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 Welcome to the Lansdale Life Church podcast.

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 If you're seeking a closer relationship with Jesus Christ, this podcast is for you.

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 Thank you for joining us today.

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 All right, welcome everyone.

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 Thank you for coming out and those who are streaming, welcome to you as well.

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 Let's open with a word of prayer.

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 Father God, we welcome your presence here tonight, Lord.

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 We thank you, God, for this opportunity to gather together, Lord, and to dig into your

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 word tonight.

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 We thank you, God, for all we've been learning, God, over the past few years, Lord.

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 In the beginning, being in the Bible, he had Genesis, and through Leviticus, and

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 now we're in Numbers, God.

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 And we just thank you, Lord, how you have been growing us, Lord, spiritually, Lord,

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 growing us closer to you, Lord, giving us a more in-depth understanding of you and

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 your scripture, Lord.

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 When we prayed tonight, God, your spirit would be here among us, Lord, and open our

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 hearts and our minds, Lord, that we can talk amongst each other and learn and

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 wrestle with your word and come into a closer knowledge of you, God.

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 We pray, Lord, for your anointing to be on, Lord, what's spoken here tonight in our

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 conversations, Lord.

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 We pray for those who couldn't be here tonight, God, that your blessings would be

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 upon them.

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 And in Jesus' name we pray, amen.

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 All right, we are in Numbers 14 tonight.

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 Faith versus fear, trusting in God in the face of giants.

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 I don't know about you, but Numbers has been a little bit easier in Leviticus, right?

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 It's been a little easier to teach.

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 I don't know about learning it, but it's been easier to teach for sure.

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 So just to give a quick overview before we jump into the text.

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 So coming out of Numbers 13, there were the 12 were sent to explore the land of

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 Cain, and 10 brought back the fearful report while Joshua and Caleb, they trusted in what

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 God promised them.

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 There's rebellion here among the people that we're going to read about that really came

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 from their fear instead of looking at what God had promised them.

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 They really kind of fell back on their fear.

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 This is really a pivotal moment here for the Israelites.

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 And there's a lot to be learned here.

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 Chapter 14 is a very, very familiar text for Christians and for Jews and really for other

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 faiths that look at the Old Testament.

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 It's a very, very familiar, there's a lot of familiar scripture in here.

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 So let's dig in.

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 We're going to start out with verses one through four that talks about the beginning of the

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 rebellion of the people.

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 It says, that night all the members of the community raised their voices and wept aloud.

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 All the Israelites grumbled against Moses and Aaron, and the whole assembly said to them,

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 if only we had died in Egypt or in this wilderness.

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 Why is the Lord bringing us to this land only to let us fall by the sword?

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 Our wives and children will be taken as plunder.

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 Wouldn't it be better for us to go back to Egypt?

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 And they said to each other, we should choose a leader and go back to Egypt.

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 It's like, wow.

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 I mean, to be thinking about, I wish we would have died.

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 I wish we would have never left Egypt.

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 I wish this.

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 And isn't it amazing what fear can do?

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 When we allow ourselves to be consumed by fear.

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 I mean, fear can cause us to do some crazy things, right?

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 I mean, when we allow ourselves to give in to fear and it just gets a grip on us,

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 it makes us do some crazy things.

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 I used to talk a lot about this when COVID was running wild.

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 And I said, you cannot give in to fear because when fear gets a hold of you, it consumes you.

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 And look back in COVID and tell me some of that stuff just wasn't crazy, crazy fear induced stuff.

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 And that's what we see here.

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 The Israelites are consumed with fear and instead of keeping their eyes on what God had promised,

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 after all that God had brought them through and after all they had seen God do.

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 I mean, we talk nowadays about believing in faith and just trusting in this.

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 Well, man, God had manifested himself so powerfully to them.

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 Over this period of time, they had seen with their own eyes what God was capable of doing.

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 And for them to just turn like this, this fear led to a rebellion.

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 It led them to question Moses' authority.

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 It led them to question God's promises and it put them in a place where we just want to go back.

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 We don't want to face what's in front of us.

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 We want to go back.

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 You know, this is a text that is referenced time and time again in the Bible,

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 in the New Testament, Hebrews 3, 16 through 19.

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 It says, you know, Israel's unbelief just kept them from entering into God's rest.

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 First Corinthians 10, 10 through 11 says,

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 and do not grumble as some of them did and were killed by the destroying angels.

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 These things happened to them as an example and were written down as warnings for us

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 on whom the culmination of the ages has come.

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 So God, you know, God used this, this short, this brief time in history.

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 He used this text that we're learning about tonight

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 as something that was a teachable moment all throughout scriptures.

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 And isn't that true of so many of these stories in the Old Testament?

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 It's one thing to read about and then say, okay, these were historical events.

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 These were the plights of the Israelites.

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 These were the things that happened.

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 But when you look at it as these were teachable moments that God used for generations

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 and generations and generations to teach people,

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 it puts it in a little bit of a different context, doesn't it?

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 It's one thing to look at it and say, oh boy, there's done Israelites.

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 There they go again.

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 But this was a life lesson that God used all throughout scripture time and time again.

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 It's powerful.

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 It's powerful.

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 So verses five through nine talks about Joshua and Caleb's faith.

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 It reads, then Moses and Aaron fell face down in front of the whole Israeli assembly,

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 gathered there.

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 Joshua, son of Nun and Caleb, son of Jebnoah, who were among those who had explored the land,

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 tore their clothes and said to the entire Israelite assembly,

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 the land we pass through and explored is exceedingly good.

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 If the Lord is pleased with us, he will lead us into the land,

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 a land flowing with milk and honey and will give it to us.

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 Only do not rebel against the Lord and do not be afraid of the people of this land

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 because we will devour them.

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 Their protection is gone, but the Lord is with us.

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 Do not be afraid.

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 So these two were basically standing in the face of these giants.

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 If you ever want to read about savage, relentless killers, read about the Amaklites.

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 They were just brutal, savage people, killing and sacrificing babies.

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 They were just like, you can see when you read about them,

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 the kind of fear that gripped the other ones.

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 But Joshua and Caleb are saying, no, man, we are going to take this.

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 He is going to deliver this to us.

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 I mean, they were so firm in this.

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 It's like, it gives me goose pimples just reading and thinking about it

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 because they were just like, yeah, kind of like David in the face of the Goliath.

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 Basically, everybody is cowering in front of Goliath, and David is saying,

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 look, you uncircumcised Philistine.

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 I got something for you right here, and this is what the Lord has for you.

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 And this is just so powerful.

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 So Joshua and Caleb, they tore their clothes, and this is something we read about.

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 You read about this in scripture a lot, even in the times of Jesus

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 where people would tear their clothes, and it's like, why?

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 Why do people tear their clothes like that?

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 It was this, they were just so conflicted.

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 This tearing of clothes and this ripping of clothes

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 becomes this outward public expression to those around of the inner turmoil

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 that they had there.

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 Look, we can see it right in front of us, what God has for us.

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 And then they see the people just saying,

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 now, we got to find somebody to take us back to Egypt.

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 And they're just saying, no, no, no.

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 And it's like in this visual expression of grief and anguish, they rip their clothes.

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 And it's a powerful statement.

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 The faith that they had focuses on God's strength,

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 not on the limitations that we have.

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 As people.

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 So when we think about what we can do, and this is something that I often find myself

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 faced with.

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 I mean, I know my limitations as a person.

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 I've got a pretty good handle on what I can and can't do.

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 When I'm faced with something, I feel like I can't do.

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 It's like, man, I just don't, it kind of starts to weigh you down.

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 But then when you look to God and say, God, give me this strength to do it.

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 There's a hope that rises up within you.

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 And there's this sense of purpose that he's called us to do it.

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 And then all of a sudden, you can see a pathway, right?

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 So they saw that so clearly by their faith.

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 Their faith focused them on what God had promised them, not on the reality that was in front

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 of them.

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 Because the reality that was in front of them was brutal.

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 I mean, it was, you look at an army like that and a vicious army like that.

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 It's like, man, there's no way.

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 There's just no way.

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 But they didn't look at that.

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 They put their faith and their focus on what God has.

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 And when we do that in challenging circumstances and where the odds are just stacked against us,

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 where we really feel like we can't do it, when we put our hope and our faith in God to get us

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 through that, it draws us nearer to God.

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 Whereas the exact opposite happens when we become consumed with fear.

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 It pushes us away, away from God.

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 And that's exactly what happened to most of the Israelites, is their fear consumed them

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 and it devoured their faith and their trust in God because they were not focusing on God.

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 They were focusing on the fear that they were consumed with.

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 Romans 8.31 says, what then shall we say in response to these things?

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 If God is with us, who can be against us?

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 Hebrews 11.1 says, faith is confidence in what we hope for, assurance of what we do not see.

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 So Joshua and Caleb, they represent the minority voice

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 of courage amidst those who were doubting what God had for them.

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 Powerful, powerful stuff here for us and such wonderful, wonderful life lessons for us.

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 Verses 10 through 25, this is a long burst of scripture here,

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 talking about God's judgment and Moses's intercession.

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 But the whole assembly talked about stoning them for this.

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 Imagine that, I mean, it's like, imagine that.

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 These guys are standing strong in their faith and they're saying,

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 trusting God, trusting God, He's going to overcome.

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 He is going to deliver the land that He promised to do.

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 And they're saying, yeah, we're going to stone you for that.

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 And the glory of the Lord appeared at the tent of meetings to all the Israelites.

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 The Lord said to Moses, how long will these people treat me with contempt?

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 How long will they refuse to believe in me in spite of all the signs I have performed among them?

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 I will strike them down with a plague and destroy them.

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 But I will make you into a nation greater and stronger than they.

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 Moses said to the Lord, then the Egyptians will hear about it.

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 By your power, you brought these people up from among them

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 and they will tell the inhabitants of this land about it.

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 They have already heard that you, Lord, are with these people

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 and that you, Lord, have been seen face to face, that your cloud stays over them

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 and that you go before them in a pillar of a cloud by day and a pillar of fire by night.

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 If you put all these people to death, leaving none alive,

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 the nations who have heard this report about you will say,

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 the Lord was not able to bring these people into the land he promised them on oath.

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 So he slaughtered them in the wilderness.

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 Now, may the Lord's strength be displayed just as you declared.

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 The Lord is slow to anger, abounding in love and forgiving sin and rebellion.

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 Yet he does not leave the guilty unpunished.

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 He punishes the children for the sin of the parents and the third and fourth generation.

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 In accordance with your great love, forgive the sin of these people

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 just as you have pardoned them from the time they left Egypt until now.

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 The Lord replied, I have forgiven them, as you ask.

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 Nevertheless, as surely as I live and as surely as the glory of the Lord fills the whole earth,

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 not one of those who saw my glory and the signs I performed in Egypt and in the wilderness,

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 but who disobeyed me and tested me ten times, not one of them will ever see the land I promised on

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 oath to their ancestors.

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 No one who has treated me with contempt will ever see it.

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 But because my servant Caleb has a different spirit and follows me wholeheartedly,

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 I will bring him into the land he went to and his descendants will inherit it.

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 Since the Amalekites and the Canaanites are living in the valleys, turn back tomorrow

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 and set out towards the desert along the route of the Red Sea.

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 So God is saying, look, it's game over for these guys.

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 I'm going to destroy them.

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 I'm going to do this.

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 And sometimes when I read things like that, I ask myself, come on, God.

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 It's like, you know these people.

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 You know their hearts.

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 You know what's going on.

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 And I wonder sometimes if he's not just giving Moses an opportunity to show wisdom

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 in these situations and show how he's grown and to show mercy to them.

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 I don't really know.

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 But this is a powerful, powerful intercession and appeal from Moses.

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 And we know that Moses has gotten to the heart of God before.

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 And God has changed his mind because of Moses's intercession.

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 But God does have mercy, but he is a just God.

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 So he's just and merciful as a God.

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 And we will see that played out here.

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 We know that when people's hearts are truly repentant,

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 when we come to God and just really pour ourselves out, we know that he is merciful.

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 James 5, 16 says, therefore, confess your sins to each other and pray for each other

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 so that you may be healed.

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 The prayer of the righteous person is powerful and effective.

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 You know, John 1, 1 John 1, 19 reminds us that God forgives those who confess.

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 So God responds to people who are truly repentant in heart.

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 And God responds to those who really intercede on behalf to those.

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 But we also know that there's consequences for these things as we're going to see.

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 And as God pretty clearly laid out there, continuing in 26 to 38,

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 the Lord said to Moses and Aaron, how long will this wicked community grumble against me?

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 I have heard the complaints of these grumbling Israelites.

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 So tell them, as surely as I live, declares the Lord,

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 I will do to you the very thing I heard you say.

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 In this wilderness, your bodies will fall.

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 Every one of you 20 years old or more who has counted, who was counted in the census

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 and who has grumbled against me, not one of you will enter into the land I swore

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 with uplifted hands to make your home.

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 Except Caleb, son of Jebne and Joshua, son of Nun.

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 As for your children that you said would be taken as plunder,

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 I will bring them in to enjoy the land that you rejected.

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 But as for you, your bodies will fall in this wilderness.

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 Your children will be shepherds for 40 years,

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 suffering for your unfaithfulness until the last of your bodies lies in the wilderness.

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 For 40 years, one year for each of the 40 days you explored the land.

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 You will suffer for your sins and know what it is like to have me against you.

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 I, the Lord, have spoken and I will surely do these things to the whole wicked community,

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 which has banded together against me.

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 They will meet their end in this wilderness.

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 Here they will die.

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 So the men Moses had sent to explore the land who returned and made the whole community grumble

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 against by spreading the bad report about it,

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 these men who were responsible for the spreading of this report about the land were struck down

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 and died of the plague before the Lord.

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 Of the men who went to explore the land, only Joshua, son of Nun and Caleb, son of Jebne,

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 survived.

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 Wow.

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 Aren't we grateful that God doesn't do that to us nowadays?

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 Because I think, you know, I think maybe there have been times in my life where I might have been

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 guilty of kind of spreading stuff or doing things.

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 And I certainly know of others too.

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 And, you know, they can be learning experience for us.

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 But thankful that God wasn't as harsh with us as he was with the Israelites here.

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 So this entire generation, with the exception of Joshua and Caleb,

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 are condemned basically to wander in the wilderness until they die.

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 And I think, as I mentioned earlier, you know, the context of what we're reading here

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 is so powerful that it's used time and time again as life lessons and as learning lessons

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 for us.

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 And rebellion has consequences.

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 You know, when we lead or when we do things that just blatantly rebel against God,

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 there are consequences and leading others away from God.

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 So when they used fear as a tool to lead others, so the others hadn't seen it.

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 They were just caught up in the fear.

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 And fear can be a contagious thing.

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 You know, when you see mobs that are just kind of like running in fear, it doesn't take much.

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 Fear just takes a little spark.

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 And then there's like gas that gets poured on it.

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 So it doesn't take much for that to go.

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 So these were just the few that led the masses into this fear and this rebellion.

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 So that holds a significantly harsher consequences than the others.

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 And even unbelief has consequences to it, some of it long, long term.

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 So there are really some powerful, powerful lessons for us here to grasp hold of and learn from.

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 Hebrews 3, 12 through 15 says, see to it brothers and sisters that none of you

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 has a sinful, unbelieving heart that turns away from the living God,

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 but encourage one another daily, as long as it is called today.

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 So that none of you may be hardened by sins of deceitfulness.

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 We have come to share in Christ if indeed we hold our original conviction firmly to the very end.

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 And it has been said today, if you hear the voice of God, do not harden your hearts

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 as you did in the rebellion.

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 So there's a warning here in the New Testament again, referring back to this very text

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 and saying, applying it to our hope that we have in Christ and this warning against

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 don't let the evilness of unbelief and fear invade and turn and twist our hearts.

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 Galatians 6, 7 reminds us that we reap what we sow.

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 So as Caleb and Joshua were sowing hope and sowing faith and sowing belief in the promises

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 of God, that's what they were reaping. But as the others were sowing this fear,

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 that just spread like wildfire.

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 And the final verse is 39 through 45. When Moses reported this to all the Israelites,

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 they mourned bitterly. Early the next morning, they set out for the highest point

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 in the hill country saying, now we are ready to go up to the land the Lord promised.

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 Surely, surely we have sinned. But Moses said, why are you disobeying the Lord's command again?

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 This will not succeed. Do not go up because the Lord is not with you.

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 You will be defeated by your enemies for the Amalekites and the Akaneites will face you there

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 because you have turned away from the Lord. He will not be with you and you will fall by the sword.

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 Nevertheless, in their presumption, they went up toward the highest point of the hill country,

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 though neither Moses nor the Ark of the Lord's covenant moved from their camp. Then the

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 attacked them and beat them down all the way to Horma. So after God pronounced his judgment,

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 the people attempted to say, okay, yeah, we changed our mind. And they attempted to enter

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 this land. It was a false remorse. They weren't repentant of it. They were just trying to get

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 their way. They were just saying, look, okay, we were only kidding here.

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 And this again is such a good example. And there's so many examples like this. I mean,

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 David talked about this. Moses talked about this. If God is not with me, I don't want to go.

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 How many times was God with David when he went up against just forces that just seemed

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 unbelievably against him and he won. But then there were times when God's favor was not with him.

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 So obedience has to be aligned with God's timing and presence.

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 So when we do things, we have to be aligned with the will of God for his favor to be on us.

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 John 15.5 says, apart from me, you can do nothing.

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 Any of our accomplishments that we do outside of the will of God, outside of his favor,

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 are just burnt offerings before God. Matthew 7.21 says, not everyone who says to me,

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 Lord, Lord, will enter the kingdom of heaven, but only the one who does the will of the Father

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 who is in heaven. So they were moving again outside of the will of God.

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 There's so much to be had within this chapter. It was just a great, great chapter to go through

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 this idea of fear versus faith. Which one are we going to hold on to?

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 You look at the examples here of leadership under pressure.

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 These guys were under enormous pressure. Moses, Aaron, Caleb, Joshua.

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 You examine Moses' humility. You look at Joshua and Caleb's courage as they went through this.

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 This is good, powerful stuff. And you look at and you really come into an understanding

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 of God's mercy and his justice here. And another thing that really spoke to me was

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 this spiritual inheritance and rest that God truly wanted for his people and that he would ultimately

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 deliver to them. And then the power of intercessory prayer in all of this.

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 Few key takeaways. Fear and unbelief can keep us from experiencing what God has for us

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 in everything that we do. Whether it's at home, whether it's at work, whether it's in

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 relationships, no matter what it is. If we allow fear, we allow unbelief to get in there,

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 it will keep us from what God has for us in those situations.

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 Faith requires focusing on God's power, not on what we think we can do or not on our limitations.

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 God's judgment is real. When you think about this and maybe God doesn't come down and just

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 lay that plague on us right now or cast us out, but I certainly have been in some

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 wildernesses in my life. Have you? Yeah. So I mean God's judgment can be real,

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 but his mercy and his patience towards us is always, always there. True obedience,

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 it always aligns with God's timing and presence. So when we're truly obedient to

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 the purpose that he has for us and what he's called us to do as a body,

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 his presence is always there. I heard this guy, I was watching this clip on TikTok this morning

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 and this guy was talking about what's going on with the homeless and he said,

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 we wouldn't have a problem with homelessness in this country if the church was doing its job.

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 Right? And I'm not making this a political statement by any means, but I'm saying if we were

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 to rise up as the church and meet the needs like the early church did in this community of

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 believers, there wouldn't be this problem where the police have to go in and just ravage these

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 communities of homelessness. And I know that there's examples of people that they just want

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 to be, and they choose to be homeless, but I'm saying that obedience, we're talking about here,

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 it aligns with what God calls us to do and his timing and his purpose. Intercessory prayer

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 is powerful and it reflects God's heart. So when we feel that compulsion to just

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 intercede in these situations, it's the heart, the heart of God in there.

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 Thanks for joining us at Lansdale Life Church as we praise God and discuss his word. Don't

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 forget to like, share, and subscribe to our channel at 8 AM Eastern on YouTube.

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 Be blessed and have a great day!