Joshua 14 Devotional

Kept Alive for the Promise

“Now therefore give me this hill country that the LORD promised me on that day, for you yourself heard then that the Anakim were there, with great and fortified cities. Perhaps with the LORD’s help I will drive them out, as the LORD has spoken.””Joshua 14:12 (BSB)

As the land is divided by lot, an old man steps forward. Caleb reminds Joshua of Kadesh-barnea, forty-five years earlier, when he brought back an honest report while the other spies made the people's hearts melt with fear (14:6-8). God had promised that Caleb would enter the land he explored and his descendants would inherit it, because he followed the LORD wholeheartedly (Numbers 14:24).

Now Caleb is eighty-five, and he names the reason he is still standing: the LORD has kept him alive, as he promised (14:10). Then he asks for the hardest ground available, the hill country of the Anakim with their great fortified cities. He mentions his strength, but his hope rests on the LORD's help and the LORD's word (14:11-12). Caleb receives Hebron, and the chapter closes with the land at rest (14:13-15). God's promises do not expire while his people wait. Whatever years you have ahead, they are held by the same faithful God who carried Caleb through forty-five of them.

To think about: What promise of God are you still waiting on, and how could Caleb's long wait shape the way you hold on to it?