Tag: Jericho

Posted in Advent devotions

A spy, a witness, and salvation

Posted on by William Douthwaite
Photo by Markus Spiske on Unsplash

I like watching movies and reading books about spies. I’m fascinated by the way they blend into a community or corporation, earn the trust of many, and gain access to information that benefits their country.

When Joshua sends spies into Jericho, they find their way to the house of Rahab, a prostitute. She hides them and helps them escape after receiving the promise that she would survive the Israelite conquest of the city. When the walls come down and Israel wins it’s first contest in the promised land, she and her family are preserved.

According to Matthew’s genealogy of Jesus, Rahab is mentioned in the family tree of Jesus the Messiah. Unknown to everyone, including her, she became a part of God’s plan of salvation.

I like to spy on people. What I mean is, I like to sit and eavesdrop on conversations at Starbucks or Panera. I admit to glancing at people’s phones to see who they are texting. I’ve watched a few people tap out their PIN when they checkout. I’m not much of a spy. But I enjoy watching and listening to people.

I believe that if we just watch and listen closely, we’ll see or hear an opportunity to communicate God’s love in some way. We’ll help, we’ll listen, or we’ll be able to share a story about our faith and our God.

I love to think of myself as a spy from God, infiltrating a world in which many don’t know him. It makes everyday an adventure or a mission. I’m sneaking behind enemy lines with mercy, love, or hope that some have never experienced. Isn’t that cool?

Anyway, Rahab is a great example of how anyone can be grafted into God’s people. The scarlet thread hanging from her window was her subtle confession of faith in the God whose power and love was greater than anything she had witnessed before. “The Lord your God, he is God in the heavens above and on the earth beneath” (Joshua 2:11).

Rahab gets an ornament on the Jesse Tree for her willingness to help the spies from Israel and her confession of faith in the one true God.

Posted in Through the Bible Devotions

The walls came down

Posted on by William Douthwaite

People are screaming, “Why didn’t you write about Jericho?” Relax. Here’s a “through the bible” devotion from Jericho 6.

There are lots of walls in Port-au-Prince, Haiti. As we drove from the airport to our guest house, every home that could be lived in was enclosed in an eight-foot tall wall topped by shards of broken glass. Heavy iron doors were the only way in and out, and you had to call ahead of time so someone on the inside would open them.

Safe? Secure? Not really. All it took was a moment, a 7.0 earthquake, and many of those walls, gates, and homes fell into piles of rubble.

Jericho looked secure from the inside and the outside (Joshua 6:1). Safe? Secure? Not really. Not after seven laps around the city, when the priests blew the trumpets, the armed men shouted, and “the wall fell down flat” (6:20). A well-timed earthquake? A sonic-wave of destructive proportions? Who knows? The earth shook at Mount Sinai and at Jesus’s temporary tomb. The sound of many waters and loud thunder accompanies God’s presence. If the Lord can raise the dead with a cry of command and the sound of a trumpet (1 Thessalonians 4:16), then a few city walls are a cinch.

The fall of Jericho is Israel’s first victory in the promised land. They marched. They blew ram’s horn trumpets. They shouted. But God did the heavy lifting. He brought down the walls. Is there a lesson there for us? We go (to all nations), we lift up our voices and play our instruments in worship, and God “gives us the victory through our Lord Jesus Christ” (1 Corinthians 15:57).

Posted in Through the Bible Devotions

One bad apple

Posted on by William Douthwaite
I wonder how the neighbors feel living next to this?

A “through the bible” devotion from Joshua 7.

My wife and I drove down many streets in various neighborhoods looking for a lot on which to build a house twenty-eight year ago. We liked a few lots on one street but decided not to build there because of one house on the corner.

Irrigation left brown stains on the side of the house. The circular driveway was moldy. The lawn was more weeds than grass. We crossed that street off our list of possibilities because of that one poorly maintained house. In hindsight, we made a wise choice. Lots of people built houses on that street since then. But cars parked in the circular driveway haven’t moved in years. And the first thing you notice: irrigation stains on the walls and driveway.

One person can ruin it for everybody.

After routing and destroying the city of Jericho, Joshua is confident of victory against Ai. So everyone is puzzled when they lose. But one person, Aachan, took some plunder from Jericho and hid it in his tent (Joshua 7:20). But God had told them to destroy everything. Aachan’s personal sin ruins it for everyone. Israel has disobeyed God and violated the covenant.

One stupid driver gets in a wreck and now everyone is stuck in traffic. You went to work with a cold instead of staying home to rest. Now everyone in the office is coughing and sneezing. One person steals something from a store, and now a whole display is under lock and key.

Perhaps sin isn’t as private and personal as we like to think. If it affects a whole family, community, or even a nation, take it seriously and pursue God’s grace and forgiveness.