So lately, I have been reading through the book of Joshua and about all the many battles that took place in order to take the land of Canaan, the future home of Israel. And as I am reading through this, I am just now realizing, through all my years of Sunday School and Bible class with Mr. Bowman (home school teacher) and all my other Bible teachers, that taking this land did not happen over night after they took Jericho, it took quite some time. However, God was trying to teach them an important lesson beginning with Jericho.
You all know, that at Jericho, the only instructions for war, beside walking around the giant city a millions times (I'm sure it felt like that to them) was to shout, but not to shout a war cry, but a shout of praise to God, for HE had GIVEN them the city. They were crying victory before the war even began!! And then God handed them the city, almost gift wrapped it for them. And as I kept reading throughout Joshua, when the Israelites had to continue to fight to win there inheritance, Joshua reminded them over and over that it was not going to be a battle, God had already PROMISED them the land, the battle was mostly just a test of faith for the people, almost a technicality. What is even more interesting is, as I am reading I am just realizing that the Canaanites were not small villages that were in the beginning steps of forming a more sophisticated government. These were highly militarized, big states (kingdoms, as the Bible calls it). And even though they had such technology as iron chariots, Joshua continued to contend that God can take them, just show up for the battle!
So, through reading this, I am realizing there needs to be some application. We all have Jericho's, you can call them what you want, your "Giant," "Goliath", "Mountain"..etc. But the key is to praise God for the victory no matter what the circumstance and how crazy it is. I like to think of Tim and I's situation as a Jericho because we do have a promised land waiting for us, no more college loans! So as we are coming up through different obstacles, waiting on the Lord, and looking into the future, I am challenging myself to praise God for all the victories that are coming ahead and hope that it will not take us as long as it took Israel to take our promised land by storm, hopefully I can practice more faith in God for victory... to be continued...
