Monday June 03
Preparation for Battle
Joshua 5:1-9
1 So it was, when all the kings of the Amorites who were on the west side of the Jordan, and all the kings of the Canaanites who were by the sea, heard that the LORD had dried up the waters of the Jordan from before the children of Israel until we had crossed over, that their heart melted; and there was no spirit in them any longer because of the children of Israel.
2 At that time the LORD said to Joshua, "Make flint knives for yourself, and circumcise the sons of Israel again the second time."
3 So Joshua made flint knives for himself, and circumcised the sons of Israel at the hill of the foreskins.
4 And this is the reason why Joshua circumcised them: All the people who came out of Egypt who were males, all the men of war, had died in the wilderness on the way, after they had come out of Egypt.
5 For all the people who came out had been circumcised, but all the people born in the wilderness, on the way as they came out of Egypt, had not been circumcised.
6 For the children of Israel walked forty years in the wilderness, till all the people who were men of war, who came out of Egypt, were consumed, because they did not obey the voice of the LORD--to whom the LORD swore that He would not show them the land which the LORD had sworn to their fathers that He would give us, "a land flowing with milk and honey."
7 Then Joshua circumcised their sons whom He raised up in their place; for they were uncircumcised, because they had not been circumcised on the way.
8 So it was, when they had finished circumcising all the people, that they stayed in their places in the camp till they were healed.
9 Then the LORD said to Joshua, "This day I have rolled away the reproach of Egypt from you." Therefore the name of the place is called Gilgal to this day.
The nation of Israel arrived safely on the other side of the Jordan River. Their crossing was a great miracle, and it sent a great message to the people of the land (5:1). The Canaanites were already afraid (2:9-11), and now their fears totally demoralized them. You would have expected Joshua to mobilize the army immediately and attack Jericho. After all, the people of Israel were united in following the Lord; and the people of the land were paralyzed by fear. From the human point of view, it was the perfect time for Joshua to act.
But God's thoughts and ways are higher than ours (Isa. 55:8-9); and Joshua was getting his orders from the Lord, not from the military experts. The nation crossed the river on the tenth day of the first month (Josh. 4:19). The events described in Joshua 5 took at least ten days, and then the people marched around Jericho for six more days. God waited over two weeks before giving His people their first victory in the land.
God's people must be prepared before they can be trusted with victory. The triumphant conquest of the land was to be the victory of God, not the victory of Israel or of Joshua. It was neither the expertise of the Jewish army nor the emotions of the enemy that would give Israel the victory, but the presence and blessing of the Lord. Here in Joshua 5, we see that there were three steps of preparation necessary before God would give His people victory over the nations in the land of Canaan.
First, in verses 1-9, they needed to renew the sign of the Lord's covenant with Israel. After triumphantly crossing the Jordan River, the nation had to pause at Gilgal while the men submitted to painful surgery. Why did God command this ritual at this time? They needed to restore their covenant relationship (Josh. 5:2-7). Israel is a covenant nation; a privilege God has given to no other nation on earth (Rom. 9:4-5). God gave His covenant to Abraham when He called him out of Ur of the Chaldees (Gen. 12:1-3), and He sealed that covenant with a sacrifice (Genesis 15). God gave circumcision as the sign of the covenant to Abraham and his descendants (Genesis 17:9-14, 23-27; note especially v. 11). Other nations in that day practiced circumcision, but the ritual didn't carry with it the spiritual meaning that it did for the Jews.
Through this ritual the Jews became a "marked people" because they belonged to the true and living God. This meant that they were under obligation to obey Him. The mark of the covenant reminded them that their bodies belonged to the Lord and were not to be used for sinful purposes. Israel was surrounded by nations that worshiped idols and included in their worship rituals that were sensual and degrading. The mark of the covenant reminded the Jews that they were a special people, a separated people, a holy nation (Ex. 19:5-6), and that they were to maintain purity in their marriages, their society, and their worship of God.
It only took one day for the people of Israel to cross the Red Sea and get out of Egypt, but it took 40 years of trials and testing for God to get Egypt out of them. If we are to enjoy and experience victory in our battles with the Jericho’s and the giants we will face on our spiritual journey, we also must go through the painful experience of cutting off the fleshly, carnal things in our lives that will hinder our effectiveness in serving the Lord!
What habit or sin is in your life today, that is keeping you from enjoying God’s best?
God bless!
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