Joshua 12
Pastor Mark Hudson
This chapter may seem a bit like reading a bookkeeping ledger. Remember to keep in mind that conquering this land was no small thing for Israel. God, who made heaven and earth, God who is holy, and God who owns every single inch of this world is doing something great. God is forming a new nation out of one couple: Abraham and Sarah. God is then giving them a small portion of land currently inhabited by a sexually immoral and violent people. God is commanded this people to remove the existing people off the land and He, the God of the universe, is giving this land, to His people.
This was promised to Abraham hundreds of years ago starting as early as Genesis 12 (“to the land that I will show you”). In that same chapter, verse 7, God says to Abraham while he is in Canaan, “To your offspring I will give this land.” The land was a central and important part of the covenant God made with Israel. We might read chapter 12 as somewhat tedious. Israel read it as fulfillment of God’s promise and a testament of His faithfulness. This chapter is what Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob and his 12 sons dreamed up. Moses spent his later years leading them to this land and now they are here.
So, the author lists all the kings that were defeated and the boundaries of the land. If you were a soldier under Joshua, you might have thought at the beginning of the conquest, ‘we will never be able to defeat these mighty nations.’ But then when you saw Jericho fall by a few trumpet blasts and shouts and Ai taken. Then when the 5 kings that attacked Gibeah were defeated, you began to see what God was doing. At Gibeah, “the Lord threw down large stones from heaven on them” (10:11) you began to see that you were participating in something historic, theological, and miraculous. Walls do not crumble because someone shouts. Stones don’t have a season annually when they strike down just as certain people group.
So, read this chapter as miraculous fulfillment of what God promised. Remember that God tells His people beforehand what He is going to do. “See, I have given Jericho into your hand, with its king and mighty men of valor” (6:30). Later after Achan’s sin had been dealt with, “See, I have given into your hand the king of Ai, and his people, his city, and his land” (8:1).
God told Abraham and now Joshua is the warrior that is leading His people to remove the Canaanites off the land. These chapters are admittedly bloody and violent, but they show how a central part of the promise was fulfilled. We know there are many who have a difficult time believing God could sanction such violence. One, we know they were incredibly evil. God, in Dt 9:5, we see both purposes, “ because of the wickedness of these nations the LORD your God is driving them out from before you, and that he may confirm the word that the LORD swore to your fathers, to Abraham, to Isaac, and to Jacob. Here is a quote from this website: https://thinkingonscripture.com/tag/the-evil-practiced-by-the-canaanites/. “For centuries the Canaanites practiced gross sexual immorality, which included all forms of incest (Lev 18:1-20; 20:10-12, 14, 17, 19-21), homosexuality (Lev 18:22; 20:13), and sex with animals (Lev 18:23; 20:15-16). They also engaged in the occult (Lev 20:6), were hostile toward parents (Lev 20:9), and offered their children as sacrifices to Molech (Lev 18:21; 20:1-5; cf. Deut 12:31; 18:10). God told His people, “you shall not follow the customs of the nation which I will drive out before you, for they did all these things, and therefore I have abhorred them” (Lev 20:23)”
Second, this command was from God Himself (Deut 2:34; 7:1-2; 20:17) “When the LORD your God brings you into the land that you are entering to take possession of it, and clears away many nations before you, the Hittites, the Girgashites, the Amorites, the Canaanites, the Perizzites, the Hivites, and the Jebusites, seven nations more numerous and mightier than you, 2 and when the LORD your God gives them over to you, and you defeat them, then you must devote them to complete destruction.1 You shall make no covenant with them and show no mercy to them.” (7:1-2). God commanded this.
Third, this was for a limited time and special circumstance. But God did the same in the flood and there are many instances in the Bible of people dying because of their or other people’s sin (see Josh. 7 and Achan’s sin). God is a warrior (Ex 15:3) and just. The fact is, God is not like us. He casts rebels into hell which is far worse. There are aspects of God that we can try to understand, and we should. But there is a time when we say, ‘I have to trust God and not pretend to judge God.’ This is not giving up. This is an aspect of our reverence for God. We wait for Him to calm us with the truth because we know He is just, perfect, and wise.
Our loving, just, and almighty heavenly Father, we know so little of You. We admit that we will never, in this life certainly, nor in the next, be able to grasp or understand You. You are so great that You are beyond our comprehension. You can listen to every language at the same time and know what every human being will do in the next second. And all things accomplish the purpose You desire. We just can’t even begin to explain how mighty You are. Help us to rejoice in You, to trust You, and not reason away what we clearly read in the Scripture. In His glorious name, Amen.