27This was their report to Moses: “We entered the land you sent us to explore, and it is indeed a bountiful country—a land flowing with milk and honey. Here is the kind of fruit it produces. 28But the people living there are powerful, and their towns are large and fortified. We even saw giants there, the descendants of Anak! 29The Amalekites live in the Negev, and the Hittites, Jebusites, and Amorites live in the hill country. The Canaanites live along the coast of the Mediterranean Sea 13:29 Hebrew the sea. and along the Jordan Valley.”31But the other men who had explored the land with him disagreed. “We can’t go up against them! They are stronger than we are!” 32So they spread this bad report about the land among the Israelites: “The land we traveled through and explored will devour anyone who goes to live there. All the people we saw were huge. 33We even saw giants13:33 Hebrew nephilim. there, the descendants of Anak. Next to them we felt like grasshoppers, and that’s what they thought, too!” Numbers 13:27-29,31-33 NLT
What would you do if God gave you a promise/declaration, removed your enemies from before your eyes, gave you drink and food in a desert, and showed you exactly what he had already prepared for you? While you think about this, understand that all of this happened for the Israelites as they departed Egypt and journeyed through the wilderness towards the promised land, which was a very interesting journey that you should read for yourself. For this post I would like to highlight the event when Moses sent 12 spies, one representative from each tribe to enter and scout the land of Canaan to collect evidence and reports to share with the people upon their return. During the 40 days and nights that they scouted the land of Canaan, they collected food and other items which they brought back to show the Israelites the abundance of the land. While collecting the goods and enjoying the sights, they also saw the occupants of the land, which included giants (Nephilim) that were historically strong warriors with heavily fortified cities. Upon the spies return, they presented the goods collected during their journey to Moses and the people, which excited the people, but they followed up with more alarming news…. All the people were huge, and the land will devour anyone who goes to live there. Pause; “the land will devour anyone who goes to live there?” That’s another story, lets look at their comments:
All the people we saw were huge. 33 We even saw giants 13:33 Hebrew nephilim. there, the descendants of Anak. Next to them we felt like grasshoppers, and that’s what they thought, too!”
Numbers 14: 32b-33
Understand that this account is told from the viewpoint of the 12 scouts from Israel, and that at no point during their travels in Canaan, did they have a conversation with any of the Canaanites, at least according to the word. How would the scouts know how the giants (at least as they described) viewed them if they didn’t talk to any of them? Where did you get other peoples assessment of you from, especially if you haven’t asked them what they thought of you? Like the scouts, we have the tendency to project our insecurities onto others. The scouts were intimidated at the appearance of the Nephilim (giants) who lived in the land of Canaan, which honestly I would assume was a very small population/group that lived in the land. It seems that they used the minority to characterize the majority of the people in the land because they lacked the faith to believe that God could fulfill his promises to them. Notice their words in verse 33 which is probably the most important words from the passage because it is a reflection of how they saw themselves in the natural. Have you allowed your lack of faith, body image issues, low self-esteem, depression, etc to render God’s power in your life ineffective? The Nephilim never spoke with the 12 scouts, most likely the Nephilim never even knew or recognized the scouts if they did see them, but somehow here the scouts are giving a false report that is filled with as much self-assessment information as it is information on the occupants of the land. The negative report of 10 scouts (excluding Joshua and Caleb) becomes one of the greatest tragedies in Israel’s history because it is this false report that causes them to spend 40 years traveling to a promised land that should have only taken 10 days. Could your mind and mouth be the reason why you still haven’t received and experienced God’s blessings/promises for your life? Their own words and negative perception of self led to them falling victim to the things that they said would happen if the people entered the land of Canaan to possess it. In Numbers 15 the people disobey God’s directions and are defeated by the occupants of Canaan whom they just talked fearfully about, for the next 40 years, the generation of Israelites who refused to follow God’s directive to enter land all die in the wilderness, much like their assessment that the land of Canaan would devour anyone who tries to live their. Growing up, I heard a saying very often that says, “You have what you say”; well, the Israelites in this story are evidence of that. The individuals who chose to fight against God’s directions were crushed like grasshoppers, and those over the age of 20 who survived the battle were devoured by the wilderness exactly as the 10 spies who delivered a false report said upon their return.
reflection time
How do you see yourself? How do you think that your family, friends, co-workers, and enemies view you? In what ways have your faith, or lack of faith impacted your life and what you’ve experienced? What can you do change your perception of yourself, and possibly how others view you?
