Daily Encouragement / March 3

Give me this mountain” says Caleb in the words of the Authorized Version. This plea of the old warrior reminds us that God’s best men are mountain men. They covet service in the heights, and in doing so follow in the footsteps of “Jesus, the pioneer of our faith” (Heb. 12:2 RSV), who climbed Mount Calvary, the highest mountain of all.

Men of such spiritual calibre are prepared to dare the difficult. Caleb might have requested an easier place to occupy, but for men like him the presence of the Anakites is an incentive rather than a deterrent. Men like him will gladly gamble their lives for God - the very thing said about Epaphroditus, one of their kind (Phil. 2:29-30).

They have this attitude because they are devoted to the Lord and follow him wholeheartedly. This is their constant prayer:

Make us Thy mountaineers,
We would not linger on the lower slope,
Fill us afresh with hope, O God of hope,
That undefiled we may climb the hill
As seeing Him who is invisible
Let us die climbing, when this little while
Lies far behind us, and the last defile
Is all alight, and in that light we see
Our Leader and our Lord, what will it be?
(Amy Carmichael)

“Now then, give me this hill country about which the Lord spoke on that day, for you heard on that day that Anakim were there, with great fortified cities; perhaps the Lord will be with me, and I will drive them out as the Lord has spoken.””

‭‭Joshua‬ ‭14‬:‭12‬ ‭NASB1995‬‬