Background Story: God called Abraham and promised him multiple descendants and a homeland, Canaan, to bless the world. Abraham’s descendants went down into Egypt due to a famine. There they multiplied but they became enslaved. God called Moses and delivered Israel out of Egypt and the Lord led Israel through the ‘Red Sea’ and through the desert by the pillar of cloud by day and a pillar of fire by night. They came to Mt. Sinai where the Lord established His covenant with Israel. He gave them the 10 commandments and called them to be a ‘kingdom of priests and a holy nation’. The Lord brought that generation to the border of their ‘Promised Land’ but in unbelief they refused to enter so they would wander forty years and die in the desert. Even Moses would not enter the ‘promised land’ because he had failed to honor the Lord as holy before Israel. Before his death, Moses commissioned Joshua as Israel’s new leader before Moses died. The Lord promised to be with Joshua as He was with Moses and the Lord caused the waters of the Jordan to be cut off. Israel crossed the Jordan into Canaan were all the men received the sign of the Abrahamic Covenant and shared in the Passover meal. Joshua sent two men to spy out Canaan and stayed at the house of a Canaanite prostitute named Rahab. The king of Jericho found this out but Rahab hid the two Israelite spies and sent the king’s messengers off in another direction. This brings us to the story of the ‘battle of Jericho’. Watch the story being told and then read the comments below.
The Battle of Jericho: God had promised to
give Israel the land of Canaan and the Lord was with Joshua. Joshua was to be ‘strong
and courageous’ for the Lord was beginning the fulfillment of His long standing
promise. Jericho was the first among several battles in Israel’s conquest of
the land over a long time (11:18, 12:1–24). This first battle was initiated by
Israel (6:1–27) but it would be fought by very unconventional means. Joshua’s preparation
for Jericho included an encounter with a mysterious visitor (5:13–15). Like
Joshua we can be confident that God will empower us to do His will. We can be strong
and courageous knowing that God is faithful to His promises and that God uses flawed
people who seek to do God’s will.
While approaching Jericho
Joshua saw a man with a sword in his hand. Joshua needed to know whose side the
man was on, but the man said, “Neither”. The visitor had come as the ‘Commander of the Lord’s
Army’. Joshua fell facedown and he was told to remove his shoes because the
land was holy. This is what Moses was told at the ‘burning bush’ where the Lord
called Moses to lead Israel from Egypt to the land Joshua was getting ready to
fight for (Exodus 3:5–10). This visitor was no
enemy or mere ally; he was the ‘Commander
of the Army of the Lord’. Joshua was to lead the conquest but in submission
to the Lord. It was Israel’s God who would fight these battles and give Israel
their land. Above all else, Joshua needed to reverently worship and to realize
the land was holy to the Lord.
Jericho was closed
off so no one could go in or out because of the Israelites. The Lord assured Joshua
that he would be given Jericho, its king and fighting men. Yet, the battle
would require the Lord’s miraculous intervention (6:1–7). The Lord’s instructions made it clear that the land was God’s gift
to Israel. By faith Israel would need to march around the city each day for
seven days marking out the city as the Lord (Heb. 11:30). The priests were to
carry God’s mobile sanctuary, the ‘Ark of the Covenant’, and seven priests with
seven trumpets were to go before the Ark. Joshua sent armed guards ahead of the
priests with the trumpets. A rear guard followed behind the ark (6:9) so that
the Lord was in the middle. On the seventh day they were to go around the city
seven times and on the seventh time around the horns would blast and the people
would shout. Then Jericho’s walls would collapse and the soldiers could go
straight in and attack the city (6:17–20).
Joshua was to devote (Heb. ḥērem) the city to destruction. The harsh reality was that the
Israelites would have to kill all the people or later they would entice Israel
to worship their gods and follow their detestable practices (Dt. 20:16–18). Everyone
and everything in Jericho was to be devoted to the Lord. All the silver and gold
and the articles of bronze and iron were to go into the Lord’s treasury. They
were warned that if anyone took any of the devoted things they would bring
trouble on Israel and they would bring about their own destruction (6:18). This
was the Lord’s battle so Israel was not to take any plunder from the battle at Jericho
since the victory was from the Lord (6:19, 21).
So when the
trumpets or ram’s horn (shofar) sounded,
the people shouted and the wall collapsed and the Israelites took the city. They
destroyed every living thing in it—men and women, young and old, and livestock
as well. Only Rahab the prostitute and her household was spared, because Rahab
had hidden the Israelite scouts who had spied out Jericho. Israel burned the
city and put the silver, gold and the articles of bronze and iron into the Lord’s
treasury. They brought Rahab and her household safely outside the Israelite camp.
Then Joshua swore this oath: “Cursed before the Lord is the man who tries to
rebuild Jericho”. The Lord was with Joshua, and Joshua’s fame spread throughout
the land (6:27).
The story concludes
with Rahab not only being rescued (6:22–23) but in time being assimilated into the
community of Israel (6:25). The repentant Rahab ends up living permanently as
one of God’s people while the rest of Jericho was ‘devoted to destruction’. While
this is may be difficult for us to understand, we should remember that the Lord
had promised Abraham the land of Canaan over 400 years earlier. The Lord patiently
tolerated the sin of the highly idolatrous and wicked inhabitants of Canaan for
over 400 years (Genesis 15:16, Deut. 9:4). So the story depicts the
long-suffering of our gracious God towards even those who will never repent.
The severity of
God’s judgment may shock us but God was zealous for the holiness of His people.
We should also realize that from the beginning the devil has tempted man to
doubt the reality and severity of God’s judgment (Genesis 3:4). Moreover, that God would be so gracious to the
stubborn and rebellious Israelites should equally shock us. In fact we have all
sinned against the Lord in many ways so that all of us have merited God’s just
judgement. The Lord’s acceptance of the repentant Canaanite, Rahab, highlights that
though we have all sinned against a holy God the repentant who turn to the Lord
Jesus will receive God’s favor and only by grace.
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