Dividing the Land

Introduction

Joshua 13-21

Funny story or example

It's ironically appropriate for us to be stepping into the book of Joshua again as we begin this new year. Many of you who follow along and attend remember we have been journeying through the Old Testament book of Joshua. When we lost picked up on their story we saw them fighting to take control of the land that God gave to them. Now today we're going to cover a massive section of the book of Joshua . We are actually going to cover about 9 chapters. Now, don't worry , we won't spend 9 hours doing so. I expect we should get this done in the next half hour believe it or not.

OK, what are we talking about today? We're going to talk about how the land of Canaan ... this is the land God promised to the israelite nation ... We're going to talk about how this land is divided among the 12 tribes of Israel. Remember, we should think about tribes kind of like large families . Really really large families of thousands of people but in general they are families of people. And they are descended from the twelve sons of Jacob. And in the chapters we will look at today we will see how God divides the land among these tribes.

Now, if you were to sit down and read these chapters you might come away kind of exhausted . Because there are just large swaths of descriptions of places and peoples that you and I have never been to or seen . And some of these people are only mentioned in this part of the Bible.

It kind of reminds me of the document in the church safe deposit box at first financial bank. We have a record I'm not sure what it's called right now ... we have a record of the ownership of the land that the church sits on for the last 200 plus years period it's really quite incredible. And when you look through that records in one sense it's just a list of names but in the other sense it gives you an important historical reference to understand the land that our church sits on.

When you understand history , you better understand the present.

I think one more way this passage may be appropriate for today is the fact that we are covering this passage in the month of January. January frequently can be a tiring month. For everyone in school, you got a longer semester ahead of you. The winter slash spring semester is longer than the fall semester. And so common January can feel like you are looking ahead at a very long journey.

So today I want to take a look at how God kept his promises through the long haul. So if you would, open your bibles with me to Joshua chapter 13.

What we're going to see here today is the division of the land that God promised to Israel and how God divided it up between the 12 tribes.

The first thing that we're going to see is that this is something that God initiated

God initiated the dividing of the land.

think about it if you remember even just the last two chapters Israel has one quite a few victories throughout the land of Canaan but God didn't want them to rest on what they had already done he wanted them to look ahead to what he called them to do.

One of my favorite passages in the book of Joshua is the first verse in chapter 13.

Joshua 13:1–7 ESV

1 Now Joshua was old and advanced in years, and the Lord said to him, “You are old and advanced in years, and there remains yet very much land to possess. 2 This is the land that yet remains: all the regions of the Philistines, and all those of the Geshurites 3 (from the Shihor, which is east of Egypt, northward to the boundary of Ekron, it is counted as Canaanite; there are five rulers of the Philistines, those of Gaza, Ashdod, Ashkelon, Gath, and Ekron), and those of the Avvim, 4 in the south, all the land of the Canaanites, and Mearah that belongs to the Sidonians, to Aphek, to the boundary of the Amorites, 5 and the land of the Gebalites, and all Lebanon, toward the sunrise, from Baal-gad below Mount Hermon to Lebo-hamath, 6 all the inhabitants of the hill country from Lebanon to Misrephoth-maim, even all the Sidonians. I myself will drive them out from before the people of Israel. Only allot the land to Israel for an inheritance, as I have commanded you. 7 Now therefore divide this land for an inheritance to the nine tribes and half the tribe of Manasseh.”

Don’t you love that phrase there?

The text acknowledges that Joshua had already served for a long time. Joshua served under Moses for four decades! And then he led the nation by himself for several years of war and battle. If there's anyone that deserved retirement, it was Joshua. And yet God was not finished with him yet.

God's message to him stands as a challenge to him and to us today. Let us never discount our capacity to respond to God in obedience. Let us never discount God's capacity to do great things through someone who is willing to say yes to him.

I know the median age of our church has gone up over the last several years. I know many of you have retired. I know many of you have served for decades. And yet, God still has a lot for us to do as a church.

Please note 2 truths.

First, God is a big fan of rest

. Rest is a good thing. God is OK with you resting and retiring from your job and stepping back from physically demanding responsibilities when it's wise.

Second, God almost never tells anyone to quit.

He never says, it's OK, you can stop serving me. It's OK, you are too old to do what I need you to do. It's OK, I need someone younger and stronger in order to do great things for me. God doesn't say these things. I want to encourage you don't limit your belief in what God can still do through you. We need you as a church to be engaged with wisdom and faithful willingness in reaching our community with the gospel of Jesus Christ

I love what Paul writes

Philippians 2:13 ESV

13 for it is God who works in you, both to will and to work for his good pleasure.

God is the one who prompts us to serve him, God is the one who works in us and equips us and gives us the grace to serve him.

So my challenge for you today is to allow God to speak to your heart. Make sure you are fully engaged in your prayer life and in your time with God every day. Know that it is not a Christian thing to say no to God. If God truly is Lord of your life then your answer is yes to him. Always. Yet also no that we don't make decisions based on the guilting of a pastor or the pressure of others , but Christians seek with wisdom to do God's will wherever he leads.

Another thing I see in this passage is that it really illustrates the life of faith.

Illustrating the nature of what a life of faith looks like

If you read through these chapters from 13 to 21 you will see that much of the land that God divides among the tribes his land that still needs to be conquered. God told Israel to divide up the land without first conquering all of it. God told them to act with faith trusting him.

Speaking of faith another one of my favorite characters in Joshua is Caleb.

Joshua 14:6–12 ESV

6 Then the people of Judah came to Joshua at Gilgal. And Caleb the son of Jephunneh the Kenizzite said to him, “You know what the Lord said to Moses the man of God in Kadesh-barnea concerning you and me. 7 I was forty years old when Moses the servant of the Lord sent me from Kadesh-barnea to spy out the land, and I brought him word again as it was in my heart. 8 But my brothers who went up with me made the heart of the people melt; yet I wholly followed the Lord my God. 9 And Moses swore on that day, saying, ‘Surely the land on which your foot has trodden shall be an inheritance for you and your children forever, because you have wholly followed the Lord my God.’ 10 And now, behold, the Lord has kept me alive, just as he said, these forty-five years since the time that the Lord spoke this word to Moses, while Israel walked in the wilderness. And now, behold, I am this day eighty-five years old. 11 I am still as strong today as I was in the day that Moses sent me; my strength now is as my strength was then, for war and for going and coming. 12 So now give me this hill country of which the Lord spoke on that day, for you heard on that day how the Anakim were there, with great fortified cities. It may be that the Lord will be with me, and I shall drive them out just as the Lord said.”

Don't you love his gusto here? Caleb had the privilege of taking down Giants. More than 40 years earlier Caleb was one of two spies who believed that it would be possible to defeat the Giants in the land of Israel. Now, 40 years later Caleb is still ready to takedown Giants.

Now, you might be tempted to think that Caleb was just this macho man . You might be tempted to think that he had more testosterone than you or I. That he had more bravery than you or I. But I think it's deeper and yet simpler than that . Read 14 verse 12 again

Joshua 14:12 ESV

12 So now give me this hill country of which the Lord spoke on that day, for you heard on that day how the Anakim were there, with great fortified cities. It may be that the Lord will be with me, and I shall drive them out just as the Lord said.”

Caleb was confident in what God had said. Caleb wasn't confident in what he could do as much as he was confident in what God said would happen.

Caleb showed us what strong faith looks like. It looks like a willingness to charge down Giants and fortified cities no matter what your age because you're confident in what God told you to do. So what has God told you to do? What has he told his church to do? Where can you and I draw greater confidence in God's promises and greater boldness to face the future?

Friends, when we spend more time connected with God's word and inundated with the promises in his word we will have the confidence of Caleb. It doesn't take superhuman ability or strength or stupidity to chase down Giants and their cities. It simply takes an extraordinary confidence in God. It simply takes a childlike confidence in God.

2021 has already proved to be capable of chaos and disturbing news. You and I will find the confidence to face the Giants that come our way based on our proximity to an relationship with God. When we live out of a life that remembers God's promises we will have outsized confidence in our life.

We also see that not everyone had strong faith. Some of the Israelites saw far more of the problems then they saw the solutions. Look at this passage:

Joshua 17:16–18 ESV

16 The people of Joseph said, “The hill country is not enough for us. Yet all the Canaanites who dwell in the plain have chariots of iron, both those in Beth-shean and its villages and those in the Valley of Jezreel.” 17 Then Joshua said to the house of Joseph, to Ephraim and Manasseh, “You are a numerous people and have great power. You shall not have one allotment only, 18 but the hill country shall be yours, for though it is a forest, you shall clear it and possess it to its farthest borders. For you shall drive out the Canaanites, though they have chariots of iron, and though they are strong.”

Instead of coming up with ways to do a God called them to do they spent time complaining to Joshua. They complained that they did not have enough space. And they complained that the obstacles they faced were too big. Joshua reminded them of their strength and Joshua reminded them of what they would do. They simply needed to trust in God.

Joshua reminds them and challenges them in this passage:

Joshua 18:3 ESV

3 So Joshua said to the people of Israel, “How long will you put off going in to take possession of the land, which the Lord, the God of your fathers, has given you?

So far we've seen how this section shows us the nature and what faith looks like. It looks like trusting God's promises. And we also see what weak faith looks like. It looks like seeing far more of the obstacles than the promises of God.

Now we're going to continue through this section and see a couple more things that Joshua teaches us here.

vengeance was justice in a society without a strong military and police force. If you were hurt or wronged by someone else it was your responsibility or the responsibility of your family to get you justice. If someone in your family was killed God forbid it was your family's responsibility to find and kill the person who killed your family member. To get vengeance. Justice look differently in the ancient world.

Yet God was concerned that his people pursue justice and protect the innocent. Take a look at this next section:

Joshua 20:1–9 ESV

1 Then the Lord said to Joshua, 2 “Say to the people of Israel, ‘Appoint the cities of refuge, of which I spoke to you through Moses, 3 that the manslayer who strikes any person without intent or unknowingly may flee there. They shall be for you a refuge from the avenger of blood. 4 He shall flee to one of these cities and shall stand at the entrance of the gate of the city and explain his case to the elders of that city. Then they shall take him into the city and give him a place, and he shall remain with them. 5 And if the avenger of blood pursues him, they shall not give up the manslayer into his hand, because he struck his neighbor unknowingly, and did not hate him in the past. 6 And he shall remain in that city until he has stood before the congregation for judgment, until the death of him who is high priest at the time. Then the manslayer may return to his own town and his own home, to the town from which he fled.’ ” 7 So they set apart Kedesh in Galilee in the hill country of Naphtali, and Shechem in the hill country of Ephraim, and Kiriath-arba (that is, Hebron) in the hill country of Judah. 8 And beyond the Jordan east of Jericho, they appointed Bezer in the wilderness on the tableland, from the tribe of Reuben, and Ramoth in Gilead, from the tribe of Gad, and Golan in Bashan, from the tribe of Manasseh. 9 These were the cities designated for all the people of Israel and for the stranger sojourning among them, that anyone who killed a person without intent could flee there, so that he might not die by the hand of the avenger of blood, till he stood before the congregation.

God sets up a practice of cities where someone who is accused of killing someone else could run and hide so they could find justice. Because in the ancient world they had the same problem we have today. You don't always know who the guilty person is. And when justice is really really fast you can't always determine the right backs. Sometimes the wrong person was executed for a crime they didn't commit. So God set up a system of refuge and protection. If you were innocent you could hide there. Because everyone in the countryside and the culture around understood that it was the right of the Avenger of blood to get revenge for the family. It was the responsibility of the refuge city to protect someone and to provide them a fair trial.

If an individual who is accused of murder hit out in a city he could be protected and if he was acquitted under trial he could find safety in the city.

You know, these cities of refuge actually point ahead to the Messiah.

Hebrews 6:18 ESV

18 so that by two unchangeable things, in which it is impossible for God to lie, we who have fled for refuge might have strong encouragement to hold fast to the hope set before us.

Jesus is described as a refuge for everyone who seeks him. Everyone who flees to him. We have hope and safety in Jesus.

But you know we also have anticipation of what Jesus will do for us in this passage. Joshua assigns the land to the people of Israel. Someday God will give an eternal inheritance to his people.

1 Peter 1:3–5 ESV

3 Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ! According to his great mercy, he has caused us to be born again to a living hope through the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead, 4 to an inheritance that is imperishable, undefiled, and unfading, kept in heaven for you, 5 who by God’s power are being guarded through faith for a salvation ready to be revealed in the last time.

This passage points ahead to Jesus.

One more thing this passage points to,

Thes chapters shows God fulfilling his promises

Joshua 21:43–45 ESV

43 Thus the Lord gave to Israel all the land that he swore to give to their fathers. And they took possession of it, and they settled there. 44 And the Lord gave them rest on every side just as he had sworn to their fathers. Not one of all their enemies had withstood them, for the Lord had given all their enemies into their hands. 45 Not one word of all the good promises that the Lord had made to the house of Israel had failed; all came to pass.

God faithfully and completely fulfilled his promises.

Conclusion

God's grace

empowers us. Everything we accomplished in our lives is by the grace of God.

Faith is a journey

sometimes we act with extraordinary faith and see God do incredible things. Sometimes our lack of faith reminds us of our need for a gracious God. When our faith is great we need to praise God. When our faith is weak we need to look to God for hope and help.

We have a refuge in Jesus.

Isn't it amazing that we can find hope and safety in Jesus?!

God is faithful

God doesn't change, he still faithful to keep his promises today to watch over you and I.