Good day dear friends.
I trust we are all still praying for our brothers and sistera long the Gulf Coast as Gustav bears down on them. Thank God Gustav came in as a Category 3 compared to what it was just a day or so ago.
Here is our study guide for today: In the OT book of Numbers, chapter 13, verses 30-33, we find a famous reference to attitude. Please read it and compare the two attitudes towards the enemy and the challenge they posed to God’s people. What would have been your attitude?
Here is that text from Numbers 13:30 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." 31 Then the men who had gone up with him said, "We are not able to go up against this people, for they are stronger than we." 32 So they brought to the Israelites an unfavorable report of the land that they had spied out, saying, "The land that we have gone through as spies is a land that devours its inhabitants; and all the people that we saw in it are of great size. 33 There we saw the Nephilim (the Anakites come from the Nephilim); and to ourselves we seemed like grasshoppers, and so we seemed to them."
Two attitudes from two groups. Is that something new? No, of course not. One's attitude is shaped by many things as I shared yesterday in my sermon. Fear is a great thing and can cause our response to many things. But so can faith. That was the major difference between Caleb and "the men who had gone up with (Caleb)" to assess the potential danger between the Israelites and their enemy. Do you notice the difference between facing something with fear and facing it with faith?
PRAYER: Loving God, fill my heart, mind, spirit, and body with faith. May it be faith in You that overcomes all fear. In Jesus' Name, amen.
Have a great and blessed day in the Lord!
e.v.
