Joshua


Family devotions after dinner one evening focused on the story in the book of Judges when the sun stood still in the sky – to give Joshua time to kill his Canaanite enemies.  After a closing prayer someone at the table remarked, “Jesus would not have endorsed what Joshua did.”  The man obviously didn’t believe that Jesus would have approved of the mandate God gave Joshua and his people to wipe out the inhabitants of Canaan.

Not long ago a leading atheist made the point even more strongly.  He spoke of the God the Old Testament being ‘a self-absorbed, genocidal monster’.  Such comments are problematic for me.  Hey, don’t we believe that Jesus is God...?

This also raises questions about defending God’s integrity.  What should we do?  Do we perhaps take a leaf out of Gideon’s Dad’s book!  Gideon’s Dad..?  And what’s he got to with defending God’s cause..?  Well, Judges chapter-6 tells us the story: Gideon pulls down his father’s altar to the idol Baal – at God’s command.  That greatly upsets the locals and they want to tan Gideon’s hide – literally.  His father, Joash, tells the villagers that they are not to defend Baal by punishing Gideon, because, “if Baal is a god then he is quite capable of defending his own honour!”

If that was true for Baal it’s even more true for the God who is the Creator of the universe.  And there’s plenty of evidence of God’s ability to do that in the Bible.  Some examples..?  King Herod, in Acts 12, thinks he can strut around as if he’s God.  The consequences are that he is infested with worms and dies a horrible death.  The Philistine giant, Goliath, slanders the name of Israel’s God but a young shepherd lad called, David, lays him out with a stone from a slingshot then severs his head from his body.

One thing should be very clear: you cannot drive a wedge between the God who gave Joshua his instructions and the God who came in the person of Jesus to give His life as an offering for our sins.

A major difficulty is that they are not easily convinced of their error, who argue that the God who gave Joshua His instructions is not the same God as He who came in the person of Jesus to die for our sins.  So what then do we do with the argument that Jesus would not have approved of Joshua’s actions?  And how do we cope with an atheist’s dismissive comments about the “Old Testament God”?

The historical novelest, James Michener, did us a service in that respect when he wrote his book, The Source.  It’s a book that traces the history of the inhabitants of Canaan from the earliest times.  Included are some very graphic stories of the ubiquitous child-sacrifices that took place on a monthly basis in key Canaanite religious centres.  Michener pictures the sheer terror of a mother who worries that this time the priests of Moloch will choose their family to provide the child sacrifice.  This was not just a once-off affair.  It happened repeatedly – every full moon and in more than just one place.  And then I haven’t even mentioned yet that temple prostitution was part and parcel of Canaanite religious observance.  In fact, archaeologists have dug up stuff from Canaanite culture of that period that’s just too crude to publish.

It’s important that we ask the question: Why did God tell Joshua that Israel must destroy the Canaanites?  Why this horrible judgment?

We know that medical science these days can cure many bodily ailments.  But there are still times when no medical treatment can help except to remove the diseased organ.  In a similar way the Bible makes clear that Canaanite culture had degenerated to the point where there was no longer any possibility of a cure.  The disease in the human population had to be dramatically removed – and God chose Joshua and his people to do that and at the same time provide a home for Abraham’s descendants.

In this way Joshua becomes a picture of the Lord Jesus Christ.  He provides a home for God’s people but he also executes God’s judgment on His enemies.  Jesus does that in a far more powerful way: He’s preparing an eternal dwelling place for us and He’s returning to judge those who rebel against God.  That makes us ask: is it a coincidence that the O.T. name, Joshua, means the same as the N.T. name, Jesus?

John Westendorp
2MaxFM 16/11/2025 

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Dads

Image
  Recently two young men I know were both unexpectedly taken from this life.   Both had taken their roles as husbands and fathers seriously.   Both had young children still in primary school.   To say that their departures left a huge gap in their respective families would be a massive understatement.   It traumatised not only their immediate families.   Their wider families too were devastated by the loss of a brother, an uncle, a son.   So were the churches in which they had been seriously involved. My heart goes out to their widows.   Being a single mum is not for the faint-hearted – as some of you well know from experience.   I sympathise too with these children who will grow up without a Dad at home.   In such situations it’s always a blessing when an uncle or Granddad or some other significant male steps into the breach.   Of course what helps too is that in both instances this happened in Christian families and Christian ...
Read more

Work

Image
  Two recent experiences with tradesmen brought home two valuable lessons when it comes to our work ethic. Our kitchen sink had become blocked – again.   It was only a little over a year since that had previously happened.   I found myself wondering whether we had a structural problem with our plumbing that caused frequent blockages or whether the previous plumber had not done a very good job in clearing on the previous ocassion.   This plumber asked me, “John, do you want a cheap quick fix or do you want to try and deal with the cause of the problem – which will take a little longer and cost you a little more?”   That was a no brainer for me.   I wasn’t looking forward to annual visits from a plumber, just to keep our kitchen wastewater flowing into the sewers.   So we bit the bullet.   I found it absolutely staggering to see the gunk that our plumber pulled out of our wastewater drain.   Obviously the previous plumber had merely poked...
Read more

Lament...?!?

Image
You don’t need to read much of the Bible’s Psalms to appreciate the raw emotions portrayed by its song-writers.   There’s the whole gamut of emotions – from ecstatic joy, wonder and praise right through to profound sadness, grief and despair. For the former you only have to read the final Psalm which has a whole orchestra, complete with bells and whistles, to express the glorious praises of our God.   The final words from the Psalms are pertinent: “Let everything that breathes praise the Lord.   Hallelujah.” For the latter, just begin with Psalm 3.   King David, persecuted by his own son, Absalom, laments: “Lord, how my foes increase!   There are many who attack me.”   Or what about the terrible sadness of Psalm 22?   It begins with words Jesus took on His lips as He suffered hellish agony on the cross, ”My God, my God, why have you abandoned me.” Speaking to one of my daughters recently, we agreed that these days we don’t do laments very well. ...
Read more