Be like Caleb

In Joshua 14:9-12, Caleb said: So that day Moses solemnly promised me, "The land of Canaan on which you were just walking will be your grant of land and that of your descendants forever, because you wholeheartedly followed the Lord my God." Now, as you can see, the Lord had kept me alive and well as he promised for all these forty-five years since Moses made this promise-even while Israel wandered in the wilderness. .... So, give me the hill country that the Lord promised me. And therefore, in Joshua 14:13, Joshua: blessed Caleb son of Jephunneh and gave Hebron to him as his portion of land.

Caleb was one of the twelve scouts sent by Moses to survey Canaan. Of the twelve, only Joshua and Caleb had faith in God's ability to defeat the Canaanites and deliver the land to Israel. For this, Moses promised Caleb his personal inheritance of land. After forty years of wandering in the wilderness, under the leadership of Joshua, the Israelites successfully crossed the Jordan and conquered Canaan.

Joshua 14 describes how Caleb, upon Israel's victory, approached Joshua to claim the promise Moses had made forty years earlier. Caleb was indeed a man of faith. First, he held on to God's ability to deliver Canaan when others had given in to fear, then he remembered Moses' promise to him even after forty years of seemingly hopeless wandering. We should learn to be like Caleb, to have faith in God's promises and actively claim them.