February 2020 GNP Article

What does it mean to have a different spirit? This is what God says of Caleb in Numbers 14:24 (NIV). Caleb and Joshua are the only two out of twelve spies who believe the Israelites can possess the promised land. Numbers 13:30 (KJV) tells us: ‘And Caleb… said, Let us go up at once, and possess it; for we are well able to overcome it’. However, he is overruled by the ten spies who capture the imagination of the Israelites, binding them to limited thinking through fear. They tell them of the giants in the land and then compare themselves with the giants: “‘… we were in our own sight as grasshoppers, and so we were in their sight'”. Because of this powerful image of their own weakness, the ten spies are able to persuade the entire nation of Israel not to possess the land which God has given them. They have already shown Moses the massive cluster of grapes from that land – so big, it requires two grown men to carry it on a pole between them – but when compared with the image of a giant and a grasshopper, such a cluster of grapes seems to belong to the giants inhabiting the promised land; not to the grasshopper Israelites.

So what does this have to do with Caleb’s spirit? God promises He will bring Caleb into the land ‘”whereinto he went; and his seed shall possess it”‘ (Numbers 14:24). Caleb goes into the same land as the ten doubting spies in his body, but not in his spirit. He sees something different, not perceiving himself as a grasshopper, but seeing that he has powerful God with him – the KJV says ‘”…because he had another spirit with him”‘. This is God’s Spirit which causes Caleb to see with different eyes – the eyes of the heart, rather than natural eyes. He sees what is already his, and sees himself overcoming everything between him and his possession, rather than seeing the giants and the obstacles visible to natural eyes. The land is promised to his seed who will possess it, rather than just inhabit it.

It’s all about perception. How do you see yourself? How do you see God? How far your vision extends is how much you will possess.