Thursday, July 13, 2017

Year 7, Day 194: Joshua 9

Theological Commentary: Click Here


Joshua 9 is a very interesting study in human behavior, sinfulness, deliverance, and God’s passive will.  There is much to discuss here.  I’ll start with humanity.

The Gibeonites (or Hivites) comes to Joshua dressed as though they had been away from their town on a long march in order to make peace with the Hebrew people.  They are intentionally attempting to deceive Joshua and His men.  Joshua and the Hebrew people smell a trap, but they don’t consult with God.  As a result, they end up making peace with these people.  After the deception is revealed, Joshua is honor bound to have his men honor the terms of the peace.

What can we learn about human behavior and sinfulness here?  From the Hivites we learn that human beings will turn to lies and deception to save our livelihood.  From the Hebrew people we learn that human beings will trust their senses (sight, primarily) even over our greater logic and understanding.  I think that this is a great lesson to learn.  People will believe what they think they see over and above what they reason to be true.  This is such an incredibly dangerous aspect of human beings.  We can also learn from the Hebrew people that we tend to overlook consultation with God.

Look at what we can learn about deliverance here.  The people of Gibeon are delivered.  Granted, they are delivered from destruction into slavery.  The fact remains, though, that they are allowed to live!  Their people are one of the few people in the area of Jericho and Ai that remain alive because they are delivered through deception.  Of course, this leads us to a sticky conversation.  Is it okay to lie in order to get our way?  The short answer is no.  But the real answer is that this lie is no normal lie.  There is truth here.  In order for these Hivites to set up the decpetion, they have to genuinely believe that the God of the Hebrew people is stronger than their own gods or else they wouldn’t be afraid of the Hebrew people.  Therefore, in this lie we can sense at the very least an openness to God.  It is subtly hidden openness to God that bring about their deliverance, not their deception.

Finally, let’s look at the passive will of God.  God allows the Hivites to live.  In spite of their deception and even more in spite of the fact that they are Canaanite and God wanted all of the Canaanites to die, here they are alive as slaves and serving the Hebrew people.  This was not a part of God’s plan any more than Achan’s rebellion and the defeat at Ai.  What we see happening here, though, is that God’s perspective on the course of events is fluid.  He has His plan and what He desires to see happen.  He also knows that human beings are going to muck it up and often cause the plan to come out differently than one might suspect.  God seems to be okay with that.  In most things, perhaps even all things except salvation, God’s passive will is more dominant than God’s active will.

As an adult who spends much time with teenagers, this is a highly important lesson for me to learn.  Most days, I get up with an agenda about how I want the day to go.  Most days, the day does not go as planned because I am interacting with other human beings.  I’m willing to be that most days don’t go as God planned, either, because He is dealing with human beings and allows His passive will to dominate over His active will.  That’s what I need to learn to imitate to become more like God.

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