Joshua 11.
SATAN is not so easily defeated as we might think. He is very powerful, and he has I different weapons. We can easily see Jabin, king of Hazor, to be a good picture of the devil, for his name means “intelligent”, and he is the leader against the people of God in the land. He gathers a great army, terrifying in their numbers (verse 4), but numbers make no difference to God; “be not afraid”, is His word to Joshua, “for I will deliver them up all slain.”
How desperately they must have fought at the waters of Merom! Defeated here with his full strength engaged, the power of Satan over the whole land was broken before Joshua and his army.
Is not this a plain picture of Satan’s crushing defeat at the hands of the Lord Jesus when on the cross the victory was won whereby poor sinners are eternally saved? Then and there, on the cross of Calvary the judgment of this world was expressed, and the prince of this world was dealt such a blow that when his punishment is carried out, it will put him in hell forever (John 12:3131Now is the judgment of this world: now shall the prince of this world be cast out. (John 12:31); Rev. 20:1010And the devil that deceived them was cast into the lake of fire and brimstone, where the beast and the false prophet are, and shall be tormented day and night for ever and ever. (Revelation 20:10)).
In Joshua 11, verse 4 we read of the associated kings of Canaan and their armies: “And they went out, they and all their hosts with them, much people, even as the sand that is upon the seashore in multitude, with horses and chariots very many.”
It is the same energy of Satan as appeared on the Egyptian shore of the Red Sea in Exodus 14, only there Satan’s object was to prevent the deliverance of the people; here in Joshua 11, he was seeking to keep them from taking the place God had given His ransomed and separated people, behind whom rolled the waters of judgment.
Just so is it with Satan today. As to those who are not saved, but troubled about their sins, his determination is to stop them, —to hold them in his fearful slavery; and then with those who have received Christ as their personal Saviour, the devil does all he can to keep them from the enjoyment of the heavenly things which God has made theirs. Where do you stand, dear reader, in this warfare?
The victory must be God’s; no power can long stand against Him, so we learn in verse 8 of our chapter that Joshua’s forces “smote them (His enemies) until they left them none remaining”—their horses were killed and their chariots burned with fire. Hazor, the capital city of all those kingdoms, was utterly destroyed; Satan’s dwelling place will not do for God.
The believer’s heart rejoices in such words as verse 15. “As the Lord commanded Moses His servant, so did Moses command Joshua, and so did Joshua; he left nothing undone of all that the Lord commanded Moses.” Is the whole Word of God in this way before my reader?
ML 08/09/1925