Minority Report

Yesterday’s reading is probably my favorite reading so far. Taken from Numbers 13 and 14, the reading for Feb. 8 records the story of the 12 spies going into the land of Canaan to check out what is there. Now keep in mind at this point, the Israelites have been traveling in the desert for over a year. They have seen miracle after miracle. Not only do they remember the plagues which struck Egypt and freed them from their control, but they have seen numerous other miracles along the way. So one would think that upon coming to the promised land, they would be ready to trust in God to give them this land.

As the spies come back from their days in the land of Canaan, they first bring good news. It is indeed a wonderful land! It is abundant, producing large amounts of very bountiful produce, and has all the space they could need for their people to live happily and be blessed! But, there is a catch – it is already being lived in by powerful people. People much greater in size, and who are dug in far more firmly, with fortified cities and the like. This latter point is what most of the spies focus on. They even exaggerate their concerns, saying they seemed like “grasshoppers in their own eyes.”

But Caleb and Joshua feel differently. They see the land, and how wonderful it is, and encourage the people – “let’s go take it now!” To these two, God has promised and so God will deliver. They trust unequivocally in God’s promises, and so have courage to face these giants. No matter what the people of the land have, they do not have God, and that is enough for them! Unfortunately, the people do not listen – indeed they begin to mutiny and God is just about ready to wipe them all out and give Moses a new people to become the great nation he promised, before Moses intercedes. Nevertheless, for 40 years they will wander in the desert because the people did not trust the Lord.

This story has so many things to be learned from it, but I want to focus on something personal to me, and I’m sure a lot of you reading. How often do you let the negatives outshine the positives? I do this all the time. I must admit it – probably my greatest spiritual struggle is worry. I worry about so many things – things that are happening, but most of the time things that aren’t and things that probably never will! I worry about all sorts of health issues, I worry about my family, and so on. Now, I know from Scripture that God has promised to take care of me. Not only do I have the promises of God to his people from the Old Testament, but I have the very words of Jesus, who reminds me that God takes care of the birds of the field, and so will certainly take care of me! But I, as the spies of the majority, doubt God. I doubt his willingness to do so. I see the giants – I see the fears and the possibilities – and I latch onto them. They get stuck in my mind, so that I am blinded to the beauty of his promises. And this blindness so often has kept me from being effective in the here and now.

One thing this story has encouraged me to do is to renew my efforts to go in a different direction, away from the stress and anxiety that I have brought upon myself through worry, to the direction of joy and hope that is brought by trusting in the promises of God. Think for a second about what the people of Israel lost by their faithlessness. They were right on top of finally having the promised land – they were there! It could have all been theirs right then! But because they grumbled and complained and refused to trust the God who had revealed his power over and over again, they were punished. How miserable! How sad! And yet this is often what we choose today. We choose to trust in our own power over the hand of God. Though we know he created all things, and that he has already defeated even death (!), we want to trust more in our own power. We forgo prayer, study, meditation – we forgo looking for God’s promises and claiming his promises, and instead give into our own powers which we know are going to fail frequently. How silly! How sad! Is it any wonder that we have so much anxiety and depression?

The world gives us the majority report still today – there is no hope, there is no promise, nothing but pain and suffering and bitterness to come. But for those of us who call ourselves the children of God, we must trust him and be willing to offer (and live by) the minority report. God has promised, and he will deliver!