Related to the reading
Numbers 12 : 3
The story of Caleb and Joshua and the other spies of Israel has always intrigued me. Moses led the children of Israel into the wilderness. In the second year of their wandering, he chose a representative from each of the twelve tribes to search the land of Canaan and bring back a report concerning its resources and its people. Caleb represented the tribe of Judah, Joshua the tribe of Ephraim. The twelve of them went into the land of Canaan. They found it to be fruitful. They were gone forty days. They brought back with them some of "the firstripe grapes" as evidence of the productivity of the land (Num. 13:20).
They came before Moses and Aaron and all the congregation of the children of Israel, and they said concerning the land of Canaan, "Surely it floweth with milk and honey; and this is the fruit of it" (Num. 13:27).
But ten of the spies were victims of their own doubts and fears. They gave a negative report of the numbers and stature of the Canaanites. They concluded that "they are stronger than we" (Num. 13:31). They compared themselves as grasshoppers to the giants they had seen in the land. They were the victims of their own timidity....
...the people were more willing to believe the ten doubters than to believe Caleb and Joshua.
Then it was that the Lord declared that the children of Israel should wander in the wilderness forty years until the generation of those who had walked with doubt and fear should pass away. ...
"But Joshua ... and Caleb ... , which were of the men that went to search the land, lived still" (Num. 14:37-38). They were the only ones of that group who survived through those four decades of wandering and who had the privilege of entering the promised land concerning which they had reported in a positive manner.
We see some around us who are indifferent concerning the future of this work, who are apathetic, who speak of limitations, who express fears, who spend their time digging out and writing about what they regard to be weaknesses which really are of no consequence. With doubt concerning its past, they have no vision concerning its future....
The Lord never said that there would not be troubles. Our people have known afflictions of every sort as those who have opposed this work have come upon them. But faith has shown through all their sorrows. This work has consistently moved forward and has never taken a backward step since its inception.
- President Gordon B. Hinckley, October 1995 General Conference
Deuteronomy 6-8; 15; 18; 29-30; 34
Joshua 1-8; 23-24
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