Joshua 7
Cleanse
In the last chapter Joshua and the people captured Jericho, and God through Joshua have said not to take anything other than gold and silver for God's treasury.
It was a huge victory but people of Israel still had more battles in front of them and the next city was Ai, it was significantly smaller than Jericho and people were so confident that they told Joshua that not all people should go.
"So about three thousand men went up there from the people. And they fled before men of Ai" (verse 4)
After this terrible loss people were in a sort of a shock
"The hearts of the people melted and became as water" (verse 5)
Joshua had no idea why this was happening so he was devastated as well as all the people, he himself and the elders of Israel fell on their faces before the ark of Lord until the evening.
And God hear their cries and God said
"Israel have sinned; they have transgressed my covenant that I commanded them; they have taken some of the devoted things" (verse 10)
"There are devoted things in your midst, O Israel. You cannot stand before your enemies until you take away the devoted things from among you." (verse 13)
And God showed Joshua who exactly it was who took devoted. It was Achan the son of Carmi, son of Zabdi, son of Zerah, of the tribe of Judah. Because of his act, 36 people in the battle with Ai were killed and people were left alone by God. People took him and his family and all his belongings and stoned them with stones.
Today...
What does it mean for us today to have something devoted ? (comment)
How can we realize that we have something devoted? (comment)
This story helps me understand and realize once again how TRUELY holy God really is.
Lets say that Israel was a heart and this heart was in contact with God. This heart belong to a person named Jim, who won hard spiritual battles. And then a temptation comes along and a quick thought got stuck in mind... Jim didn't think much of it, it was just a thought. Later that week Jim wanted to share the Gospel with one of his classmates.
Without prayer being confident in himself, Jim goes and starts telling his classmate about God, and instead of his classmate really hearing Jim, he laughs at him and recites the Bible verses in such a way that it made sense to Jim why he didn't believe and Jim was embarrassed that he didn't have anything to say that would touch his classmates heart.
Jim had something in his heart that wasn't holy, he had buried a sinful thought. "But it's just a thought!" one might say
a thought will turn into an action and then into a habit if you do not get rid of it at the right time.
We're bombarded with different temptations every minute of our life, and we always will, we have to check and recheck our hearts...We need to ask Jesus to shine some light in our heart and then we will see all the clutter that we need to get rid of... and only with Jesus' help can we defeat out enemies, but Jesus is with people that are cleaning their clutter out and not holding on to it.
In the last chapter Joshua and the people captured Jericho, and God through Joshua have said not to take anything other than gold and silver for God's treasury.
It was a huge victory but people of Israel still had more battles in front of them and the next city was Ai, it was significantly smaller than Jericho and people were so confident that they told Joshua that not all people should go.
"So about three thousand men went up there from the people. And they fled before men of Ai" (verse 4)
After this terrible loss people were in a sort of a shock
"The hearts of the people melted and became as water" (verse 5)
Joshua had no idea why this was happening so he was devastated as well as all the people, he himself and the elders of Israel fell on their faces before the ark of Lord until the evening.
And God hear their cries and God said
"Israel have sinned; they have transgressed my covenant that I commanded them; they have taken some of the devoted things" (verse 10)
"There are devoted things in your midst, O Israel. You cannot stand before your enemies until you take away the devoted things from among you." (verse 13)
And God showed Joshua who exactly it was who took devoted. It was Achan the son of Carmi, son of Zabdi, son of Zerah, of the tribe of Judah. Because of his act, 36 people in the battle with Ai were killed and people were left alone by God. People took him and his family and all his belongings and stoned them with stones.
Today...
What does it mean for us today to have something devoted ? (comment)
How can we realize that we have something devoted? (comment)
This story helps me understand and realize once again how TRUELY holy God really is.
Lets say that Israel was a heart and this heart was in contact with God. This heart belong to a person named Jim, who won hard spiritual battles. And then a temptation comes along and a quick thought got stuck in mind... Jim didn't think much of it, it was just a thought. Later that week Jim wanted to share the Gospel with one of his classmates.
Without prayer being confident in himself, Jim goes and starts telling his classmate about God, and instead of his classmate really hearing Jim, he laughs at him and recites the Bible verses in such a way that it made sense to Jim why he didn't believe and Jim was embarrassed that he didn't have anything to say that would touch his classmates heart.
Jim had something in his heart that wasn't holy, he had buried a sinful thought. "But it's just a thought!" one might say
a thought will turn into an action and then into a habit if you do not get rid of it at the right time.
We're bombarded with different temptations every minute of our life, and we always will, we have to check and recheck our hearts...We need to ask Jesus to shine some light in our heart and then we will see all the clutter that we need to get rid of... and only with Jesus' help can we defeat out enemies, but Jesus is with people that are cleaning their clutter out and not holding on to it.
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