Wednesday, March 24, 2010

March 24th

Today's reading from the One Year Chronological Reading Plan is Joshua 7-9 and 1 Chronicles 2:7.

Today's passage contains a few failures by the Israelites that came right on the heels of their spectacular victory over Jericho.

Achan's direct disobedience, combined with Joshua failing to inquire of God regarding the city of Ai, resulted in the army being routed and lives lost.

Joshua was surely on a high after their victory over Jericho, and since he knew God's plan was for them to destroy all the Canaanites, he failed to inquire of God how they were to go about attacking the city (he assumed they only needed a few soldiers, not the whole army). If he had inquired of the Lord, God would have revealed Achan's sin at that time, and the lives of the men in the army would've been spared.

How often do we just proceed because we assume we know God's will and plan for our lives without even asking Him? Of course, we can't go to the other extreme of never doing anything because we haven't received a divine revelation confirming what we're supposed to do. If our decision lines up with the Word of God, and we have prayed for direction, I think we can go ahead and pray that we are planning to proceed this way and ask God to slam shut the door if the timing/decision is wrong.

Notice too the reaction of the Israelites to the failed attack on Ai. They begin to doubt God and
His promises, not even considering that they could be to blame. Being willing to take personal responsibility is not in vogue these days either, but is a huge sign of maturity and something we need to strive to do.

Though doubts about God are included in Joshua's prayer, he humbles himself and pours out his true feelings and thoughts to God. An excellent example of what we should do when circumstances confuse us.

God's response is something we need to keep in mind as well. He doesn't want us to wallow in our despair, confusion and self-pity. From this commentary.....

While the Lord understands and sympathizes with our problems and fears, and while humbling ourselves before the Lord is always needed, He nevertheless never condones our being prostrate in despair nor excuses us from appropriating His grace and moving out in obedience. His word to us is get up off our face, get our eyes on Him and deal with our problems according to the principles and promises of Scripture. This is a call for decisive action that is willing to make tough decisions to deal with our sin. Feeling sorry and sad about our condition is not enough. We must be willing to deal decisively with our sins. “He who conceals his transgressions will not prosper, But he who confesses and forsakes them will find compassion” Proverbs 38:13

When the sin of Achan is revealed, God commands the Israelites to deal with it completely. His sin probably seemed like a small thing to him, but the consequences affected the entire nation and especially his family. We need to remember that our actions too affect more people than just ourselves, and not rationalize ours sins.

From the Life Application Study Bible
Why did Achan's entire family pay for his sin? The biblical record does not tell us if they were accomplices to his crime, but in the ancient world, the family was treated as a whole. Achan, as the head of hsi family, was likea tribal chief. If he prospered, the family prospered with him. If he suffered, so did they. Many Israelites had already died in battle because of Achan's sin. Now he was to be completely cut off from Israel..... In our permissive and individualistic culture we have a hard time understanding such a decree, but in ancient cultures this punishment was common. The punishment fit the crime: Achan had disobeyed God's command to destroy everything in Jericho; thus everything that belonged to Achan had to be destroyed. Sin has drastic consequences, so we should take drastic measure to avoid it.

Once the sin was dealt with, God instructed Joshua to attack Ai and they were completely successful.

However, this success was followed by another failure. The Gibeonites tricked the leaders of Israel into signing a peace treaty with them - again they made a decision based on their knowledge, instead of inquiring of the Lord. But they took an oath, and God had commanded that oaths be kept. We also need to remember not to take our promised lightly or make them hastily.

More commentaries on this passage are Victory at Ai and The Peril of Walking by Sight.

Tomorrow's passage: Joshua 10:1-12:6

6 comments:

Miriam said...

I've found what you said about praying about a decision and having the door either stay open or slam shut to be true several times. A specific example would be my Teen Missions trip. When I decided I'd like to go, I prayed and asked God that if it was His will for me to go then the funds that needed to be raised would come in. If it was not His will, then the funds would not come in. The funds came in and I went. That stands out in my mind every time I have an important decision to make. If we ask, He will answer.

I've also been thinking a lot in the past few years about keeping your word. It used to be that people did what they said they were going to do, or at least it seems that they did that more in the past than now. The Israelites made an oath with those people and had do keep it, regardless of the fact that they'd been deceived. I've been trying for a while now to remember to always do what I say I'll do. That means also remembering not to thoughtlessly agree to something and then find I can't follow through on it. James 5:12 says "Above all, my brothers, do not swear—not by heaven or by earth or by anything else. Let your "Yes" be yes, and your "No," no, or you will be condemned." To me that means that if your yes is yes and your no is no, then people will already know that you mean what you say and there is no need to swear by this or that. I also want my children to learn this. That means that when the time comes that they play on a sports team or join something like a club at school or a band or a choir, they need to be at every practice, every lesson, every game, etc. Man, all the things we have to not only teach our children by our words, but also set an example by our actions! It's exhausting to think about!

Tammy said...

Thanks Miriam, I agree.

The sports thing can be a tough call sometimes, because of our priorities. For example - Nathan teaches Sunday School and I am the superintendant - we simply can't miss church other than a rare exception. I also want our children to know that church is a priority. So we let the coaches know at the beginning of the year that the girls would not be playing Sunday games. They were fine with that. I imagine this could become more difficult as they get older, and the games become more important, because when you miss a game you are letting down the team. It's hard to know where to draw that line.

Mrs.Oz said...

we had our girls join some extra classes after school but the load was too tough and they were not functioning well. they were exhausted. they are 12 and 9 and still not ready to take all that on with homework. we told them that normally we would encourage them to really stick to it unless it was keeping them from doing more important things. it's hard to know when to bend and flex with kids sometimes. you don't want them to learn legalism either so it's tough. every commitment has it's level of importance, somethings you cannot ethically back out of, others you may have to.
I still cannot help but to be amazed that Achan did this. Espeially with the severity of his culture. It really shows how greatly his heart was corrupted with greed to be willing to put those he loved in deadly harm to have it.
I have to say too, the tough cultural ways has been hard for me in these readings. Killing of women, children, baby boys, innocent animals! Sheesh, sometimes it's tough to read it all and remember this is the God I hold with such effection in my heart! It even made going through some recent trials harder for me. I was tempted to feel it was my human way to have to suffer and started to feel God's care for me at a distance. I admit, I don't like thinking that God's okay with killing infants with a sword. Yet, it reminds me of his perfect righteousness that without Christ, we ALL would be dead. Still, I just had to say it's been tough and a little exhausting.

Miriam said...

True, Tammy, if arrangements are made when starting out for no Sunday games, etc. then that is part of the commitment and I see no problem with missing those games. They are still abiding by the commitment that they made.

Alicia, I agree that there are cases where one could allow them to back out of something if it is negatively affecting something more important. There is validity to that. I hope that I would then try to make it clear to them (age-appropriately, of course) that they need to be careful in the future when agreeing to or signing up for something that they try to make sure it's something they can follow through on. There can be a lesson there as well.

What I take issue with in general is people who can't be counted on. They are either never on time or don't show up at all, they say they'll bring something or do something and regularly don't, etc. I don't expect 100% perfection -- people make mistakes or forget sometimes. What irritates me is the people who "forget" on a regular basis - that indicates a lack of respect and inconsideration for others. That's why I think it's important to teach kids early on, with something short term like 10 weeks of swimming lessons, or a two-month season of soccer, that when they make a commitment to something it's important for them to stick to it.

Tammy said...

I agree Miriam!

We've had that opportunity in hockey as well. If they whine or complain about going we remind that that they/we together made the commitment to be on the team for the entire year. We can re-evaluate in summmer, but finishing out the year is not optional just because they don't feel like it.

I have to admit that being on time is a huge failure of mine. I am regularly late - never very late, usually less than 5 mins, but it's the principle of it. It irritates my husband as well who likes to be early, nevermind late! My problem is I always underestimate how much time it will take me to get ready. I need to learn my lesson and get ready ahead of time and then I can get other stuff done while I'm waiting, instead of making people wait for me. It's actually a very selfish trait to be late and this is something I need to improve on.

Miriam said...

I struggle with being punctual at times too, depending on how many of my kids I'm bringing with me! Like you say, it's usually less than 5 minutes, but it does aggravate me, especially when I'm making an extra effort to try to be on time.

It's not so much the 5 minutes late from people that bothers me. There are all kinds of good reasons why someone might be 5 minutes late and I don't want anyone to have an accident while rushing to get somewhere. What gets to me is people who just seem to have no regard for the time at all and show up an hour or more late EVERY TIME! And sometimes don't show up at all without even the courtesy of calling.