“Then the land had rest from war” Joshua
11: 23
The land God promised Israel was
full of enemies. It was not one they could walk in at ease and occupy. The boundaries
are described in Numbers 34: 2 – 12. These lands were occupied by people who
worshipped and practiced abominations. Because of this God gave them and their
lands over to His people Israel whom God ordered to totally destroy and take
over their lands. This was to be God’s inheritance to Israel. After defeating
some kings East of the Jordan in battle, Moses was able to share out their
lands to the Reubenites, the Gadites and half tribe of Manasseh (Deut. 3: 12 –
17). God permitted him to see the remaining land from a distance, but never to
enter it, for
he incurred the divine displeasure (Deut. 3: 26 – 27). He was to
commission Joshua to continue from where he would stop. Joshua received the
mantle at Moses’ death (Josh. 1: 1ff), and proceeded to take on the kings and
people of those lands in battle. Serially he defeated them and took over their
lands. Then the land had rest from war.
You will have rest from ‘war’ as
you cooperate with God in putting to death those enemies in and around you. We say
the enemies in and around you. None is to be gratified. Achan,
the internal troubler of Israel was eliminated (Josh. 7) just as the external
enemies from Jericho on, were. Peter describes the enemy within us as ‘fleshly
lust’ or ‘sinful desires’, and says “they war against our soul” (1 Peter 2. 11).
They include such ‘innocent’ things as selfish ambition, envy, jealousy, spite,
anger (overt or covert), discord, factions, pride – those things considered not
as ‘Christianly’ sinful as fornication, adultery, stealing, pride, and other
censurable offences for which a church committee would sit. Those other sins
are considered innocuous for no other reason but that they are hidden within us
and nobody can ‘prove’ them against us. Why, we may even take pride in doing
them and explain them away, even blaming them on others. But while they remain,
the land cannot have rest from war because they violate God’s holiness. Watchman
Nee once said that every Christian would sooner or later know that the real
enemy he/she has to deal with is the enemy within. Any Christian who wants to
please God must deal with the enemy within. The enemies around are the picks of
the world we so much cherish, our desire to be like people who care less to be
like us. The Bible warns us against unequal yoke, which means getting along
with an incompatible person in a partnership that one suffers (not infrequently,
the Christian), while the other is eased. A Christian’s heart cannot have rest
in such relationship. The land cannot have rest from war, and this is not God’s
will for us.
God wants us to confront ourselves,
not so much the next person. Be courageous enough to confront yourself and deal
with those so called weaknesses of yours, be they within or around you. This way,
the land will have rest from war. Your heart will be at peace. God bless you.
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