Will you Take Your Land?

Will You Take Your Land?

God is so amazing. Today I’ve been reading a little in the book of Numbers chapters 13-14. It’s a very familiar passage, but it always convicts me every time I read it. It tells of the time when the Israelites had already come through the amazing deliverance from Egypt and they are on their way to the promised land…the land PROMISED to them by God. They send out some men to scope out the land and see if it actually is what they’ve heard it was…a land flowing with milk and honey. When they returned their report was as follows, found in 13:27: “we went into the land to which you sent us, and it does flow with milk and honey! Here is its fruit. But the people who live there are powerful, and the cities are fortified and very large…” Caleb then stops them from continuing to talk and tells Moses “we should go up and take possession of the land, for we can certainly do it.” The other men continue “we can’t go up there and attack those people; they are stronger than we are…” and they go on to say “We seemed like grasshoppers in our own eyes, and we looked the same to them.”
After all of this went down the Israelites were complaining and grumbling against the Lord, saying “if only we had died in Egypt! Why is the Lord bringing us to this land only to let us fall by the sword?”
Remember, all of this was after God parted the Red Sea for them and saved them from the Egyptians. They had already seen amazingly miraculous signs, and quickly forgot that God would indeed give them the land He promised them, no matter how big the inhabitants looked or what they had to face to even get there.
So, that’s the question we should ask today…the thing that really sticks out to me is how the men saw themselves. They viewed themselves as grasshoppers, and that’s exactly what we do in life so many times. When God promises certain things to us that we read in His word, we say, “there’s no way I can do that. God, how can you expect me to face that and win?” It’s His promise, that’s how, and He is with us! It’s his power that defeats the enemy, we just need to obey and follow His lead. We get defeated by so many schemes of the enemy, and don’t remember who God has made us to be. We are more than conquerors! We can do all things through Christ who gives us strength! With my God I can advance against a troop, and scale a wall! We are strong, firm, and steadfast. We have the same power that rose Jesus from the dead living in us! The one who is in us is GREATER than the one who is in the world. All of these amazing things that God says we are, and we just sit back and let the devil attack us and take away the promises of God. God says “by Jesus’ stripes we are healed.” Jesus says in John 10:10 that he has come that we will have life in abundance, to the full, till it overflows! How exciting is that! The question is, do you REALLY believe it? Do we live our life in such a way that demonstrates that we trust Jesus and all he has done for us? Do we hold onto these promises, knowing that God absolutely, 100% has them for us and we won’t let go until we see them? Or, do we see ourselves as defeated, and that the enemy is just way too big for us to conquer? These promises are ours. Period. God does not forsake his promises. He keeps them. He wants things to be done “on earth as it is in Heaven.” Is there sickness in heaven? How about poverty? None of those things are there. God doesn’t just want us to sit back and take what the devil gives. If we see sickness, we need to believe that GOD is our healer. That's HIS promise. He wants us to know who we are, children of God, and stand up and fight for the promises He’s given to us. He always has our best in mind, and if we trust Him and believe in Him we will win victory after victory. It might not come easy, we might actually have to stand up and fight, renewing our mind with GOD's truth, not what we hear all around us, but the battle for the promised land has already been won! We just need to step up and fight, trusting that when we hope in the Lord, we will never be put to shame. Change the way you view yourself. Know that sickness, sin, strife, and the ways of this world are NOT God's best for you, and that His promises are waiting there for you to take hold of!