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6/29/08

Sin Hung on a Tree

SLIDE1

Well, we’re coming to the end of our journey with Joshua and the Israelites, and what a journey it’s been, hasn’t it?  The Israelites are finally entering the promised land they’ve so long awaited, but there’s been one little catch.  It’s not like this land flowing with milk and honey wasn’t inhabited.  It’s not as if there were lush green pastures just waiting for the Israelites.  Quite the opposite.  Any land that was that good, not surprisingly, had a good number of people living in it.  A good number of bad people.  The land was filled with many tribes who did not fear or serve the Lord.  So what was God’s plan?  How did he intend to give this land to the Israelites?  He did it in a double purposed plan.  He would punish those who did not follow his commands while at the same time give the land he had promised to the Israelites to the Israelites.

SLIDE2

Our passage this morning continues with the story of just how God delivered the promised land into the hands of the Israelites.  I’ll be reading from Joshua 10:1-28

Joshua 10:1-28 (NIV)

10     Now Adoni-Zedek king of Jerusalem heard that Joshua had taken Ai and totally destroyed it, doing to Ai and its king as he had done to Jericho and its king, and that the people of Gibeon had made a treaty of peace with Israel and were living near them.  ² He and his people were very much alarmed at this, because Gibeon was an important city, like one of the royal cities; it was larger than Ai, and all its men were good fighters.  ³ So Adoni-Zedek king of Jerusalem appealed to Hoham king of Hebron, Piram king of Jarmuth, Japhia king of Lachish and Debir king of Eglon.  ⁴ “Come up and help me attack Gibeon,” he said, “because it has made peace with Joshua and the Israelites.”

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OK, to sort of set the scene of what’s going on here.  News of one kingdom coming through overthrowing city after city spreads quickly.  It’s as if there was a tornado coming through and it was heading your direction.

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Jerusalem could see the impending doom on the horizon, and rather than just taking cover, Jerusalem’s king, Adoni-Zdek, planned to do something about it. 

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He gathered up the kings of Hebron,

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Jarmuth,

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Lachish,

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and Eglon

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intending to attack Gibeon, Israel new ally.  So let’s continue with the passage.

SLIDE 10

⁵ Then the five kings of the Amorites—the kings of Jerusalem, Hebron, Jarmuth, Lachish and Eglon—joined forces.  They moved up with all their troops and took up positions against Gibeon and attacked it.

⁶ The Gibeonites then sent word to Joshua in the camp at Gilgal: “Do not abandon your servants.  Come up to us quickly and save us!  Help us, because all the Amorite kings from the hill country have joined forces against us.”

⁷ So Joshua marched up from Gilgal with his entire army, including all the best fighting men.  ⁸ The Lord said to Joshua, “Do not be afraid of them; I have given them into your hand.  Not one of them will be able to withstand you.”

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⁹ After an all-night march from Gilgal, Joshua took them by surprise.  ¹⁰ The Lord threw them into confusion before Israel, who defeated them in a great victory at Gibeon.  Israel pursued them along the road going up to Beth Horon and cut them down all the way to Azekah and Makkedah.  ¹¹ As they fled before Israel on the road down from Beth Horon to Azekah, the Lord hurled large hailstones down on them from the sky, and more of them died from the hailstones than were killed by the swords of the Israelites.

¹² On the day the Lord gave the Amorites over to Israel, Joshua said to the Lord in the presence of Israel:

“O sun, stand still over Gibeon,

O moon, over the Valley of Aijalon.”

SLIDE 12

¹³ So the sun stood still,

and the moon stopped,

till the nation avenged itself on its enemies, as it is written in the      Book of Jashar.

The sun stopped in the middle of the sky and delayed going down about a full day.  ¹⁴ There has never been a day like it before or since, a day when the Lord listened to a man.  Surely the Lord was fighting for Israel!

¹⁵ Then Joshua returned with all Israel to the camp at Gilgal.

¹⁶ Now the five kings had fled and hidden in the cave at Makkedah.  ¹⁷ When Joshua was told that the five kings had been found hiding in the cave at Makkedah, ¹⁸ he said, “Roll large rocks up to the mouth of the cave, and post some men there to guard it. 

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¹⁹ But don’t stop!  Pursue your enemies, attack them from the rear and don’t let them reach their cities, for the Lord your God has given them into your hand.”

²⁰ So Joshua and the Israelites destroyed them completely—almost to a man—but the few who were left reached their fortified cities.  ²¹ The whole army then returned safely to Joshua in the camp at Makkedah, and no one uttered a word against the Israelites.

²² Joshua said, “Open the mouth of the cave and bring those five kings out to me.”  ²³ So they brought the five kings out of the cave—the kings of Jerusalem, Hebron, Jarmuth, Lachish and Eglon. 

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²⁴ When they had brought these kings to Joshua, he summoned all the men of Israel and said to the army commanders who had come with him, “Come here and put your feet on the necks of these kings.”  So they came forward and placed their feet on their necks.

²⁵ Joshua said to them, “Do not be afraid; do not be discouraged.  Be strong and courageous.  This is what the Lord will do to all the enemies you are going to fight.”  ²⁶ Then Joshua struck and killed the kings and hung them on five trees, and they were left hanging on the trees until evening.

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²⁷ At sunset Joshua gave the order and they took them down from the trees and threw them into the cave where they had been hiding.  At the mouth of the cave they placed large rocks, which are there to this day.

²⁸ That day Joshua took Makkedah.  He put the city and its king to the sword and totally destroyed everyone in it.  He left no survivors.  And he did to the king of Makkedah as he had done to the king of Jericho.

SLIDE 16

I don’t if you noticed, but one thing that stuck out for me in this passage was just how old this story is!  In the passages we have read the last several weeks, the Israelites have been going from city to city, from kingdom to kingdom, conquering every city with the strength and courage that could come only from God.  But did you notice what city the Israelites finally neared at the beginning of our passage. 

SLIDE 17

Jerusalem!  Now days, when I mention Jerusalem, what first comes to mind?  The Jews… Israel… right.  The two practically go hand in hand.  You can’t think about Jerusalem without thinking about the Jews.  In later years the city has come to be connected with Christianity and Islam as well, but don’t you think first of the Jews when you think of Jeruselem.  But here, in this passage, Jeruselem was not yet a Jewish city.  Quite the contrary.  Jerusalem was a pagan city with a pagan king – King Adoni-Zedek.  So that gives us just a bit of a clue as to how old this story is.

SLIDE 18

And maybe that explains all the bloodshed.  Not only all the blood shed, but all of the God ordered blood shed.  Today’s passage has different cities and different people, but the outcome is still pretty much the same as the last five weeks, isn’t it?  The Israelites are descending upon the promised land like a plague, leaving little alive in it’s wake.  The book of Joshua seems to be just one great big killing frenzy, and today’s story is just a continuation of that.

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But today something’s changed, right?  Isn’t the reason that we’re often uncomfortable with this story because we’re uncomfortable with so much killing?  We’re uncomfortable with God’s people doing so much killing.  We’re uncomfortable with God instructing God’s people doing so much killing.  Now days it seems that no one is that ruthless, especially God’s people.  God’s people are to be loving and kind.  The crusades and the Spanish Inquisition were a low point in Christian history, not something to be emulated! 

SLIDE 20

So what’s changed?  Maybe people have changed.  Perhaps people have just become more civilized.  Back then war was common.  Everyone was always killing someone for their land.  Now days we’re much more refined.  We exchange money or goods or labor for land.  If we see property we would like to own, we no longer kill the present owner of the property.  Rather we enter into a contract.  Certainly preferable to and less bloody than the Joshua example.

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One problem with this, though.  It wasn’t primarily the people’s plan to enter the promised land and kill virtually everything in it… it was God’s.  lt was God who led the Isrealites out of Egypt.  It was God that promised the Israelites the promised land.  It was God who led the Israelites to the promised land.  And it was God who instructed the Israelites to kill the inhabitants of the land.  So all of the war… all of the blood shed in the book of Joshua isn’t the people’s plan… it’s God’s.

But doesn’t that make things even worse.  Does this mean we serve a bloodthirsty God?  Does this mean God values lush pastures more than human life?

SLIDE 22

  Well of course not.  God is a God of love.  God is a God of compassion.  God is a God of forgiveness.  So maybe God has changed.  Perhaps you’ve heard someone talk about the “God of the Old Testament” versus the “God of the New Testament” as if they were two separate Gods.  People who talk in these terms usually mean that the God of the Old Testament is vengeful and wrathful while the God of the New Testament is loving and forgiving. 

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But there’s a problem with this too.  The Bible tells us that God is unchanging and Jesus, one person of the triune God, is the same yesterday, today, and forever.

So hasn’t anything changed?  Is everything the same today as it was in Joshua’s time? 

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If my neighbor has a pretty nice house with a big lawn and a nice pool out front, should I pray to God and see if it’s his will for me to knock off him and his family and just nonchalantly move in? 

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No, I don’t think so.  So what’s changed?  Well, I want to get to that in just a minute, but first, let’s get to what hasn’t changed.

SLIDE 26

I don’t know about you, but when I read the book of Joshua, I get caught up in how many lives were lost just so that the Israelites could have some land.  Granted it was nice land… land promised from God… but was the death of so many people necessary just so that they could have the land?

Well, as I hinted at in the beginning of my message, not exactly.  The Israelites taking possession of the land was only part of the purpose of Israelite’s conquest of the land.  The other, less talked about purpose was the punishment of sin. 

SLIDE 27

It’s not as though the people being slaughtered were innocently going about their business when the Israelites suddenly came in and struck every last one of them to the ground.  These were evil, pagan people.  They worshiped false gods in ways that were detestable to the one, true God.  All the way back in Genesis… all the way back at creation… humanity was told that the price for sin would be death.  Should we be surprised then that God was not only true to his promise to provide the promised land, but he was also true to his promise of death being the penalty for sin?

SLIDE 28

I know I have a tendency to down play the seriousness of my own sin, and really even the sin of others.  I may have a little sin here.  I may have a habit in my life there that I know isn’t really a good thing.  I may see someone else do a sin that I wouldn’t personally do, but think it’s not really that big of a deal.  Isn’t that kind of thinking a product of our culture?  None of us are really bad people.  Sure, we may do bad things from time to time, but it’s not a big deal… everybody does it.  And if you get away with it, it’s even less serious than it would have been otherwise.  Everyone sins.  We know that.  And in some ways, that almost makes it better, doesn’t it?  If everyone does it, how bad can it really be?

SLIDE 29

How bad can it be?  It’s bad enough that you and I deserve the same fate as the five kings in this morning’s passage.  Do you remember what happened?  “²² Joshua said, “Open the mouth of the cave and bring those five kings out to me.”  ²³ So they brought the five kings out of the cave—the kings of Jerusalem, Hebron, Jarmuth, Lachish and Eglon.  ²⁴ When they had brought these kings to Joshua, he summoned all the men of Israel and said to the army commanders who had come with him, “Come here and put your feet on the necks of these kings.”  So they came forward and placed their feet on their necks.

^“25 Joshua said to them, “Do not be afraid; do not be discouraged.  Be strong and courageous.  This is what the Lord will do to all the enemies you are going to fight.”  ²⁶ Then Joshua struck and killed the kings and hung them on five trees, and they were left hanging on the trees until evening.”

How serious is sin… any sin?  In God’s eyes, very!  It was serious in the time of Joshua and it’s serious today.  Each of us deserves to be hanging on the sixth tree right next to those kings.  Each of us deserves it, but none of us has to. 

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People haven’t changed much since the time of the Joshua.  God hasn’t changed any since the time of Joshua.  But something has changed. 

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Jesus.  Jesus came into the world to hang on that sixth tree so that we wouldn’t have to.  Jesus had no reason he had to be killed on that tree… on that cross.  He had, has, and never will do anything wrong.  He’ll never sin.  But it was he who willing died on that cross… on that tree… so that we wouldn’t have to.  That’s what changed.  The Isrealites were given the promised land by God because he had promised it to them, but God also used the Israelites to show the world just how serious he was about sin.  He can’t tollerate it.  It deserves death, a death that Jesus died so that we wouldn’t have to.

But again, that’s only half of the story.  If God can’t tollerate sin, how can he have a loving relationship with me?  I know I sin every day.  Well, that’s the really cool part.

SLIDE 32

 The God of the New Testament is the same God as the God of the Old Testament.  True, the New Testament God is loving and compassionate, but can you think of any action more vengeful and wrathful than demanding the life of your own innocent son.  And true the Old Testament God is vengeful and wrathful, but can you think of any action more loving and compassionate that providing his people with land and crops in abundance to provide for themselves. 

There is no way the Israelites could have ever defeated all of those cities on their own.  God was on their side.  He fought on their behalf! 

SLIDE 33

“As (Israel’s enemies) fled before Israel on the road down from Beth Horon to Azekah, the Lord hurled large hailstones down on them from the sky, and more of them died from the hailstones than were killed by the swords of the Israelites.”  “The sun stopped in the middle of the sky and delayed going down about a full day…  Surely the Lord was fighting for Israel!”

SLIDE 34

The Israelites had to step into seemingly impossible battles, but God was by their side every step of the way!  Do you ever get psyched up here at Sunrise on a Sunday morning, ready to take on a new week with new intentions only to find yourself traped in the same temptations on Monday morning?  I know I do.  And I think I know why.  I think it’s because it’s a battle I try to take up on my own, but on my own it’s an impossible battle.  I can’t do any better fighting this battle by myself than Israel could have done going into the promised land on their own  We saw how that worked for them on their first attempt to attach Ai.

We have to step into the battle… we need to acknowledge our sin and make a stance to flee temptation, but when we ask God to join us by our side… on our side… every step of the way, he’s immediately there!

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 Surely the Lord is fighting for us!  God detests sin… enough so that he wants to see it hung on a tree, but he loves you and me enough that he sent his Son so that we’d never have to see the view from the top of that tree.  In the name of the Father, and the Son, and the Holy Spirit.  Amen.