Joshua 22:1-20.  In today’s reading the land has been basically conquered and divided up.  Several times the two and one half tribes that had land on the east side of the Jordan have been mentioned.  Those tribes requested that land after it was taken as Moses and the Israelites approached the promised land.  It was good pasture land and those tribes had quite a bit of cattle.  At the time Moses was worried that those tribes were defecting from Israel.  He thought that they were afraid to take over the promised land just like their fathers had done forty years earlier.   Their response was that they would join in all of the battles to take the promised land along side of the other tribes and would not return home until the job was accomplished.  For them now it was time to go home.  Along the way just as they got to the Jordan River they stopped and built an altar.  To the rest of the tribes it appeared that they were abandoning God (verse 16).

There are a few things to notice.  First notice that Joshua does not seem to be included in the group that is going to confront the two and one half tribes.  He appears in the beginning of the story reminding the two and one half tribes to continue to be faithful (vv. 3,5) but he does not appear in the group that goes to talk to the 2 ½ tribes.  Notice, though, that a guy named Phinehas the son of Eleazar does go.  Although Joshua was the overall leader of the Israelites Eleazar was also charged with assisting him, especially in the division of the land.  And remember that the land was divided by casting lots or “rolling the dice”, a process considered to be controlled by God (and Proverbs indicates that it actually was.  Proverbs 16:33.  But don’t think this gives you permission to run off and gamble, see the 3/16/12 post).  Eleazar’s part, as a priest, was to be a representative and reminder of God’s presence.  Now it looks like his son has taken up that position.  Notice that the decision to deal with this situation was made by the whole group of Israelites and that they chose 10 representatives, one from each tribe on their side of the river to represent them.  It is interesting that this means that even Manasseh was represented, the tribe that had close relatives on the other side of the river (see verse 7 which reminds us about the split tribe).  The building of an altar would have been a religious matter so maybe the Israelites thought that they didn’t need Joshua for this one.  As we will see from the next chapter Joshua was quite old by this time and maybe he basically had retired.  In today’s reading he released the 2 ½ tribes back to their land which indicated that the conquest was finished.  And the land had been divided so his job was done.  This story seems to be a transition of leadership in the nation.

In the confrontation two events from Israel’s past are mentioned,  events which caused the Israelites to get serious about this altar building event, the “iniquity of Peor” (v. 17) and the disobedience of Achan (v. 20).  The story of Peor is told in Numbers 25.  As the Israelites wandered around in the desert they got involved romantically and religiously with a group of people called Moabites.  They began to worship their false gods with them.  This was the very reason that the people of the land had to be destroyed when Israel finally took the land over (Deuteronomy 7:1-6).  The unfaithfulness at Peor resulted in the execution of the leaders of the Israelites.  Also it appears that some sort of deadly illness spread through the camp.  An illness described as the “anger of the LORD” (Numbers 25:3-4) which resulted in the death of 24,000 people.  At the height of the plague an Israelite man actually brought a Midianite woman home (Midianites were allies of the Moabites).  Phinehas heard about it and went into the mans tent and ran a spear through both of them (Numbers 25:6-7) at which time the plague stopped.  The other story was one we read at the beginning of Joshua.  When the Israelites started to take that land the first city was Jericho.  They were to destroy everything in Jericho.  Achan saw some stuff that he wanted and took it.  As a result the Israelites were defeated at the next battle.  When Achan was revealed (by lots, actually) he confessed to his disobedience and he and his whole family were destroyed.  In our current story all of these actions are called unfaithfulness, disobedience, or rebellion.  The leaders were afraid that God’s wrath would return and they also felt that theses sort of actions were an on going problem in Israel (see v. 17).

Tomorrow we will see the outcome of this confrontation and it’s probably not what you might expect.  I mentioned before that this story seems to include a transition in leadership but notice that it is not, “Bam! Out with the old in with the new.”  Phinehas was the son of Eleazar.  The priesthood was a family thing by God’s design and Phinehas was in the line.  Later in the Bible we see that being in the line does not guarantee that a person would be Godly (Eli’s sons come to mind) but Phinehas’ involvement shows a respect for the rules God had put in place.  And Phinehas is not completely new on the scene, he was there at the Peor thing and showed a faithfulness to and passion for God at that event.  Also, Joshua had been in power for quite some time but he still connected his actions back to Moses.  In 1 Peter in a passage talking about Church leadership Peter encourages the leaders to voluntarily, eagerly, and according to the will of God  lead the church by example.  He then encourages the young men to humbly submit to the leadership.  And to wait for God to lift them up at the right time. It had been years since Phinehas killed the rebellious man at Peor, a decade or more, that may seem like a long time but we need to trust God.  Leadership is a trust from God and it is about God.  Phinehas and Joshua and Eleazar and Moses were tools for God to use, willing tools.  It was in God’s timing and it was about God.  Proverbs 24:21 warns us not to look for too much change too fast.  We need to remember God and his purposes do not change and we need to stay on his track.  Tomorrow we will see if the 2 ½ tribes were getting off the path but today we need to be careful to live for God and trust his timing.  Lord help me honor you with my life.  I know this means trusting you and the things you are doing through others.  Let me be careful to do my part.  Let me not be shy about doing though.  I know this story and I know that sometimes the part you want us to do seems odd to others.  But we need to be careful.  Give me wisdom as I lead those around me.  Help me be faithful.  And let us all exalt the next generation at the proper time.  In the mean time help them practice following you faithfully.