Good morning. Please open your bibles again to the book of Joshua chapter 18. Joshua chapter 18.
We’ve nearly made our way through the entire nation of Israel being given their inheritance in the promised land. The battles have been waged. Victories have been given by God. The land has been subdued, and the people of God have been granted prominence in the land.
All that remains is for them to take it. It’s as if he’s handed them the desire of their heart on a silver platter, and they just need to trust Him enough to reach out and grab it.
But will they? That’s the tension that is left in the mind of the reader as he makes his way through the text. And that’s where we are today.
There remains 7 tribes to receive their allotment of land. Will they trust the Lord, will they take it?
In order to help them in their remaining work, the Lord provides them with several reminders in our text, reminders to boost their faith, and reminders which also can boost our own faith.
Before we get into the text, let me pray, and we will see what the Lord would teach us today.
PRAYER
Our first reminder in our text this morning is found in the very first verse. The first verse reminds us of the goal of God’s plan: worship.[1] The goal of God’s plan is worship.
Look with me at Joshua 18:1
Then the whole congregation of the people of Israel assembled at Shiloh and set up the tent of meeting there. The land lay subdued before them.
Israel has assembled at a place called Shiloh, which was about 30 miles north of Jerusalem, inside the territory of Ephraim. Shiloh is related to the Hebrew word for peace, shalom, and that location seems to have functioned as a center for worship for the nation before the setting up of the temple in Jerusalem under David and Solomon.
The setting up of the tent at Shiloh marked a transition, and an initial fulfillment of the goal that was set so long ago. Do you remember what Moses said to Pharoah back in Exodus? Why did God send Moses to demand that the Hebrews be released from their slavery?
He didn’t say to let my people go because slavery was bad.
He didn’t say let my people go so that they can have a more peaceful and fruitful life in Canaan.
He didn’t say let my people go because I just really like them.
God told Moses in Exodus 3 from the burning bush that Moses would go up to the powerful Pharaoh and tell him to “Let my people go so that they may go up from here and offer sacrifices to Me.” He demanded their release so that they could go and worship God in the place and manner of his choosing.
Worship was the goal of the whole Exodus story.
And Moses knew that. Moses had told them in Deuteronomy 12 that Yahweh would choose a place in the land where he would be worshipped, a place where they would perform the sacrifices and eat the meals.
And for now, Shiloh was that place. They had been given rest in the land, rest being the very image of the opposite of slavery, which was their initial condition, and now in their restful freedom, they were to worship him.
They were to rid the land of pagan idolatry, and now that that had been done, or mostly done, they were to turn and worship Yahweh faithfully.
And the setting up of the tent at Shiloh marked a new day in their journey. Not the final day, but a day of significance wherein they were able to worship God with faithfulness and righteousness. Worship him without fear.
And therein we have a reminder for us, a reminder of the goal of our whole spiritual journey.
The goal of the Christian life is not merely to perpetual an organization. We don’t exist ultimately to make sure there is another generation of Christians after us.
We don’t exist to try and work hard for a long time, and then retire and enjoy the fruits of our labor.
We exist fundamentally to bring glory to God and worship him. To respond reflexively to him for who He is and what He has done.
That’s the goal.
But how often do we forget that? In our busyness and our distraction, we get consumed with the things that fill our eyes.
We worry about this or that, and clamor for the things that the world pursues.
Or we lie to ourselves and act as though we are really on this earth to make a name for ourselves, or to serve our family, or to build a business, or to find our comfort.
None of those are evil goals. But when they take the place of the ultimate goal, we have misplaced our priorities.
If my ultimate goal is to make a name for myself, then I will run myself ragged, chasing after a desire for fame that this world can never satisfy. The praise of man can never provide rest.
If my ultimate goal is to protect my family, then I will exhaust myself with always being on red alert, and I’ll be a failure whenever my children encounter something painful or unpleasant, which they inevitably will in this fallen world.
If my ultimate goal is my career, then I’ll bow down to the idol of performance and wealth, never getting off the treadmill of ambition.
Indeed, if your vocational success is your ultimate goal in your life, what will that mean for you when you are older and retired, or if you’re no longer physically capable of doing your work? Does that mean that you no longer have any fundamental purpose or meaning?
Lastly, if you make your comfort and peace in this age your fundamental goal, you will be sorely disappointed. This age can provide little by way of lasting peace and comfort.
No, our fundamental purpose, the goal of our existence must be to bring glory to the lord and serve him as he has chosen. To worship him in the manner that he has ordained.
That’s the fundamental goal of our Christian life.
And thankfully, in the New Covenant, we don’t have to travel to a tent in Shiloh to do it. We don’t have to take a pilgrimage to Jerusalem and slaughter cattle to worship Him.
Jesus said to the Samaritan woman in John 4 that we won’t need to worship on this mountain or that mountain. He said instead that “the hour is coming, and is now here, when the true worshipers will worship the Father in spirit and truth, for the Father is seeking such people to worship him.”
The father is seeking such people to worship him, he said. Just like God was seeking worshippers out of slavery in Egypt, and he was seeking worshippers at Shiloh, now he is seeking worshippers.
He seeks those who would bow the knee in gratitude to him, not those who worship themselves, or worship money or fame or success.
Will you worship him? Or will you settle for lesser gods who will never satisfy? As Joshua will say at the end of this book: choose this day whom you will worship.
That’s our first reminder, a reminder of the goal of our redemption: worship.
Let’s keep going in our text and look at the second: a reminder of the scope of God’s plan. A reminder of the scope of God’s plan. Let’s pick up in verse 2:
2 There remained among the people of Israel seven tribes whose inheritance had not yet been apportioned. 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? 4 Provide three men from each tribe, and I will send them out that they may set out and go up and down the land. They shall write a description of it with a view to their inheritances, and then come to me. 5 They shall divide it into seven portions. Judah shall continue in his territory on the south, and the house of Joseph shall continue in their territory on the north. 6 And you shall describe the land in seven divisions and bring the description here to me. And I will cast lots for you here before the Lord our God. 7 The Levites have no portion among you, for the priesthood of the Lord is their heritage. And Gad and Reuben and half the tribe of Manasseh have received their inheritance beyond the Jordan eastward, which Moses the servant of the Lord gave them.”
8 So the men arose and went, and Joshua charged those who went to write the description of the land, saying, “Go up and down in the land and write a description and return to me. And I will cast lots for you here before the Lord in Shiloh.” 9 So the men went and passed up and down in the land and wrote in a book a description of it by towns in seven divisions. Then they came to Joshua to the camp at Shiloh, 10 and Joshua cast lots for them in Shiloh before the Lord. And there Joshua apportioned the land to the people of Israel, to each his portion.
We’ll cover Joshua’s words in verse 3 in a few minutes, but before we get to that, I want us to look at this whole section and notice Joshua’s constant concern, both in this chapter, but also throughout the whole book.
His major concern is always with ALL of Israel. All 12 of the tribes. The scope of God’s plan is the entirety of the nation.
You may have noticed in many of these chapters, the thoroughness in Joshua’s accounting. He goes through the tribal math, mentioning multiple times that the Levites get no land inheritance, that the tribes of Ruben and Gad and half of Manasseh are on the other side of the Jordan.
He takes great pains to account for each of the tribes and their inheritance.
“This is not needless redundancy, but proceeds from [his] interest in the twelve-tribes…and the unity of Israel as it participates in the Conquest, and as it shares alike in the distribution of the promised land.”[2]
Joshua seems concerned to make sure that every reader is crystal clear in their understanding that ALL of Israel received what God had promised to them.
The entirety of the nation receives the inheritance. And therein we can find our reminder.
In every generation there can be a temptation to think that the inheritance belongs to some elite class. Some special group.
Maybe it is the rich man that seems to have more spiritual blessing, simply because his clothes are nicer. And so we treat him with special regard.
Or maybe the pendulum swings the other way, such that the poor man has special intimacy with God simply because he has had more severe trial, as if suffering in and of itself is the key to spiritual inheritance, and poverty alone makes a man pious.
Or maybe it is the men who are spiritually more discerning, or maybe it the women who actually are more intuitive, and thus have a greater portion of God’s inheritance.
Or in our neck of the woods, the divide was between blacks and whites.
Whatever the division, whatever the class distinctions, there remains a temptation within the church to divide the body of Christ in ungodly ways and grant the inheritance simply to part of the group.
Which is why we see multiple places in the New Testament specifically railing against such an idea.
Think about the words in the beginning of the gospel of John:
14 And the Word became flesh and dwelt among us, and we have seen his glory, glory as of the only Son from the Father, full of grace and truth. … 16 For from his fullness we have ALL received, grace upon grace.
We have ALL received grace upon grace.
Or the Apostle Paul, rebuking division among the church in Corinth by saying in 1 Corinthians 12:
For in one Spirit we were all baptized into one body—Jews or Greeks, slaves[d] or free—and all were made to drink of one Spirit.
We all partake of the same divine inheritance of the Holy Spirit, Jews and Greeks, slaves or free. The whole body receives the same inheritance. There’s not a certain portion of the body of Christ that has special access to the Spirit of God.
He says similarly in Ephesians 4:
But grace was given to EACH ONE of us according to the measure of Christ’s gift.
Everyone receives the same gift of grace, the same divine inheritance.
That doesn’t them make us all the same. The scriptures nowhere say that the people of God should be all the same or that we should all look alike.
The bible doesn’t deny Christian diversity, but what it does do is undercut any idea of partiality, or preferential snobbery or prejudice.
All of God’s people receive the inheritance. And it is all of grace.
So don’t listen to the lies of Satan that say that you’re not fully apart of the people of God, that you’re not one of the super-Christians who has the special access to God’s blessing.
If you’re trusting in Christ, then you are united to Him, and therefore an heir with him. That means that the benefits of Sonship that are owed to Christ, are likewise owed to you also.
If you’re united to Christ by faith, you’ve been sealed with the Holy Spirt for the day of redemption, and your inheritance, your adoption, your sonship is as secure as Christ’s own inheritance.
You’re spot in God’s house is as secure as Jesus’s is, which means that God will not cut you out of the will any more than he would cut off Jesus, which is an inconceivable thought.
You’ve been granted the promise of a divine inheritance that’s being kept for you, and it can never break, it can never rot or rust, it can never be stolen, it can never be corrupted.
That’s good news for us, and a blessed reminder.
But before we leave this section, let’s look at Joshua’s words in verse 3 and see a third reminder: a warning about laxity. A warning about laxity.
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?
His question might also be translated, “How long will you continue to show yourselves slack about going in and possessing the land?”
The idea of the verb is persisting in an action, or in this case, persisting in in-action.
Israel is in danger of “letting go, of dropping the call to possess the gift of God.”[3]
The time has arrived for them to take their inheritance. In fact, they should have already taken it. The land had been subdued. And while the land was down, they should take it.
“With the backbone of Canaanite resistance broken for the moment, these tribes must follow up this advantage and nail down the land (i.e., permanently occupy it). But here they remain—letting the opportunity slip away.”[4]
Joshua, their leader, does what he can. He sends in men from each of the remaining tribes to write up a description of their inheritance to try and push them out of their sluggishness.
He gives them every reason to go and take it. And yet, here they remain.
And herein we have an illustration of the tension that the people of God experience, both the Israelite in Canaan, and the contemporary believer. The inheritance is a gift of God, and yet we are responsible to go and take effort to claim it.
God’s gift of grace to us does not cancel our human responsibility.
One of my favorite Old Testament commentators is a theologian named Dale Ralph Davis, and he says about this text that: Yahweh’s promises are not intended as sedatives, but as stimulants.[5] I love that: Yahweh’s promises are not intended as sedatives, but as stimulants.
God does not want us to accept his promises and then just sit there and do nothing. He wants us to act upon the promises that he gives us. That is the clear pattern of scripture.
2 Peter 1 is very clear in this regard. Listen to Peter says:
[God’s] divine power has granted to us all things that pertain to life and godliness, …]4 by which he has granted to us his precious and very great promises… 5 For this very reason, make every effort to supplement your faith with virtue,[e] and virtue with knowledge,” and so on.
God has granted all things needed and he’s given us His promises, so make every effort.
His gifts of grace and promise are given to us to stir us up to faithful action, not to lull us to inactivity and sleep.
And if that’s the case, then how are you feeling in your spiritual battle? Are you making every effort?
Or, are you sluggish and lax? If sluggish, then why is that the case?
He’s given you the promise, and he’s provided what you need. What has he withheld from you that prevents you from being holy? Nothing. As Peter said: He’s granted us all things pertaining to godliness.
Christ, our greater Joshua, has completely subdued the enemies, by defeating the Cosmic powers of this age on the cross. Colossians 1:15 says that God “disarmed the rulers and authorities and put them to open shame, by triumphing over them in, ” Christ.
And, even better than Joshua, Christ has given you something better than a written report in the land, he’s given you his inerrant word.
Plus, He’s promised to go with you the rest of the way, and done so personally by filling you with his Holy Spirit.
What more could you need? What’s preventing you from taking possession and worshipping him in holiness and righteousness? What stands between you and holiness?
If we are honest, we look at ourselves and we admit that we have no excuse. We’re like the Israelites. We’ve grown sluggish and lazy. We’re happy with less than our full inheritance.
Or maybe we’re fearful, like they were afraid of the remaining Canaanites. Afraid that being holy might not make me cool. Afraid that righteousness might mean discomfort, might mean suffering, might mean less happiness now, which shows us that there remains some unbelief in us.
We don’t believe what God has said, and we don’t believe that he will truly satisfy the desires of our heart.
He’s told us in Psalm 37:
Trust in the Lord, and do good;
dwell in the land and befriend faithfulness.
4 Delight yourself in the Lord,
and he will give you the desires of your heart.
He’s promised to grant us all the holy desires of our heart. And yet we choose to delight in lesser things that can never satisfy.
Whatever our excuse, we should realize that we’re just as guilty as the Israelites. We’re not trusting in the promises of God, and that unbelief holds us back from all that God would have for us.
The good news is that there was another Joshua who came, another leader, who not only gave reports about the inheritance to be had, but that greater Joshua went and personally prepared an inheritance for His people.
He says so in John 14, that he’s going to prepare a place for you in His father’s house.
That later Joshua personally secured the defeat of the enemies.
And he did so with perfect energy and devotion, not with sluggishness or laxity. Zeal for God’s house consumed him, scripture says.
He never left off a single part of his mission. Perfect holiness in every aspect of his life, in every nook and cranny of His soul. No job was partially completed and no obedience was ever half-hearted.
“It is finished” is what he said. Nothing left undone. No holiness left to attain.
And he did all that on behalf of His half-hearted and sluggish bride. So when you’re feeling sluggish in your faith, and you’re not being as diligent in pursuing holiness as you should, remember the savior who died in your place.
He went to the cross knowing full well the reluctance heart that was in his bride. She was Gomer, running away from her Hosea again and again, and yet like the faithful bridegroom that he is, he continues to pursue her, and woo her back to him with reminders of His grace.
That’s the good news of the gospel, that although we aren’t what we should be and we don’t do what we ought, Christ takes our punishment way, defeats our enemies, and remakes us into more and more faithful children, one step at a time.
Trust in Christ, and turn away from the lies of this world. Believe in him and he will help you with every step of the battle. He will guide you; he will wash you; he will strengthen you; he will protect you.
And armed with those promises, we can be emboldened to go out and lay hold of what he was prepared for us. Don’t be lax, but be emboldened by his promises and his good work in your place.
Next, in these verses there is a fourth reminder worthy of our reflection, and that is a reminder of the true authority: who is Yahweh. The true authority: who is Yahweh.
The process used for the allocation of the inheritance of these 7 remaining tribes is clearly governed by the will of the Lord in this text. Yahweh is the determiner of the allocation; he’s the one in authority over the lots.
In verse 6 and verse 8 and verse 10 we are told three times that Joshua would allocate the land by casting lots before the Lord. God would work through the casting of lots to give out the inheritance as he saw fit.
It wasn’t Joshua granting the land to the tribes that he thought really deserved it. It wasn’t that the best land was granted to the people that had worked the hardest and the rotten land was left for the lazy bums.
God would sovereignly dispense and allocate according to his good pleasure. Which means that there shouldn’t have been any bickering or quarreling over who got what. No jealousy. No envy of the other guy and what he received.
And that same kind of arrangement should be in place in the church today. The Holy Spirit sovereignly dispenses His gifts according to the wisdom of God.
Likewise, God ordains every aspect of our individual lives according to his perfect and holy will. Like the Psalmist says, our times are in his hands (Psalm 31:15), and the Lord holds our lot (psalm 16:5, which we read earlier).
So that means that what you are given in this life, and what your particular lot in life is, is determined by no one other than the all-powerful, all-good, all-wise Lord of the universe.
And given that fact, that means none of us ever experience any jealousy towards someone else’s lot in life, right?
Never once envying someone else’s wealth, or job, or gifts, or appearance?
Not one time grumbling in discontentment with the lot you’ve been given?
Never once throwing a pity party because you don’t have the life that you would have picked?
Well, that’s certainly not the case in my heart. I know I’m prone to grumbling about the lot that’s been cast for me.
I don’t like it when things don’t go the way I’ve planned, and I’m quickly tempted to fuss and complain when I don’t get things that I want, in the way that I want, in the timing that I want.
I forget that all my days are granted under the sovereign authority of the Lord. I’m slow to remember that although I make my plans, it is the Lord who actually ordains my steps.
But when I reconsider that all my days are in HIS hands, I can actually experience a refreshing sense of peace.
What could be more comforting than knowing that the one who holds me, is the one being that sees and knows all things?
Who would I want writing the story of my life the God who is all-good?
I certainly don’t want ME writing my story, I can’t even make it one hour without messing something up.
But when I remember who it is that holds me in the palm of his hands, then I can actually rest.
I can grow to be free of discontentment and bitterness and jealousy.
When I remember that He is good, he is wise, and that he loves me, then I can actually rest in His sovereign plan for me.
His plan for me is always better than my own, and I can grow to praise him for the lot that he’s granted me. And in faith, we can actually come to say with the psalmist, as we read earlier from Psalm 16:
The lines have fallen for me in pleasant places;
indeed, I have a beautiful inheritance.
In the Lord, each of His children have indeed received a beautiful inheritance.
Next, let’s move on to our final point, final reminder, and that is a reminder of God’s faithfulness to His promises. A reminder of God’s faithfulness to His promises.
The next large section of text details the allotment of the 7 tribes. It’s not clear the extent to which these tribes overcame their laxity in cleaning out the Canaanites of their respective chunks of land, but we do see that Joshua had done his work of giving to them the boundaries of their respective plots of land.
I won’t walk through the geography of each tribe, you can check a decent map, likely in the back of your bible, to see where all the various tribes ended up.
Instead, we’re going to skip down to the end of chapter 19.
49 When they had finished distributing the several territories of the land as inheritances, the people of Israel gave an inheritance among them to Joshua the son of Nun. 50 By command of the Lord they gave him the city that he asked, Timnath-serah in the hill country of Ephraim. And he rebuilt the city and settled in it.
51 These are the inheritances that Eleazar the priest and Joshua the son of Nun and the heads of the fathers’ houses of the tribes of the people of Israel distributed by lot at Shiloh before the Lord, at the entrance of the tent of meeting. So they finished dividing the land.
This paragraph stands as an end to the chapter, but also as an end to the whole section going back to chapter 14. It is the closing of a parenthesis, a big block of text that began with Caleb receiving his inheritance, and ends with Joshua being granted his.
Thus, the whole account of the distribution of land for the tribes west of the Jordan stands together as a unit. Caleb’s inheritance, then the tribes, then Joshua’s inheritance. An example faithfulness at the beginning, and at end.
And as such, the text drives us back to remembering Numbers 13-14, where only Caleb and Joshua were willing to trust in the promises of God to actually grant them the inheritance of the land, and victory against the scary armies inside of it.
Sadly, Caleb and Joshua were in the minority, and the majority report from the spies dominated. But, despite the fearful unbelief of the majority, God promised that this little remnant, these two faithful spies would enter into the land, despite everyone else dying off in their unbelief.
Thus, Joshua receiving his inheritance here, is yet another reminder that God keeps his promises, and that He rewards faithfulness.
And so again we see the repeated reminder from the book of Joshua, that God keeps his word and that we and that we should trust Him.
God keeps his promises, even when we must face scary giants like the Anakim, or the iron chariots of Canaanites, or the scary waters of the Jordan, or the swords of the Perizzites. We can trust Him to keep his promises.
We can trust him when we face intimidating battles too, like the scary diagnosis.
Or the loss of a loved one.
Or mocking from a pagan world.
Or the grief of a strained relationship.
Whatever the scary thing facing you at the moment, remember that God keeps his word. He delivers on his promises.
It might take longer than you’d like. It might be scarier than you wish it were. But God will always prove faithful to His word.
And just like He was faithful to keep His promise to Caleb, and granted him his inheritance, and just like He was faithful to His word to Joshua, and granted him his inheritance, for all of us who are trusting Him, He will grant us the fullness of our inheritance in due time.
Trust in him, and don’t let Satan lead you to doubt God’s promises. Hold fast to them, and to Him, and you will receive your reward in due time, you’ll be like Caleb and Joshua, and hear those blessed words: well done, my good and faithful servant.
[1] Several of these reminders are expanded from Dale Ralph Davis’ No Falling Words, referenced below.
[2] Marten H. Woudstra, The Book of Joshua, The New International Commentary on the Old Testament (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1981), 270-271, cited in Davis, No Falling Words, 145.
[3] Dale Ralph Davis, No Falling Words, 146.
[4] DRD, 146.
[5] DRD, 146.
