The Power of Two Faithful Witnesses
In reading chapter two from the book of Joshua, I noticed the contrast between the two spies sent in to Jericho and the twelve sent in to Canaan in Numbers 13, where ten of the twelve spies brought back a faithless report and two offered a faith-filled report. The people were discouraged by the ten fearful witnesses and accordingly, spent 40 years in the wilderness. In the case of Jericho, only two faith-filled spies were sent. They brought back a positive report and all of Israel miraculously crossed the flood-stage Jordan River on dry ground. Afterward, Joshua chose twelve witnesses (one from each of the tribes) to gather a stone from the river and build a monument in testimony to God’s deliverance.
In the first case, the negative report of the ten spies made cowards of all the people. In the second case, the positive report of the two spies encouraged and brought victory to all the people and enabled twelve of them to step forward as faithful witnesses.
A clear lesson for leaders emerges from the contrasting cases: Don’t surrender power to the doubters. Empower and deploy those who faithfully embrace the mission and use their examples to encourage and empower everyone. They see and commit to the vision and view the world through the lens of its achievement. Most people see the vision more slowly and need more encouragement. They should not be placed in the position of speaking for the vision or the mission and strategy that emerges to achieve it.
In this case, the vision is to inhabit the land that flows with milk and honey and live there in shalom under God’s blessing. The mission for accomplishing that vision is to enter the land by crossing the Jordan River and conquering the cities. The strategic plan begins in Jericho: first establishing a base of operations and then moving throughout the land in conquest. Vision always comes first, then a mission emerges to achieve the vision, and then a strategy is adopted to achieve the mission. Even if people get excited about the vision and the benefits it will entail, they may be slower to put their faith in the mission and the strategy that leaders propose to achieve it.
People who don’t believe in the vision and its achievement aren’t “bad.” They just cannot commit to what they haven’t seen. If they are led properly, they will eventually see victory and become faithful witnesses to the win. In other words, they might not be among the two, but they can become one of the twelve.
Leaders achieve the vision of their organization by communicating a vision, the missional plan to achieve it, and building the social architecture (structures, teams, and supporters) that will carry out the strategy. To succeed, they have to identify the early adopters who see the vision and have faith that it can succeed. They deploy people whose faith helps to spread the vision, mission, and strategy to everyone else. That makes the skeptics and naysayers useless for key positions of leadership. Leaders should hear their opinions, listen to their concerns, and be open to their wisdom, but they must not deploy them at a higher level than they have faith for. As the contrasting stories from Numbers and Joshua illustrate, two can be stronger and wiser than twelve, but under good leadership, the twelve will come along.