Not one of you will enter the land I swore with uplifted hand to make your home, except Caleb son of Jephunneh and Joshua son of Nun

Numbers 14:26-45

So tell them, ‘As surely as I live, declares the Lord, I will do to you the very thing I heard you say: In this wilderness your bodies will fall—every one of you twenty years old or more who was counted in the census and who has grumbled against me. Not one of you will enter the land I swore with uplifted hand to make your home, except Caleb son of Jephunneh and Joshua son of Nun. As for your children that you said would be taken as plunder, I will bring them in to enjoy the land you have rejected. But as for you, your bodies will fall in this wilderness. Your children will be shepherds here for forty years, suffering for your unfaithfulness, until the last of your bodies lies in the wilderness. For forty years—one year for each of the forty days you explored the land—you will suffer for your sins and know what it is like to have me against you.’

these men who were responsible for spreading the bad report about the land were struck down and died of a plague before the Lord.  Of the men who went to explore the land, only Joshua son of Nun and Caleb son of Jephunneh survived.

When Moses reported this to all the Israelites, they mourned bitterly. Early the next morning they set out for the highest point in the hill country, saying, “Now we are ready to go up to the land the Lord promised. Surely we have sinned!

Nevertheless, in their presumption they went up toward the highest point in the hill country, though neither Moses nor the ark of the Lord’s covenant moved from the camp. Then the Amalekites and the Canaanites who lived in that hill country came down and attacked them and beat them down all the way to Hormah.

Why?

Emotional action or action without the Lord won't be successful. 

For we are sons of the Lord, we were sinners, obeying the word of the Lord is the essential way of peace and freedom to us. 

When Moses told them the word of the Lord to the Israelites we thought they had sinned so we wanted to fight the Canaanites but without Moses nor the ark of the Lord's covenant moved from the camp.

Forty years is a long time in wildness for Israelites rejected the Lord ten times. Grumbling and not trusting in the Lord is their problem.

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第一代的以色列人，20歲以上的人，即數點可以打仗的60萬人無法進應許之起，其他如婦人和孩子可以進入應許之地，因為他們完全沒有能力打仗的人，反而可以進入應許之地，得到恩典。知道自己完全沒有能力，完全依靠神的可以得勝。神的審判也是恩典，報惡信的人遭瘟疫馬上死。40天抵40年，回到曠野繼續學習認識神，依靠神。經過一年學不會，就繼續學習。38年時間足夠他們悔改！

他們不願意接受神的審判，不甘心留在曠野，他們似乎悔改，卻沒有順服神安排的道路，接受神的審判。因此他們沒有真正悔改，只是怕回到曠野，死在曠野，似乎在賭看看是否能夠得勝?拒絕神安排的路，只是憑一時的衝動。反正都會死，爭鋒陷陣也有可能會得勝。人可以勇敢，但是沒有神的同在，只會送命。

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How?

The way of these Israelites is a mirror to all Christians and how we should serve the Lord in our lives.