GOING IN FOR THE INHERITANCE
J. Webster
2 Samuel 15: 19–22; Joshua 14: 6–15; 15: 16–19; 17: 3–6; 1 Kings 21: 1–3
I would like to say a few words from these scriptures, beloved brethren, about going in for the inheritance and not giving it up. They are well known scriptures and I am not going to say anything new, but I would desire to say a few words by the help of the Spirit of God that something may come into our souls by way of quickening, to stimulate us and set us forward in relation to the Lord’s things. The persons I have read of are all persons who were interested in the things of God, and we give one another credit as being here today because we are interested in these things. They were persons who were marked by energy and that is also needed. As well as the desire to have things we need to have the energy to get them. We are living in difficult times. Things around us are not improving generally in the world; that is known to men apart from believers. Man’s systems are not infallible. They can fail, as we have seen in recent years, how the greatest institutions of men are very uncertain to say the least, but there is nothing uncertain about the things of God. The things of God are absolutely sure, and if you want to be sure of your ground, sure of your future, you need to go in for these things. Paul says, “the things that are seen are for a time, but those that are not seen eternal”, 2 Corinthians 4: 18.
There was a blessed Man of whom it says, “that for your sakes he, being rich, became poor, in order that ye by his poverty might be enriched”, 2 Corinthians 8: 9. That involved Him coming here into manhood. In John 8, when he spoke to that woman who was taken in the act, twice it says of Him that stooping down He wrote on the ground. The Lord Jesus came down from glory’s heights to this world and He had a purpose before Him. He came for a purpose, and that was to fill out the will of God. The great matter that lay upon man was death. It reigned from Adam until Moses. It says, “thus death passed upon all men, for that all have sinned”, Romans 5: 12. There it lay. Nobody could meet the matter until Jesus came, and He went into death.
He moved here amongst men, for thirty years of secret history, what a pathway it was. We are told very little about it, but we get quite a lot about the three and a half years of His public service. John says, “if they were written one by one, I suppose that not even the world itself would contain the books written”, John 21: 25. He went into death and we were touchingly reminded at a recent burial that when He went into death, death had to give way. The Jordan had to give way before Him. The psalmist says, “What ailed thee, thou sea, that thou fleddest? thou Jordan, that thou turnedst back?”, Psalm 114: 5. You think of the touch of sarcasm in that. Death itself had to give way. It had reigned as a monarch for all those years, and when this blessed Man went into it, it had to give way. He annulled it. He was in the heart of the earth three days and three nights, then He came out of death and He was taken up into heaven. It says, “a cloud received him out of their sight”, Acts 1: 9. That is the present position, that there is a Man in heaven.
I have been reading a little in Joshua and when you come to Joshua 10 nothing could stand before Joshua. It says in verse 12, “Then spoke Joshua to Jehovah in the day when Jehovah gave up the Amorites before the children of Israel, and he said in the sight of Israel, Sun, stand still upon Gibeon; And thou, moon, in the valley of Ajalon! And the sun stood still, and the moon remained where it was, until the nation had avenged themselves upon their enemies”. And then it says, “And there was no day like that before it or after it, that Jehovah hearkened to the voice of a man”. There is a Man in heaven, and this whole dispensation, this day that is spoken of typically in Joshua, the day we are in, there has never been a day like it, and there will never be a day like it again. God is working out His great thoughts in this present dispensation and securing what will be for eternity. We may have some small apprehension of it, but the immensity of what God is working out at this present time should take hold of us; God through grace would give us to have a part in it.
So I have read of these persons here. Ittai in the first scripture is well known, Ittai the Gittite. David refers to him as a stranger. We have all come in that way; the Jews had many advantages but we Gentiles had no claims on God, but in wonderful grace, God commends His love to us. Think of how God has reached out to us in view of our coming into this wonderful system of blessing. This was a man who was a foreigner, but here he has attached himself to David. It is one of the most important things in Christianity, especially for young people, but it applies to older people just the same, that we are closely attached to the Lord Jesus Christ. There is no substitute for it. Maybe you can look back on a time when you accepted Him as your Saviour, but you need to have a current link with Him, and so David tests this man out. He says, you are a stranger, you do not have to go with me. David was in rejection at this point and the Lord Jesus is in rejection in this world. But He is the centre of God’s universe. He will be eternally, and God intends that He should be the centre of your world now. We are largely the centre of our own world, but in the glad tidings God would work in grace that the Lord Jesus may become the centre of my world and your world.
This man Ittai is an example of a real believer. David says to him, “Return and take back thy brethren. Mercy and truth be with thee! And Ittai answered the king and said, As Jehovah liveth, and as my lord the king liveth, surely in what place my lord the king shall be, whether in death or life, even there also will thy servant be”. Many of us have grown up in fellowship, and we may have come into things, not automatically, but in a certain sense things have been made easy for us. However we need to be definite as to our committals to the Lord Jesus as Ittai was to David.
I refer to Caleb in the book of Joshua. He was a man with a long history. He was eighty-five, and had been with the spies that Moses sent to spy out the land. When they came back ten of them had an evil report, and were occupied with all the difficulties. Christianity is not always easy but two of these men, Joshua and Caleb, came right through. They had a good report of the land. It shows amongst other things that the majority are not always right. You might feel in your local meeting that you are very small, but these were two men out of twelve and they went right through the wilderness. So here we have Caleb. Think of the definiteness with which he speaks. He is claiming his inheritance. There are some things that God has made available to us, and they have been made available at great cost. Think of God and what He has given. It has been at tremendous cost to God to make these things available to us. “He who, yea, has not spared his own Son, but delivered him up for us all, how shall he not also with him grant us all things?”, Romans 8: 32. Caleb is putting in his claim here to the inheritance.
He goes over his history and we can go over our histories. Largely they are histories of failure, but it is good to go over them. We can find points in our histories where we did what was right. If you go back over your history you will find points where you felt the support of God in what you did. So Caleb says here, “And Moses swore on that day, saying, The land whereon thy feet have trodden shall assuredly be thine inheritance, and thy children’s for ever! for thou hast wholly followed Jehovah my God”. I would encourage all of us that we might be in these things as committed and definite persons, not half-heartedly. Paul says to Timothy, “be wholly in them”, 1 Timothy 4: 15. The Lord Jesus is the prime example to us in everything; at the age of twelve He said to His parents, “did ye not know that I ought to be occupied in my Father’s business?”, Luke 2: 49. So here Caleb says, “I am this day eighty-five years old. I am still this day strong, as in the day that Moses sent me—as my strength was then, even so is my strength now, for war, both to go out and to come in”. Persons get old and the physical frame deteriorates, but what is spiritual can begin to take the ascendancy. This man was strong spiritually. I think he sets out the line of faith. Nothing was too much for him; his enemies did not deter Caleb in the slightest. I like this word here at the end of verse 12, “If so be Jehovah shall be with me”— we cannot be presumptuous.
I like this spirit of Caleb. He says first, “And now give me this mountain, of which Jehovah spoke in that day; for thou heardest in that day that Anakim are there, and great fortified cities. If so be Jehovah shall be with me, then I shall dispossess them, as Jehovah said”. God never lets anyone down who is looking for His help. We need to be persons who are humble and count upon the help which comes from God. Paul says in one place, “Having therefore met with the help which is from God I have stood firm unto this day”, Acts 26: 22. Well, Caleb says, “If so be Jehovah shall be with me, then I shall dispossess them, as Jehovah said. And Joshua blessed him”. I do not think there is anyone that has this attitude that will feel that they have been let down. There is plenty in Christianity for every one. It is a wonderful system that God is calling us into where we can get as much as we want. So this man got Hebron. It refers to the purpose of God. It is a fine thing to get some touch in your soul as to the purpose of God, how God marked us out; God purposed in Himself before the ages of time. Things go away back before time, when God had plans in mind that He should tabernacle eternally with men, and He marked us out beforehand for adoption through Jesus Christ to Himself. Much had to be worked out in the interim. It involved meeting the sin question but God met all that, all the expenditure that was involved God met it; and so it says, “Hebron therefore became the inheritance of Caleb the son of Jephunneh the Kenizzite to this day, because he wholly followed Jehovah the God of Israel”.
Now I read about these persons in chapter 15. Caleb said, “He that smites Kirjath-sepher and takes it, to him will I give Achsah my daughter as wife. And Othniel the son of Kenaz, the brother of Caleb, took it”. I am not going to say too much about that; I think it has been referred to as the city of the book, but it says in any case that “Othniel the son of Kenaz, the brother of Caleb, took it; and he gave him Achsah his daughter as wife. And it came to pass as she came, that she urged him to ask of her father a field; and she sprang down from the ass”. I think it is very fine to see what these persons were interested in. “And Caleb said to her. What wouldest thou?” It is a good question to ask ourselves as to what we are looking for. God asked Solomon that question, “Ask what I shall give thee”, 2 Chronicles 1: 7. What would you like out of life, young people, and older people for that matter? What would I like out of life? What am I looking for? He said to her, “What wouldest thou?” This is a young woman, it might apply to the young sisters. He says to this young woman, “What wouldest thou? And she said, Give me a blessing”.
There are wonderful blessings to be found in Christianity, “Things which eye has not seen, and ear not heard, and which have not come into man’s heart, which God has prepared for them that love him, but God has revealed to us by his Spirit”, 1 Corinthians 2: 9, 10. God would make these things known to us, beloved, by the Spirit of God. Since the Lord Jesus went on high the Spirit of God is here. Then she says, “Give me a blessing”. Would you like a blessing from God? You have to go in for these things to know something of the joy, the quickening touch that comes into your soul, the thrill that comes into your soul as you get some touch of divine things. She says, “Give me a blessing; for thou hast given me a southern land; give me also springs of water”. I suppose a southern land would speak of an area where everything is favourable. It is not favourable for the Christian in this world, but there is an area that you can touch by the Spirit where everything is favourable. She says, “thou hast given me a southern land; give me also springs of water”. I think the springs of water are what maintains us in freshness. The Lord spoke to the woman in John 4 about “a fountain of water, springing up into eternal life” (John 4: 14). What do we know about our links with the Spirit of God?
We have the Scriptures, maybe we could link these lower springs and the upper springs with Romans and Ephesians but we need the Spirit of God that these things may be living in our souls and maintained in freshness. The Spirit of God would maintain things in freshness in our souls. The Scriptures are part of our inheritance, and the Spirit of God would make them living to us. Think of these persons in Luke 24 as they walked away from Jerusalem. The Lord Jesus joined them and He opened up to them the Scriptures; He spoke to them about the Scriptures and their hearts were burning. The Spirit of God would bring a touch into your soul about the Lord Jesus Christ. What a Man He is! When Paul begins the epistle to the Romans, it is God’s glad tidings concerning His Son. He is the centre of God’s universe and, as I said to begin with, it is intended that He should be the centre of your world and my world. Achsah says, “give me also springs of water”. Well, we might be tested as to what we want. It has often been said that we get what we go in for. We have quoted it often but it is still true. If you go in for worldly things that is what you get; if you go in for spiritual things God will give them to you. Caleb got them and this young woman was given the upper springs and the lower springs.
I refer now to the five daughters of Zelophehad. It is very beautiful how they come up in the Scriptures a number of times, and almost every time the Spirit of God goes over their names. It appears that it was a peculiar delight for the Spirit of God to name these persons; and you know, your name is known. It is known amongst the brethren of course, but it is known in heaven; think of that. Every believer’s name is written there. The Lord Jesus said to the disciples, “rejoice that your names are written in the heavens”, Luke 10: 20. It is fine to know that your name is written in heaven. Once it is written there it will never be erased. These persons came up in Joshua 17 and they were claiming their inheritance. They were definite about what they wanted, it says here, “And they came near before Eleazar the priest, and before Joshua the son of Nun, and before the princes, saying, Jehovah commanded Moses to give us an inheritance among our brethren”. They knew what they wanted and they were going to have it; so it says, “And he gave them according to the commandment of Jehovah an inheritance among the brethren of their father”. These young persons knew what they wanted and they went in for it.
I refer now in closing to Naboth. He had received things from his fathers. We need a link with the Lord Jesus, we need a link with the Spirit of God, we have the Scriptures, and we have the ministries. There is a wonderful inheritance in these ministries that are on our bookshelves and they are there to be assimilated. Then we have the local meeting and those with whom we can work things out. These things are all part of our inheritance, and we should value them and be committed to them. Ahab was king of Israel at this time, and he should have been giving a lead to the people of God in the right direction, but he was a wicked king. He served the Baals and he wanted this vineyard. It has been likened to Christendom; he was not far away, he was quite near, and he wanted what Naboth had without the moral exercises connected with it. So he says, “Give me thy vineyard ... and I will give thee for it a better vineyard than it”. He apparently wanted it as a convenience but he did not really put a proper value on it. Ahab says, “I will give thee for it a better vineyard than it; if it seem good to thee, I will give thee its value in money”. None of these things influenced Naboth. It would appear that no amount of money that he could have given Naboth would have paid for this vineyard, and he certainly could not have given him a better one.
I think we need to be definite about matters. I take it to myself first; we need to be definite about our Christianity, and be in it in a real way and value these things that have come down to us at great cost. Men have suffered for them; you go over Hebrews 11 and you think of what these men suffered in the testimony, “a cloud of witnesses”, Hebrews 12: 1. There have been many since that time who have suffered for the truth; things have come down to us at tremendous cost and we are intended to value them. “And Naboth said to Ahab, Jehovah forbid it me, that I should give the inheritance of my fathers to thee!” There is what has come down to us from our fathers, our spiritual fathers, and it may be from our natural fathers too in a right way. He says, “Jehovah forbid it me”. He is not going to give it up. The local meeting is where the Lord has placed us to work things out for His will and where we can share things. Christianity is a sharing of things. We are told in Romans 8, “The Spirit itself bears witness with our spirit, that we are children of God. And if children, heirs also—heirs of God, and Christ’s joint heirs” (Romans 8: 16). It is wonderful that we are brought into these things, to share and enjoy things with that blessed Man.
I was just thinking, we have been speaking about the local meeting and being committed to it; that if we have any spare time we can share things with the next meeting. It is very good when there is neighbourliness among meetings. Recently we were very small, it was holiday time in July, and my wife and I thought we might be the only ones at the reading. However we had an extra local brother and seven brethren came from Peterhead; it was like a fellowship meeting! Small meetings really appreciate an unexpected visit now and then. We do not have to be very old to go along to the next meeting and give them a little encouragement. Christianity is a sharing of things and a working together. Well, let us be committed to these things, beloved brethren, and value what has come down to us in the way of inheritance. May the Lord help us, for His name’s sake.
Address at Dundee
5 September 2009