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Joshua 6
Skip Heitzig

Joshua 6 (NKJV™)
1 Now Jericho was securely shut up because of the children of Israel; none went out, and none came in.
2 And the LORD said to Joshua: "See! I have given Jericho into your hand, its king, and the mighty men of valor.
3 "You shall march around the city, all you men of war; you shall go all around the city once. This you shall do six days.
4 "And seven priests shall bear seven trumpets of rams' horns before the ark. But the seventh day you shall march around the city seven times, and the priests shall blow the trumpets.
5 "It shall come to pass, when they make a long blast with the ram's horn, and when you hear the sound of the trumpet, that all the people shall shout with a great shout; then the wall of the city will fall down flat. And the people shall go up every man straight before him."
6 Then Joshua the son of Nun called the priests and said to them, "Take up the ark of the covenant, and let seven priests bear seven trumpets of rams' horns before the ark of the LORD."
7 And he said to the people, "Proceed, and march around the city, and let him who is armed advance before the ark of the LORD."
8 So it was, when Joshua had spoken to the people, that the seven priests bearing the seven trumpets of rams' horns before the LORD advanced and blew the trumpets, and the ark of the covenant of the LORD followed them.
9 The armed men went before the priests who blew the trumpets, and the rear guard came after the ark, while the priests continued blowing the trumpets.
10 Now Joshua had commanded the people, saying, "You shall not shout or make any noise with your voice, nor shall a word proceed out of your mouth, until the day I say to you, 'Shout!' Then you shall shout."
11 So he had the ark of the LORD circle the city, going around it once. Then they came into the camp and lodged in the camp.
12 And Joshua rose early in the morning, and the priests took up the ark of the LORD.
13 Then seven priests bearing seven trumpets of rams' horns before the ark of the LORD went on continually and blew with the trumpets. And the armed men went before them. But the rear guard came after the ark of the LORD, while the priests continued blowing the trumpets.
14 And the second day they marched around the city once and returned to the camp. So they did six days.
15 But it came to pass on the seventh day that they rose early, about the dawning of the day, and marched around the city seven times in the same manner. On that day only they marched around the city seven times.
16 And the seventh time it happened, when the priests blew the trumpets, that Joshua said to the people: "Shout, for the LORD has given you the city!
17 "Now the city shall be doomed by the LORD to destruction, it and all who are in it. Only Rahab the harlot shall live, she and all who are with her in the house, because she hid the messengers that we sent.
18 "And you, by all means abstain from the accursed things, lest you become accursed when you take of the accursed things, and make the camp of Israel a curse, and trouble it.
19 "But all the silver and gold, and vessels of bronze and iron, are consecrated to the LORD; they shall come into the treasury of the LORD."
20 So the people shouted when the priests blew the trumpets. And it happened when the people heard the sound of the trumpet, and the people shouted with a great shout, that the wall fell down flat. Then the people went up into the city, every man straight before him, and they took the city.
21 And they utterly destroyed all that was in the city, both man and woman, young and old, ox and sheep and donkey, with the edge of the sword.
22 But Joshua had said to the two men who had spied out the country, "Go into the harlot's house, and from there bring out the woman and all that she has, as you swore to her."
23 And the young men who had been spies went in and brought out Rahab, her father, her mother, her brothers, and all that she had. So they brought out all her relatives and left them outside the camp of Israel.
24 But they burned the city and all that was in it with fire. Only the silver and gold, and the vessels of bronze and iron, they put into the treasury of the house of the LORD.
25 And Joshua spared Rahab the harlot, her father's household, and all that she had. So she dwells in Israel to this day, because she hid the messengers whom Joshua sent to spy out Jericho.
26 Then Joshua charged them at that time, saying, "Cursed be the man before the LORD who rises up and builds this city Jericho; he shall lay its foundation with his firstborn, and with his youngest he shall set up its gates."
27 So the LORD was with Joshua, and his fame spread throughout all the country.

New King James Version®, Copyright © 1982, Thomas Nelson, Inc. All rights reserved.

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06 Joshua - 1998

Pastor Skip Heitzig expounds on the book of Joshua as a historical book, as the Israelites enter, conquer, and divide up the Promised Land, and also as a practical book on victorious living.

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Turn to Joshua, chapter 6, and we really want the begin chapter 6 with a couple of verses from chapter 5 that we left off on last week on purpose. Have you ever met someone who is so outstanding, so unusual, you wonder about that person, especially if that one walks close to the Lord, has an inside track, so to speak, with God, and they so impress you with the depth of relationship, the depth of experience, the spirituality? Joshua meets someone like this, but on a whole different level, someone that he didn't expect. Back in chapter 5, beginning in verse 13, "It came to pass, when Joshua was by Jericho, that he lifted his eyes and looked, and behold a man stood opposite him with his sword drawn in his hand. Joshua went to him and said, 'Are you for us or for our adversaries?'

"So he said, 'No, but as the Commander of the army of the Lord I have now come.' Joshua fell on his face to the earth and worshiped, and said to him, 'What does my Lord say to his servant?' " He sees someone with a sword drawn. That automatically puts up a red flag, he being a general and all, not knowing exactly who this character is at first. He's got a sword, so he thinks, "Okay, does this guy want to fight? Is he going to fight on our side or is he going to fight me right now?" And so he asks him this question: "Are you friend or foe?" His answer is very revealing. He says, "No." What kind of an answer is that to the question? The question is: "Are you for us or for our adversaries?" "No." As if to say, "That's not the issue, wrong question. The issue isn't am I on your side, but are you on my side?

"Because, Joshua, you are not in charge. I am the Commander of the Lord's army." The fact that he has a sword---and we'll kind of unfold this step by step here. The fact that he has a sword drawn now as the Commander of the Lord's army---if you're an astute Bible student, we'll bring you back to Genesis, chapter 15. You don't have the turn there, but it'll bring you back to a passage about God judging the Canaanites. The drawn sword means the sword is ready for action, ready for use. The idea here is that delay in judgment---and, yes, there has been a delay in Canaan for about 400 years. The delay is now over. God will judge and he'll use this Commander to begin. The sword is ready to fall. Back in Genesis, chapter 15, the story is with Abraham, has a conversation with God, makes a covenant with God.

And the Lord says to Abraham, "Abraham, know this: your descendants will be taken as captives, as slaves, in a land not their own for four hundred years. I'll punish the nation that oppresses them, and they will come out bearing much spoil as they come. And they will come again to this land that you are now in. They'll have this land. This is the Promised Land, but it will be about 400-year delay." And he says, "Four because the iniquity of the Amorites is not yet full." God waited 400, about 430 years all together before the children of Israel come into the land of Canaan, before they occupy the Promised Land. Now the iniquity's full. Now is the time to judge. Now the Canaanites will be spared nothing, and we'll touch on that the little bit tonight, but that's important background.

So here's the Commander of the Lord's army, drawn sword, delay in judgment no longer. Something obviously happens in the thinking of Joshua for him to call this guy "Lord," to fall down and worship. He realizes, no doubt, that he's dealing not with a mortal soldier, but with someone different. He calls him "Lord." And this brings back, of course, to our minds other like stories in the Bible, other incidents where you go, "H'm, well, who is this person exactly?" For example, Abraham, when he was at the terebinth trees or the oak trees of Mamre. He's there with his tent. Flocks are around. Sarah's in the tent. They're very old at this point. Three strange visitors come and they're talking, and Abraham goes, "Okay, I got visitors, I gotta make a nice stew and cut up the meal."

And, you know, he kind of says, "Sarah," and they get really busy to serve and to feed these three strangers. One of them, the spokesmen says, "Abraham, let me tell you something. I know you're old and all that, but your wife Sarah is going to have a child, going to have her own child. She's going to get pregnant and you guys are going to have a son." That's great news. Sarah overhears the conversation in the tent and the Bible says, "She laughs within herself." Not even an audible laugh, just [laughing silently] because she thinks, "I'm an old lady. These things don't happen. I can't have that kind of pleasure. I'm way past the flower of not only youth, but middle age. May be miraculous forty years ago, but this is like, "Come on." So she laughs, and this messenger says, "Why did Sarah laugh?"

And Sarah pokes her head and goes, "I didn't laugh." And the messenger says, "Yeah, you did laugh. And is anything too hard for the Lord?" He says, "I will visit you at your appointed time and you will have a son." He is known as "the Angel of the Lord" in that passage, not an angel, not just a messenger, but "the Angel of the Lord," and addressed as "the LORD" later on. And so we keep reading in our Bibles and we come to the incident of Jacob, when he crosses the Jabbok River and says, "He wrestles with a Man all night to the breaking of the day." And the guy wrestling him, you know, finally says, "What's your name?" And Jacob says, "My name is Jacob." The guy says, "Well, not anymore. I'm going to give you a new name, Israel; because you have struggled with God and with men and have prevailed."

And then Jacob, "What's your name?" The guy says, "Why do you ask me my name?" Well, after this strange incident of wrestling with this guy who touches and cripples Jacob's thigh, Jacob calls the name of place Peniel, which means "the face of God," saying, "I have seen God face to face and I'm not dead. I'm still alive to tell about it." Strange personage, strange incident. Then there's Moses, he's walking through the desert one day and hears a plant talk to him. He's never had this happen before. He's thinking, "I've been out here way too long." [laughter] This bush is burning and the Angel of the Lord is speaking from the midst of the bush. And this Angel of the Lord says, "I am the Lord," and, "Take your sandals off, this is holy ground." And it's an odd kind of passage.

We wonder now, "What's talking? Who's talking? Who is the Angel of the Lord that is called 'the Lord'?" And then we see Jacob here bowing down to worship. In the next verse this messenger says, "Take your sandals off, your shoes off, because this is holy ground," very reminiscent of Moses and his whole interaction with God. And there are other passages. I'll spare you going through all of them. But because of these passages where you have a personage called "the Angel of the Lord," who is called "God" or "Lord," or worshiped as God, or given the attributes of God, most scholars, most theologians say these are "theophanies" in the Bible; that is, some manifestation of God, some flesh manifestation, some special apparition of God in Old Testament times.

Or more precisely, some will say these are "Christophanies," the appearance of Christ in the Old Testament. Now he's called---notice this---"the Commander of the army of the Lord." I don't think you should limit that just to Israel's army and fighting men. But it says, "the army of the Lord," that would include, no doubt, the host of angels. And I would say, looking at the way the land was conquered, I think God used a lot of those angels. I don't think they were just sitting around; I think they were being used. They were dispatched. What kind of an army are we talking about? Okay, another story: do you remember when---oh, this is classic---the king of Syria is talking to his commanders and he's saying, "Okay, gentlemen, we're going to set up camp in a certain place in Israel." They said, "Gotcha."

Well, they dispatched people to set up camp and Israel's armies are already there waiting for them. So this happens again. The guy says, "I'm going to set up camp over there," and Israel's armies are setting up camp. Everywhere they go there's somebody out to ambush them. So the king of Syria gets his guys together and he goes, "Okay, which one of you guys are rats? Who's the spy? Who's giving information over to the king of Israel?" One of them says, "King, none of us are, but there's a prophet named Elisha. He lives in Israel. And, King, you can't even talk to your wife in your bedroom, but he doesn't know about it. And what you say in your bedroom, he knows about it and he'll tell it to the king of Israel. He knows every move." He goes, "Where is this guy located at?" "Oh he's over in a town called Dothan."

He goes, "Let's go get him." So the whole Syrian army is out to get one dude and they surround the entire city of Dothan. Elisha is in Dothan, indeed, with his assistant. And as they're there and his assistant looks up and sees, "We're surrounded by the armies of see Syria," he gets all nervous. He goes, "Oh, man, we're in trouble. We're toast. They're out the kill us. They've come here because of you." And so Elisha, knowing this guy's just going panic, he goes, "O Lord, would you just open his eyes." And then he turns to his friend and he goes, "Let me tell you something: those who are on our side and for us are a lot more than those are who for them." And God opened his eyes spiritually, and saw angels and chariots camped around the mountains, around Dothan, surrounding the Syrian army.

And wiped them out, struck them with blindness, basically. And Elisha escapes with his assistant out of Dothan. So here we have one worshiped as the Lord who is the Commander of the Lord's army. And don't you know it's more than just the children of Israel. We're talking about a pretty sizable army here, if you include angels. I think Jesus referred to them when Jesus said in the garden of Gethsemane---remember when Peter was lopping ears off and Jesus said, "Put your sword up, Peter. Don't you know that right now I could pray to my Father and he'll send me seventy-two thousand angels if I want, just like that, drop of a hat, twelve legions?" A "legion" being 6,000 men. "I could get seventy-two thousand angels right now." This is the Commander of the Lord's army, the Lord's hosts.

Verse 15, "Then the Commander of the Lord's army said to Joshua, 'Take off your sandal off your foot, for the place where you stand is holy.' And Joshua did so." Now, if I told you to do that, you'd say, "Forget it." [laughter] That's reserved for God to say that. That happened to Moses. Moses did that to worship God. And Joshua, no doubt, remembered back. As soon as he said this, he went, "Ding! That happened to Moses. Moses did it; I'm going to do it." He knew that this was no mortal man, but this was God. Now, what's the lesson in all this? Well, Joshua learns that he's not the general, that headquarters is not his tent, that he's second in command, that there is somebody over him. He's only a private. And, no doubt, this was an encouragement to Joshua as the leader. He realizes, "I'm not alone."

Remember in chapter 1, God says, "As I was with Moses, I'm going to be with you." Here's he's experiencing that promise. There is a type of loneliness in leadership. Leaders are often people who have certain vision and insight and want to go a certain direction, and not everybody sees it. And they make decisions that affect other people's lives, and it's an isolated kind of feeling. And probably Joshua, it's like, "Okay, you know, I'm having this weird experience of coming over the Jordan again. I've always wanted to take this land. I know God has called me to do this," but still knowing, "This is going to be a battle, this is going to be tough ahead," that assurance that God is with him during this meeting. "Take your sandals off." And he worshiped. He did so.

I'm sure that not everyone in Israel knew about this private meeting. But you know what? It was because of this meeting that made the difference between defeat and victory. "Hey, the Commander's here." "No problem." It was great comfort as he realized: "this is the success; this is not the failure. I'm second in command. I'm doing this at the bidding of the Lord. He's in charge. This is God's battle." I think that every mother, every father, every boss, every pastor, every leader of any sort should realize they are not in command. God is in command. God is in charge. It's the Lord's battle. We are, at best, second in command and we must learn to take our orders from him. Do you remember that Jesus said, "without me you can do nothing"? How many of us believe that? "Without me you can do nothing."

"Well, I believe that." Well, I tell you how you can tell if a person believes that: if they depend on God, if they turn everything in their life over to him. If everything is bathed in prayer, then they believe, "Without me you can do nothing." If you don't bathe everything in prayer, you must believe you can do a lot of things without him. Joshua needed to learn who's in charge before the battle begins. Well, now in chapter 6 we come to the famous battle of Jericho. This is one of those walled cities, those fortified cities that the twelve spies noticed as they looked into the land many years before, and now they're about to conquer it. Verse 1, "Now, Jericho was securely shut up because of the children of Israel; none went out, none came in.

And the Lord said to Joshua: 'See! I have given Jericho into your hand, its king, and the mighty men of valor.' " This is the Promised Land, but it's also the "problemed" land. There is opposition. They're going to walk in and, yes, walls are going to fall down. This is a great, great time, but not every battle will be like this. They're entering now into conflict, and they're facing people in walled cities, walled villages, city-states, well-armed idol worshipers. Don't want anything to do with their God. Don't want anything to do with them. Would rather they were not there. And Jericho, in looking at it, must have seemed impossible, unconquerable, formidable. According to the archaeology digs, there was not one wall, but two walls spaced about fifteen feet apart.

The walls went up and they were vigas, pieces of wood were put horizontally in the walls, and so that you could build a structure on top of that wood section. That's probably where Rahab the harlot and others lived, the perimeters of the walls. But they were thick, stout walls. "Impossible. How do we break through it?" Very, very tough area. Now on one side is this walled city filled with armed men and women. They're ready for the battle. On the other side, this ragtag, Bedouin wandering group of slaves. And the way they approached Jericho, as we go through this chapter, is very, very interesting. I believe that every Christian has a Jericho or two or three. Oh, you're in the Promised Land, this is great.

You're walking by faith, not by sight, but you have something that you think, "This is unconquerable. This is impossible. This is tough. It's formidable." It might be an internal Jericho, some flaw in your character, some weakness, some weakness where you're tempted in an area more than any other area of your life, some Achilles' heel. Could be anger. Could be lust. Could be impatience. Others have external Jerichos: an unsaved friend. You just can't seem to get the victory in that. Perhaps, it's a debt, or even a disability. It seems impossible. Maybe it's a work for the Lord you feel God's called you to, but you think, "I could never do that. That's too big. I'm not good enough. I'm not significant enough. It's too hard of a battle." Things looked impossible for the children of Israel.

Look at the phrase in verse 1: "Jericho was securely shut up." They were ready for battle. And these things test our faith. "There's a wall. They got weapons. They don't love God. They don't like me. And I've got to go after them." At these times the question is not How big of a man are you? but, How big is your God? You might admit, "Listen, I'm a weakling here. I can't handle this." You're not called upon to handle this. And as long as you stand there in your own power and your own might without the strength of God, without the faith of God, your walls are going to fall down. You'll collapse. The question is: How big is your God? Remember Joshua and Caleb forty years before said, "Let us at 'em. Come on, I don't care how big they are, God can do this. Let's go for it."

Their God was big. How big is your God? Memorize Genesis 1:1 if you haven't already. It's the easiest verse in the Bible: "in the beginning God created the heavens and the earth." You probably got it memorized by now, if you hadn't up to this point. Every time you face a Jericho, remember that verse: "God created the heavens and the earth." If your God can do that, how hard is Jericho? How hard is that debt? How hard is that disability? How hard is that unsaved relative? How big is your God? So they approach it. Also, we begin here in verse 3, noticing this: Jericho teaches us that God's ways are not our ways. Keep in mind, these are armed men, some form of armament they have in going around the walls of Jericho. They're ready for battle. They're ready for action. This is a military endeavor.

But as you listen to the marching orders, if you're a military person, it would sound very frustrating. And the only thing you could conclude is: "God's ways aren't my ways. This doesn't seem logical." No, but it's going to work. That which is theological isn't always logical. That doesn't mean that God says, "Abandon logic, do not think." No. The Bible says you're to love the Lord your God with all your mind, but sometimes the ways of God do not make sense in the flesh. Look at the marching orders: " 'You shall march around the city, all you men of war,' " is the phrase there. The "men of war" are out there. " 'You shall go all around the city once. This you shall do six days. And seven priests shall bear seven trumpets of rams' horns before the ark. But the seventh day you shall march around the city seven times, and the priests shall blow the trumpets.

"It shall come to pass, when they make a long blast with the ram's horn, and when you hear the sound of the trumpet, that all the people shall shout with a great shout; then the wall of the city will fall down flat. And all the people shall good up every man straight before him.' " Now picture General Joshua gathering his captains and colonels and his leaders as they're going, "We're ready. What did God tell you? What's the plan?" "Okay, we march around it once." "Cool! Yeah!" and then we attack?" "No." And then he spells out the scenario: "The walls are going to fall down flat." You know, imagine they went, "Okay, is there anybody else that can rule this ragtag army besides you?" I'm sure that some of them struggled with this.

It's a principle of God, very consistent with God, and sort of summed up in 1 Corinthians 1. It's my favorite verse---not my favorite verse, but it is, of sorts, my life verse: "For God has chosen the foolish of this world to put to shame those things that are wise, and God has chosen the weak things of this world to put to shame the things that are mighty, and the base things"---now here's the reason---"that no flesh should glory in his presence." God wants to make sure this firstfruits battle in the land of Canaan, that it's so obviously God, that it's not the wisdom of Joshua, it's not the prowess of the fighting men; it's so obviously God that no flesh can glory, that people go, "Wow! Cool! That was God." And so it's done this way.

What can what can be more foolish than walking around a city securely shut up, ready for battle, tooting horns? I mean, not even great horns---rams horns, shofars. I don't know if you've ever heard, I've blown on a couple occasions, but they don't even get a great tone. And, again, I said this is consistent throughout the Scripture, many times God does these foolish things. Peter had been fishing all night and Jesus comes to him and says, "Peter, let's get in your boat, launch out into the deep, through down your nets, get ready for a big catch." And Peter argues with the Lord: "Uh, Lord, we've been fishing all night and caught nothing." That's Peter's way of saying, and it was true in a sense, "I've lived here on the lake. I've done this all my life.

"Everybody who's anybody knows the best time to fish Galilee is not now, sun's up, middle of day, but late at night or early, early in the morning when it's still dark. And we've done it. We've been out all night, caught nothing. All right?" And then he looks at Jesus, Jesus kind of gives him that look, and Peter says, "Nevertheless at your word, at your command we'll go for it." And you can picture Peter, you know, he's the guy with the little hooks in his hat in Field & Stream magazine. He was the pro. He rolls his eyes: "Oh, great!" lets down the net. "This is going to be fun." Until all of a sudden that boat starts pulling down. It's so full of fish, takes a couple boats to bring it in. Falls down to his knees and he says, "Depart from me, Lord, I'm a sinful man." "Wait a minute, I thought you were an expert fishermen."

"Uh, that was before," [laughter] very humble. So illogical, but it worked. Okay, how about Naaman the leper? Talk about being illogical. Naaman was one of the commanders of the Syrian army that we just mentioned a little while ago. He had leprosy all over his body. He was doomed to death. Somebody in the Syrian camp, a gal, says, "There is a character down in Israel named Elisha. They say he's a miracle worker. You ought to go down and talk to him. You ought to go down and make an appointment with him." So they get it all squared away with the king of Israel, the king of Syria. Naaman comes down into Israel with his entourage, goes up to Elisha the prophet's home, to his door. Messenger gets off, knocks on the door, says, "Naaman's here. He's the guy with leprosy. What should he do?"

Elisha doesn't even go outside. He just sends his messenger, says, "Go tell him to go to the Jordan River and dunk seven times. He'll get better." The messenger tells Naaman, who traveled all this way, "Go to the Jordan River and dunk seven times." Now, Naaman gets very upset. He goes, "Wait a minute," because he thought, it says in the Scripture, he thought that Elisha would come out and call on the name of his God and wave his hand in a dramatic way over Naaman. He thought he'd be like one of the televangelists. [laughter] He'd come out and maybe wear a white suit and part his hair really low. [laughter] He was expecting something dramatic. And he gets angry and he says, "Are not the rivers of Damascus better than all the waters of Israel?

"I could have dunked back in Damascus, why did I come all the way from Damascus to this little Podunk place to go to a muddy river?" Ever look at the Rio Grande? [laughter] When you think of Jordan River, think Rio Grande. You get the idea of what this guy meant. "Why did I come here the Jordan?" It's a muddy river in Israel, for the most part. So he's about to go away angry. And the servant says, "You know what? You came all this way, give it a try." So he goes over to the Jordan, dunks once. Nothing happened. Dunks twice. Nothing happened. He's just kind of making a fool out of himself. Dunk, up and down, up and down. People are watching. [laughter] I'm sure like on the sixth time he's going, "This is so lame!" But he goes down the seventh time and he comes up completely purified of his leprosy.

So illogical, but it worked. See, it's consistent with God often in the Scriptures. What about the multitude that was hungry? Jesus is out teaching all day and the disciples say, "These guys hungry." Jesus says, "So feed them. You give them something to eat." Guy tallies it up. Andrew tries to figure out: "Okay, we take two-thirds of a year's wage of everybody and still . . . ." Jesus says, "Have them sit down." So they sit down on the grass. And the disciples say, "We don't have any food. There's just a kid, he's got a few loaves and fish." "Perfect, bring them to me." "Bring the loaves and fish to you, right?" "Right." So foolish, but it worked. You see then, God chooses the weak, the beggarly, the foolish to confound people, so that no flesh could glory in his presence.

So, you feel weak? Do you feel foolish? You feel like 'I can't do it '? You're qualified. [laughter] Don't you see, it's, like, perfect. You will do. Now, if you come to God and say, "I am not like one of those foolish Christians. I am more educated. I've got some masters degrees and Ph.D.s and I'm brilliant, and God certainly will use me." I think he'll bypass you. Not that God can't use you, God certainly does use intellects. Paul the apostle was the exception to the rule that he just stated in 1 Corinthians 1. But God's pattern is to use normal stuff, normal stuff. And it seems so weird, and it seems so illogical, but it works. And let me go a step further, even the cross seems illogical to most.

Think about it: the shed blood of one person is efficacious enough to cleanse a person's sin---past, present, and future---and could, if the world turned to him, cleanse the world's sin? Yes. It seems so illogical, but you know what? It works. And, see, so many people don't come to Christ for this reason. And I had a woman when I worked at a hospital in Westminster, California---"You tell me that the blood of one person can save me from sin?" I said, "You know what? Before you knock it, try it. Try him. Give Jesus a chance. Receive him as Lord. See what he can do. Trust him. Experience him." Well, Joshua responds with an unquestioning obedience. "Joshua, do this." And as we read on, Joshua does this. Of course, I think the whole secret is the last part of Joshua 5.

He had met with the Lord, this meeting with the theophany, the Angel of the Lord, preincarnate Christ, perhaps, got him all ready. "Okay, I'm not the commander here. This is the Commander. I met him. So I'll march around the city and blow the horns all day long. He's the guy in charge, not a problem." Make sure that you go out the same way, being strong in the Lord and in power of his might, not in your own strength. Make sure it's God-directed, otherwise, as I said, your walls will fall down. One of the first rules in medicine is: never let a patient prescribe his own medicine, his own cure. You know the type. There are people who read every book and see every medical show, and they're sure they have it all. "I have that! And I have that. I'm, like, I'm totally sick. I have all those diseases." [laughter]

A doctor will often say, "Quit reading those books. Let me be the doctor." Don't try to be the doctor as a layperson. And in a spiritual realm, never try to do spiritual battle in the energy of the flesh; do it in the energy of the Spirit. What if Joshua would have taken a poll to see if the polls were up in his favor? Should he do this, or not? Should he really march around the city this way, or should he try something else? Good leaders don't necessarily operate that way. Harry Truman said: "I wonder how far Moses would have gone if they had taken a poll in Egypt?" What would Jesus Christ have preached if they took a poll in Israel? Where would the Reformation have gone if Martin Luther had taken a poll? It isn't the polls or public opinion of the moment that counts.

"It is a right and wrong, and leadership---men with fortitude, honesty, and a belief in the right that makes epochs in the history of the world." Well, let's go on in our text. We've seen the marching orders, let's look at the order of the march. "Joshua the son of Nun called the priests and said to them, 'Take the ark of the covenant, let the seven priests bear seven trumpets of ram's horns before the ark of the Lord.' " So, not only are the men of war just going to be walking around, the musicians are leading the battle and the chaplains. They're out front, the religious people, the priests. "And he said to the people, 'Proceed, and march around the city, and let him who is armed advance before the ark of the Lord.'

"So it was, when Joshua had spoken to the people, that the seven priests bearing the seven trumpets of ram's horns before the Lord advanced and blew the trumpets, and the ark of the covenant of the Lord followed them. The armed men went before the priests who blew the trumpets, and the rear guard came after the ark, while the priests continued blowing the trumpets. Now Joshua had commanded the people, saying, 'You shall not shout or make any noise with your voice, nor shall a word proceed out of your mouth, until the day I say to you, "Shout!" Then you shall shout.' So he had the ark of the Lord circle the city, going around it once. Then they came into the camp and lodged in the camp. And Joshua rose early in the morning and the priests took up the ark of the Lord.

"Then seven priests bearing seven trumpets of ram's horns before the ark of the Lord went on continually and blew with the trumpets. And the armed men went before them. But the rear guard came after the ark of the Lord, while the priests continued blowing the trumpets. And the second day they marched around the city once and returned to the camp. So they did six days." Think of the tension that is building within the walls of Jericho, from the watchmen on the wall, to the top brass in the Pentagon of Jericho burning the midnight oil trying to figure out, "What are they doing?" To put it in modern terms, the guy's out there on the wall with his binoculars, he goes, "I see them. They're coming! They're marching! Well, there's a lot of them, but they're carrying a box and they're guys in robes blowing horns.

"And they're not saying anything. And they're marching around the city---oh wait, they're taking a turn. They're going all around the city." And this watching them and then, "Well, now what are they doing?" "They're retreating. They're going back to camp." [laughter] Why are they doing this? Why did God command this? There's a few reasons, I think. Number one, to frustrate the people in Jericho for this very reason. "What's this new strategy?" And in that frustration they will see this is the Lord. Remember, their hearts had melted because of what they heard and the reputation of God in the past. So this frustrates them, uncertain when the children of Israel would attack. Secondly, to test the faith, no doubt, of the Joshua and the children of Israel.

They're going to have lot of tests of faith coming up. This is sort of the premier test of faith for the entire country. It is a test of faith because they're not fighting. These are armed men, but they're not fighting, and they're very vulnerable. When you march around a city when people are up on the walls and they have weapons to fling down at you, or oil, or rocks, you're very open and very vulnerable. So it's testing the faith of Israel and of Joshua. Having vision and faith are not always easy, because if you've heard from the Lord or you have an insight, or you have a particular---you really feel in your heart: "I know this is the Lord." Others who are even close to you may not see things the way you see them. And so you'll be, perhaps, misconstrued as, "Uh, you're a little weird."

Now you might be a little weird, [laughter] or it might be the Lord. Time will tell. There are ways to test it. Fruit is the best way to see the fruit of this whole endeavor. But, you know, here's Joshua a man of faith, a man of insight, a man of vision. Caleb's probably in the rank somewhere going, "Yeah! Yeah! Right." And I bet there's a few that are going, "H'm, okay, urn you know, we're going to follow this guy, and the water opened up like it did for our forefathers, the Jordan opened up, but it's a little weird." When we first came and looked at this building, we needed a place to meet. Our fellowship was growing larger when we were at our rented facility. And one of our board members said, "Hey, there's this place on Osuna Road." And we thought, "Where?" because it was so far away from our facility, Osuna Road.

So we drove over here, looked inside at a big, empty chasm with no heating, no air-condition, Astroturf. It was a soccer field. And I looked at it and I said, "This is perfect." I was with my board of directors and almost everyone said, "Won't work. Too big. You could have one service in here and you wouldn't even fill it, you know, half. It's just---it's too big." I said, "No, you can put the stage up here and you can put a foyer." And I'm going through it, and goes, "Won't work." And even when we announced to the church on a Sunday morning, "We're thinking of do it," had some people write letters: "Won't work. This is isn't God. You're not hearing from God. It's too big, too much money, too this, too that." So I read them, threw them out. [laughter] We prayed.

Board came back together and said, "I really think this is the Lord. Let's go for it." And now you think, "Well, we have four services on the weekend, the place isn't too big. It could stand to be a little bigger." But God knew what he was doing. But, you know, as you stand, you stand in the middle looking at it, I was wondering, "Why couldn't they see it, it's perfect? You could just see it all unfold. "Won't work." Well, it's worked, thank God. There's another reason, no doubt, that God did this, and that is the test their humility. These soldiers of Israel are used to a battle; to them this is like a May Day parade. They're humbling themselves in obedience and following Joshua. You're going to see it pan out and play into Joshua's favor at the very end of the chapter, but this is to humble them.

Verse 15, "It came to pass on the seventh day that they arose early, about the dawning of the day, marched around the city seven times, same manner. On that day they marched around the city seven times. And the seventh time it happened, when the priests blew the trumpets, that Joshua said to the people. 'Shout, for the Lord has given you the city! Now the city shall be doomed by the Lord to destruction, it and all who are in it. Only Rahab the harlot shall live, she and all who are with her in the house, because she hid the messengers that we sent. And you, by all means abstain from the accursed things, lest you become accursed when you take of the accursed things, and make the camp of Israel accursed, and trouble it.' "

These are the devoted things, is the idea, things, the booty, the spoil that was to be devoted to the treasury of the Lord. No one was to take it and use it on themselves. One man will disobey, named Achan, and we will see his plight as the chapters unfold. " 'But all the silver,' " verse 19, " 'and the gold, the vessels of bronze and iron, are consecrated to the Lord; they shall come into the treasury of the Lord.' So the people shouted when the priests blew the trumpets. And it happened when the people heard the sound of the trumpet, and the people shouted with a great shout, that the wall fell down flat. Then the people went up into the city, every man straight before him, and they took the city." Imagine how that shout must have sounded. They had withheld a noise for a week.

These are soldiers. That would be very difficult, all that pent-up energy and adrenaline. You know, when you go out to a battle, I'm sure that your heart is pumping and adrenaline---you know, even the movies that I've seen. It's the people---soldiers grunt. They want to yell, make noise. They couldn't do anything. There's just silent marching. And then when Joshua says, "Go for it!" and they all shouted. Ooh, what that must have sounded like. The shout was more than just pent-up human energy. I think it was the victory shout. It was a shout of praise, a shout of worship. I look at it look the children of Israel were in the grandstands and God was down on the field carrying the football from one end to the other, to use an analogy.

He was the one running the game, winning the game, and the children of Israel were shouting, "Yeah! It's God's victory, not ours." And, by the way, that's the way to do ministry. Do it in such a way that you can shout for God doing the work rather than you getting the glory: "This is God. Go God!" Listening to that worship song right before I came out, what a great anthem of excitement. William Sangster was a preacher many years ago in England, and something happened. He had a disease of the vocal cords so that he couldn't speak, he couldn't preach, he couldn't sing, and it was very devastating. One Easter he woke up unable to use his voice, and he wrote this entry in his journal, he said: "How terrible it is to wake up on Easter and have no voice to shout 'He is risen!' "

But he went on, "Far worse to have a voice and not want to shout." "Far worse to have a voice and not want to shout," not want to get excited about "this is God's work." So they shout, beautiful, beautiful shout. Verse 4, I want you to go back, because it mentions the trumpets. Notice in verse 4 there are seven trumpets. They blow the trumpets here just to note there are seven trumpets. And that should ring a little bell prophetically for you. In biblical numerology, seven is a complete number, not necessarily a perfect number, because Satan has seven heads. So it's a complete number, just as there are seven colors in the scale, seven notes---or in a rainbow, seven notes in a musical scale, seven days that comprise a complete week.

God rested on the seventh day and sanctified it. In the tabernacle, the seven-branched candlestick, the menorah. It means something. And I tie it into the book of Revelation where also seven trumpets issue forth. And in the book of Joshua we have seven trumpets and judgment falling upon the land and Joshua taking captives. In the book of Revelation we have another Joshua. Joshua is the Hebrew name for Jesus. Same exact name, just one difference, it was a different language. We have another Joshua taking captives and judgment falls upon the earth. So we have seven trumpet judgments similar to the book of Joshua. Verse 21, "They utterly destroyed all that was in the city, both man and woman, young and old, sheep and donkey, with the edge of the sword."

Now face it, a lot of people have difficulty with that. They don't like that verse. And there's a lot of verses in the Bible like it. And it's probably in the underlined in most your Bibles. It's hard for us to reconcile that. And so people have come up with two Gods. There's the two-deity theory: there was a God of the Old Testament, a God of wrath; and there's a God of the New Testament, a God of mercy. And I've heard people say that they're irreconcilable: "Why would God ever allow this to happen?" If your children were playing in the front yard, and rabid dogs with known disease were running after them, you saw it out of the corner of your eye from your front window, you see the scene unfolding quickly before you as those dogs are approaching.

At that point, you're not going to think a lot of the rights of those dogs. You will stop it to the point of destruction, because you love your children and you want to preserve your children in that land that they're in, and the rabid dogs would absolutely destroy those that you love. What most people do not realize is the Canaanites were not only heavily involved in witchcraft, the use of mediums, astrology---not just the kind of astrology that's in newspapers, that's bad enough, but living their lives that way---idol worship, demonology, but also sacrificing their children was very common, their infants. They would kill them and sacrifice to their gods. That kind of environment could ruin and destroy the children of Israel from out of their land. Indeed it did, because they did not obey this commandment.

They didn't go in and take all the land. They didn't go in---they spared enough people so that their idolatry spread to the children of Israel, and they were kicked out of their land into Babylon. Study the Canaanites, study those groups and find out what kind of people they were. You'll go, "Oh my goodness!" They were really raunchy." It wasn't like they were just innocent little people, it was so---they were so steeped in the worst kinds of practices. Not only that, folks, but it's not a sudden kind of a judgment. Remember back in Genesis 15, God had given them 430 years with Abraham being in the land, with them hearing the reports of the Red Sea drying up, the forty-year march, Og and Sihon the kings being destroyed by God. They had the fear of God in their hearts, but they didn't turn to God.

They all said, Joshua chapter 1, "We know that your God is God. We know that." Only Rahab did something about it and she's spared. There was a change, there was a repentance, but on a national level God had been very, very patient. Now the patience is up. It's time to judge. The children of Israel, as I mentioned, did fall many times into idolatry, to the point of almost being destroyed completely, completely. And I think what we see is Satan trying to destroy the Jewish nation to the extent that the Messiah could not come. There's a spiritual battle going on. Not just little battles, which are bad enough, but there's a spiritual battle going on. "Joshua had said to the two men who spied out the country, "Go into the harlot's house, and from there bring out the woman and all that she has, as you swore to her.'

"And the young men who had been spies went in and brought out Rahab, her father, her mother, her brothers, was and all that she had. So they brought out all her relatives and left them outside the camp of Israel. But they burned the city and all that was in it with fire. Only the silver and gold and vessels of bronze and iron they put into the treasury of the house of the Lord. And Joshua spared Rahab the harlot, her father's household, and all that she had. So she dwells in Israel to this day, because she hid the messengers whom Joshua sent to spy out Jericho. Then Joshua charged at this time, saying, 'Cursed be the man before the Lord who rises up and builds this city Jericho; he shall lay its foundation with his firstborn, and with his youngest he shall set up its gates.' So the Lord was with Joshua, and his fame spread throughout all the country."

After the march was over, after the city was destroyed, two things are mentioned. Number one: "Don't take any booty for yourselves. Destroy everything. This goes into the treasury. Don't be selfish." Second command: "Save Rahab the harlot." She's the exception. She and her family turned to God. They did act by faith. They hid the messengers, they believed in God, we saw that a few weeks ago, and so they are spared. Now do you realize how important that is right there, that little lesson? Judgment falls, those who trust are spared. They are kept from the judgment. They are kept from the judgment. Now this is God's pattern, just like choosing the foolish things, this is God's pattern. We have two and a half, 2.34 minutes left. Would you turn to 2 Peter, chapter 2, very rapidly.

Second Peter 2:4, Peter, in going through this pattern, says, "For if God did not spare the angels who sinned, but cast them down to hell and delivered them into chains of darkness, to be reserved for judgment; and did not spare the ancient world, but saved Noah, one of eight people, a preacher of righteousness, bringing in the flood on the world of the ungodly; and turning the cities of Sodom and Gomorrah into ashes, condemned them to destruction, making them an example to those who afterwards would live ungodly; and delivered righteous Lot, who was oppressed by the filthy conduct of the wicked (for that righteousness man, dwelling among them, tormented his righteousness soul from day to day by seeing and hearing their lawless deeds)---then the Lord knows how to deliver the godly out of temptations and reserve the unjust under punishment for the day of judgment."

Folks, that is God's pattern. When he judges a portion of the world or judges the world because of sin, he spares those who trust in him. That's a pattern. It was a pattern in the flood. It was a pattern with Lot in Sodom and Gomorrah. It's a pattern here in the book of Joshua. And that pattern will continue even to the very end of times in the tribulation period. In the end of time there is going to be, I believe, this sequence of events: the rapture of the church, which can happen at any moment, I believe. Nothing is stopping it. It could happen tonight. We should always live in that expectation. There will be then seven years of tribulation. The last three and a half years, the great tribulation, the worst time period, epoch, ever in human history, according to Daniel and Jesus.

After that seven-year period is over, the second coming of Jesus Christ, he comes with us, with the armies of heaven, stamps out the Antichrist. There's the resurrection of the just at that time. There's a thousand-year millennial reign of Christ on the earth, physically, literally, from Mount Zion. At the end of that comes the resurrection of the unjust, the great white throne judgment. Then time is wiped away. There is the eternal state. There's no time anymore. It's eternity. There is the New Jerusalem, a new heaven, a new earth. Every single thing is new. Before all of that happens, the rapture of church comes, I believe, no question, before God enacts judgment upon the earth in the tribulation. Number one, because of the nature of God. We just read here the Lord knows how to deliver the godly and to reserve the ungodly for judgment.

Number two, that's been God's track record. That's what Peter says: "He did it there, he did it there, he's going to do it again." That's God's track record. Third reason is because of the nature of judgment. Now, I hear people quote this, they'll say, "I think that we will be raptured in the middle or at the end of the tribulation because Jesus said, 'In the world you will have tribulation.' " Oh, please. I don't want to make a big issue of that, but don't use that text. Yes, in the world everybody will have tribulation, even the Christian. But there's a big difference, Christian, from the tribulation that the world gives us and the tribulation that God sends the world, two different kinds of tribulation. One is unmistakable judgment. The Christian will not face that kind of judgment.

"You pass from death into life," Jesus said, you do not face the judgment of God, John, chapter 5. So it's very, very different. The tribulation that we all face from the world and the great tribulation from God are different. And then there's a fourth reason, I'll end quickly with this: because of the natural reading of the Scriptures. If you have a natural reading of Matthew 24, a natural reading of 1 Thessalonians 4 and 2 Thessalonians, which speaks about the "day of the Lord." A natural reading of the book of Revelation, your conclusion reading it naturally, linguistically, contextually, is that, "Oh, the rapture happens before the judgment." Why? Well, you look at the church mentioned nineteen times in the first few chapters till you get to chapter 4. The focus is the church.

The church isn't mentioned from chapter 4 through the entire book of Revelation, to the last couple chapters, when it's all over and there's a reuniting of all of heaven and a new heaven and a new earth. The idiom of the lampstands which is mentioned predominantly on chapter 2 and 3 of the book of Revelation is absent after chapter 3. And what do we see in chapter 4? "I saw a door opened in heaven and a trumpet and a voice speaking to me, and I was in the presence of the Lord," this immediate rapture.

Additional Messages in this Series

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7/29/1998
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Joshua 1
Joshua 1
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8/5/1998
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Joshua 2
Joshua 2
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8/12/1998
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Joshua 3
Joshua 3
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8/19/1998
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Joshua 4-5
Joshua 4-5
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9/2/1998
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Joshua 7
Joshua 7
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9/16/1998
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Joshua 8-9
Joshua 8-9
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10/21/1998
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Joshua 10-12
Joshua 10-12
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10/28/1998
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Joshua 13-15
Joshua 13-15
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11/4/1998
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Joshua 16-19
Joshua 16-19
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11/11/1998
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Joshua 20-21
Joshua 20-21
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11/18/1998
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Joshua 22
Joshua 22
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12/9/1998
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Joshua 23
Joshua 23
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12/16/1998
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Joshua 24
Joshua 24
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There are 13 additional messages in this series.
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