LORD, Give Me My Hebron
LORD, Give Me My Hebron July/2024 Series: Lord, Give Me This Mountain #1 “Joshua blessed Caleb and gave the Mountain of Hebron to him …” (Joshua 14:13).
HEBRON: A district and city of Judah 22 miles south of Jerusalem with a mountain and fertile valleys.
Joshua and Caleb stood alone away from the other 10 spies, eyes aglow like sparks of fire, they spoke eagerly about this new territory - God’s land. The two had calculated the risks of taking the land on their reconnaissance mission. Caleb was particularly impressed with the city of Hebron, a walled city in the south, perched nearly at the crest of the mountain chain at about 3,000 feet elevation. And in this strongly fortified city lived a race of giant men called the descendants of Anak, or the Anakim. Think Andre the Giant only bigger, uglier, and with 300 or so same size brothers. Caleb, the 40-year-old warrior knew the odds were against Israel. But he also knew the odds were God’s. YHWH had promised.
Joshua and Caleb, as you know, lost. They became a minority of two. Peer pressure, power, and prestige made no difference to these men. They stood with Moses and watched Israel sentence themselves to 40 years of wilderness wandering for their unbelief. Now, 45 years later, the Promised Land is to be divided by allotment. The twelve tribes are each to get their real estate. Caleb, wrinkled and scored as a dried apple at 85 years of age, stands before his buddy Joshua the Commander-in -Chief, and reports to duty. Read this slowly and allow the spiritual steel to stiffen your spine for Christ:
“I was forty years old when Moses the servant of the LORD sent me from Kadesh Barnea to explore the land. And I brought him back a report according to my convictions, 8 - but my fellow Israelites who went up with me made the hearts of the people melt in fear. I, however, followed the LORD my God wholeheartedly. 9 - So, on that day Moses swore to me, ‘The land on which your feet have walked will be your inheritance and that of your children forever, because you have followed the LORD my God wholeheartedly.’
10 - “Now then, just as the LORD promised, he has kept me alive for forty-five years since the time he said this to Moses, while Israel moved about in the wilderness. So here I am today, eighty-five years old! 11 - I am still as strong today as the day Moses sent me out; I’m just as vigorous to go out to battle now as I was then. 12 - Now give me this hill country that the LORD promised me that day. You yourself heard then that the Anakites were there, and their cities were large and fortified, but the LORD helping me, I will drive them out just as he said” (Joshua 14:7-12).
And old Caleb did just that! To Caleb it was not “quitting as he came down the stretch but pressing on to new achievement; not descending the mountain but attacking a higher peak. With “the LORD helping him” his life moved steadily forward not to termination but to consummation. His last years for the LORD were his best. “So, kick off those soft slippers, get out of the Lazy Boy rocker and start heading for your mountain” (J. Oswald Sanders.)
But my body is broken down and the reality is I just don’t have the physical strength I used to, what then? I can surely sympathize with you. It seems each month another body part of mine fails in an even frailer fashion. Last month I was walking like a Maryland crab and this month it’s my eyes. Without my glasses I can now no longer read restaurant menus, so rather than look old I fake it when the waiter comes. ME (pointing randomly): I’ll have this, please. WAITER: You’ll have JOIN US FOR BRUNCH Saturday 12 to 2PM? ME: Yes, I’ll have that medium rare.
None of us are what we used to be physically as we age. But all of us as we age in the LORD are still given opportunities to take a mountain for the LORD. Pray for your Pastor/Pastors and if you don’t have one to pray for, please, pray for me. An old Caleb called me this past week to put his arm around me and tell me he loved me and often intercedes for me before God’s throne. Such wind in the sail this was for me. What might you do to help a loved one or family member in your current condition? Send a text or card? Who is drowning and how might you be their floaties?
One key to Caleb’s Mountain taking Mindset was his God-given approach. It’s recorded that Caleb “whole heartedly” followed the LORD six times. God said it three times (Numbers 14:24, Deuteronomy 1:36, Joshua 14:8). Moses said it once in Numbers 32:12. Joshua restated it in Joshua 14:14 and Caleb acknowledged it himself in Joshua 14:8. In fact, Caleb means “full heart.”
One quickly calls to mind the way our Jesus loves us, no? Jesus loved you and me with his everything. Emptying himself of all his divine prerogatives he became the Godman. Jesus did for us what we could never do. Lived a holy life. Zero defect. Then he became our sin on the cross to take ours away. This is wholehearted love and the motivation we so desperately need to find the conviction to take the many mountains we have ahead of us in our later years in Caleb like fashion. Isaac Watts taught us to sing it like this: “Love so amazing so divine. Demands my soul my life my all.”
Make no mistake about it. God is still looking for a few “Calebs” to rout some giants and claim some mountain strongholds for himself. “Lord, help me follow you completely as you loved me completely and, if it be your will, give me my Hebron.”
Jesus Loves Us,
Pastor Tim (1-210-837-3934)
