POINT #3 – HOW TO POSSESS THE LAND
Summary (Numbers 13:1-3, 17-21,25, 27-33)
(***Begin by reading this summary. I encourage you to open your bible to Numbers 13 and place the summary inside your bible. We want our kiddos to know that this truly is the word of God, not just a story.***)
***(v. 1-3) The Lord told Moses, “Send some men to explore and spy out the land of Canaan. I will give this land to you, the Israelites, which were God’s people. Send one leader from each of the 12 tribes.” So Moses obeyed the Lord’s command and sent out the 12 leaders while the rest of the people camped out in the desert. Moses told the people to look and see what the land was like, what the people were like, and for them to have courage. The men went to spy out the land.
***(v. 17-21, 25) When Moses sent the 12 leaders out to explore the land of Canaan he said, “Go through the Negev (which is a desert), and then into the hill country. See what the land looks like. Learn about the people who live there. Are they strong or are they weak? Are they few or are they many? Learn about the land that they live in. Is it good land or bad land? What kind of towns do they live in? Do the towns have walls protecting them? Are the towns strongly guarded? And learn other things about the land. Is the soil good for growing things, or is it poor soil? Are there trees on the land? Try to bring back some of the fruit from that land.” (The first grapes should be ripe at this time.) So they went to explore the country…. The men explored that country for 40 days, and then they went back to the camp.
***(v. 27-33) When they came back to their camp, they told Moses, “We went to the land where you sent us. It is a land filled with many good things! Here is some of the fruit that grows there!” They brought back some fresh grapes from the vine. And they continued to say, “But the people living there are very powerful and strong. The cities are very large and there are guards protecting the city. We even saw some Anakites, Hittites, Jebusites, and Amorites.” Caleb, one of the leaders, told the people near Moses to be quiet. Then he said, “We should go up and take that land for ourselves. We can easily take that land.” But the other leaders that had gone to spy the land with him said, “We cannot fight those people! They are much stronger than we are.” So those men gave a report that made all the rest of the people sad. They said, “The land we saw was full of really strong people. They are strong enough to easily defeat anyone who goes there. We saw giants there too, the Nephilim. We felt like tiny little grasshoppers. Yes, we were like grasshoppers to them!”
God told the Israelite people to TAKE the land of Canaan. They were to take it for themselves. But, there were other people living there, the giants. If they were going to take the land for themselves, they were going to have to 1) make all of the other people living there get out of the land, and then 2) move their families and belongings into the new land once the other people were gone. Think about moving into a new house or getting a new bedroom. The other people will have to move all of their things out of the house/room, before we can move all of our things in and live there.
Sometimes in our heart, there are things that move in there and end up living there… fear, anger, sadness, unforgiveness, worry, etc. Those are things that we don’t want living inside of our heart. These things do not come from Jesus, and we don’t want anything living inside of us that is not from Jesus. We want what Jesus gives and His gifts to live inside of our heart: love, joy, peace, goodness, etc. Before those things can live in our heart, we have to remove all of the other things, first (the fear, anger, sadness, unforgiveness, worry, etc). We have to tell those things to go! We can tell those things to get out of our heart and mind. We can even tell sickness to leave our body, in the name of Jesus! We may have to give up watching a movie or reading a book that scares us, even though it may seem exciting at the time. We may need to forgive someone for hurting us, even if we don’t feel like it. These things can be really hard to do sometimes. But, we can do it with Jesus’s help.
Once we tell those things to go, we ask the Holy Spirit to FILL us with his love, peace, joy, mercy, etc. We can help fill ourselves by reading our Bible, spend time talking to Jesus in prayer, listening to worship music, etc. This may mean that we need to give up a few extra minutes of game time or free time, but it is well worth it to be full of Jesus and not have those yucky things living inside of us.
Discussion Questions/Application
- Do you have any thoughts in your mind or heart that you know are not from Jesus? (Ex. fear, worry, anger, unforgiveness, etc) **Take time to address those things and tell those things to “get out” of my heart and give/receive forgiveness.
- Is there anything you can stop doing to cause those things to come into your life? (Ex. stop watching scary movies, etc.)
- What do you want the Holy Spirit to fill you with? (Ex. peace for worry, perfect love for fear, joy for anger or sadness, etc)
- How can you help fill yourself up more with Jesus each day?
Scripture memory verse: Whatever is good and perfect is a gift coming down to us from God our Father, who created all the lights in the heavens. He never changes or casts a shifting shadow. James 1:17 NLT
Prayer: Jesus, thank you for showing us the things inside of our hearts and minds that do not belong there, and that are not from you. Thank you for showing us the things we need to not do in order to have more time filling ourselves with you. Holy Spirit, thank you for filling us up, for filling our hearts and our minds with your love, joy, peace. Help us to be strong to tell the enemy no when he tries to bring bad things into our minds and hearts. Help us to be brave and tell those things to get out of our minds and hearts before they ever try to live there. Help us to be so full of you, Holy Spirit, that there is no room for those things to enter our minds and hearts. We love you Jesus! We pray all of these things in your mighty name, amen!