Joshua 7:1-26

6 Then Joshua tore his clothes and fell to the earth on his face before the ark of the Lord until the evening, he and the elders of Israel. And they put dust on their heads. 7 And Joshua said, “Alas, O Lord God, why have you brought this people over the Jordan at all, to give us into the hands of the Amorites, to destroy us? Would that we had been content to dwell beyond the Jordan! 8 O Lord, what can I say, when Israel has turned their backs before their enemies! 9 For the Canaanites and all the inhabitants of the land will hear of it and will surround us and cut off our name from the earth. And what will you do for your great name?”

10 The Lord said to Joshua, “Get up! Why have you fallen on your face? 11 Israel has sinned; they have transgressed my covenant that I commanded them; they have taken some of the devoted things; they have stolen and lied and put them among their own belongings. 12 Therefore the people of Israel cannot stand before their enemies. They turn their backs before their enemies, because they have become devoted for destruction. I will be with you no more, unless you destroy the devoted things from among you.[1]

What a short step there is between a great victory and a great defeat. One moment we are riding high on the cloud of some great spiritual success. The next we are plunged into the dark valley of some grim spiritual failure. One moment we are Elijah standing on Mount Carmel, calling down fire on God’s altar. The next we are Elijah at Horeb, complaining to God that we are alone and marked for death (1 Kings 19:10).

That is the experience we come to in the book of Joshua. When we think of this book, most think of the victory of the armies of Israel at Jericho, the walled fortress that stood at the entrance to the promised land. It is good that we do. It was a great victory, conducted in strict obedience to God’s battle plan and accomplished by his power in throwing down the city’s towering walls.

But the story that immediately follows in Chapter 7 tells of Israel’s terrible defeat at Ai, a much smaller town. It is the only defeat of Israel’s forces recorded in Joshua and it contains the only report of Jews actually slain in combat. What caused such a drastic change? How was it possible for a defeat like this to follow so closely after such a great victory?

The first word of the first verse strikes an ominous note: “But….” The entire first verse sets up the situation of which the rest of the narrative is the explanation and exposure. “But the people of Israel broke faith in regard to the devoted things, for Achan the son of Carmi, son of Zabdi, son of Zerah, of the tribe of Judah, took some of the devoted things. And the anger of the Lord burned against the people of Israel.”

Some teachers have suggested the Israelites were too self-confident, which is clearly evident when one reads the story. Ai was smaller than Jericho, so the argument was made: “Not all the people will have to go up against Ai. Send two or three thousand men to take it and do not weary all the people, for only a few men are there” (7:3). The people had forgotten that it was God who delivered Jericho to them and not Israel’s army. How quickly they had returned to their default mode of managing their own flesh and living like orphans.

Others have advanced the idea that the defeat at Ai was due to a lack of prayer. Joshua, who should have consulted the Lord for the ordering of the battle apparently did not pray. He simply acted on the recommendation of his scouts. The text certainly does not record that Joshua prayed for direction. Again, like the people he leads, he is living like an orphan and attempting to manage the situation out of the power of his own flesh.

While commentators are correct that those elements were present, they are not the reasons God gives for the disaster. God’s explanation was that there was sin in Israel’s camp. After Israel’s defeat, Joshua threw himself face down and asked, “Alas, O Lord God, why have you brought this people over the Jordan at all, to give us into the hands of the Amorites, to destroy us?” He even echoes the complaints of the previous generation who wanted to return to Egypt. “Would that we had been content to dwell beyond the Jordan!”

God replied: “Get up! Why have you fallen on your face? 11 Israel has sinned; they have transgressed my covenant that I commanded them; they have taken some of the devoted things; they have stolen and lied and put them among their own belongings. 12 Therefore the people of Israel cannot stand before their enemies. They turn their backs before their enemies, because they have become devoted for destruction. I will be with you no more, unless you destroy the devoted things from among you.”

God takes sin seriously, even if we do not, and that sin is the real cause of defeat for God’s people.

SIN’S PATH

Achan is a good object lesson of how our idolatrous thoughts become despicable acts with tragic consequences for us and those around us if our sin is not confessed, repented of, and forsaken. He was one of Israel’s soldiers in the battle of Jericho. Though he was on the right side of the conflict, he was not obedient. God had commanded that the entire city of Jericho be destroyed. All metal articles were to be taken to the treasury as firstfruits of the conquest. Everything else was to be destroyed. The people were to be killed. Achan heard those commands along with everyone else.

But when he entered the city and saw some of the spoils of war, he coveted what he saw and took it. He would later confess before Joshua when discovered, “when I saw among the spoil a beautiful cloak from Shinar, and 200 shekels of silver, and a bar of gold weighing 50 shekels, then I coveted them and took them” (7:21). The fact that he hid the plunder demonstrates that he knew what he was doing was wrong. It was for this willful hidden sin that the judgment of God came upon all of Israel in their second battle.

What led Achan to this act of disobedience? There are certain elements common to all our idolatry. First, Achan was dissatisfied. He did not like how God had ordered the affairs of his life even though God was in the process of leading him, along with the rest of the nation, into a new land of great wealth and opportunity. Each family would have their own land, their own home, and their own crops.

But Achan’s mind was not on the blessings that lay ahead. Likely, his mind was on how terrible it was to eat the same food every day for so long. How shabby were his clothes after 40 years. How terrible it was to not have any real money to save up for the future. He had had enough of this kind of life. He was not satisfied in God’s provision. He was ready to find the first chance to improve his situation.

Achan’s dissatisfaction, which itself was a sin, gave birth to disobedience. This is usually the case. When Satan sinned by rebelling against God, it was dissatisfaction with his position in God’s world that led him into open rebellion. He was the creature. God was the Creator. Satan wanted to be like God. He said, “I will ascend to heaven; I will raise my throne above the stars of God; I will sit enthroned on the mount of assembly, on the utmost heights of the sacred mountain. I will ascend above the tops of the clouds; I will make myself like the Most High” (Isaiah 14:13-14). Dissatisfaction was the root of his sin.

It was the same for Adam and Eve when sin first entered the human family. Our first parents were perfect in every respect. But when Satan called Eve’s attention to the fact that she and her husband were not like God, knowing good and evil, he sowed the seed of dissatisfaction and paved the way for his triumph (Genesis 3:5).

Isn’t this our case as well? No follower of Christ should be satisfied with poor discipleship or disobedience. There is a proper form of spiritual ambition. Even Paul said, “Forgetting what is behind and straining toward what is ahead, I press on toward the goal to win the prize for which God has called me heavenward in Christ Jesus” (Philippians 3:13-14). Yet, Paul also writes in the same letter, “I have learned the secret of being content in any and every situation, whether well fed or hungry, whether living in plenty or in want” (4:12). Paul’s desire was to strive for Christ’s glory rather than for his own and to be willing to achieve that end through whatever means God ordained for him.

Second, Achan coveted what was not his. Under the rules of war, a conqueror was able to seize the possessions of the defeated foe, and perhaps Achan was thinking along those lines. But that was his error. He may have been part of the invading army and may have wielded his sword to great effect, but he was not the Conqueror of Jericho. God was the Conqueror. God gave the city of Jericho to Israel’s army, and it was he who had the right to demand the spoil of battle go into the temple treasury and that everything and everyone else being destroyed. This is why God explained the defeat to Joshua saying, “11 Israel has sinned; they have transgressed my covenant that I commanded them; they have taken some of the devoted things; they have stolen and lied and put them among their own belongings” (emphasis added).

Achan took two kinds of things: gold and silver, which display the underlying sin of materialism, and a beautiful Babylonian garment, suggesting a desire to be fashionable, successful, or chic. Babylon was the big city, and its products were considered ultra fashionable. Achan saw the robe and spied a chance to be like the world in its outwardly visible success and fashion. So he took the garment.

It doesn’t take a great deal of effort for us to see the same things at work in our own lives, since materialism and worldliness are two of the more popular expressions of sin in human history. Sin is not primarily the bad act itself, it is the condition into which all human beings are born since the Adams’ fall in the Garden of Eden. It is a heart condition, the symptoms of which are our actions and attitudes. Sin is alienation from and dissatisfaction with God, creating our desire to covet things, people, and situations we are certain will bring us happiness.

The third thing we learned from Achan is that he stole the swag. His internal dissatisfaction and covetousness led to outward sinful actions. He stole things dedicated to God and he lied about it. That is always the way it is. We may sin in our hearts and minds but by the grace of God be convicted by the Holy Spirit to confess and repent. But if we do not repent of our heart sins, they will inevitably break out into the open. James warns:

13 Let no one say when he is tempted, “I am being tempted by God,” for God cannot be tempted with evil, and he himself tempts no one. 14 But each person is tempted when he is lured and enticed by his own desire. 15 Then desire when it has conceived gives birth to sin, and sin when it is fully grown brings forth death. [2]

The only innocent dissatisfaction is a longing to live a more holy life. But even that can be driven by pride and by dissatisfaction with God’s work in our life because he is not changing us according to our own schedule, but only according to his.

JUDGMENT AND BLESSING

The Bible tells us that one day the secret sins of life are going to be brought to light at the final judgment. But it doesn’t always take that long for sin to be exposed. In Achan’s case it took only a brief time for his sinful actions to be revealed before all of Israel. By God’s command, lots were drawn and fell on one tribe out of the 12. The lots fell again on one clan out of the numerous clans of that tribe. Then they fell on one of the families of that clan, and finally upon one person out of the various people in that family: Achan of the family of Zimri, of the clan of Zerah, of the tribe of Judah.

“19 Then Joshua said to Achan, ‘My son, give glory to the Lord God of Israel and give praise to him. And tell me now what you have done; do not hide it from me.’” Achan replied (7:20-21),  “Truly I have sinned against the Lord God of Israel, and this is what I did: 21 when I saw among the spoil a beautiful cloak from Shinar, and 200 shekels of silver, and a bar of gold weighing 50 shekels, then I coveted them and took them. And see, they are hidden in the earth inside my tent, with the silver underneath.”

Next comes a chilling moment. “22 So Joshua sent messengers, and they ran to the tent; and behold, it was hidden in his tent with the silver underneath. 23 And they took them out of the tent and brought them to Joshua and to all the people of Israel. And they laid them down before the Lord” (emphasis added). The stolen objects were not simply displayed before the people. The most sobering part of the story is that they were spread out before the Lord. As readers, we know God already knew of this sin. But as actors in this scene, neither the people nor Achan had bothered to consider the fact that all that they do is laid bare before the face of God.

The narrative concludes with the death of Achan and his entire family, stoned by the Israelites as punishment for the sin that brought defeat on the army and dishonor to the name of God. Following the death of one man, the blessing of God returned to his people and Ai was destroyed. As we have seen in previous weeks, the book of Joshua is a bridge between the years of wilderness wandering and the years of settlement in the promised land. It is a bridge between preparation and possession.

That bridge is built upon the written Word of God in the Pentateuch, evidence of his unchanging power, and the presence of the supernatural leader, the Commander of the Armies of the Lord. The book displays the continuity of God’s covenant. This chapter shows the continuity of the covenant curses as well as the return of covenant blessings with the people’s renewed covenant faithfulness. This is the repeated cycle of life under God’s holy, perfect law.

First comes blessing, then sin enters, then comes judgment. If the people repent and trust into God following judgment, the blessing begins again and flows on. This process binds all of scripture together. It is the principle of God’s judgment of his people. It is unchanging throughout scripture because God really is there. He truly is holy. He loves his people infinitely. And he deals with his people consistently.

DOOR OF HOPE

We see this principle at work in the book of Hosea. Like Joshua 7, Hosea is a story of God’s judgment. Hosea is called to marry a prostitute who represented the unfaithful actions of Israel during the days of his ministry. Hosea’s wife was named Gomer. Speaking to her as an example of all Israel, God announced three judgments, each prefaced with the word “Therefore.”

First, God promises to “block her path with thorn bushes” and “wall her in so that she cannot find her way” (Hosea 2:6). This means God is going to stop Israel so they cannot obtain their desires, just as he often does with us when we choose disobedience over discipleship. Second, God promises to take away their grain when it ripens and their new wine when it is ready (Hosea 2:9). It means that God is going to deprive his rebellious children of their necessities. Third, God makes a reference to the judgment that took place in the Valley of Achor (Hosea 2:15).

This is a direct reference to the story of Achan and his death by stoning. Achan and Achor have similar spellings, and the place of Achan’s death was called the Valley of Achor, a pun on his name since the word “achor” means “trouble” or “disaster.” At the time of his stoning, Joshua asked “Why have you brought this trouble [achor] on us? The Lord will bring trouble [achor] on you today” (Joshua 7:25).

This is a frightening point in the story of Hosea and Gomer. The Valley of Achor was a place of death, of capital punishment. This is the place the idol-worshipping Israelites were headed. Their path began with frustration, then deprivation, and would lead ultimately to death. There was nothing left for the unrepentant sinner but death. The soul that sins shall die. That is not good news! That is not gospel. That is law, God’s holy, perfect, and utterly un-keepable law.

But at this dire point in Hosea’s prophecy, God’s inexplicable grace and mercy appear. God says, “Therefore, behold, I will allure her, and bring her into the wilderness, and speak tenderly to her. 15 And there I will give her her vineyards and make the Valley of Achor a door of hope. And there she shall [sing] as in the days of her youth, as at the time when she came out of the land of Egypt.” [3]

Does sin bring down the curses of the law? Of course it does. This is why we must take it seriously. But judgment is not the entire story. Sin does bring judgment, but God is always at the ready to call his people, to allure us to repent and return. Only he can turn the Valley of Achor into a door of hope. The Lord Jesus Christ, the Commander of the Lord’s Army, has turned the Valley of Achor into a door of hope.

He took Achor’s trouble upon himself. He was troubled so that those who trust into his perfect, law keeping life offered freely to us as our holiness, and into his sacrificial, blood shedding death offered freely to us to pay the price of our sin. Jesus went down into that dark valley of judgment, dying in our place, in order that he might raise us up in hope by his resurrection from the grave. He removed the curses of the covenant.

17 Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, he is a new creation. The old has passed away; behold, the new has come. 18 All this is from God, who through Christ reconciled us to himself and gave us the ministry of reconciliation; 19 that is, in Christ God was reconciling the world to himself, not counting their trespasses against them, and entrusting to us the message of reconciliation. 20 Therefore, we are ambassadors for Christ, God making his appeal through us. We implore you on behalf of Christ, be reconciled to God. 21 For our sake he made him to be sin who knew no sin, so that in him we might become the righteousness of God. [4]

[1] The Holy Bible: English Standard Version (Wheaton, IL: Crossway Bibles, 2016), Jos 7:6–12.

[2] The Holy Bible: English Standard Version (Wheaton, IL: Crossway Bibles, 2016), Jas 1:13–15.

[3] The Holy Bible: English Standard Version (Wheaton, IL: Crossway Bibles, 2016), Ho 2:14–15.

[4] The Holy Bible: English Standard Version (Wheaton, IL: Crossway Bibles, 2016), 2 Co 5:17–21.