READ: JOSHUA 14:6-15 TEXT: V8 MADE THE HEART/PEOPLE MELT
Nevertheless my brethren that went up with me made the heart of the people melt: but I wholly followed the LORD my God.
Context: Testimony of Caleb – a very godly/faithful man
A man who wholly follows the Lord is a good witness to heed
Not a man given to deception or self seeking
Just as Jehovah abominates lying lips (Proverbs 12:22) so too His faithful followers, even if to their own disadvantage
Neither should we disregard his testimony here because he is old
It is true that he is 85 years old and so we might think of attributing some of his words to the dotage/old age etc.,
But his claim that he was as strong (mentally/physically) at 85 as he was at the peak age of 40 (v11) must discount that
He is speaking under the inspiration/God and so must be heard
In his testimony, he recalls how he went as a spy into the Land/Canaan and brought back word as it was in his heart
(From the actual account in Numbers - it was a positive word)
Had the people listened to Caleb (and Joshua) – they would have gone up 45 years previously and conquered the Canaanites
But the people did not heed the 2 faithful spies
Rather they heeded the words of the unfaithful 10 spies who said that such conquest could not be accomplished
This report (false report) had an effect upon the people
Our text: it made their hearts melt
Did not encourage them or strengthen them or make them bold and
courageous – rather it turned them into cowards and they turned
their back, on this misinformation, from the blessing
Particularly sad that the source of this lie within the brethren themselves who actually had gone up with Caleb and Joshua
Did not fall victim to Canaanite propaganda or enemy deception
They met with these false words from within their own camp
Safely observe how Satan can appear as an angel/light and deceive many into believing his soul damning falsehoods
When we come to the gospel, we observe how people are quick to believe
the lie rather than the truth and so experience their heart melting
with subsequent failure to enter/Promised Land
Let us observe 3 different lies (any 1 of which is sufficient) to send sinners away from Christ rather than draw them to Him
1) THE SINNER’S HEART WILL MELT WHEN HE IS TOLD THAT GOD IS TOO HOLY TO FORGIVE HIM:
May be worded in another way: Sinner is too sinful to be saved
Picture one who has been awakened to a conscious need/Saviour
How has this most blessed condition been brought about?
A/ A faithful Christian will have witnessed to them
Perhaps one like Caleb who has wholly followed the Lord
[i] Wholly followed Him in the sense of dedication/discipleship
[ii] Wholly followed Him in faithfully proclaiming His truth
Such a faithful witness has been making judicial use/law of God:
The law/God was given to expose the wickedness of men’s hearts
Law/God is a scalpel that lays bare the wickedness/heart
Let one get beyond a superficial glance of the commandments
The law is a schoolmaster – it educates man to his need/Christ
Furthermore, the bare page alone will not do this
One who feels need/Christ will have been convicted/Holy Spirit
And when he is come, he will reprove the world of sin, and of righteousness, and of judgment: (John 16:8)
B/ Imagine such a one – alive to the reality/sin and judgment
hereafter and the holiness/God that must punish sin – being
told that while his views of God’s hatred
of sin are correct, yet they mean that he cannot be saved – that he has
sinned away salvation
What a calamity – awakened/need early but left high and dry
Akin to spending years in death row without an execution date
Asian country where prisoners are not told the day/execution
Every opening/cell door might be the last time for them – daily
C/ Left unchallenged – such a thought/sinner could well drive him to despair and into depression and into suicide itself
We must therefore challenge it at every opportunity
Truth is that Christ died for the ungodly (Romans 5:6)
Spoke of harlots/other wicked entering into the Kingdom
Stated that the whole world is lying/wickedness
Best argument/all: 1 Timothy 1:15 (“…chief/sinners…”)
D/ Worth noting that the Devil often uses/opposite argument
Tells refined sinners: salvation is only for the extreme cases
This does not melt/heart so much as blind the eyes/reality
But let none yet alive conclude himself to beyond redemption
Even if he should come trembling…yet let him come
Invitation/wide (Revelation 22:17) - the assurance solid (John 6:37)
Another way to ensure that sinner’s hearts will melt:
2) TELLING…THE WAY/SALVATION: TOO DIFFICULT/OBTAIN:
This false report feeds equally on two different kind/lies
[i] Assumes that salvation is by human merit or contribution
Sinner must do something to earn the favour/God
Worth/salvation is recognised but no mention of grace
Sinner is encouraged to think that he cannot only buy/earn
Realising worth/salvation, sinner’s heart then melts
How can I ever attain to doing/paying enough?
This is why you see people on long pilgrimages and fasts etc.,
Never assured that they have done enough to pay/price
Two things to learn fast to keep the heart from so melting:
[i] Salvation is sourced entirely in grace: Romans 3:24
[ii] Salvation is appropriated by faith alone; Romans 5:1
Price has been paid full through Christ dying/Cross
One who paid price has decided to make it a free gift
A gift can only be received – without money/price (Isaiah 55:1)
Let no man’s heart melt because of false views/subject
If salvation were by human contribution – well may he despair
Let him cry out/the deepest despair for he would never be saved
But if it be by grace through faith alone…then let him avail of it
[ii] Another kind/falsehood that lies nearer home/Evangelicals
That the sinner needs to display a certain degree of repentance
before he can be saved by faith
What is repentance? Simple answer: It is a U Turn
The sinner whose face is towards sin/hell turns his face towards holiness/heaven
He expresses sorrow for his sins and his delight for God
Repentance and faith are like Siamese twins – they are joined
We believe with a repentant faith – we repent in faith
Faith without repentance is assumption and leads to deception
Repentance without faith is mere remorse and leads to despair
Salvation/Bible is promised to returning/repenting rebels
God will pardon the returning rebel and forgive him
But there are no mercy for those who want to sit on in rebellion
That would be akin to God endorsing their rebellion
So there must be repentance or else the soul will perish (Luke 13:3)
Here’s where the hearts of some are made to melt in despair
Not for the witnessing saint to insist on the level/repentance
If there is no sorrow – but instead of proliferation/excuses – then let there be no “sinner’s prayer” etc.,
But let there not be a man made standard set
That some repent very deeply more than others appear to is clear to be seen
Several reasons may be attributed to this:
Depth plunged into sin – nature of the seeker etc.,
God has not set the standard/Bible so that we may gauge
We must look for repentance but not try/set the required level
If we do try and speak where God has not spoken:
We may be guilty of making the hearts/people melt
Tempt the anxious sinner to invent repentance
Let us go no further than what God has declared
Think of the simple question in Acts 16:30
Think of the even simpler answer in Acts 16:31
Men believe and repent through the power/God
Let God affect the work through our witnessing
Enough for us to sow the seed and let God gave the increase
Never put roadblocks in the way/sinners
Human heart, even if awakened, is so liable to melt
Satan is extremely active at this time
Shame if we were to be even unwitting instruments in his hand
By insisting in the principle/repentance we avoid easy believism
By insisting: salvation/faith we avoid merit mongering altogether
Here’s another way, men make men’s hearts to melt:
3) THEY TELL THE SINNER THAT THE CHRISTIAN LIFE IS TOO HARD TO LIVE:
A/ Again, there is an element/truth in the charge
No one would deny that the Christian life is hard to live
Think of the language/Scripture – even use the word extreme
[i] Denying ourselves and taking up the Cross daily (Luke 9:23)
[ii] Enduring hardness as good soldiers/Jesus Christ (2 Timothy 2:3)
[iii] Exhorted: be thou partaker of the afflictions of the gospel according to the power of God; (2 Timothy 1;8)
Christian heroes include folk like Moses:
Because when he was come to years,
refused to be called the son of Pharaoh's daughter; Choosing rather to
suffer affliction with the people of God, than to enjoy the pleasures
of sin for a season; Esteeming the reproach of Christ greater riches
than the treasures in Egypt: for he had respect unto the recompence of
the reward. (Hebrews 11:24-26)
B/ Faithful witnessing will have conveyed to the sinner (especially
when repentance is dealt with properly) that salvation is much more
than a ticket to heaven when you die
It involves/requires a change of life different from our unregenerate days when we gave ourselves to sin/pleasure
C/ Devil overloads the duty end of things
Satan certainly won’t tell the seeking sinner that he can do all things through the power/strength of Christ
Paul said: For me to live is Christ (Philippians 1:21) – that is true
Christianity is much more than that – for Paul spoke again:
Christ liveth in me (Galatians 2:20)
Sinners are not born of the spirit and then abandoned by God
Who then could be saved i.e. make it home safely to Heaven?
No one – even the mightiest Christian could not do it
Paul himself would have failed and heaven would be empty
Those whom God saves, God keeps and enables to live for Him
Let no one fear to trust the Lord at any point
Not least in the salvation of the soul
A melting heart cannot save
A heart that builds upon the Rock/Ages is safe forevermore
Appeal
THE END