Here is a wonderful ministry for the servant of God: to commission, encourage and strengthen one who can do for the people what he cannot and take them further than he can. It is a ministry to be accepted without any sense of jealousy or regret for past failure. Such might well have been Moses’ reaction, but he accepted the Lord’s “That is enough” (Deut. 3:26) and went ahead to give the charge to Joshua.
How well he did it we read further on: “Then Moses summoned Joshua and said to him . . . ‘Be strong and courageous . . . The Lord himself goes before you and will be with you; he will never leave you nor forsake you. Do not be afraid; do not be discouraged’” (Deut. 31:7-8).
What an encouragement for Joshua to be commissioned by Moses, for Timothy to receive his charge from Paul: “In the presence of God and of Christ Jesus, who will judge the living and the dead and in view of his appearing and his kingdom, I give you this charge: Preach the Word” (2 Tim. 4:1 ff). Those who give such charges magnify the Lord rather than themselves, yet in thus humbling themselves under his mighty hand they are exalted (1 Pet. 5:6).
“But charge Joshua and encourage him and strengthen him, for he shall go across at the head of this people, and he will give them as an inheritance the land which you will see.’”
Deuteronomy 3:28 NASB1995
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