Why does God condone so much war and killing? You will read all about this in Joshua...
First of all, this war for the land where God’s people would settle, was Gods war. Gods ways are NOT our ways.. Its very difficult to understand, but God is God.. he gave us the right to live, and can take it away when He sees fit. Throughout the early chapters of Joshua, we see God overwhelmingly presenting Himself to the Canaanites (Rehab admit it that the Canannites realized Israel's God was the God of the universe) only to be rejected. They chose their pagan lifestyle over Him, and God, allowing them to suffer the consequences of that choice….. consequences He had forwarned if they would not repent, He gave them lots of time to repent.. like 400 years!! And nope they would not listen.. they wanted to live the way they wanted to live.. ) The Canaanites wer quite aware of God’s power.. and all they had to do was repent.. some did.. most didn’t.. They had a choice to turn from sin.. or.. die.. they continued to rebel against God to the bitter end.. Second, the Canannite religion was based on the concept of sympathetic worship (worshipping one's god, by behaving as he or she does). Consequently, Baal worship was perhaps the most degraded and degrading form of idolatry ever practiced. …And it existed in its rawest form in Canaan. The Cannanites engaged in temple prostitution, drunken sexual orgies, snake worship, homosexuality and even infant sacrifice. Everything about this stood in absolute and total contradiction to everything God had revealed about Himself to His people and His holiness demanded a response!!. The New Testament states that the law of Moses was only a shadow of the good things to come. (Hebrews, 10:1) in the Old Testament, the “ shadow “ of those good things was literal warfare against neighboring nations that were thoroughly contaminated with evil. The incarnation of Christ brought the reality - warfare against evil itself
The Promised Land
Joshua was with Moses throughout the desert journey, he was probably around 20 years old when he left Eqypt.. so he saw everything God had done for his people. All of it.. God appointed Joshua to lead the Israelites into the Promised Land. When they entered the land, God's 700 year old promise to Abraham was fulfilled. Jericho's walls collapsed before Joshua's army as they took possession of the land. Then at this point the land was divided up among the twelve tribes (named after Jacobs 12 sons). After the death of Joshua, there was no formal leadership except for judges that were called from time to time by God as the need arose. The judges had several functions: military leadership, spiritual leadership and as judge in case hearings and administering justice in Israel. However, during the 200 years Israel was governed by judges, there was little law and order. There were 15 judges all together. One women Debrah - the judges I know most of are Sampson, Eli and Samuel.
I can tell you about them.. briefly of course cause I dont want to loose your attention. So I will tell you about them in another letter ok……
Ok before I continue I must tell you.. we have gone over Genesis, Exodus, Leviticus, Numbers and Deuteronomy, I just want to let you know about Joshua. Because he was important in the Bible too. He took over when Moses died, Moses publicly appointed Joshua his successor, he had huge faith. God uses Joshua to conquer Canaan. The Canaanite were evil people, engulfed in such things as religious prostitution, many kinds of sexual perversion, and human sacrifices. Like big time evil ok. He sends forth two spies to see what is going on in Canaan before they take it over. When the spies get caught in the city, a prostitute hides them in her home, her name is Rahab. She gets them safely out of the city with one request, do not harm her or her family. She is a believer. She was a very special woman, God seeks out righteous people from the nations and draws them to His faith. So off they go back to Joshua and they start on their mission to take the city over. They are carrying the Ark of the Covenant. The Ark of the Covenant is described in the Bible as a sacred container, inside this container rested the Tablets of stone containing the Ten Commandments as well as Aaron's rod and manna (the only food they had when they were with Moses in the desert). According to the Biblical account, the Ark was built at the command of God, in accord with Moses’s prophetic vision on Mount Sinai. God communicated with Moses "from between the two cherubim" on the Ark's cover. It is important to know about this because it was carried with them for years. It was like a protection for them. Only the Levites who where like the priests back then, could carry the ark.. When they reached the Jordan River before they crossed it with the ark.. the waters parted for them, same as when the waters parted for Moses. I thought it was important to tell you about that before we moved on.
And this too.. God commanded Joshua to say this after they crossed over the Jordan River, 'Because the waters of the Jordan were cut off before the ark of the covenant of the LORD; when it crossed the Jordan, the waters of the Jordan were cut off.' So these stones shall become a memorial to the sons of Israel forever." Thus the sons of Israel did as Joshua commanded, and took up twelve stones from the middle of the Jordan, just as the LORD spoke to Joshua, according to the number of the tribes of the sons of Israel; and they carried them over with them to the lodging place and put them down there. Then Joshua set up twelve stones in the middle of the Jordan at the place where the feet of the priests who carried the ark of the covenant were standing, and they are there to this day. When looked upon this memorial on the bank of the Jordan, it would cause the people to remember the Lord’s goodness, when He led them into the Promised Land.
Joshua’s mission was clear. He was to enter the land, conquer its inhabitants, and divide the land into portions for all the tribes. God promised him success in his conquest; “No man shall stand up before you all the days of your life; as I was with Moses, so shall I be with you. I will not weaken My grasp on you nor will I abandon you. Be strong and have courage; for you will cause this nation to inherit the land that I have sworn to their ancestors to give to them.”
In Joshua’s conquest of the Holy Land, God was with him every step of the way, and in certain instances the supernatural was clearly at work. The first city the Jews conquered, Jericho, had impenetrable walls. God commanded Joshua to circle the walls for six days and on the seventh to have the priest blow shofars, which is an ancient musical horn typically made of a ram's horn, used for Jewish religious purposes, it is like the modern day bugle. When they did so on the seventh day, the city walls were swallowed up by the ground and the Jews conquered Jericho with ease. Only Rahab and her family were spared. And she converted at that point and went on to marry Salmon, and had a baby named Boaz.
Another time, when the Jews were fighting the five Emorite kings at Gibeon, night time was approaching and the battle was going to have to be put off. Joshua prayed to God for the sun to stand still until his soldiers achieved victory. The sun stood still and the day was extended, enabling the Jews to defeat the Emorites on that day. Joshua prayed, and God supernaturally provided the light necessary for Joshua’s army to win its battle. The lengthened day was indeed unlike anything ever seen, but in Joshua’s mind the greater miracle may just have been that God listened to him and answered such an amazing prayer.
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