JOSHUA 22
Read Joshua 22
This is a curious episode in the life of God’s people which nearly ended in tragedy when the people had a dispute amongst themselves (there is nothing new under the sun!).
And it all started so well. We recall that at the beginning of the conquest of the Promised Land, the tribes that had been allocated land outside the Promised Land, east of the Jordan, were called upon to cross the river and help their countrymen to conquer the land. They did this, and now Joshua commended them for not deserting their brethren, for being loyal to them (and the Lord) and honourably discharging their duty. Joshua blessed them and sent them homewards (v6) with the injunction to walk with the Lord, to obey his commands and to serve him with ‘all your heart and all your soul’, language which John draws upon in his first letter in encouraging us, as servants of the Lord, to live our lives as Christians.
When the eastern tribes reached the Jordan to cross over to their homes they built an altar, which incensed their fellow countrymen to the extent that they sent an investigative committee (v14) which spoke harshly to them about rebelling against the Lord (vv16-18). What is going on here? How have things turned so sour so quickly? What was wrong with building an altar?
If we look at Deuteronomy 12:4-5 we see that the Israelites are told to worship at the place the Lord their God chooses for them, they cannot pick and choose worship sites as they wish. The view of the majority was that the eastern tribes were disobeying God and taking the first steps towards turning away from the Lord. Well, if they want to do that, surely that is their own look out, isn’t it? Why should the others care? But the experience of the Israelites (look at Achan’s sin in Chapter 7 for example) is that even if only one of God’s people sins then the whole community suffers. It is important that the worship of God is not corrupted – and we need to bear that in mind in our own context; people come up with all sorts of innovative ideas for worship but we need to be on the lookout for what does not honour God and what is not in accordance with his word.
Thankfully, the eastern tribes (under oath) state that disobedience was not in their minds when they built the altar. The integrity of worship was not in danger and the altar was not for worship, but as a witness to God’s faithfulness. It was about remembering what God had done for them, and we have seen how important it is for God’s people to remember his saving grace when they built a cairn on crossing the Jordan in Chapters 3 and 4. The two factions were reconciled and the chapter ends with the naming of the altar, ‘A Witness Between Us that the Lord is God’.
We are, as Christians, called to witness to God’s faithfulness, his grace, his love. And in this unbelieving society, to declare that the Lord is God, that Jesus is our saviour, that he is God. And like the Israelites of old, we remember what the Lord has done for us every time we share at the Lord’s Table, ‘Do this in remembrance of me’.