FBC Daily Devotional – August 10, 2021

Faith Baptist Church

Subscribe

Download

Share

00

00:06

Well, a good Tuesday to you. How are you doing so far this week? Hope things are going well for you. Well, today we want to get back to the routine of looking at the passage of Scripture that is in our

00:17

Bible reading schedule for the day and today we're in Joshua, the last half of Joshua 22 and on into 23 and the last half of chapter 22 tells the rest of the story.

00:29

So, Joshua 22 is an interesting case study in what we so often see occur even in our own experience and that is someone observes, makes an observation, they see something at a distance and what they see leads them to conclusions, to draw certain conclusions and then on the basis of those conclusions from what they saw, they turn around and tell somebody else.

00:57

They say, hey, did you know so -and -so has done thus and such? Whoa, you know, this is really a bad thing.

01:05

That's exactly what happened in chapter 22. The two -and -a -half tribes of Israel, Reuben Gad and half the tribe of Anassah, they did their job in helping to conquer the land of Canaan and they've been sent back to the east side of the

01:21

Jordan River and and so while they go, on their way, they get to the

01:27

Jordan River and they build an altar. And I understand to be on the eastern side of the

01:33

Jordan River. They build this altar that is comparable to the altar that is supposed to be used for sacrificing to the

01:43

Lord. So, they build this altar and they go on their merry way. Well, somebody sees this building project.

01:52

They come back to Joshua and the elders, the leaders of the land. They say, hey, the two -and -a -half tribes, they built this altar.

02:00

They're apostatizing. They're turning away from the worship of the Lord and they're worshiping other gods and they're offering sacrifices to other gods.

02:08

And this is just awful. This is awful. And the leadership of Israel says, yeah, this is terrible.

02:15

We got to go wipe these people out. They're all brothers. We got to go wipe them out because if we don't wipe them out, you know,

02:21

God's gonna judge us. And so they send a delegation to go and confront the two -and -a -half tribes.

02:29

And when they get there and they do the confrontation of these two -and -a -half tribes, they don't ask the question, what's this all about?

02:39

They make the accusation. Look at what you've done. Do you not realize how bad this is?

02:45

Do you remember what our ancestors did? Do you remember how they turned against the

02:52

Lord and all this kind of thing? And how the false gods turned the people away from God?

02:59

Do you remember this? You're doing the same thing. You're gonna bring judgment upon us. I mean, you could probably feel the tension.

03:10

It would definitely be tension in the air. I mean, the leaders from the two -and -a -half tribes are they're listening to this and they're kind of looking at each other, eyes are getting big, and they realize, you know, this means war.

03:22

This could mean war. This could mean war. And finally, in our reading today, finally, they get the chance to offer a full and complete explanation.

03:34

And oftentimes, when parties will sit down across the table from each other and one will offer a complete full explanation, that'll resolve the conflict or the misunderstanding.

03:47

Hmm. There is a basic assumption there, isn't there? And the assumption is that the other party actually will trust enough to believe the explanation.

04:00

And I've experienced both of these things. When the somebody makes a supposition, they draw a conclusion and then level an accusation, and I hear about it and I go to them and say, hey, you know what?

04:13

What's this? Why are you saying this about me? And they say, because you did blah blah blah blah blah.

04:20

I say, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa. That's not it at all. And I take the time to offer an explanation and then they go, oh, okay, now

04:30

I see. Okay, I get it. I've been on the other end of it too, where the person I'm trying to give an explanation to doesn't want to hear it.

04:37

They've already got their mind made up and they just want to hate on me. So, you know, there is that caveat.

04:44

Fortunately in Joshua 22, the explanation makes sense.

04:51

Both parties come to an understanding. The party that built the the altar, they said, look, we had no intention of having this as a worship center.

04:59

That wasn't it at all. This is just to help us on both sides of the river realize that we have part with one another.

05:09

We belong together. We're worshiping the same God. This isn't an altar to worship on. This is an altar to remind our families and your families that we are brothers and we're all worshiping

05:20

Yahweh, the Lord God of Israel, together. Fortunately, the explanation was satisfactory.

05:29

The guys on the east side of the Jordan, they were afraid that, you know, out of sight out of mind.

05:36

And the guys on the west side of the Jordan would figure you don't have anything to do with us anymore. Nope. Here's the testimony that we're one.

05:44

So let this let this little episode be a warning to us on the one hand, not to be quick to jump to conclusions and then to spread those conclusions.

05:53

Let's be quick instead. If we suspect something is awry, we give the other party an opportunity to explain before we go jumping to damning conclusions and then spread around some word of gossip or destructive malicious message to other people.

06:14

And then let's be quick to hear slow to wrath as the New Testament exhorts us.

06:20

Father, help us with this. So easily, so easily do we succumb to this negative temptation.

06:28

May we be delivered from it. And this we pray in Jesus name. Amen. All right.