfilled, and His death and resurrection,

might enter the promised Land forever.

So this morning, what report are you going to believe?

You're going to believe the slanderous report of our

unbelieving age, Or are you going to place your hope and a

dissenting message? It says God is who he says He

is. And reflecting on this passage,

preacher of Hebrews wrote that for we are to come to share in

Christ, if indeed we hold our original confidence firm to the

end, as it is said today, if you hear His voice, do not harden

your hearts as in the rebellion. Brothers and sisters, Do you

hear His voice this morning? Can you hear His voice?

In the midst of the chaos and confusion and slander of our

unbelieving age, can you hear His voice today?

If you hear His voice, do not harden your hearts, but hear the

voice of the One who is crying out in the wilderness, The one

who's proclaiming A dissenting message of hope that God is who

He says He is and His promises are true.

The voice of Caleb and Joshua calling us to enter into the

promised land. The voice of the prophets

promising the coming Messiah. The voice of John the Baptist,

who said, Behold, the Lamb of God, who comes to take away the

sin of the world, and the voice of Jesus who bore the judgment

of God on the cross for you and for me today.

If you hear his voice, do not harden your hearts, but trust

and the dissenting hope of the one who died and rose and is

coming again for you. Let's pray.

Father in heaven, would you set our eyes on the promised Land

that is to come? And in looking and believing and

trusting and that future promise, would you now reorient

our present? Would you change the way that we

look at life in the wilderness and able us to trust you to hear

your voice until you come again? In Jesus name we pray.

Amen. Let's stand.

Let's sing together.