…Surely the land on which your feet have walked shall be an inheritance to you and your children always, because you have wholly followed the Lord my God. – Joshua 14:9, Amplified Bible

Patience is one of the hardest virtues to harvest. Like any good crop, we must wait for patience to grow until its season is full. Yet, because of our impatience, we kick and scream every moment that we have to wait until the crop is ready for the sickle.

One thing that can help us endure the wait is to visualize what it will be like when we receive the promise God has given us. And, while we wait, we should saturate our minds and hearts with stories of others to whom God has been faithful in return for their faithfulness to Him. By doing these two things, our faith will grow along with our patience, and we will pass the time in contentment rather than in contention of heart.

Joshua 14 contains one such encouraging story of fulfilled hope. Finally, after forty-five years of waiting, trusty Caleb was able to claim the inheritance promised him by God years before at Kadesh-barnea (Number 13). As Caleb testified to Joshua, “the Lord has kept me alive…these forty-five years…and…I am this day eighty-five years old. Yet I am as strong today as I was the day Moses sent me; as my strength was then, so is my strength now for war and to go out and to come in. So now give me this hill country of which the Lord spoke that day…if the Lord will be with me, I shall drive them out just as the Lord said… So Hebron became the inheritance of Caleb…because he wholly followed The Lord.” (Joshua 14:10-14, Amplified Bible)

I have to believe that, during his forty-five year wait, Caleb often thought about what it would be like the day God fulfilled His promise. During the days of drudgery in the wilderness, such thoughts no doubt strengthened Caleb and those of his house. When we face the drudgery of our own wilderness wandering, we, too, should visualize the day His promise to us is fulfilled. For, by thinking on His promises rather than on our circumstances, we will walk a walk of obedience, faith, and dedication to God. If we allow ourselves to dwell upon today’s mundaneness, then discontentment and grumbling will most likely mark our character, and such would be displeasing to our Savior.

If God was willing and able to maintain Caleb’s strength for the day the promise would be fulfilled, then He is willing and able to do the same for us today. All we need do while waiting is wholly follow The Lord, and we can be sure the promise will come.

Are you wholly following The Lord today?