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Set Up For Success

Links for today’s readings:

 Read: Joshua 12-13 Listen: (8:18) Read: Ephesians 4 Listen: (3:58)

Scripture Focus: Joshua 13.1

1 When Joshua had grown old, the Lord said to him, “You are now very old, and there are still very large areas of land to be taken over.

Reflection: Set Up For Success

By John Tillman

Nearing the end of his life, Joshua recognized the next generation would have to complete what he started. He would not live long enough to finish what he set out to do.

From one perspective this may seem a human failure or tragedy. But from another perspective it is natural—even good.

Joshua’s mentor, Moses, fell short. Moses could not lead the people into the land and he himself only glimpsed it from a distance. (Deuteronomy 3.27) Joshua took up the mantle to complete Moses’ dream for Israel.

Joshua fell short. He could not take all of the territory and remove all of the sinful idolatry. The people would have to complete the work themselves. The tribes’ leaders would work together to take the remaining land. Then, when future troubles arose, God would raise up leaders to save the people.

As your mentors, teachers, and role models come to the end of careers or their lives, they will fall short. There will be failed projects and dreams that never came to completion. Perhaps you, if God calls you, will take up their mantle to continue the work.

Previous generations always leave behind undone work, unfinished tasks, and unattainted goals. No generation closes their book with every box ticked “complete.” When we pick up the mantle of those who have gone before us, there will always be messes to clean up and unfinished business.

Like Joshua, when we reach the end of our sojourn, we will also fall short. Our hopes for this world’s work must be passed on to those who follow us. Rather than being a tragedy, this may be how God intends his work to pass from generation to generation.

Jesus left work behind for his disciples. He left people to heal, sermons to preach, Centurions to baptize, and dying girls to bring back to life. (Acts 2.14-17; 3.6; 9.39-42; 10.47-48) He left Jerusalem, Samaria, and the rest of the world to be evangelized—a task still passed down to us. (Matthew 28.19-20; Act 1.8)

Jesus left his followers plenty to do and yet, he was able to say, “It is finished” because he completed his Father’s work. (John 17.4) He also empowered his followers with the Holy Spirit to complete their work.

Have you thought about what you are leaving undone that you pray the next generation can finish? How are you preparing them to take over? Are your actions today setting them up for success in the future?

Divine Hours Prayer: The Request for Presence

You are the  Lord; do not withhold your compassion from me; let your love and your faithfulness keep me safe forever. — Psalm 40.12

– Divine Hours prayers from The Divine Hours: Prayers for Summer
by Phyllis Tickle

Read more: Time to Go

Are we viewing the younger generations…as future leaders? Are we humble enough to step down when God calls us?

Time to Go
Read more: Glimpsing the Promise

Yet, all is not lost…God will be faithful to his purposes for the next generation. God’s grace to us is being able to glimpse it.

Glimpsing the Promise

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Hamstrung Power

Links for today’s readings:

Read: Joshua 11 Listen: (3:52) Read: Ephesians 3 Listen: (2:41)

Scripture Focus: Joshua 11:7-9

7 So Joshua and his whole army came against them suddenly at the Waters of Merom and attacked them, 8 and the Lord gave them into the hand of Israel. … 9 Joshua did to them as the Lord had directed: He hamstrung their horses and burned their chariots.

Reflection: Hamstrung Power

By Erin Newton

When we read stories of warfare and violence in the Bible, especially in narratives that depict the events as God-ordained, we should not take the stories too lightly. In fact, I suggest we not read them while gloating or with a sense of prowess. They are troubling; they jolt our senses.

The narratives in Joshua describe the journey of God’s people into an occupied land by means of war. The text says that God commanded them to kill everyone. Scholars have long felt the uneasiness of such a brutal request. Some have downplayed the language as hyperbole.

Others say the conquered locations are military outposts rather than civilized towns. Others focus on the details and compare Israel’s God with the foreign gods.

In a pursuit to understand why the violent texts are preserved as God’s word, William Webb and Gordon Oeste looked at various texts and discovered not a God who delights in death but “a highly reluctant war God who is not exactly eager to participate with Israel in its wars” (Bloody, Brutal, and Barbaric? Wrestling with Troubling War Texts).

In Joshua 11, God tells Joshua to hamstring the horses and burn the chariots. Webb and Oeste point out, “We might immediately cringe at the maiming of these animals.” I do. My love of nature includes my compassion on all created beings—from the beetles who burrow in my yard to the elusive tigers of Malaysia. Why would God call for harming his creatures?

Ancient Near Eastern cultures increased power and pride through the accumulation of chariots. With these new victories, Israel might try to increase its weaponry. Therefore, the horses are reduced to domestic labor.

Webb and Oeste see a God who “wanted his people to be owners of cattle in a land flowing with milk and honey, not a people whose land was full of war horses and chariots—the instruments of human oppression and domination.” It is God who hamstrings his people’s pride by asking them to debilitate the enemy’s horses and burn their chariots.

Webb and Oeste’s perspective offers another way of balancing the “leave-none-alive” Old Testament texts with the “turn-the-other-cheek” character of God.

We still wrestle with these violent texts and not all questions may ever be answered. But we see a God who disarms his people, stunts their might, and hinders their pride.

Because in our weakness, he is made strong.

Divine Hours Prayer: The Small Verse

The Lord is my shepherd and nothing is wanting to me. In green pastures he has settled me. — The Short Breviary

– Divine Hours prayers from The Divine Hours: Prayers for Summer
by Phyllis Tickle

Read more: Horses of Flesh or Spirit

Crises expose what we truly rely on. Comfort dulls our hold on principles and the strength of our convictions.

Horses of Flesh or Spirit
Read The Bible With Us

What meaning will you find by reading the Bible with us at a sustainable, two-year pace?

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Dethroning Kings and Powers

Links for today’s readings:

Read: Joshua 10 Listen: (7:23)  Read:  Ephesians 2 Listen: (3:04)

Scripture Focus: Joshua 10.22-26

22 Joshua said, “Open the mouth of the cave and bring those five kings out to me.” 23 So they brought the five kings out of the cave—the kings of Jerusalem, Hebron, Jarmuth, Lachish and Eglon. 24 When they had brought these kings to Joshua, he summoned all the men of Israel and said to the army commanders who had come with him, “Come here and put your feet on the necks of these kings.” So they came forward and placed their feet on their necks. 25 Joshua said to them, “Do not be afraid; do not be discouraged. Be strong and courageous. This is what the Lord will do to all the enemies you are going to fight.” 26 Then Joshua put the kings to death and exposed their bodies on five poles, and they were left hanging on the poles until evening.

Reflection: Dethroning Kings and Powers

By John Tillman

In 2003, Saddam Hussein was dragged from a hole in the ground in Iraq, humiliatingly illustrating his fall from power. Three years later, Iraqis convicted Hussein of one of many mass killings from decades of unaccountable brutality, and executed him by hanging.

Across Iraq and the world, people celebrated sang, danced, and cried tears of relief. Victims and families felt a measure of justice. Few mourned Hussein or his brutal regime, even as we mourned the devastation of Iraq required to bring him down.

Like Hussein, five Amorite kings were dragged from a cave where they were hiding from Israel’s army. We aren’t given details of their crimes. We only know that during Abraham’s time, their sin had not “reached its full measure,” but in Joshua’s day, the time of judgment had arrived. (Genesis 15.16)

Joshua had Israelite leaders place their feet on the kings’ necks before he killed them. Kings who spent their lifetimes with their feet on the necks of their subjects and enemies, were treated as they had treated others. For the proud, humiliation is worse than violence and dishonor worse than death.

Knowing these kings were wicked doesn’t make Canaan’s conquest easy reading. Wars and deaths, even when we know the criminality of leaders, peoples, or countries are still tragic. People, wicked or not, suffer, and death is our enemy, not our ally.

From one perspective, Joshua is the story of a king-killer and a god-killer. Just like the plagues of Egypt made theological statements, disarming the gods of Pharaoh, the destruction of Canaanite city states made theological statements, disarming the gods of Canaan’s kings. Joshua was defeating the spiritual powers over the land. Joshua threw down kings but did not take their place. God was the only king or power Israel needed.

We usually don’t mind killing kings when they are wicked. The problem is we want their thrones for ourselves. Like Israel, we want a king “like other nations” (1 Samuel 8.4-7) and we want it to be us. We dethrone sinful despots, then become them. Whether or not there are wicked kings and their gods over us, there are often wicked kings and their idols within us.

The regime change we need is to dethrone the sinful powers in our hearts. We need to drag them out of hiding, where Jesus the seed of Eve will crush their heads under his feet.

Divine Hours Prayer: A Reading

Meanwhile the eleven disciples set out for Galilee, to the mountain where Jesus arranged to meet them. When they saw him they fell down before him, though some hesitated. Jesus came up and spoke to them. He said, “All authority in heaven and on earth has been given to me. Go therefore, make disciples of all the nations; baptize them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, and teach them the commands I gave you. And know that I am with you always; yes, to the end of time.” — Matthew 28.16-20

– Divine Hours prayers from The Divine Hours: Prayers for Summer
by Phyllis Tickle

Read more: Forces and Powers

We don’t resist the world’s powers with worldly weapons or resist demonic powers by attacking humans.

Forces and Powers

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Grafting in the Gibeonites

Links for today’s readings:

Read: Joshua 9 Listen: (3:46) Read: Ephesians 1 Listen: (3:10)

Scripture Focus: Joshua 9.24-27

24 They answered Joshua, “Your servants were clearly told how the Lord your God had commanded his servant Moses to give you the whole land and to wipe out all its inhabitants from before you. So we feared for our lives because of you, and that is why we did this. 25 We are now in your hands. Do to us whatever seems good and right to you.” 26 So Joshua saved them from the Israelites, and they did not kill them. 27 That day he made the Gibeonites woodcutters and water carriers for the assembly, to provide for the needs of the altar of the Lord at the place the Lord would choose. And that is what they are to this day.

Romans 11.17-22

17 If some of the branches have been broken off, and you, though a wild olive shoot, have been grafted in among the others and now share in the nourishing sap from the olive root, 18 do not consider yourself to be superior to those other branches. If you do, consider this: You do not support the root, but the root supports you. 19 You will say then, “Branches were broken off so that I could be grafted in.” 20 Granted. But they were broken off because of unbelief, and you stand by faith. Do not be arrogant, but tremble. 21 For if God did not spare the natural branches, he will not spare you either.

22 Consider therefore the kindness and sternness of God: sternness to those who fell, but kindness to you, provided that you continue in his kindness. Otherwise, you also will be cut off.

Reflection: Grafting in the Gibeonites

By John Tillman

The Gibeonites didn’t originate the phrase “If you can’t beat them, join them,” but they lived it.

I was first introduced to this aphorism when Yosemite Sam, representing the British army, could not defeat Bugs Bunny, representing the American revolutionaries, and determined to join the revolution instead.

The NIV says the Gibeonites “resorted to a ruse.” The NASB says, “acted craftily” and the NLT, “resorted to deception.” (Joshua 9.4) The translated phrase has negative aspects of cunning and deception, however, it can also mean prudence, discretion, or even wisdom.

Gibeon is the third of three stories of deception or betrayal in the early chapters of Joshua. Rahab betrays Jericho, Achan betrays Israel, and the Gibeonites betray Canaan’s other kings. These stories illustrate what Paul would later write about the “tree” of Israel—unfaithful branches will be broken off and “wild” branches grafted in. (Romans 11.17-24) Achan is broken off while Rahab and Gibeon are grafted in. As Peter would learn, God accepts from any nation ones who fear him and do what is right. (Acts 10.35)

People sometimes think that the “Old Testament God” and “New Testament Jesus” are two different beings. One is murderous. The other is merciful. One is violent. The other is virtuous. Let not faulty human logic separate Yahweh, Jesus, and the Holy Spirit. They are one. These stories show that they are. The hard-hearted face justice. The repentant find mercy. The proud perish. The humble escape.

The Gibeonites had the right idea, even if they did it in a wrong way. God accepted them, even though they didn’t deserve it, just like Jesus accepts us. Israel had the right idea to accept them, even if they did it for wrong reasons and never fully included them.

There’s probably someone in your life who thinks, like the Gibeonites, they’ll never be accepted by God as their true selves. They don’t know God but they see what is said about him and what is said about them. Perhaps they will just harden their hearts against God, like the other Canaanites hardened their defenses. But perhaps they will come to you, maybe with the wrong reasons, maybe in the wrong way.

If they do, find in your heart the same grace for them that God showed the Gibeonites. Those who come to Jesus in repentance won’t be second-class community members. They will be fully accepted family members.

Remember, you don’t deserve to be grafted in either.

Divine Hours Prayer: The Refrain for the Morning Lessons

Happy are they who fear the Lord, and who follow in his ways!
You shall eat the fruit of your labor; happiness and prosperity shall be yours. — Psalm 128.1-2

– Divine Hours prayers from The Divine Hours: Prayers for Summer
by Phyllis Tickle

Read more: Ask and Keep Asking

By God’s sovereignty, not only the Ephesians but we are included in Christ by hearing and believing the gospel of salvation.

Ask and Keep Asking
Read more: Becoming Part of the Promise

Rahab the Canaanite prostitute becomes a part of the Abrahamic promise…No situation is hopeless and no person is doomed to destruction who turns to God.

Becoming Part of the Promise

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Forces and Powers

Links for today’s readings:

Read: Joshua 5-6.5 Listen: (5:25)  Read: Colossians 2 Listen: (3:27)

Links for this weekends’ readings:

Read: Joshua 6.6-27 Listen: (4:47) Read: Colossians 3 Listen: (3:09)
Read: Joshua 7 Listen: (4:58) Read: Colossians 4 Listen: (2:21)
Read: Joshua 8 Listen: (5:55) Read: Philemon Listen: (2:52

Scripture Focus: Colossians 2.8-15

8 See to it that no one takes you captive through hollow and deceptive philosophy, which depends on human tradition and the elemental spiritual forces of this world rather than on Christ. 9 For in Christ all the fullness of the Deity lives in bodily form, 10 and in Christ you have been brought to fullness. He is the head over every power and authority. 11 In him you were also circumcised with a circumcision not performed by human hands. Your whole self, ruled by the flesh, was put off when you were circumcised by Christ, 12 having been buried with him in baptism, in which you were also raised with him through your faith in the working of God, who raised him from the dead. 13 When you were dead in your sins and in the uncircumcision of your flesh, God made you alive with Christ. He forgave us all our sins, 14 having canceled the charge of our legal indebtedness, which stood against us and condemned us; he has taken it away, nailing it to the cross. 15 And having disarmed the powers and authorities, he made a public spectacle of them, triumphing over them by the cross.

Reflection: Forces and Powers

By John Tillman

When Paul says there are “forces” and “powers” in this world, what does he mean?

Paul’s language seems ambiguous. Some translations use “basic principles” instead of “elemental spiritual forces”. (Colossians 2.8) Paul’s ambiguity is probably intentional. Ancient thinkers were comfortable with the concept of spiritual powers co-mingling with other powers. Paul recognized layers of visible and invisible powers and forces operating in his world.

Our world also has interconnected forces and powers. Obvious forces include local, state, and federal governments. Cultural forces include social and economic philosophies. We also see the effects of less obvious forces. Corporations create algorithims that influence our media and social media. Dark money floods politics. Insider trading infests banking and business. Wealthy influence peddlers push cultural narratives. And behind the visible and hidden human powers are spiritual powers.

A word of warning: Dangerous and manipulative movements and leaders twist teachings about spiritual things to cause panic and excuse violence and vitriol. The existence of spiritual powers doesn’t mean everyone who votes differently from you or does something you oppose is “demonic.” Beware those discussing “spiritual warfare” in these ways.

How do we navigate a world with multiple layers of spiritual and non-spiritual forces and powers? Look to Paul’s example. Paul stood trial before Roman rulers. Paul opposed ideological forces of Greek philosophy and idolatry at the Areopagus. Paul resisted spiritual forces by tearing down strongholds of spiritual arguments and casting out spiritual beings.

In all cases, Paul defended himself and others against these powers by testifying to the gospel in the name of Jesus. That’s it. No weapons. No mobs. No insurrections. No attacks. No violence. Paul delivered people from demonic influence. He didn’t attack them. Paul just spoke the truth of Jesus.

We must resist many “powers.” Like Paul, we don’t resist the world’s powers with worldly weapons or resist demonic powers by attacking humans. Demonizing and dehumanizing are sinful synonyms from a Christian perspective.

As for the spiritual powers, we don’t fight them—we announce their defeat by Jesus. We don’t disarm the powers—we remind them that Jesus already did.

It’s foolish to be unwary of spiritual forces, yet dangerous to be obsessed with them. Instead, we can walk through the world of powers, confident that Jesus has disarmed them. So long as we walk with him, we cannot be captured by any force or power. Rooted in him, we cannot be moved.

Divine Hours Prayer: The Small Verse

“I am the Alpha and the Omega,” says the Lord God, who is, who was, and who is to come, the Almighty. — Revelation 1.8

– Divine Hours prayers from The Divine Hours: Prayers for Summer
by Phyllis Tickle

Read more: Jericho’s Wall

God isn’t interested in destroying people we call our enemies. He’s not on “your side.”

Jericho’s Wall

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