Year 4, Day 200: Joshua 15

Theological Commentary: Click Here 

Discipleship Focus: Imitation

• Imitation: This is the second over-arching step of the discipleship process.  First we gain information, then we imitate our spiritual mentor.  Imitation leads to innovation of spirituality in our own life.

Today I’m going to look hard at the relationship between Ohniel and Caleb.  I will begin by confessing that I am going to make some basic assumptions.  I’m going to assume that Caleb and his nephew were on good relations.  I think this is a fair assumption as Caleb offers up his daughter for marriage to Othniel.  I’m also going to make the assumption that Othniel was a pretty decent guy, which I think is supported in general by the fact that Othniel is the first judge we meet in the book of Judges.  Of course, we don’t need to assume anything about Caleb’s character.  We spoke at length about that yesterday.

I think that it is a really cool testimony that we get here between Othniel and Caleb.  Remember the chain of influence here.  Moses was the original leader.  Joshua and Caleb liked, listened to, and served underneath Moses.  Joshua became the next spiritual leader.  Caleb liked, listened to, and served under Joshua.  Then Caleb got his allotment and became a person of influence.  We find Othniel in the circle of Caleb’s influence.  Othniel appears to like and listen to Caleb.  We know here in this story that he is willing to serve Caleb.

This is a pattern we will see all throughout scripture.  Elijah and Elisha.  Daniel and his three friends.  Jesus and His disciples.  Barnabas and Paul.  Paul and Timothy.  Paul and Titus.  Paul and Luke.  Peter and Mark.  These are just the easiest examples to point out, but they are not the only ones.

The reality is that all throughout the Bible we find that great leaders in the faith are born out of relationship and submission to other great leaders in the faith.  In order to become greater than just a “Bible Theologian” and actually become a disciple-maker, we need to learn to submit to others.  We need to put ourselves into a place where we can learn to imitate those of faith around us.  This step is usually the most overlooked, and it is also one of the worst steps to overlook.

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