Joshua 23-24
The last words of this servant of God possess a peculiar emphasis, and demand special attention. When Israel hearkened to the last exhortations of their captain, their privileges had to be retained, their position kept.
How different was this exhortation from that given before the Jordan was crossed! The freshness of their early zeal had passed away, and they were settling down among Jehovah’s enemies, apathetic to His honor, and to the integrity of their own position. The leaven of the surrounding evil nations was already among them, and had lowered their standard of separation to God, when Joshua exhorted them, “Come not among these nations, these that remain among you.” The gods of these wicked nations had been allowed in their midst, and they were now bidden “neither make mention of their names”; the inheritance itself was for a great part peopled by Jehovah’s enemies. “Behold, I have divided unto you by lot these nations that remain ... with all the nations that I have cut off.”
What should be felt by the believer to be a terrible word, reached Israel at this time. “If ye do in any wise go back.” This word now occurs for the first time in the book of Joshua, but, settling down precedes backsliding, and they had not come to need such a warning suddenly. At Jericho evil had entered their camp; then, with an upright spirit it was summarily judged, and the camp cleansed. At Gibeon a worse thing happened, the unwatchful princes were deceived into alliance with the wicked, from which they could not free themselves. Afterward the enervated men of war of Judah and Ephraim tolerated the heathen among them, and at last, when the seven tribes received their inheritance, it was the land with its inhabitants also, “the nations that remain.”
What was “going back?” It was leaving the place of separation to God. It was entering into alliance with evil. Making marriages with the nations and uniting in worshipping their gods. If they would go back into what God hated, His strength would be taken from them, and the very powers which they once overcame would become their oppressors. “Know for a certainty that the Lord your God will no more drive out any of these nations from before you; but they shall be snares and traps unto you, and scourges in your sides, and thorns in your eyes, until ye perish from off this good land which the Lord your God hath given you.”
Our own day is a day of going back; going back into worldliness, into superstition, into infidelity, into abominations from which to deliver themselves and their fellows, and above all the name of the Lord, soldiers of Christ in earlier times freely shed their blood. The mass of Christians is enervated. There is but little power to withstand evil, although here and there a noble spirit rises up. Our inheritance is now peopled with enemies, and the chief thing required of the soldier of Christ is that he disentangle himself from the foes which surround him; that he, in spirit and in practice, be separate for the Lord. “We wrestle ... against principalities, against powers, against the rulers of the darkness of this world, against spiritual wickedness in high (heavenly) places.” But if there be a desire “to cleave unto the Lord,” the promise is still before us, and the feeblest believer may prove His faithfulness who spake it. “The Lord your God, He it is that fighteth for you, as He hath promised you.” One shall chase a thousand; the might of the foe is of no moment, for the Lord cannot fail. A heart for the Lord was the remedy set before Israel – “Take good heed therefore unto yourselves, that ye love the Lord your God.” True devotedness to Christ frees the soul from tyrants and makes it victorious over oppression, and as it deepens in love to Him, it will gain greater victories. The Lord never exhorts, never bids us deliver ourselves, without showing us the path of strength. He does not array evil before us, except that in the spirit of self-judgment, and in the power of His might, we may free ourselves for Him. Would that God’s people, who lament the state of Christians in this present day, might “Take good heed unto themselves that they love the Lord their God;” each then would become a center of strength and a lamp holding forth the words of life, displaying the glorious character of the Lord. Dwelling upon evil only defiles the spirit; we should betake ourselves to the contemplation of the good. Jericho, Gibeon, the past alliances, the present condition of the mass of Israel could not be changed, melancholy as all these things were. But bright the light, and sure the promise to the faithful heart.
Each believer will readily set his seal to the following words: “Ye know in all your hearts and in all your souls, that not one thing hath failed of all the good things which the Lord your God spake concerning you; all are come to pass unto you, and not one thing hath failed thereof”; and let us also lay to heart the warning which follows, a warning especially suitable for “these last days” in which there are “ungodly men, turning the grace of our God into lasciviousness” (Jude 44For there are certain men crept in unawares, who were before of old ordained to this condemnation, ungodly men, turning the grace of our God into lasciviousness, and denying the only Lord God, and our Lord Jesus Christ. (Jude 4)). For God, faithful in grace, is also faithful in rebuke.
Having thus warned the people, Joshua finally called Israel together at Shechem, and “they presented themselves before God,” and heard from Him how He had been their strength, their stay, their shield, from the very first. The Lord brought to their remembrance His purpose towards them before they thought about Him, when in “the old time” He took them from the idols on the other side of the flood. He reminded them of their land of bondage, from which by His own hand they were “brought out,” and how He had led them through the waters of the Red Sea when their pursuers were overthrown. He recalled His gracious ways to them in the wilderness – His delivering them both from the Rebel (the Amorite), and from the Accuser, “I would not hearken unto Balaam; therefore He blessed you still.” He spoke to them of Canaan – of its victories, “I delivered them into your hand” – and of its bounties, “I have given you a land for which ye did not labor, and cities which ye built not, and ye dwell in them of the vineyards and oliveyards which ye planted not eat.” From first to last all was God’s own doing for them, His own love to them, and with His mercies spread before them, they were told, “Now therefore fear the Lord, and serve Him in sincerity and in truth.”
If Israel had felt the force of Jehovah’s words, they would have bowed to Him, remembering that He had chosen them, and that their ability to serve Him was given by Him; but self-confidently they replied, “Therefore will we also serve the Lord; for He is our God,” yet demonstrating their real condition, by not cleansing themselves from their idols. “And Joshua said unto the people, Ye cannot serve the Lord: for He is an Holy God; He is a jealous God,” when they again, stout-heartedly answered, “Nay; but we will serve the Lord.” To Joshua’s renewed entreaty to put away the strange gods which were among them, and to incline their hearts unto the Lord God of Israel, their response was, “The Lord our God will we serve, and His voice will we obey”; but the idols remained among them, and the wicked nations were not destroyed. Idols may be brought by a believer even into the holy places, and if idols are in the heart, all our proposed zeal will not save us from serving them. Joshua might indeed say, “As for me and my house, we will serve the Lord,” for his heart and life agreed with his words, and God’s grace was present before his soul. It was by the old oak or monument of Shechem Joshua spake thus; thither Jacob had repaired in former years, and buried his household gods; there Israel had set up the law (Shechem lies between Ebal and Gerizim); and there, at the close of their captain’s life, they stand, again, and promise obedience to the Lord. We, doubtless, have our memorable oaks of Shechem, where, at times of deep heart-stirring, we have honestly longed to be all for God and his Christ. “And Joshua wrote these words in the book of the law of God,” and “took a great stone, and set it up there under an oak, that was by the sanctuary of the Lord. And Joshua said unto all the people, Behold, this stone shall be a witness unto us; for it hath heard all the words of the Lord which He spake unto us: it shall be therefore a witness unto you, lest ye deny your God.”
“So Joshua let the people depart, every man unto his inheritance.”
“And it came to pass after these things, that Joshua ... the servant of the Lord, died.” The elders of his eventful day have departed; Eleazer’s bones are laid with those of his father Aaron, and they mingle in the grave with the dust of Joseph and his progenitor Jacob. The sons of Heth who sold, and Abraham who bought, are none the richer for their exchanges. The earliest inhabitants of Canaan, where are they? Man’s short history upon this perishing world is traced to the grave.
Our Captain has entered the heavens. He will shortly call His people up on high. The first resurrection may burst upon us before our bodies are sown in the earth. God’s eternal spring may begin for us without our bodies passing through death’s cold winter. “We shall not all sleep” (1 Cor. 15). But whether we sleep or wake, we are the Lord’s. Let us, then, not live for this world, but for Christ, the Resurrection and the Life.