When you read the Bible, it is rare to see someone respond to a giant the way David does. He looks at Goliath and basically says, “Yeah, he’s big. Totally scary. But my God is bigger and stronger. Let’s do this!”
Ever since I was a kid, everyone has used David’s story to talk about facing giants. But in Numbers 14, we see a very similar response from Joshua, something I have read countless times and overlooked. This morning, though, I noticed something completely different.
I’m in the throes of Numbers still and there is another moment in Scripture that carries the same courage and maybe even deeper wisdom. In Numbers 13 and 14, Moses sends twelve spies into the Promised Land. Joshua is one of them. He sees exactly what everyone else sees. A beautiful, rich land overflowing with promise. And also real opposition.
Fortified cities.
Legit giants.
The threat is not imagined.
The fear makes sense.
Yet when panic spreads, rebellion begins, and the people turn against God, Joshua responds in a way that stops me in my tracks.
They are bread for us. Sorry, what?
Apparently, no one else lingered on that phrase. In a nutshell, fear drowned it out. Rebellion took hold. And instead of moving forward into promise, Israel wandered for forty years.
But let’s go back. What was Joshua actually saying? Actually, in the original Hebrew it says כִּ֥י לַחְמֵ֖נוּ הֵ֑ם, which literally means “for they are our bread.” This is an ancient Near Eastern idiom, not trash talk or bravado. In the ancient world, bread was not a side item. It was daily survival. It was sustenance. It was strength. It was life.
To say, “They are bread for us,” was to say, this will not destroy us, it will sustain us. This will not weaken us, it will strengthen us. This will actually nourish what God is forming in us.
Joshua is not saying, “We will crush them easily.” He is saying, “This opposition will feed our obedience.” The battle itself would become part of God’s provision. It echoes Deuteronomy 8:3, where we are reminded that man does not live by bread alone, but by every word that comes from the mouth of the Lord. In other words, God was not just taking them into a land. He was forming a people.
I do not know what you are facing today. I do not know what kind of giant has taken up residence in the promise God has placed in front of you. But I do know this.
Fear makes giants look like monsters. Faith makes them look like meals.
Our God has a plan, and sometimes that plan includes real opposition. Not to break us, but to grow us. To shape us. To remind us that the same God who brought us here is the God who will keep us moving forward.
Do not be led by fear.
Be rooted in trust.
The Lord is with you.
Onward.
x Chari