Joshua 10:28-43. At the end of yesterdays reading the five kings that started the fight with Israel were all dead.\u00a0 Most of their people were dead with a few hiding in the cities.\u00a0 It had been a long day (Whether you think the earth stopped rotating and it actually was a longer day or you think it was some sort of poetic statement it was still a long day.).\u00a0 The Israelites had marched and fought for 50 miles or more.\u00a0 God had fought for them but their swords were still bloody, they did not just stand by and watch.\u00a0\u00a0 You would think the next day would be time to rest, sharpen the swords, bandage the blisters, but in today\u2019s reading they get right back at it.<\/p>\n
In this next part of the story they first attack Makkedah and destroy all of the people there.\u00a0 Remember in Deuteronomy 7 that the Israelites were commanded to destroy all of the people living within the land promised to them, the people in the land were strongly involved in the worship of false gods and if they remained they would eventually tempt the Israelites to compromise in their relationship to God.\u00a0 From a strategic point of view you also have to see that Makkedah had not come out and destroyed the enemy kings but had given them shelter.\u00a0 If the Israelites knew where the kings had hidden it is very likely that the people of Makkedah did too.\u00a0 Unlike Jael who killed the ally of her husband with a tent peg (Judges 4) because he was an enemy of Israel theses people did nothing.\u00a0 But the bottom like is that they were to be destroyed and that is what Joshua did.\u00a0 He then destroyed the rest of the Canaanite cities in the southern part of the promised land west of the Dead Sea.\u00a0 If you read closely you might have noticed that three of the cities that belonged to the five kings were mentioned.\u00a0\u00a0 Jerusalem and Jarmuth are not mentioned.\u00a0 Their kings are dead but the cities are not.\u00a0 It is likely that the people of Jarmuth were also killed since the oly other mention of the city in the Bible involves the borders of the tribes when the land is divided up between the Israelites.\u00a0 Maybe all of the people had died in battle.\u00a0 The description of the land that was conquered (Joshua 10:40-41) basically covers all of the land west of the Dead Sea from it\u2019s northern tip all the way down to the border of Egypt except for most of the caastland which would have been Philistine territory.\u00a0 And verse 40 he killed everyone who breathed just s God had said (Deuteronomy 7:1-2).\u00a0 The southern half of the kingdom was basically conquered (except for part of the coastland maybe) so Joshua and the Israelites returned to the camp at Gilgal.<\/p>\n
I think it is important to remember that the Tabernacle (the sort of portable church where the Israelites had worshipped God during the wandering in the wilderness.) and the Ark of the Promise (A wooden and gold box that contained the stone tablets that Moses had written the first ten rules of God on and which was a symbol of God\u2019s contract and presence with the Israelites.)\u00a0 were in Gilgal.\u00a0 God had given the victory to Joshua and the troops (Joshua 10:42) and they were returning to Him (and their families).\u00a0 What strikes me about this story is the fact that God fought for them and they also had to fight.\u00a0 And the fight went on and on, several days of it, perhaps week or months.\u00a0 We are not told how long the rest of the campaign took.\u00a0 And there was more to come.\u00a0 In fact when Joshua died there was still more to come (Joshua 23:2,5). But God was there the whole time.\u00a0 Later on Joshua will tell the Israelites to keep it up and hold on tight to God.\u00a0 We need to do that, we need to keep on doing \u201cjust as the Lord, \u2026. Commanded\u201d (Joshua 10:40).<\/p>\n
We need to trust His commands.\u00a0 God knows what is going on.\u00a0 He alone knows the future and the hearts of people (As we will see tomorrow or the next day).\u00a0 We must remember that God loves people and doesn\u2019t want them to perish (2 Peter 3:9).\u00a0 Physical death is tragic but in the end physical death is conquered and physical life is restored (1 Corinthians 15:51-57; Revelation 20:4-6).\u00a0 But only to those who have put their eternity into Jesus hands (Revelation 20:15; John 3:16-18).\u00a0 God loves people but people will still perish.\u00a0 Men will go their own way, try to get to God on their own and they will fail (Revelation 20:12-15).\u00a0 As ugly as physical death is here and now an eternity without God is far more serious.\u00a0 So we need to trust and fight on.\u00a0 In 1 Corinthians 15:58, right after the part about God restoring our physical lives we are told to be\u00a0 steady, like a rock, in living for God.\u00a0 That is the response, god is loving and giving and faithful and we need to be faithful back.\u00a0 We need to do just as the Lord commands us.\u00a0 Lord help me be faithful.\u00a0 Help me understand clearly what you want be to do, each day, in each battle.\u00a0 Sometimes there is spoil, reward, sometimes the stuff needs to be left behind.\u00a0 It\u2019s not one way or the other so I need to keep listening to you.\u00a0 Help me hear and help me be faithful.\u00a0 Thank you for fighting for me and thank you for your presence.\u00a0 Help me return to You often.<\/p>\n
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Joshua 10:28-43. At the end of yesterdays reading the five kings that started the fight with Israel were all dead.\u00a0 Most of their people were dead with a few hiding in the cities.\u00a0 It had been a long day (Whether you think the earth stopped rotating and it actually was a longer day or you […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-551","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-daily"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/deltaforcedaily.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/551","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/deltaforcedaily.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/deltaforcedaily.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/deltaforcedaily.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/deltaforcedaily.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=551"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"http:\/\/deltaforcedaily.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/551\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":552,"href":"http:\/\/deltaforcedaily.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/551\/revisions\/552"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/deltaforcedaily.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=551"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/deltaforcedaily.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=551"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/deltaforcedaily.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=551"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}