CRITICAL NOTES.—
Joshua 1:14. All the mighty men] All of those selected for the campaign. About 40,000 passed over, leaving upwards of 70,000 effective men to guard the women and children. (Cf. chap. Joshua 4:13; Numbers 26:7; Numbers 26:18; Numbers 26:34.)
MAIN HOMILETICS OF THE PARAGRAPH.— Joshua 1:12-18
UNEQUAL POSSESSIONS AND CORRESPONDING OBLIGATIONS
Several religious writers recently have called attention to the “Gospel” in the O. T. Some books have been thought to shadow forth much of the doctrinal teachings of the Gospel, others, the glory of the Church. “Christ in Leviticus” is set forth typically; in other books, prophetically. The Gospel in Joshua is a Gospel of right feeling about daily life. It is a system of Christian ethics, and the teaching is the same in outline as the teaching of the Saviour and His apostles. Here are insisted on the same obedience towards God, and the same duty towards men, which are made so emphatic by Jesus Christ. One glory of the Bible is that all which is new is so old. Nothing of the O. T. is recalled in the New; nothing is amended, nothing is altered. Not a jot or a tittle of the old principles passes away. The clothing of them may change, but Christ says of the truths, “I came not to destroy, but to fulfil.” The O. T. shews us a plant; in the N. T. we have the same plant developed amid the glories of the work of Christ into blossom and beauty; now and here the centuries are bearing fruits, and yonder these are being gathered home; but the plant has been ever the same. The Hindoos teach the doctrine of transmigration of souls. A man dies, and they say he may become an elephant, then a bird, then an alligator, then a tiger, then a serpent, and so on through various and endless forms of being; but with all these changes of body, they insist that the soul is always one and identical. Revelation may come now in one form, and now in another; it may be given now by this man, and now by that; the body may change,—the spirit of the Bible is ever the same. This paragraph speaks of the inequalities of human inheritances; of the obligation of opportunity; and of the duty of caring for the weak.
I. Men, by God’s appointment, come into life’s inheritance in differing measures and by various ways. The whole army of Israel had gone up against Sihon and Og. (Cf. Numbers 21:21-35; Deuteronomy 2:24-37; Deuteronomy 3:1-17.) These marvellous victories thrilled the heart of the nation, and animated its songs for at least four centuries. (Cf. Psalms 135:2; Psalms 135:11-12; Psalms 135:21; Psalms 136:17-21.) Yet the two and a half tribes inherited the whole of the land on the east of Jordan. Reuben and Gad had a preponderance of cattle. (Cf Numbers 32:1.) How did that inequality of possession come about? Perhaps through greater industry, or more agricultural habits. This inequality of cattle led to the two and a half tribes inheriting this fat and fertile land, which all Israel had fought to conquer. Here was another irregularity. There were yet others. The number of men upwards of twenty years of age was in Reuben, 43,700, in Gad, 40,500; in half Manasseh, 26,350. Manasseh, though fewest by far in population, had an immensely larger territory than either of the others. Gad numbered less than Reuben, yet its territory was nearly double. Looking at the plan of the land in ordinary maps, the case, in rough figures, stands nearly as follows:—Where a Reubenite inherited one acre, a Gadite would possess two, while a member of the half-tribe of Manasseh would have nearly fifteen. How this brings abruptly into view our heavenly Father’s method of disposing of His gifts. Men would say—at least, many poor men, and not a few others—“Let every man have things equally.” Their panacea for the ills which afflict the world is an equal division of the world’s substance. God does not even start His model nation on that plan. To one tribe He gives no territorial property whatever, and to this half-tribe, which is only as the fourth of the sons of Joseph, He gives by far the largest acreage of all. And why not? “Because of justice,” men say. Well, if all things were equalised to-day, they would begin to get uneven again to-morrow. The industrious and able would gain; the idle and dissolute would lose. And why talk of justice where there are no rights? The parable of the labourers in the vineyard disposes for ever of this question. The rights of rebels and traitors are not usually thought large among men. Besides this, our life on earth is a system of training and discipline, and our God does not govern by a routine method of equal pleasures and equal pains.
1. Glance at the differing lots of different men now. (a) Look at men in their birth. Life is a race, and much depends on the start. Do men start equally? “Some men are born to greatness, some achieve greatness, and some have greatness thrust upon them.” Some are born in mansions, and some in hovels; some of godly parents, and some in the midst of vice; some in civilised countries, and some of barbarians; some with good mental powers, and some idiots; some with a well-balanced emotional nature, and some with passions which might need an angel to control them. (b) There is the same diversity in providence. Some of even the slothful rise to riches, and some of even the industrious never know prosperity. One farmer’s corn is blighted, or his cattle are carried off by an epidemic; another, of far less merit, succeeds. One merchant suffers continually by fires, or storms, or markets which seem always adverse; another, not nearly so worthy, is continually meeting with prosperity. You can only look at it all, and say, “The Lord maketh poor, and maketh rich.” (c) There is the same inequality in religious privileges. Some are so taught, and trained, and pleaded with, and prayed for, that they seem carried to heaven by the force of Divine grace in others; some are so taught, and tempted, and constrained, that they seem borne as on a flood tide to destruction. Some live long, and have many opportunities to repent; others do but get fairly into years of responsibility, and suddenly they die. These are not theories; life is shewing them daily as her own stern facts.
2. What are the reasons for these differing measures and lots in human life? We are not omniscient, and therefore cannot tell. Not a small part of the efficiency of life’s teachings lies in the demand which they make on our absolute trust in God. But “we know in part.” Ask why the earth is not one level plain, with no majestic hills and no pleasant valleys. What wondrous beauty would be lost in such a dismal monotony of arrangement! Ask why all climates are not equal? why the world was not made with no Borneo and no Iceland, no Sumatra and no Siberia, but with one dead level of temperature all over? How death would reign everywhere if this were the case! With no breezes, no currents of air, no purifying winds, earth would be a scene of perpetual pestilence, so long as any remained alive for victims. Ask why the world has not one eternal summer; why trees do not bear flower and fruit all the year round? How beautiful this would be; yes, but how enervating! What about moral health, moral strength, and moral beauty, if all men had an equal heritage and an even course in coming into possession? What, if among men, there were no hills and valleys? What if the moral climate were everywhere alike? What if perpetual summer reigned the wide world over? Oh, if there were no sore poverty and riches, no terrible bereavements and sicknesses, and no robust health, the currents of pity and charity would sink into a calm, putrid, and fatal selfishness, and compassion would stagnate and die. With some it seems already to be, “Every man for himself, and God for us all;” then it would be, “Every man for himself, and God for none of us.” “No more pain and no more tears” may be well where there is “no more sin;” it could not be so here. If the heritage of all men were the same, the world’s rich experiences and moral health and beauty would vanish and die for ever. Thank God for such inheritance as you have. It is an unmerited gift, to be used to His glory.
II. A common obligation rests on all men to whom God gives an easy inheritance, to help those whose lot is only won through hard work and stern conflict. The two and a half tribes had fertile lands, and had them through the service of all Israel: now, having rest, they were to fight the battles of their brethren. God teaches the young nation that men who have rest are to help men who are in unrest and conflict. How it all reads like a verse out of the N. T. What is it but saying, “We then, that are strong, ought to bear the infirmities of the weak, and not to please ourselves”? It is God’s early version of a later proclamation, “Bear ye one another’s burdens, and so fulfil the law of Christ.” Do we use our rest to help our brother who is yet in stern anxiety and conflict? Some men take all they can get, but give nothing to their fellows. They are like the gluttons of whom the ancient Juvenal wrote:—
“Such whose sole bliss is eating, who can give
But that one brutal reason why they live.”
Inequalities do but exist that we may give our rest for our brother’s strife. Especially should he who has entered into the rest of faith, labour for the help of him who is borne down into sin by many temptations. Feltham well said, “Shew me the man who would go to heaven alone if he could, and I will shew you the man who will never be admitted to heaven.” We are to be followers of Him who, “though He was rich, for our sakes became poor,” etc.
III. The weak have always been God’s care, and ought ever to be ours also. (Joshua 1:14.) God would not have their women and children exposed to the strife. He impresses the gentleness of His own heart on His people from the very outset. How beautifully this feeling of interest in the weak comes out all through the ministry of the Saviour! Why should God be so gentle with weak men?
1. Think how useless weak people are for service. Dr. Livingstone told us in one of his indignant letters that twenty thousand slaves were annually exported from the East Coast of Africa, but that having to walk five hundred miles, not one in five of those captured ever lived to embark. Think of it; one hundred thousand people torn every year from home to furnish an exportation of twenty thousand! What became of the eighty thousand? They became weak and sick with marching, and were driven on till they fell down to die on the road Think of it; two hundred and twenty of the weak thus driven to death every day all the year round! Oh, how differently God deals with us; and how worthless many of us are in our weakness!
2. Remember the tendency of weakness to despondency. The way-worn Elijah cries out in his grief, “O Lord, take away my life.”
3. Think on the tendency of men in weakness to reject their Saviour. Notwithstanding this, Christ still cares for such. Peter, in his weakness, denies Christ, yet Christ prays for him; Thomas doubts, and his Lord says, “Reach hither thy finger;” Judas betrays his Master, but how tenderly that Master pleads with him at the table; of the eleven Jesus prophesied, “Behold, the hour cometh, yea, is now come, that ye shall be scattered every man to his own, and shall leave me alone,” immediately He adds concerning the long discourse in which He had ministered to their coming feebleness, “These things have I spoken unto you, that in Me ye might have peace.” It is said that during his youth Themistocles was very idle, and that when he suddenly turned to a life of industry, many asked his reason for the change; the answer was, “The glory of Miltiades will not suffer me to sleep.” The glory of the Lord’s compassion for us in our helplessness might well awaken our dormant sympathies, and quicken our still hands to holy efforts for others who are also weak.
SUGGESTIVE COMMENTS ON THE VERSES
Joshua 1:12-16. THE PROMISE BETWEEN THE DEAD AND THE LIVING.
I. God ratifies, through Joshua, the covenant made between these tribes and Moses. He holds Himself bound by the word of His deceased servant, whom during his life He had so visibly recognised. The importance of the words of a man by whom the Lord is manifestly working. In a measure, God honours such words still.
II. God, “who keepeth covenant” on His side, demands faithfulness from men on their part also. These tribes had made a solemn promise which they are now called upon to fulfil. (Cf. Numbers 32:16-33.)
1. Vows which ought never to have been made, and which it would be sinful to perform, should be kept only with penitence and prayer, (e. g. Acts 23:12.)
2. Vows which in themselves are neither evil nor good should be faithfully kept for conscience’ sake.
3. Vows in which holy service is offered to God or man, God holds to be unquestionably sacred and imperatively binding. (Cf. Deuteronomy 23:21-23.) The death of one of the parties to this agreement in no measure cancels the obligation of the other. Numbers 32:23, which treats of this promise, does not so much assert that sin is self-revealing as that it is self-remunerating. It ensures its own penalties; and the penalty for this broken vow should be certain and heavy. Joshua 1:12-16 may be otherwise treated, as indicating some
INCENTIVES TO GENEROSITY
I. Generous kindness towards others is the best policy towards ourselves. If the nine and a half tribes had been defeated, or had not made their victory sure, the two and a half tribes would speedily have suffered also. It was security for the eastern side of Jordan, that the western tribes should have rest. This is so throughout our own lives also. To help our brethren, is to lay up riches where, even for this life, “neither moth nor rust” can wholly destroy them.
II. Generous kindness towards others is invariably due to others. It may be due to them because of what they have done for us. This was the case here. It is always due because of what some have done for us. What we owe to men, should be judged in the light of that which we have received from men. Thus human kindness, while always graceful, is ever a debt.
III. Generous kindness towards others is due to God, and is well-pleasing in His sight. He from whom we have received all that we prize most in life, and all that we shall care for in death, graciously says about all our efforts to help needy brethren, “Ye have done it unto Me.” Even Cicero could write, “Men resemble the gods in nothing so much as in doing good to their fellow creatures.” Self-interest, as a motive for action, is allowable; self-denial for the good of others is noble. Wm. Jay well said—“To render good for good is human; to render evil for evil is brutish; to render evil for good is devilish; to render good for evil is divine.”
Joshua 1:16-18. These verses, at first sight, read like the reply of the two and a half tribes; probably they should be taken as the response of all Israel to Joshua’s call to war. Two addresses had been given, of which the substance is recorded one to the “shoterim,” or subordinate officers of all Israel, and the other probably to the similar officers of the two and a half tribes. The verses read like a declaration of fealty to Joshua, made on behalf of the whole of the twelve tribes, whose officers had “passed through the host,” and gathered the mind of the people, which they here formally express.
Joshua’s claims on the people were made not on his own behalf, but as the representative of the mind of Jehovah. The people had been led to regard him as the medium through which God declared His will. Taken in this light the verses shew us
THE SPIRIT OF TRUE OBEDIENCE
I. Obedience to the will of God should be prompt and complete.
1. True obedience will lead us to keep, not merely some, but all of the commandments. If we are really loyal to God, we shall need no exposition of that seemingly harsh word—“He that offendeth in one point is guilty of all.” The spirit that can practise any one known disobedience sets itself up in opposition to God, who gave all the commandments, and who is therefore greater than them all put together. To break one command knowingly is to intentionally violate the will of God; and of what use is it to obey some of His words, and then to dare Him on the strength of having kept a part of His precepts? For His people there is only one thing to say—“All that Thou commandest us, directly or indirectly, we will do.”
2. True obedience will lead us in all the ways of God. “All the paths of the Lord are mercy and truth unto such as keep His covenant and His testimonies.” “Whithersoever Thou sendest us, we will go.”
3. True obedience loves to refresh itself with helpful memories. The Israelites had hearkened unto Moses in some things, and therein had been their greatest happiness. Where they had murmured and rebelled, there they had suffered; where they had obeyed, therein had they been blessed. They did not mean to vaunt in their obedience to Moses as perfect, but express, in this general way, their desire in all things to obey Joshua. They knew by a deep experience that this was the path of happiness. “Great peace have they which love Thy law; and nothing shall offend them.”
II. The spirit of obedience to God, and the spirit of prayer and holy desire for God’s people, ever go together.
1. “The Lord be with thee, as He was with Moses.” How constantly our Lord Himself shews us the close connection between the spirit of prayer and that of obedience. The key to the power of the prayer in John 17 is given in its own words, “I have glorified Thee on the earth; I have finished the work which Thou gavest me to do.”
2. “Only be strong and of a good courage.” The voice of obedience is the echo of the voice of God. These are the very words which the Lord had spoken in His charge to Joshua; here they are reiterated by the people. So God supplements His teachings by the common feeling of mankind.
III. He who best obeys God, most severely estimates the penalties due to transgression. The disobedient, they say, “shall be put to death.” This was martial law, and was certainly as necessary in an army then as it is now. Through rebellion in the wilderness there had been forty years’ delay already. This is no reckless statement made in a moment of excitement, neither is it unmerciful. Severity to the few would be mercy to the multitude. It is when in the spirit of obedience that the Israelites see this. Were we more holy, we should probably have far fewer discussions on the amount of punishment due to sin. It is when we live nearest to God that we most feel the guilt of sin and its dreadful deservings. It was Murray McCheyne who talked with such awful gentleness and love of the wrath of God. Probably no angel sees any reason for wonder, much less for complaint, when he “looks into” the word to guilty men—“The soul that sinneth, it shall die.” Apart from disposition and desire, could it be otherwise?
“THE MORAL ADVANTAGES OF GOOD ORGANIZATION.—Society must have leadership, and leadership must be a question of competence. There are three things about the true leader which are most notable:
1. He must be directly called of God. Moses was; Joshua was.
2. Being directly called of God, he will walk constantly in the Divine counsel. ‘This book of the law shall not depart,’ etc.
3. Walking constantly in the Divine counsel, he shall achieve the most distinguished success. This is God’s promise.
“Organization is as much required in the Church as in the army. God is not the author of confusion, but of order. Every man has a place, and ought to keep it; and if he overstep it, he should be made uncomfortable until he return. The mature thinker, the new-born Christian, the untried youth, the undisciplined mind, and the cultivated intellect, cannot be equal, and ought not to have equal authority in the Church. There are chief seats for chief guests, and lower rooms for less conspicuous men; and society should exhibit displeasure towards the man who wantonly asserts a claim to a place above the merits of his character. When this principle is recognised, we shall get good organization, and such organization will secure the following advantages:—
I. Such organization would facilitate the development of individual talent. In the absence of wise organization, the modest man will be ignored or crushed. He will have no power and no disposition to cope with the self-asserting and blustering men who worship their own infallibility. For the moment insolence will vanquish genius, simply because genius disdains the rude weapons which insolence adopts, and cares not to fight where even victory would be disgrace.…
II. Such organization would consolidate the Christian society assembling in one place. The army is a compact confederacy. Its consolidation is its strength. Break up its wisely arranged gradations, and its power is paralysed. The same principle has its bearing upon the Church.…
III. Such organization would present the most formidable front to the enemy. Every man in his place, every man moving at the same word of command every man living for the common good—let that programme be carried out, and no power can withstand the united influence of Christ’s believers. Disorder is weakness; disorder is waste! The Church is to-day torn by intestine strife. Every man’s hand is lifted up against his brother, and through all the ranks this question is asked, Who shall be greatest? What wonder if the enemy be laughing at our impotence, and deriding our pretensions?
IV. Such organization would promote a most healthful spiritual discipline. The organization which God appoints is calculated to train men to habits of self-dominion.… The young man is held in check; the passionate man is subdued; the lethargic man is quickened; and each nature has the advantage of association with natures of a different type. The organization thus commended is not merely mechanical; it is the order which comes of a living love, which is willing to do the most good in the least time. It is quite possible to have a perfect mechanical outline, and yet to make no impression on the age. We want all the force of individuality combined with all the regulation of order; and this we can only have by living constantly in the spirit of Jesus Christ, without which we are none of His. It may be said that life will make its own order. This is a pleasant sophism, very gratifying to an indolent spirit; but the whole history of human training gives it emphatic contradiction. It is forgotten that we have to do, not with life in the abstract, but with fallen life; with life under the constant influence of Satanic appeal, and which is inclined to go down rather than to go up: so that life under such conditions cannot be trusted to make its own order; it must be brought under Divine discipline, as that may discover itself in human appointments, and by serving humbly must learn to rule benignantly.” [Dr. Parker; Pulpit Analyst, vol. i. 626.]