The Book of Joshua: Lesson 1 - An Introduction to Joshua

[Music] [Applause] you it's common for people around the world to delight in the grand events that took place when their nations were founded but when later generations faced challenges loss and disappointment it's often necessary to remind them of the significance of those events from long ago in many ways this common experience is reflected in the Old Testament book of Joshua grand events had taken place when the Israelites first entered their homeland and Canaan but as later generations faced hardships it became necessary for them to learn afresh how important those events were this is the first lesson in our series on the book of Joshua and we've entitled it an introduction to Joshua as we'll see when we learn what the book of Joshua meant for ancient Israel will be better equipped to see how much it has to offer us in our day as well our introduction to the book of Joshua will divide into three parts first we'll explore its authorship and date second we'll introduce an overview of its design and purpose and third we'll sketch several broad considerations we need to keep in mind as we make Christian applications of our book let's begin with the authorship and date of the book of Joshua the Holy Spirit inspired the book of Joshua so that it would give us true historical records but we also have to remember that the Holy Spirit employed the perspectives and purposes of scriptures human authors to shape their historical records so as with every other portion of the Bible the more we know about the human author and his times the better we'll understand the book of Joshua we'll briefly sketch three perspectives on the authorship and date of Joshua first traditional outlooks second modern critical outlooks and third some basic evangelical outlooks that will guide us in this lesson let's turn first to ancient traditional outlooks on the authorship and date of our book The Book of Joshua is anonymous neither the book itself nor the rest of Scripture tells us who its final compiler or author was the title the book of Joshua that appears in most of our modern Bibles was added to the book long after it was written but the tendencies of traditional ancient Jewish and Christian positions on these matters are nicely summarized in the rabbinical perspectives expressed in the Talmud in a series of questions and answers in the part of the Talmud known as tractate Baba Batra 15 we read you say that Joshua wrote his book but is it not written and Joshua son of nun the servant of the Lord died it was completed by Eleazar but it is also written in it and Eleazar the son of Aaron died Phineas finished it as we see here leading rabbis identified Joshua himself as the author of the vast majority of our book but they also acknowledge that certain parts of Joshua had to have been written after Joshua died they attributed the account of Joshua's death in chapter 24 verse 29 to the high priest Eleazar and they assigned the account of eleazar's death in chapter 24 verse 33 to eleazar's son Phineas from this traditional perspective the book of Joshua came to be written very early soon after the events of the book in reality there is little to no evidence to support the specific claims of the Talmud but we should not entirely dismiss the possibility that Joshua Eleazar and Phineas contributed to this book of the Bible as early as Exodus chapter 17 verse 14 we learned that Joshua was involved in the preservation of Israel's early historical records also Joshua supervised the writing of God's law for ceremonial use in passages like Joshua chapter 8 verse 32 and chapter 24 verse 26 and along these same lines priests and Levites like Eleazar and his son Phineas had important roles in handling and teaching the scriptures in a few moments will note that the author of Joshua relied on a variety of written sources as he composed his book and it's possible that Joshua Eleazar phineas and others like them at the very least indirectly contributed to these sources the book of Joshua gives us some clues as to its writing in chapter 18 it tells of seven tribes that had not received their allotment and so they talked with Joshua about this and he commissioned men from those tribes to go into the land and to to write a report about what the land looked like and they came back with that report it seems to me that probably that served as the as the description was found in chapters 18 to 20 when they're talking about these tribes were a lot of their land it describes the cities that they took in the boundaries of the land and so that portion of that three chapters is probably an early writing that the the men who sent out to recognize or the the land came back with that description chapter 24 tells us that Joshua wrote in the book of the law and probably that included at least the covenant that he was making with the children of Israel at that time that this was probably the same book of the law that Moses had written in is suggested because Joshua will set it up before the Lord he writes it he puts it before the Lord in the same way that the the material of Moses was placed before the Lord apparently in the tabernacle as a sacred deposit and so this portion of Joshua is also probably explicitly mentioned in the book of Joshua if it's true that we have the description of the land and we have the account of the of the Covenant that's found at the end of Joshua then it's probably true that the other accounts having to do with the battles that contain so much detail are probably also written very early and by Joshua for all intents and purposes with these traditional outlooks on the authorship and date of Joshua in mind let's consider modern critical outlooks points of view commonly held by modern scholars who reject the full authority of Scripture most recent critical scholars on Joshua have been deeply influenced by Marteen notes work the deuteronomistic history written in 1943 in brief notes view was that the books of Deuteronomy Joshua judges Samuel and kings were written during the battle own Ian's exile by someone usually deemed the deuteronomist and from this perspective the entire deuteronomistic history including the book of Deuteronomy was composed from a variety of earlier written sources during the Babylonian exile the main purpose of these books was to demonstrate that Israel deserved the judgment of defeat and exile that had befallen the northern and southern kingdoms throughout the decades the majority of critical interpreters have affirmed many of notes central perspectives especially dating the authorship of the book sometime during the Babylonian exile still many critical scholars have rightly argued that note failed to identify the unique theological outlooks of the individual books of this portion of the Old Testament and they've argued that note overlooked the positive hopeful outlooks that also appear in these books having looked at traditional and critical outlooks on the authorship and date of our book let's consider some modern evangelical outlooks perspectives held by scholars who affirm the full authority of Scripture these perspectives will guide our approach to the Book of Joshua throughout these lessons as we've already noted The Book of Joshua is anonymous and as a result evangelicals have held to a number of different outlooks on its authorship and date still it will be helpful to make two observations first we'll look at what we may call the compositional development of the book and second we'll explore the range of possible dates for its completion consider first the compositional development of Joshua when we speak of our books development we have in mind that like many other Old Testament authors the author of Joshua didn't write his history de novo or entirely from scratch rather he compiled a variety of written sources as he formed his book as we just saw both the Talmud and critical interpreters maintained that our book reflects some kind of compositional development and by and large evangelicals also acknowledge our authors use of sources we know for certain that this is true to some degree because in chapter 10 verse 13 our author quoted directly from what he called the book or scroll of Yahshua we don't know much about this book but clearly the author and his original audience did beyond this as we'll see throughout this series time and again our author incorporated portions of the Pentateuch as well as extra biblical texts of various sorts we can't reconstruct these unidentified sources without straying into a lot of speculation but knowing that our author used earlier sources like the book of Yashar helps us understand why his book feels repetitious and disjointed at times this use of earlier sources also helps us avoid a common mistake when identifying the date of our books final form on 15 occasions the book of Joshua says that this or that circumstance was true to this day naturally it's easy to think that the phrase to this day refers to the time of the author but as is clearly the case in passages like first Kings chapter 8 verse 8 sometimes the phrase to this day may actually refer to the days of earlier sources although evangelicals generally agree that there is some kind of compositional development of the book of Joshua we're still left asking when to this book reach its completion when was it brought together as we have it now in the Bible as with many Old Testament books we can't identify precisely when our author brought the Book of Joshua to its final form the evidence only allows us to identify a range of possibilities for the earliest and latest likely dates but as we'll see in these lessons when we keep this full range of possibilities in mind we gained numerous insights into how our author shaped his book to impact his original audience we'll look at this range of time for the completion of the Book of Joshua in two steps first will consider the latest possible date of completion and second will examine the earliest possible date let's start with the latest possible time when Joshua could have been written one of the best ways to determine the latest possible date of Joshua's final composition is to look outside of the book itself there's good evidence that our author consciously contributed to what many scholars today called Israel's primary history the history that stretches from Genesis through Kings excluding Ruth this perspective is important because these books create a timeline one after the other like interlocking links think about it this way the Pentateuch comes from the days of Moses and comprises the first set of five links in this historical chain Genesis begins with creation and ends with Joseph and his brothers in Egypt Exodus assumes the existence of Genesis because it picks up the chronology with the death of Joseph and ends with Moses and Israel at Mount Sinai Leviticus takes us further by reporting events that took place at Mount Sinai numbers adds a record of the travels of the Israelites from Mount Sinai to the plains of Moab a Deuteronomy completes the Pentateuch with Moses speeches on the plains of Moab and with Moses death in a similar way the book of Joshua is the first link of the subsequent deuteronomistic portion of the primary history the portion that depended heavily on the theological outlooks of the book of Deuteronomy the author of Joshua began with the death of Moses and continued through Joshua's death Judges picks up the history of Israel where the book of Joshua ends Samuel begins with the rise of Samuel as the last judge of Israel and ends with David's reign and Kings forms the last stage of the primary history by beginning with the death of David and ending with the Babylonian exile in the sense the Book of Kings flows out of all the earlier books of the deuteronomistic history and this fact tells us something crucial about the latest likely date for the completion of Joshua it had to have been completed before the book of Kings was written this observation is helpful because we know a lot about when the book of Kings was written the last event reported in Kings appears in second Kings chapter 25 verses 27 through 30 here we learned that David's royal descendant Jehoiachin was released from prison in Babylon in the year 561 BC for this reason we can be certain that Kings was not completed before this date and more than this the book of kings stops short of reporting Israel's all-important release from exile in 538 BC it's unimaginable that the writer of Kings wouldn't have mentioned Israel's deliverance from exile if it had occurred by the time he wrote Kings so in keeping with the order of Israel's primary history the very latest the book of Joshua could have been completed was during the period of the Babylonian exile with this latest possible date in mind we should look in the other direction what was the earliest possible date for Joshua's completion it isn't difficult to see that the earliest the book of Joshua could have reached its final form was during the period of the judges a generation or so after the death of Joshua consider what the author wrote near the end of his book in chapter 24 verse 31 Israel served the Lord all the days of Joshua and all the days of the elders who outlived Joshua and had known all the work that the Lord did for Israel notice that this passage refers to the elders who outlived Joshua and along these lines we also read that Israel served the Lord throughout the lifetimes of those who had known all the work that the Lord did for Israel this positive evaluation of Israel's spiritual condition implies something about our author he must have been aware that the next generation after Joshua's death did not continue to serve God faithfully a fact highlighted in the book of Judges so this verse indicates that the earliest possible date for the completion of our book was the period of Israel's judges other passages in Joshua also reference events that took place during the period of the judges for example Joshua chapter 19 verse 47 mentions the migration of the Danites to a new territory in the north this event took place in the period of the judges according to judges chapter 18 verses 27 through 29 so it's fair to say that this is the earliest possible date for the books completion now we also should mention that many interpreters have argued for a date during the period of the monarchy for a number of reasons they've concluded that this is actually the earliest possible date of final composition and we cannot rule out this possibility the primary evidence for this outlook appears in Joshua chapter 11 verse 21 where we read these words Joshua came at that time and cut off the on hakeem from all the hill country of Judah and from all the hill country of Israel as we see here this verse distinguishes the hill country of Judah or the southern kingdom from the hill country of Israel or the northern kingdom this distinction between Judah and Israel has suggested to some that our book could not have been written before the Kingdom of Israel was divided in approximately 9:30 BC but having said this it's important to note that at least one version of the Septuagint the ancient Greek translation of the Old Testament does not make this distinction and scholars disagree over whether the Hebrew or Greek version represents the better reading so while it's possible that Joshua chapter 11 verse 21 acknowledges the division of the kingdom it isn't certain if we bring all of this evidence together the very earliest possible date for Joshua's completion was sometime during the period of the judges but a later date during the period of the monarchy is also possible and even a date as late as the period of Babylonian exile isn't out of the question as we'll see in a moment recognizing this full range of possibilities helps us grasp more fully the kinds of challenges the Book of Joshua was designed to address keeping in mind what we've learned about the authorship and date of the Book of Joshua we should now turn to a second introductory consideration the books design and purpose how did our author design his record of the days of Joshua and why did he design it in this way whenever we study a book of biblical history like Joshua it's always important to remember that the same historical events can be told in many ways without introducing errors every biblical book that reports historical events organizes the history it reports in order to accomplish particular purposes and to emphasize certain perspectives for its original audience we'll look into these matters in much more detail in later lessons but at this point we'll sketch the design and purpose of Joshua in two steps first we'll introduce his overarching content and structure the large-scale arrangement of the book and second will comment on its original meaning the impact our author hoped to have on his original audience consider first the content and structure of Joshua the book of Joshua consists of 24 chapters that contain many different types of literature we find narratives reports speeches as well as lists of people and places that probably came from a variety of sources because of this interpreters have analyzed the structural details of Joshua in different ways but it's not difficult to see how its structure and content work together on a large scale Old Testament scholars have different ways of designating or identifying genre within various books in the Bible but in general terms the book of Joshua has three main types of literature within it it has what we would call narratives or stories the sorts of things that we would normally understand like the story of the Battle of Jericho those kinds of things it also has long lists geographical lists of places that various tribes inherited that were given to them by God and would list one place after another after another after another and then it also has sections where there is speech or speeches that are given by a particular person to another group of people and you can see if you just think about in those three big categories that those correlate roughly to the first major division and the second major division and the third major division of the book the first is primarily narrative the second is primarily geographical lists and the third is primarily speeches but the problem comes up in this way and and that is that within those major or umbrella Zondra designations you also have the other two always sort of seeping in and so as we deal with these various sections in these various genre and the book of Joshua is very important to keep them in mind and to be able to spot them as you go along one of the greatest points of confusion that interpreters have especially new interpreters are new students of the Old Testament is that they will not recognize these various genre and won't treat them in ways that they need to be treated and as we approach the book of Joshua as anyone approaches the book of Joshua if you don't focus on those various genre and how they're mixed together in different parts of the book then it will lead to a great deal of confusion in brief Joshua has three main divisions each division begins with a statement indicating a significant shift in time the first division in chapters 1 through 12 focuses on Israel's victorious conquest of Canaan how Joshua led Israel to a decisive victory over the Canaanites this division begins in chapter 1 verse 1 with the temporal notice that God commissioned Joshua after the death of Moses these 12 chapters report a number of events that took place during Joshua's conquest of the land of Canaan they begin with Israel's crossing of the Jordan and initial victories at Jericho and I and these victories are followed by a covenant renewal ceremony in the vicinity of Mount Gerizim and Mount Ebal the narrative then moves to Joshua's major campaign against an alliance in the southern regions of the promised land and this record is followed by Joshua's campaign against an alliance in the northern regions [Music] the second division of our book in chapters 13 through 22 deals with Israel's tribal inheritances how the national unity of Israel was maintained as particular inheritances were allotted to the tribes of Israel this division begins in chapter 13 verse 1 with the temporal statement now joshua was old and advanced in years this second major division of Joshua first established the extent of territories that God granted to Israel both in Transjordan the lands to the east of the Jordan River and in sis Jordan the lands to the west of the Jordan River it goes on to explain in some detail the specific allotments of lands to the tribes who received permission to settle in Transjordan and it also spells out how God granted large territories west of the Jordan to Judah Ephraim and Manasseh as well as lesser territories to the other tribes of Israel and when conflict arose between the tribes of sis Jordan and Transjordan we learn how they maintained their national unity as the people of God the third major division in chapters 23 and 24 closes our book by giving attention to Israel's covenant loyalty how israel's loyalty and disloyalty to the terms of god's covenant would shape their future it begins in chapter 23 verse 1 with another statement that alerts us to the passage of time we read a long time afterward when Joshua was old and well advanced in years and this temporal notice is reinforced in verse 14 with Joshua's words I am about to go the way of all the earth these last two chapters of our book focus on two assemblies that Joshua held near the time of his death the first of these assemblies probably took place in Shiloh a holy site that played an important role in Joshua's day and later in a period of the judges and it closes with a final assembly at Shechem the place where Abraham built his first altar in the land of Canaan all of Israel gathered at these assemblies and Joshua warned them against flagrant violations of God's covenant then the main body of our book closes with Joshua leading the people of Israel in renewing their commitment to be loyal to God alone they vowed to reject the gods of all other nations and serve the God of their fathers according to the terms of his covenant with them following this covenant renewal the book closes with an afterword that includes Joshua's death and several subsequent events we've explored the design and purpose of Joshua by considering the books content and structure now we're in a position to ask how we should summarize the original meaning of Joshua what was our author's purpose for writing his book in many ways it's fair to say the author of Joshua wrote with purposes that every biblical author shared he designed his book to honor God and he sought to further God's kingdom by applying the principles of God's covenants to the concepts behaviors and emotions of his original audience but as we study the book of Joshua we can also identify the special emphases that our author had for his audience as he wrote his book there are many ways to summarize the original meaning of Joshua but for our purposes we'll express it along these lines the book of Joshua was written about Israel's victorious conquest tribal inheritances and covenant loyalty in Joshua's day to address similar challenges facing later generations as we can see this summary refers to the three main divisions of the Book of Joshua victorious conquest tribal inheritances and covenant loyalty but why did our author focus on these matters as our summary suggests first he sought to remind his audience about events in Joshua's day and second he wrote to address later generations and the similar challenges they faced let's look at both of these purposes starting with why our author wrote about Joshua's day everyone familiar with the book of Joshua knows that it deals most explicitly with the events that took place when Joshua led Israel these include Israel's victorious conquest of Canaan Joshua's division of Israel's tribal inheritances and Israel's covenant loyalty to God so it's fair to say that one of our authors central purposes was to inform the original audience of what had happened in that world the world of Joshua's time many Old Testament passages stressed that the Israelites often lost their way because they forgot what God had done for them in the past our author hinted that this was a problem for his original audience when in chapter 24 verse 31 he distinguished himself and his audience from those who had known all the work that the Lord did for Israel the original audience of our book needed to be reminded of what had happened in the days of Joshua whether they lived in a period of the judges during the monarchy or during the Babylonian exile so on a basic level we may say that the author of Joshua wrote to give his original audience a true record about what had been accomplished in Joshua's day in the second place as our summary suggests the book of Joshua was also written to address the challenges of later generations our author stood as it were between two worlds that world the world of Israel in Joshua's day and their world the world of the original audience for this reason our author didn't simply write a record that was true to historical facts he also wrote about Israel's victorious conquest the distribution of tribal inheritances and the call to covenant loyalty to provide meaningful points of contact or connections between that world and their world like other biblical authors he frequently pointed out historical backgrounds that explained the origins of his audience's current privileges and responsibilities he also presented models for them to emulate or reject and on a few occasions he wrote accounts of Joshua's times as for shadows of his original audiences experiences these kinds of connections reveal something about our author that we need to keep in view on the one side he wanted his audience to remember what had happened in Joshua's day but on the other side he didn't want them to return to doing things precisely as Israel had done in Joshua's day his original audience lived in a different time and they needed to apply his historical record to their lives in ways that were appropriate for their own day I believe that the original audience of the book of Joshua were greatly impacted by its message all the promises that God made all of them were fulfilled to Israel concerning their coming into the Promised Land not one of them failed and I think this is at the core to teach the people God is faithful God has been faithful and will remain faithful and this is especially important in their moving into the time of the judges because in the time of the judges we see them described as a people who are doing what's right in their own eyes but what they've been called to is faithfulness to Yahweh and so this is a message to them that they see in the life of of Joshua and those who were faithful along with Joshua in light of where they are now where this generation is not truly following in the footsteps of Joshua and it is a call to them to repent really and come back to who they were called to be now at times modern interpreters have difficulty grasping how the original audience was meant to apply this historical record to their lives after all our author didn't spell out these matters in his book but we need to remember some viewpoints that our author and his audience would have learned from the scriptures available in their day but we know as the Pentateuch with these perspectives in mind the implications of our authors record of that world for their world are not as difficult to discern as it may first appear consider how the pentateuch set the stage for understanding the implications of Israel's Victoria's conquest for the original audience this division of our book gave a record of Joshua's great victories but three basic outlooks on warfare derived from the Pentateuch helped them see how to apply this part of Joshua in the first place both our author and his original audience knew that they were engaged in a war that was rooted in the primeval conflict between God and Satan Genesis chapter 3 verse 15 indicates that throughout human history after the fall into sin God and Satan have been in conflict this invisible conflict is visible on earth in the struggle between the seed or descendants of the serpent people who serve satanic powers and the seed or descendants of the woman people who serve God this is why the book of Joshua doesn't reduce Israel's conflict to just a physical war rather in Joshua chapter 5 verse 14 our author referred to the angelic commander of the army of the Lord this passage indicates the Joshua and the army of Israel were participating in a battle involving God and his angelic army and as passages like Joshua chapter 23 verse 16 indicate our author also recognized that the Canaanites satanic gods stood alongside the Canaanites in opposition to the people of Israel Joshua's original audience had much to learn from Israel's conquest because just like the Israelites in Joshua's day they knew they were engaged in this ongoing conflict between God and Satan and those who served them in the second place the pentateuch also made it evident that Joshua's conquest was Israel's special conflict while the original audience could learn a great deal from Israel's conquest they and the generations to come were not to imitate it in every detail the Pentateuch made it clear that Joshua's day was extraordinary in Genesis chapter 15 verses 13 through 16 God told Abraham that his descendants would be enslaved in Egypt for a time because the iniquity of the amorite s' another name for Canaanites was not yet complete but by the time of Joshua's conquest Canaanite sin had grown so offensive that God called for their total destruction much like he had called for the destruction of sodom and gomorrah in the days of Abraham this is why our author drew from the vocabulary of the Pentateuch and described Canaan's destruction using the Hebrew verb Haram and the noun kerim as Joshua chapter 6 verses 17 19 and 21 illustrate in the context of Joshua's conquest these terms didn't mean simply to destroy rather they meant to devote holy to the Lord or to destroy in devotion to the Lord so when the Israelites made war in Canaan it was an acknowledgment of God's just judgment against plague Hrant Canaanites in and they destroyed and dedicated everything they conquered as an act of honoring God in worship we know that this command for utter destruction and devotion to the Lord in Joshua's day was extraordinary for a number of reasons for one in Deuteronomy chapter 20 verses 10 through 20 Moses directed total destruction for the Canaanites but he commanded Israel to offer peace treaties to peoples outside the land of Canaan Joshua himself acknowledged this distinction in Joshua chapter 9 when he made a treaty with the Gibeonites believing they had come from outside of Canaan in addition to this the extraordinary character of Joshua's conquest becomes evident when we recall how the ongoing conflict between God and Satan took different forms both before and after Joshua to mention just a few examples before Joshua in Genesis chapter 11 verses 1 through 9 God and his heavenly army went to war against rebellious human beings at the Tower of Babel but they did this without a human army and simply scattered the people in Genesis chapter 14 verses 1 through 24 abraham fought with god's help but god didn't order the total destruction of abraham's enemies in Exodus chapter 12 verse 12 we learned that God went to war against the Egyptians and their gods during the plagues on Egypt but Israel was passive and God didn't kill every Egyptian he in Exodus chapter 14 at the Red Sea Israel followed God obediently in battle formation but it was God who destroyed Egypt's army similar variety also appears after the days of Joshua as the book of Samuel explains David fought many of Israel's enemies with God's supernatural help but God didn't devote all of his enemies to utter destruction the Book of Kings indicates that the same was true of many generations of David's royal descendants and Israel's prophets predicted that the end of Israel's exile would unfold in connection with war through unrivaled miraculous divine intervention as we can see God's ongoing conflict with evil unfolded in a variety of ways in the Pentateuch and throughout the Old Testament this alerts us to the fact that Joshua's conquest wasn't the norm for all battles of course the original audience could learn many lessons about warfare in their day from Joshua but the conquest itself was a time of extraordinary judgment unlike many other battles God determined at that time that the Canaanites with rare exceptions like Rahab fully deserved utter destruction the sin of the Canaanites gradually grew over time to be particularly heinous in the book of Genesis there is a allusion in Genesis chapter 15 I believe to the sin of the amorite s' reaching its full measure it's not until then that God's people will take possession of the land so there is this notion in the scriptures that God is watching the Canaanite nation as it declines and understands that when their decline reaches a certain point that his justice will be poured out now the instrument of his justice is the nation of Israel but not because the Israelite nation had great moral rectitude or anything of that sort they're a very small nation they're given to great sin as we've seen even in the generation prior to Joshua coming into that and even in their conquest there is sin but the fact of the matter is God in His grace has called that nation to itself to himself and is using that nation to exterminate and remove another nation that if allowed to live there is going to corrupt them and that's another reason that God allowed the Israelite nation to go into Canaan and they were to destroy everyone living there God didn't want his people to be corrupted by the religious practices their idolatry the sin of the people living there and he didn't want his nation to become patterned after the nations around them he wanted them to follow him with him as their is their king and so the Israelite nation went in and of course did not complete that task entrusted to them and so even within the book of Joshua we see rumblings of it what we see in for expression in the book after the book of Judges where the Israelite nation is increasingly corrupt and becomes more and more involved in a spiral of sin and decline less characteristic of those that are in covenant relationship with God and more like the nations around them all something that God sought to avoid by commanding the Israelites to go in and remove those living there in the third place our author also knew from the Pentateuch the Joshua's conquest was but one step toward the future victory of Israel's king the anticipated king who would reign over the whole world forever early on the patriarch Jacob announced in Genesis chapter 49 verse 10 that the royal family of Judah would receive the obedience of the peoples in the period of the judges this hope in Judas royal line was acknowledged in the leading role given to the tribe of Judah in judges chapter 1 verses 1 & 2 during the monarchy the fulfillment of this expectation was identified specifically with the house of David in passages like Psalm 72 and in many passages Israel's prophets predicted that the Exile would end with the victory of David's great son over all nations so like the Israelites in Joshua's day the original audience knew they were part of something much greater than themselves and for this reason they were never simply to go back to what Joshua did they had to apply what happened in the conquest of Canaan to their own day as God continued to move history toward the future worldwide victory of Israel's King our author expected his audience to have similar theological outlooks on the second division of his book concerning Israel's tribal inheritances in the first place he understood from the books of Moses that Israel's possession of Canaan was rooted in God's primeval call for human dominion over the earth God had ordained from primeval times that the earth would be turned into his kingdom as his faithful images filled and subdued it this call was first reported in Genesis chapter 1 verses 26 through 30 and later confirmed in Genesis chapter 9 verses 1 through 3 so the record of Israel's tribal inheritances in the Book of Joshua was clearly relevant for the original audience like the Israelites of Joshua's day the original audience was also called to participate in God's Commission to humanity to have dominion over the earth in the second place our author rightly understood from the Pentateuch that God had established Israel's special inheritance and the distribution of lands to Israel in Joshua's day represented the initial fulfillment of this inheritance for instance in Genesis chapter 15 verses 18 through 21 God promised Abraham an inheritance for his descendants that extended from the border of Egypt to the river Euphrates so drawing from the vocabulary of the Pentateuch the book of Joshua frequently refers to Israel's possession of their land with the Hebrew verb Nahal meaning to inherit and the noun Nacala meaning inheritance this terminology indicates that Israel's land was an enduring possession from God for this reason the original audience had much to learn from what Joshua had done in distributing their tribal inheritances in the period of the judges disharmony among the tribes of Israel and troubles from other peoples disrupted Joshua's successes during the monarchy Israel's kings expanded israel's lands but they also experienced setbacks and losses and of course during the Babylonian exile only a small remnant of God's people remained in the land and they remained there only under the tyranny of other nations so Joshua's distribution of Israel's tribal inheritances offered the original audience great insight as they sought to live in service to God in their own day in the third place our author also knew that Israel's inheritance of Canaan was but one step toward the future inheritance of Israel's king at the appointed time Israel's great and righteous King would possess every land and nation as he fulfilled humanity's original call to have dominion over the entire earth as we've mentioned Genesis chapter 49 verse 10 declares that one day a royal son of Judah will reign until he receives the obedience of the peoples in addition in Genesis chapter 17 verse 4 God promised Abraham you shall be the father of a multitude of Nations this is why in Psalm 2 verse 8 God said specifically to the house of David I will make the nations your heritage and the ends of the earth your possession Israel's prophets announced many times that the land of David's great son would extend from one end of the earth to the other and Paul summarized these Old Testament outlooks in Romans chapter 4 verse 13 when he wrote the promise to Abraham and his offspring was that he would be heir of the world the implications for our author's original audience were clear they were to apply what they read in the book of Joshua to the ways God was leading his people in their times toward the goal of his worldwide inheritance we see in Romans chapter 4 that the Apostle Paul interprets the promise of inheritance for Abraham and his offspring to include the whole world and that may surprise us at first we think of the promised land as only a strip of real estate along the eastern edge of the Mediterranean Sea but this is really of a piece of the way Paul understands the Abrahamic covenant to be global to be worldwide he so often he will talk about the seed the children of Abraham including not just his biological descendants but really those who follow in the footsteps of Abraham that is the footsteps of faith who trust in the promises of God in fact Paul emphasizes that not only Jew but also Gentile who believe in Christ are Abraham's descendants heirs according to God's promise the end of Galatians chapter 3 so when Paul says in Romans 4 that the promise is that Abraham's children by faith will inherit the whole world he's really just extending that same understanding just as with the first and second divisions of our book the author of Joshua expected his original audience to keep certain theological outlooks from the Pentateuch in view as they applied the third division Israel's call to covenant loyalty in the first place our author understood from the Pentateuch that covenant loyalty was rooted in the primeval requirement of human loyalty to God simply being images of God binds us to God by covenant and this bond requires loyal service to Him God's covenant with all of humanity in Adam required obedience as indicated in Genesis chapters 1 through 3 and hosea chapter 6 verse 7 and god's covenant in Noah in Genesis chapters 6 and 9 revealed that all human beings are required to serve God by covenant because this is true of all people in all times the original audience could learn much from Joshua's call for covenant loyalty in his day they like all other human beings were obligated to God's loyal service in the second place the original audience also had to be aware of Israel's special covenant loyalty our author was careful to note that in the time of the conquest joshua exhorted the people to remain faithful to God's covenant and the people vowed to do so the original audience would have known of God's covenant with Abraham in Genesis chapter 17 here God required circumcision as a commitment to being blameless before him and the Covenant God made in Moses in Exodus chapters 19 through 24 and renewed in the book of Deuteronomy made it clear that Israel was to obey the law of Moses now in the third division of our book Joshua focused on the trials that would come to Israel if they didn't fulfill these requirements especially the requirement of rejecting false gods and he set before them the possibilities of Troubles defeat and exile from the promised land if they were unfaithful by the time of the books original audience these trials had already begun to unfold in the period of the judges Israel had entered into cycles of troubles during the monarchy more judgments came on Israel because of the repeated idolatry of the people and their kings and during the Babylonian exile the threat of losing the Promised Land had become a horrific reality so the original audience had to consider Joshua's warnings to Israel in light of God's judgments that they were facing in their own day in the third place what happened in Joshua's day also anticipated that God would make a future covenant with Israel's King we know that Genesis chapter 49 verse 10 indicates that God had ordained for a king of Judah to reign and Genesis chapter 17 verse 6 also indicates that Israel would have a king although Israel had no legitimate king during the period of the judges passages like Judges chapter 21 verse 25 and the end of Hanna's song in 1st Samuel chapter 2 verse 10 indicate that even during this period the faithful looked for deliverance through Israel's royal family now if the book of Joshua was written during Israel's monarchy or during the Babylonian exile the original audience had to relate Joshua's called to covenant loyalty to God's dynastic covenant with David in passages like second Samuel Chapter 7 and Psalms 89 and 132 we see how God's covenant with David focused on the necessity of loyalty David's royal line had to be loyal to God because they represented the people of Israel before God in addition according to the prophecy of Isaiah chapter 53 verse 11 eternal forgiveness would come in the future because of the substitutionary death of the righteous one the Lord's servant Israel's perfectly righteous King and this great king is none other than Jesus the Christ who brought the New Covenant predicted in Jeremiah chapter 31 this covenant will come in its fullness when Christ returns and makes all things new as the original audience applied Joshua's called to covenant loyalty to their own times they had to do so in the light of where they stood in these developments of the covenants God had made with his people so as we seek to understand the original meaning of the Book of Joshua we always have to keep in view that our author wanted his audience to learn what had happened in Joshua's day but he also wanted them to apply his record of the victorious conquest tribal inheritances and the call to covenant loyalty in ways that were appropriate for their own times and circumstances so far in our introduction to the book of Joshua we've looked into its authorship and date as well as its design and original purpose now we're in a position to introduce the third main topic of this lesson Christian application how should the Book of Joshua impact our lives as we follow Christ in Hebrew the name Jesus is Joshua this simple fact reminds us that from a Christian perspective Jesus fulfills or completes what began in Joshua's day and in many respects applying the Book of Joshua to our lives flows out of this fulfillment in Christ the more we grasp this connection between the book of Joshua and Jesus the more we can understand the impact this book should have on us as followers of Christ as we've seen the author of our book wrote about Israel's victorious conquest tribal inheritances and covenant loyalty under Joshua's leadership to guide later generations of Israel but our author also understood that some time in the future a great king of Israel would come and he would accomplish all of the goals pointed to in the book of Joshua yak yasuo provides you when Joshua was leading the victorious battles he was leading the nation to conquer the promised land he advocated on behalf of the nation when they failed and sinned he interceded for the nation and then led the promised nation into the Promised Land this is all a picture of the Lord Jesus Christ Christ led God's people into their promised inheritance as it is written in Hebrews chapter 4 he advocates on behalf of God's nation prays for the nations and intercedes for the nation and does the work of the high priest for the New Testament nation which is the Church of the Lord Jesus Christ all of this is a picture meant for the time of the New Testament broadly speaking as Israel's Messiah Jesus fulfills these goals in two main ways first when we compare Jesus with the good things Israel accomplished under Joshua the conquest of Canaan the initial inheritance of the promised land and Israel's loyal covenant service to God we can see how Jesus expands and ultimately fulfills each goal and second when we contrast Jesus accomplishments with Israel's failures their inability to destroy all the Canaanites as commanded their bickering and arguing over their tribal inheritances and their failure to remain loyal to God's covenant we can see that Jesus actually reverses all of israel's failures and by these means Jesus wages victorious conquest over the entire earth he inherits all things and he establishes covenant loyalty everywhere in the world but to understand how to make Christian applications of the book of Joshua today we need to remember something God determined that the Messianic fulfillment of these goals would unfold over time on the basis of Old Testament prophecy many Jews in first century Palestine rightly believed that the Messiah would win a global conquest inherit the world and spread coven loyalty everywhere but these Jews also believed that he would do this quickly and catastrophic Lee in contrast Jesus and the authors of the New Testament explained time and again that the kingdom Jesus established would unfold gradually in three interconnected phases will gain an orientation toward the Christian application of Joshua by looking at each phase of the kingdom separately first will consider how Christ fulfilled the expectations established in the book of Joshua by examining what Jesus accomplished in the inauguration of his kingdom ii will investigate how he fulfills the book of joshua during the continuation of the kingdom and third we'll explore what Jesus will accomplish during the consummation of the kingdom at his glorious return consider first the inauguration of Christ's Kingdom the New Testament teaches in many places that Jesus inauguration of God's kingdom was the initial phase of his glorious worldwide victorious conquest but when we compare Israel's victorious conquest in the book of Joshua with Jesus first Advent we see a distinct difference rather than taking up a physical sword as Joshua did Jesus followed a two-fold strategy he began the ultimate defeat of Satan and his demons and he also proclaimed the gospel or good news of the kingdom to human beings by warning them of judgment to come and offering them God's mercy in John chapter 12 verses 31 and 32 Jesus described this twofold strategy when he said the ruler of this world will be cast out and I will draw all people to myself this is why in Colossians chapter 2 verse 15 the Apostle Paul described Jesus death as the time when he disarmed the rulers and authorities by triumphing over them and it's why Paul also said in Ephesians chapter 4 verse 8 that when Christ ascended on high he led a host of captives from among people who served the kingdom of Satan and he gave them as gifts to men the New Testament also emphasizes two perspectives on how the inauguration of Christ's Kingdom fulfilled the hope of a worldwide inheritance for God's people on the one side Hebrews chapter 1 verse 2 explains that God has spoken to us by his son whom he appointed the heir of all things in Matthew chapter 28 verse 18 jesus told his disciples that he had received this inheritance when he said all authority in heaven and on earth has been given to me on the other side the New Testament also stresses that Jesus distributed a foretaste of his worldwide inheritance when he poured out the Holy Spirit on his church as prophecies like Isaiah chapter 44 verses 3 and 4 indicate the outpouring of the Holy Spirit will one day renew the entire creation so in Ephesians chapter 1 verse 14 Paul spoke of the Holy Spirit poured out on the church as the guarantee of our inheritance and as he put it in 2nd Corinthians chapter 1 verse 22 and chapter 5 verse 5 the Spirit is a guarantee of what is to come our future inheritance in the new heaven and new earth in addition the New Testament announces that Christ's inauguration of the kingdom emphasized covenant loyalty when he ushered in the New Covenant age alluding to the prophecy of a new covenant in Jeremiah chapter 31 jesus told his disciples in Luke chapter 22 verse 20 this cup is the New Covenant in my blood and New Testament authors made it clear that Jesus bore the eternal judgment of God on the cross as the final atonement for true believers but we must remember that Jesus did not bring the fullness of the New Covenant to the earth in his first Advent so he and his apostles and prophets still instructed even true believers to be faithful to God because we are not fully sanctified and more than this there are false brothers among us as Paul called them in 2nd Corinthians chapter 11 verse 26 and Galatians chapter 2 verse 4 the call to covenant loyalty still goes forth because we wait for the New Covenant to be completely fulfilled in many respects our Christian applications of the book of Joshua in regard to the inauguration parallel what the New Testament also teaches about the continuation of Christ's Kingdom the New Testament describes the continuation of Jesus Kingdom as a time in which his victorious conquest expands across the globe through his Spirit at work in the church as Paul said in first Corinthians chapter 15 verse 25 Christ must reign in heaven until he has put all his enemies under his feet but in our mission as the church we don't take up physical arms any more than Jesus and His apostles and prophets did instead we continue with the twofold strategy that Jesus established in his first Advent on the one side we further the defeat of Satan and evil spirits in more and more parts of the world as Ephesians chapter 6 verse 12 tells us we do not wrestle against flesh and blood but against the cosmic powers over this present darkness against the spiritual forces of evil in the heavenly places and on the other side we represent Christ in the world today by proclaiming the good news that warns human beings of God's coming judgement and offers them the mercy of forgiveness and eternal life in the words of second Corinthians chapter 5 verse 20 we are ambassadors for Christ we implore you on behalf of Christ be reconciled to God we also see that our anticipation of a worldwide inheritance for God's people is furthered throughout the continuation of his kingdom in church history the fact that Jesus is God's appointed heir of all things has become more and more evident as people everywhere embrace him as Lord and Christ continues to distribute the down payment of the Holy Spirit to more and more people throughout the world as passages like Galatians chapter 3 verse 29 tell us if you are Christ's then you are heirs according to promise in the words of Romans chapter 8 verses 16 and 17 we are heirs heirs of God and fellow heirs with Christ in many ways we can also see how Joshua's emphasis on covenant loyalty remains true during the continuation of Christ's Kingdom as the church spreads throughout the world the full atonement of the blood of the new covenant still covers the sins of all who have saving faith those who are in Christ are destined to be entirely free from eternal judgment but it's still important for the church throughout the ages to be called to covenant loyalty on the one side true believers still need to grow in their devotion to God they need to take to heart the warnings of passages like Hebrews chapter 12 verse 14 where it says strive for peace and for the holiness without which no one will see the Lord and on the other side false brothers still among us need to be warned so that they will repent and be saved as hebrews chapter 10 verses 26 and 27 puts it if we go on sinning deliberately there no longer remains a sacrifice for sins but a fearful expectation of judgment and a fury of fire that will consume God's adversaries Medora in well a fee Ella the theme of cover and loyalty and renewal is one of the important topics in the book of Joshua after almost every war where Joshua led the people in the book of Joshua we see that there is a ceremony for renewing the covenant and loyalty to the Lord within the context of the Covenant this theme is very important to us as Christians because we too are in covenant with the Lord the new covenant that Christ made with us by his blood the theme of covenant loyalty is related to something the Lord did to the benevolence of the Lord and the Lord's grace so as the Lord showed kindness to Israel and fulfilled his promises to them it was important for Joshua to remind the people of the importance of being loyal and faithful to the Lord within the Covenant the same exact thing is applicable to us to the Lord showed us kindness in Christ and we received salvation through the work of His grace as a result we are to be faithful to the Lord and this should be shown in our obedience that is in obeying the Lord's commands and statues when we live the life of obedience faithfulness and loyalty we express our thankfulness to what the Lord has done for us from the beginning the Lord is the one who takes the initiative in the Covenant by giving blessings and benevolences to us and we respond to these blessings and benevolences by our obedience and loyalty within the context of the Covenant having seen how Christian application of the book of Joshua appears in the inauguration and continuation of the unfolding kingdom of Christ we should turn briefly to the consummation of the kingdom how should we apply our hope and Christ's future and final fulfillment in light of the book of Joshua without question the New Testament indicates that the consummation of Christ's Kingdom will be the grand finale of his worldwide victorious conquest he will complete the defeat of Satan and evil spirits and when Jesus returns in glory the time of God's mercy toward unbelievers will end at that time God's judgment against Canaan in Joshua's day will seem small compared to the judgment that Jesus will bring against every human enemy of God as we read in Revelation chapter 19 verses 14 and 15 the armies of heaven will follow him from his mouth will come a sharp sword with which to strike down the nation's of course when Christ returns at the consummation of his kingdom his worldwide inheritance his right as heir of all things will be fully realized as we read in Revelation chapter 11 verse 15 the kingdom of the world will become the kingdom of our Lord and of his Christ and this worldwide Kingdom will be distributed to all who follow Christ according to Matthew chapter 25 verse 34 on the day of final judgment the king will say to those who believe in Christ come inherit the kingdom prepared for you from the foundation of the world and only in the consummation of Christ's Kingdom will the warnings calling God's people to covenant Lowell t end when Christ returns those who haven't come to him in saving faith will come under God's eternal judgment and all who are true believers will enter the new creation where the blessings of the New Covenant will be received in their fullness as Revelation chapter 22 verse 3 tells us at that time no longer will there be anything accursed but the throne of God and of the Lamb will be in the city and his servants will worship Him in effect the New Testament calls us to remember how Christ fulfils the themes of Joshua in the inauguration continuation and consummation of his kingdom when we do Israel's conquest inheritance and covenant loyalty in Joshua's day enriched our awareness of the wonder of what Christ established in his first Advent they teach us how we are to live in service to God every day of our lives and they point us toward the grand finale of history when the conquest will be completed the inheritance of the new creation will be ours and we will be vindicated as God's loyal covenant people in Christ in our introduction to Joshua we presented three crucial issues first we touched on the authorship and date of the book including the traditional critical and evangelical outlooks on these matters second we examined the design and purpose of Joshua by considering the content and structure of the book as well as its original meaning and third we explored some Christian applications that can be drawn from the book by looking at how Christ in the inauguration continuation and consummation of God's glorious Kingdom fulfills the expectations established in Joshua the book of Joshua reminded ancient Israelites of what God had accomplished for them through the life of Joshua as they faced challenges in their day and in many ways we faced similar challenges in our lives today but as we'll see in this series the book of Joshua offered Israel opportunities to renew their zeal for what God was doing in their day and it offers you and me opportunities for renewal as well as we learn more about this book will not only grow in our awareness of what God did through Joshua in the Old Testament but will also grow in our awareness of all that God has accomplished is accomplishing and will accomplish through our greater Joshua Jesus our Savior 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Channel: Thirdmill

Views: 63,313

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Keywords: third millennium ministries, thirdmill, third mill, Theology Matters, Reformed, Ministry, Biblical Education, God, Education, Study, Scripture, Theology, Free, Truth, For the World, Bible, Seminary, Doctrine, Old Testament, Joshua, Covenant, Moses, Israel

Id: GM-6g9ymqQQ

Length: 77min 56sec (4676 seconds)

Published: Thu Jun 25 2020