Harvest Daily with Greg Laurie - Oct. 13, 2006

Looking Forward

 

“Now therefore, give me this mountain of which the Lord spoke in that day; for you heard in that day how the Anakim were there, and that the cities were great and fortified.   It may be that the Lord will be with me, and I shall be able to drive them out as the Lord said.”

—Joshua 14:12

 

“Give me this mountain,” the 85-year-old Caleb said.  He wasn’t afraid.  He had no thought of retirement.  He wasn’t headed for Leisure World.  There was still the unfinished task.

 

There is no retirement from the Christian life or the spiritual battle.  God may give us the privilege, like Caleb, of living to be 85 or more.  Or He may not.  But we should want the same zeal as Caleb, the zeal to get up every morning and say, “What’s ahead?  I am available.  I am ready.   Give me this mountain.”  That is the way we should live each and every day—not living in the past, not looking over our shoulders at the good old days, but instead looking ahead to Jesus, the author and finisher of our faith.

 

Caleb asked for a treacherous area known as Hebron, near Kadesh Barnea where he first spied out the land 40 years earlier.  He said, “I like this spot right here.  It’s treacherous.  It’s rugged.   It has formidable foes.   This is my kind of place.   Give me this mountain.”  He never forgot it.  And Moses promised it to him.

 

But Hebron was also known for something else.  It was known as the place where God spoke to Abraham face-to-face and gave him the promise of the land in the first place.  The very name of Hebron is telling.  It means fellowship, love, and communion.

 

This is the place Caleb longed for and received.  While others were looking back, Caleb was looking forward.  And that is an essential key to spiritual longevity: you need to always be moving forward, always seeking to grow spiritually—and never looking back.

For more relevant and biblical teaching from Pastor Greg Laurie, go to www.harvest.org.

Copyright © 2006 by Harvest Ministries. All rights reserved.

Scripture taken from the New King James Version. Copyright © 1982 by Thomas Nelson, Inc. Used by permission. All rights reserved. Bible text from the New King James Version is not to be reproduced in copies or otherwise by any means except as permitted in writing by Thomas Nelson, Inc., Attn: Bible Rights and Permissions, P.O. Box 141000, Nashville, TN 37214-1000.