Joshua 14

Two and a half tribes received their inheritance east of the Jordan. One tribe, the Levites, had no inheritance of land. Though the Lord provided cities, pasture lands, and a participation in the offerings of the people, the Lord Himself was the inheritance for the people of Levi. The remaining nine and a half tribes received their allotments in the land of Canaan itself.

The story of that allotment for the nine and a half tribes began with the only man, together with Joshua, who was a part of both the wilderness generation and the conquest generation. Caleb had urged the people of Israel to trust God and to take the land of Canaan forty years before, but they would not listen to him. Now in his eighties, he was ready for the fulfillment of his dreams.

Caleb said to Joshua, “I wholly followed the Lord my God.”

Caleb had a good conscience, though he lived among a generation that was a confusing mix of faithfulness and unfaithfulness. On one hand, Hebrews 11:29 says that it was by faith that the people of Israel crossed the Red Sea on dry land. So they had faith. On the other hand, Hebrews 3:19 says that they were unable to enter because of unbelief. They had both faith and unbelief.

Even in the conquest generation, as we saw in the prior chapter, there were significant holes in their victory. It was a glorious gift of God to Caleb that in a sea of mixed belief and unbelief, he had the testimony of a good conscience. He wholly followed the Lord.

This was not only Caleb's internal conviction. It was confirmed by the word of Moses who had promised him a special blessing for his faithfulness. Now the Lord had preserved his life over these forty-five years. He was able to make the extraordinary report that, “I am still as strong today as I was” back in the day when he had first spied out the land. He came to Joshua to receive what Moses had promised.

Caleb asked for and received that blessing. He knew any victory that came to him would be due to the power and goodness of God, but he was willing to be the Lord's instrument in taking the land that Joshua granted to him. “It may be that the Lord will be with me, and I shall drive them out just as the Lord said.”

Caleb was a man of bold humility; humble before the Lord, but bold in the power of God at work within his life. Joshua allotted him Hebron in the hill country south of Jerusalem for an inheritance. That was his blessing.

Caleb was a great man. We celebrate the joy of knowing individuals to whom the Lord has granted a sincere life of holiness, especially when everyone else around them has such a mixed testimony. Not that Caleb was actually flawless. If Caleb had been entirely without sin, we would not have needed the Son of God to come and die for us.

Someone even greater than Caleb had to save us. That Someone was promised a great blessing because of His perfect faithfulness. Did He win a city like Hebron? Was He granted the whole land of Canaan? What was the allotment of Jesus for His work of absolutely perfect righteousness when He lived without sin in the midst of a crooked and perverse generation.

You were.

You were granted to Him as an inheritance. He had the spiritual eyesight necessary to see that inheritance as great.

Jesus endured the cross. What kept Him going? The joy that was set before Him. The joy of obeying the Father, but also the joy of His promised inheritance, a glorious kingdom of holy ones, without spot, or blemish, or any such thing. Can you see it?

To grasp the joy of Christ toward you and all His glorified inheritance, you need eyesight that can only come from the Holy Spirit. That is why the Apostle Paul prays for the Ephesian church that they would receive wisdom and revelation in the knowledge of Christ and His love, that they might understand, among other things, the glory of the Lord's inheritance in His people. See Ephesians 1:18.

You will be Jesus Christ's Hebron. He was able to see you as a glorious inheritance even as He went to the cross. That gave Him joy as He went forward to do His greatest work of suffering love. He saw you as part of the eternal kingdom perfected in trust and obedience to the glory of God forever.

See the joy of Jesus in His most difficult moment, and give yourself wholly to the Lord in suffering love. Joy is set before you in the One who reigns in heaven now. Like the Levites so long ago, the Lord is your inheritance. You are His, and He is yours. Follow the way of the cross in good conscience in the midst of a very mixed multitude, and embrace the One who will never let you go.