Living by Faith
Joshua - 1 Kings

Here are Giant Truths from the Bible to help you live the Christian life. These lessons were written not only to learn more of God's will and His ways through His dealing with His people in Old Testament times but to also appropriate His life and His power today in every day living. The giants have been named on the level of the understanding and experience of children. The principles by which the children of Israel won or lost to the giants in their land form the basis of either victory or defeat today.

Introduction: Pleasing God and Fighting Giants

The books Joshua through I Kings tell about people who lived in Old Testament times, long before the Lord Jesus came into the world. In Old Testament times they had only a very small part of the Bible….just the first five books, called the Books of the Law.

God used a man named Abraham mightily. Abraham was special not because he was a king but because he loved God and was willing to be obedient to Him. The Bible tells us that God said to Abraham, “Depart from your country and your relatives, and come into the land that I will show you. (Canaan). But along with the command, God gave Abraham some wonderful promises:
(a) I will make you a great nation, and
(b) I will make your name great, and so
(c) You shall be a blessing.
(d) I will bless those who bless you and the one who curses you I will curse, and
(e) In you all the families of the earth shall be blessed.

You see, Abraham was called out of the city where he knew everybody with his family, and God told him to go somewhere he didn’t know anyone at all, and he didn’t even know where he was going. He just had to go and God would say “stop” when he got there. That took a lot of faith, but Abraham believed that God’s plan was best, and he obeyed him.

So taking Sarah, his wife, Lot, his nephew, and Terah, his father, Abraham set out for the land God would show him. Abraham believed God, and he was willing to be led by God. When Abraham came into the land…the Promised Land…God appeared to Abraham and said, “unto your children I will give this land. God kept His promise to Abraham. He always does. God’s Word is true. He never lies. We can depend on His Word. (Heb. 11:8)

Hundreds of years after Abraham died, the children of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob, left their land and went down into Egypt, where they could get food. They became slaves in the land of Egypt. Finally when they cried to God, He raised up a great leader, Moses, who led them out of Egypt and back toward this land which God had promised to give them. God did many miracles to show them that He was able to care for them. They went through the Red Sea on dry ground and when the Egyptians tried to follow them, what happened? They were drowned.

God wanted the children of Israel to march right in and take the land of Canaan away from the wicked people living there, but the people were afraid. At Kadesh Barnea twelve spies were sent ahead to look over the land and bring back a report. When they came back, ten of them said, “It is a wonderful land, filled with fruit and good things, but there are giants there. We could never conquer them. We just seem like grasshoppers before them, so little and so weak. We can’t take the land.” But two of the spies said, “We can take it. The Lord is with us, and He will give us the land. We are little and weak, but God will go before us.” Can you tell me the name of the two who said we can take it, we have God with us? Yes, it was Joshua and Caleb. Then what happened? The people listened to the ten spies and said, “No, we will not go.” They were looking at the giants. The two faithful spies, Caleb and Joshua, were looking at God.

God punished the people who would not believe His Word and who refused to obey Him. For forty long years they wandered in the wilderness until the ten spies and all the grown men who had followed them died and were buried in the wilderness. God said, “Because you did not believe me you shall never go into the good land which I wanted to give you.”

After forty years, the children of Israel finally went into the land…those who did not believe had died in the wilderness. The land which God gave to Abraham and His people is called the Promised Land. God told the children of Israel that they were to go into the land and take it away from the giants there! This new generation of Jews who had wandered 40 years in the wilderness felt that they were as little as grasshoppers beside the giants, but God was with them. They could not see with their eyes any more than we can see God today, but they could see His wonderful works. They had seen God provide for them daily. God had fed the children of Israel quail and manna in the wilderness for 40 years, and their shoes did not wear out!

The world in which we live is full of enemies within us who seem as giants to us. These enemies in our lives have names such as Fear, Disobedience, and Discouragement. These enemies seem too large and strong. Is there any way we can conquer such giants? In the lessons ahead we will see how God helped the children of Israel to stand against giants in the land, and we will see how God can enable us to fight against the giants we may encounter in our lives day by day. God expects His children to be so confident in Him that in any crisis they are the reliable ones—the ones who do not panic. If you are in God’s family, God wants you to depend on Jesus to do for you what you cannot do for yourself. He is adequate for your every need.

Today every believer—every person who has received Jesus as Savior has the Holy Spirit living in them. He GIVES us the power to do the things we should just as God gave Joshua power for the big job ahead. The invasion which Joshua was about to lead had been ordered by God. God had already planned this whole thing and He said, “now don’t be afraid for the Lord thy God will be with thee wherever thou goest.” There were two million people to take care of. They must have water; they must have food. They must have a place to camp; the soldiers must be ready to do battle, for there were enemies to be conquered in the new land to which they were going. There was a deep and wide river to be crossed. There were no bridges. There were no boats. The enemies in this new land were exceedingly wicked. Only a man who believed in God with all his heart could be the leader.

If you are one of God’s children, God wants you to look to Jesus to do for you what you cannot do yourself. He is adequate for your every need. Next we will see how Joshua planned to take the city of Jericho.