Moses is dead: Now what? (Joshua chapter 1)

 Living in the Promised Land: A study in the book of Joshua

A 24-week series given in 2021

By Bob Mendelsohn

Jews for Jesus, Sydney

Lesson One (Joshua Chapter 1)

26 February 2021

bob@jewsforjesus.org.au

 

To view this online as a video: https://youtu.be/8p14cmQT6FM

Lesson One: A funeral and a promise: Leadership in the Land

A.               Introduction

1.     Greetings

Shalom to each of you here on the Zoom call and those who will watch this class lecture on YouTube later. For the first 25 minutes I will teach this section of the Bible then we will let everyone on the call into a conversation for questions and answers for the last half hour. This will include comments about all the themes or ideas that I will bring up. Further discussion happens even deeper in our D-Groups that happen over the next week and maybe some of you will conduct a D-Group on Shabbat. I want to ask you to consider whom you want to invite to join us here or in your home groups later. 

For those watching on YouTube please read the next Bible chapter before you watch the rest of this. Today we are discussing Joshua chapter 1. Go ahead and press pause, read the chapter, then press play on your machine and re-join us. Thanks.  Welcome back.

2.     Overview

[For those online, see this book overview from The Bible Project (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JqOqJlFF_eU )

B.    Today’s study:  A funeral and a promise: Leadership in the Land

1.     Divine Marching Orders (.1-9)

The book begins with the death of Moses. This is a tragedy from word 1. Moses was the main man of the Jewish religion for the last 40 years. He was God’s deliverer for our people out of the hands of Pharaoh and the slavery in which we had lived for centuries. He had been our leader through the wilderness, and as the Torah ended, he died and was buried somewhere on Mt Nebo.

Moses, my servant is dead. Not the way to begin a happy book. Not the way to state a book of Guaranteeing Promises. Hey, guys, be sure I’m with you, like I was with Moses. Only, Moses isn’t here any longer. 

Wait you say, how can I trust God who has now abandoned us? He left Moses on Nebo to die alone. He doesn’t even want us to sit shiva for him. Get up, march on, in 3 days… let’s go. 

Promises? This is as bad as an electioneering candidate who makes promises that will never happen. And he knows they won’t happen. God says, I promise and then he lets Moses die? What kind of promise keeper is he?

All good questions. The promise of the Land was given to and through Moses, but didn’t oiriginat with Moses. It originated in Abraham’s day 500 years earlier. Did Abraham see the Land? Did Isaac receive the promises? Did Jacob or any of the 3 million in Egypt? No, but God is still faithful. The promises were made to Abraham ON BEHALF of his children who would conquer in the days of Joshua. The promises are real and true and able to be believed, not on the basis of the human spokesman, but on the basis of the character of God who speaks those promises. 

11 times in chapter 1, Moses is mentioned. He’s still a pivotal character!

Look at the promises given in this hapter alone:

Verse 2: Promise of the land reiterated

Verse 3: I have given you the land wherever you step

Verse 6: I swore their fathers to give this land. The promise will NOW be fulfilled.

Verse 5: Beyond the land, now, Joshua, I will be with you

Verse 5: you are invincible. No man will be able to stand against you (successfully)

Wow, how do you read those promises. How do you read any promise of God? 

Consider these….and add some of your own that speak directly to you…

• Psalm 145:9 The Lord is good to all; he has compassion on all he has made.
•  1 Chronicles 16:34 Give thanks to the Lord, for he is good; his love endures forever.
•  Psalm 100:5 For the Lord is good and his love endures forever; his faithfulness continues through all generations.
•  James 1:17 Every good and perfect gift is from above, coming down from the Father of the heavenly lights, who does not change like shifting shadows.
•  2 Samuel 7:28 Sovereign Lord, you are God! Your covenant is trustworthy, and you have promised these good things to your servant.

•  Psalm 19:7 The law of the Lord is perfect, refreshing the soul. The statutes of the Lord are trustworthy, making wise the simple.
•  Psalm 34:8 Taste and see that the Lord is good; blessed is the one who takes refuge in him.
•  Nahum 1:7 The Lord is good, a refuge in times of trouble. He cares for those who trust in him.
•  Psalm 84:11 For the Lord God is a sun and shield; the Lord bestows favour and honour; no good thing does he withhold from those whose walk is blameless.
•  Matthew 6:31-33 So do not worry, saying, ‘What shall we eat?’ or ‘What shall we drink?’ or ‘What shall we wear?’ For the pagans run after all these things, and your heavenly Father knows that you need them. But seek first his kingdom and his righteousness, and all these things will be given to you as well.
•  2 Corinthians 9:8 And God is able to bless you abundantly, so that in all things at all times, having all that you need, you will abound in every good work.
•  Psalm 34:10 The lions may grow weak and hungry, but those who seek the Lord lack no good thing.
•  Romans 8:32 He who did not spare his own Son, but gave him up for us all—how will he not also, along with him, graciously give us all things?

Make your own list and see if God is the one to trust or if it’s dependent on you to fulfill these promises. 

We are talking in this series about God who makes and keeps promises. Most notably the Land of Promise, but by application, listen and learn, live in the hope of God’s fulfillment. Amen?

God is faithful! It’s not because we believe that he will be faithful; he’s faithful and thus we believe him. 

2.     Commands to Joshua then the people (6-9)

With the promises, God also gave these words to Joshua. They are commands. No matter what, whether promise or command, these are words of God. God gives you ‘his word’ and you can count on him to fulfill and strengthen us to fulfill.

God expects us to trust him, to believe him. He didn’t make robots. He wants us to have a role in the fulfillment of his words. God has spoken to his people, Hallelujah! And his words are words of wisdom, hallelujah!

Three times God says (and one time the people say) to Joshua to be strong and courageous. One time he adds “me’od” to the Chazak v’ematz. Your strength comes not from yourself, or even from ‘your faith’ but rather from the God in whom you trust. 

.7 Do all Torah, don’t go off the beaten path. Be orthodox. Go straight. I believe this is during his military campaigning, rather than the way many think of this as Joshua was to set up religious academies of learning and study. I don’t see that anywhere here, and certainly not in the rest of the book. I don’t mind if someone says Joshua is charged to keep Torah, but I don’t think that’s what God is encouraging. He’s on a military march to conquer the land of promise for Jehovah!

Wherever he steps, and the people step, that will be the territory for Jehovah. 

.8 Meditate on the Word. וְהָגִ֤יתָ בּוֹ֙  This speaks to me. And I use the imagery of a bagel and a bakery. If you read the Bible it’s like you are walking by the bakery and the aroma draws you. You know the good stuff is there, but you (so far) don’t have any benefit to it. Then when you memorize the Bible, you actually take the bagel into your mouth. It’s almost satisfying and certainly a delight to the taste buds, but again, you don’t have any real benefit from it yet. It’s only when you Hagita Bo (say it to yourself) meditate on it, that this is like swallowing the bagel and it goes into your system, you gain from it. The bagel becomes part of you. It IS you. Reading? Walking past the bakery. Memorizing? Tasting. Meditating on the Word? Swallowing it and it becomes you.

When? Yomam v’layla. יוֹמָ֣ם וָלַ֔יְלָה Day and night. Compare ‘evening and morning.’ That phrase refers to one day only. ‘Day and night’ refers to this day and the next day (which begins in the erev (evening)). So day and night could carry the meaning of ‘from now on’ or ‘continually.’

.9 Be strong, don’t fear, don’t be dismayed. We are in a battle for trusting God. We are not called to fulfill God’s promises. He can do that all by himself. Our battle and our battles are to trust him in all our circumstances. 

Don’t confuse faith with presumption. What he says, he will do. He however will not always heal all people of all their woes. He will not prevent death from happening to his people. Don’t presume that nothing bad will occur. That no bad thing will happen to your mother or your child. That you will win the lottery and own a property on Nantucket or Surfers Paradise. 

Those personal words you receive in your meditation on the Word, that’s how this works.

3.     Chain of command settled (.10-11)

.10 All the officers are called in and get their marching orders. God speaks personally

Hobbs in his commentary on the book of 2 Kings chapter 2 says this, “A point of note in this chapter is an overt reminder of the traditions connected with Moses and Joshua (cf. Montgomery/Gehman, 354; Gray, 475.) The similarities are quite extensive between this narrative, the narrative of the crossing of the Reed Sea (Exod 14), and the narrative of the crossing of the Jordan (Josh 3). They are expounded in the comments below. The similarities extend beyond the use of common words. The relationship of Elijah to Elisha is like that of Moses to Joshua, and both successors are appointed in similar fashion (Num 27:18–23; 1 Kgs 19:15–21). Further, the location of the crossing of the Jordan is identical, and the cities of Bethel, Gilgal, and Jericho are common to both. Whether this connection is due to the preservation of the Reed Sea traditions and the first crossing of the Jordan by the custodians of the shrine at Gilgal (so Gray, 475, following H.-J. Kraus, VT 1 [1951] 190–91), who later became the followers of the prophet, or whether it is a deliberate echo created by the writer is difficult to determine.”

4.     Leadership lesson 

The lesson of leadership is clear. Trust God. You are invincible because you are with Him! After the funeral, they take 30 days (Deut. 34) but they don’t (in Joshua) sit shiva. They get going because they have work to do. It’s time to take God at his word and to live in the assurance of that, and the realm of his kingdom. 

Verse 4 says “from the wilderness to Lebanon all the way to the river Euphrates!” We Jews have never owned that entire piece of land. There YET remains a fulfillment of that promised land. 

We need leaders who will take God at his word, who will believe it, who will meditate on it, who will speak it, and who will be strong and courageous. 

Invitation

Dear friends, if you have never asked Yeshua to be your Saviour, today as we begin learning from Joshua, would you choose to believe the Lord of life?   What does it mean to be strong and courageous in light of learning about Yeshua? Would you be willing to take a stand for him who took a stand and died on a Roman cross for you?

If you’d like to do that today, just now, join me as we pray.

Say something like this: “Father in Yeshua’s name, forgive me my sin, I was wrong to dismiss you and to disbelieve in you. I need your mercy. I deserve punishment but you are kind and merciful and I receive your grace. I repent. I receive Yeshua as my saviour and Lord. I will live because of my faith in Messiah Yeshua. Amen.

If you prayed that, please let us know of your profession by writing straightaway, won’t you? Bob@JewsforJesus.org.au We’d love to hear from you.

Conclusion

We are delighted you have joined us today. Please join us next week and learn with the others how you can stay on track in 2021 and beyond.   I hope to see you next week as we continue our studies in Joshua.       You will certainly see yourself in the readings and in the lessons. I plan to take 24 weeks to read and learn with you. That’s almost 6 months. Line by line. It will be worthwhile!  Next week we will look at Rahab, a scarlet woman. And see what lessons we can draw for ourselves.

Hope to see you then… until then, Shabbat shalom!

 

Bibliography

Butler, Trent C., Word Biblical Commentary, Volume 7. Joshua. Word, Waco, 1983.

Davis, Dale Ralph, Joshua: No Falling Words, Christian Focus, Fearn, Ross-shire, Scotland, 2019.

Meyer, F.B., Joshua and the Land of Promise, Christian Literature Crusade, Ft Washington PA, 1977.

Sanders, J. Oswald, Promised-Land Living, Moody Press, Chicago, 1984.

Weirsbe, Warren. Be Strong: Putting God's Power to Work in Your Life. David C. Cook Publishing, Colorado Springs, 2010.

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D-Groups for this week

1)             Tuesday 11 am Sydney time. Led by James Howse

2)             Monday 7 pm, Sydney time, led by James White

(Contact our office for zoom details)

If you’d like to host a D-Group either online or in person, please contact bob@jewsforjesus.org.au for further details. It’s time to step up. Ponder this—who will be in your D-Group?

 

Espionage and Rosh Hashanah 5781

 Given on the occasion of Rosh Hashanah

Sydney Australia

19 September 2020

 

Good yontif to each of you. They say that our actions on the High Holidays determine what will be decreed for the upcoming year. So, whatever you guys did last year, please don’t do it again! Seriously, it’s been a very tough year for us, and for the planet. Here we had bushfires that lasted longer than ever before destroying hundreds of thousands of hectares of property, millions of animals, uprooting so many from their places then floods followed almost before we had settled into the year 2020, and nothing we’ve ever seen managed to get our attention like COVID-19. We still aren’t out of danger, although COVID fatigue is upon most of us, and we see the consequences of Karens and others who disregard public safety for their own personal rights and freedoms. Friends, we are not out of the woods on this by a long shot. We long for a vaccine, and there are good reports about such possibilities just now, but we shall see.

I’m intrigued by the possibility of a vaccine. Can you imagine working in one of those laboratories that is close to the discovery? Huge pressure to perform. The danger of not recording certain data, the peer review would be intense.

Last week I thought of a biblical story with some serious peer review, and reports that demonstrated discrepancies in the data, and how to understand the data… and maybe that story has something to say to us in 5781 and beyond.

I think one of the grabbers of such stories is the espionage and intrigue. The reason we love mysteries and whodunits is the guesswork, the unpacking of clues and the finding of the resolution of a television show before the next commercial or by the end of the book.  

Espionage and real spy adventures are not easy missions, after all. In the Bible when the Jewish people are wandering in the wilderness, after about 2 years since we departed Egypt, Moses sends out 12 men to get some data about what’s ahead. They leave Kadesh-Barnea and check out what we today call Israel. Then it was a confederation of nomads and other peoples, made up of seven nations and called Canaan. The spies have to lie. They trick people into winning their trust, then they use that trust to gain advantage for their side. We value spies who work for us and cast aspersions on those others who invade our sacred space. So, spying in and of itself is not held in high honor, unless the spies are on our team.

I remember in school on the gridiron field, leaning into the opposing team’s huddle to hear the play being called by the quarterback, so we could implement the appropriate defense? Eavesdropping on your parents could give you great power in future blackmailing purposes or what we title in Canberra as ‘negotiating.’  Do you remember the story of the child who is asked by his parents to say the prayer at the dinner party? The boy is a bit uncomfortable with public prayer, but his parents insist. The child says, “I don’t know how to pray.” And the parents tell him to pray like you have heard us praying. So, the boy begins, “Oh, Lord, I don’t know why you had to send the Rosenblum’s to our house for dinner tonight.”

But eavesdropping, espionage and spying are central in this story, aren’t they? Let me rehearse the story a bit. It’s another page-turner as Moses sends out spies to check out the Promised Land, to find out if it is all the stories have made it out to be. Abraham and the boys some hundreds of years ago made out like it was a great place to live; many are buried there. Then a few years ago God told Moses about the place, and he has never seen it, but this ‘land of milk and honey’ thing seemed a bit strange. Moses is well familiar with this area. He’s been a shepherd on the backside of the wilderness for 4 decades. How different could this ‘other land’ really be?

But maybe I’m making this biblical story too Hollywood, too DaVinci. The spies in this story didn’t go to deceive the Hittites or the Canaanites, but rather to investigate the scene. They went to scout out the land and to conduct research. They were to find out how many people there were and if the people were weak or strong. The assessment of the towns was about defenses and the soil of the fields. No need to conduct espionage with the James Bond flavor, rather an edaphic research project along with laboratory fruits brought back in Petri dishes. How civil, and how mundane.

So off they went. Moses sent a leader from each of the 12 tribes including Joshua, the future leader of the Jewish people, and after 6 weeks of scouting, this dozen returned with one large cluster of grapes so big that it had to be carried on a large pole on the shoulders of two able-bodied men. And they brought other fruits too.

That was the laboratory evidence, but they also brought their defense of the evidence to an almost parliamentarian hearing convened just to hear what awaited the Jewish people now after two years out of Egypt. 

And what did the spies report to the Jewish people? They told of fruitfulness and plenty, and that it was a good place to take, but 10 of the spies also reported that giants were in the land, that there was no way we were going to conquer their cities with their high towers, and that our children would become a prey to the enemies. And what was the response of the Jewish people to the report of the spies? 100% agreement. They bought the report, they grumbled against Moses who had schlepped them out of their comfortable homes as slaves in Egypt to wander in the wilderness. The people wanted to go back. And God wasn’t happy. Why? Because the people did not believe in what he had told them.

Moses interceded; he prayed along with Aaron his brother for the Jewish people. The people however wanted nothing to do with this caretaking; they wanted to return to Egypt. God told them that the entire populace of the Jews over 20 years old was going to die in the wilderness. Two exceptions, Joshua and Caleb, no young men in their own right, would survive and get to enter the Promised Land. Even the 10 spies, who formed the majority report, went to their deaths in the wilderness. And that’s how the story ends.

Much of what we read in Bible is pretty positive. Let me list some: we are loved, we are chosen as Jewish people, we get to move into the land of promises, we win in the battle of Jericho, Esther wins the beauty pageant, the Jews of Shushan survive, and David gets chosen over all the others to be king. Usually positive information. So much positive information I wonder how the anti-Semites who abound in the world and who detract from the truth of the Scriptures can read from this book along with us. Ah, but then there are portions like this one today. 

God gave the Jewish people a chance, in fact, 12 chances to hear and believe the word previously spoken in Exodus and Leviticus. Each of the spies is the chance. Each spy had an equal opportunity to share the truth of God’s word and His ability to triumph over adversity and every human situation to accomplish His word. (Ex 3.8, 3.17, 13.5, 33.3, Lev 20.24) The word had been spoken 5 times, “I will bring you into… (or go up to) a land flowing with milk and honey.”

The word was clear and now we had a chance to believe, to keep our focus on God and his word and his purposes. What we chose, however, was less. We chose the words of 10 men, the Mixed-up Minyan, if you will. They saw things clearly. They saw giant gentiles; they saw themselves as grasshoppers. They saw huge grape clusters. They saw both opportunity and they saw themselves outnumbered. Which would they believe? Which would they live in?

   Dear friends on this Rosh Hashanah, you have God’s promises of His love and His assurance of pardon for all your sins. You have the guarantee of forgiveness because of what Yeshua did for you 2,000 years ago. All the while you have many situations ahead of you which could bury you in fear or apprehension, knock you out of the forward look and get you worried, broken, downcast, or lazy. So many young people are frozen from moving forward because of fear of making the wrong choices. Giants of corporations and their own apparent insignificance stymie others. Risk requires jumping sometimes and trusting the One who knows all things.

So, what will you hear and what will you see? And people in this congregation, what will you hear and see in your life beyond today? Will you take risks? Will you go for all you can no matter what others say? Will you follow God with all your heart no matter the opposition?

I grew up an Orthodox Jew in Kansas City, and used to sing Eretz zavat chalav ud’vash in rousing chorus with the many in my youth group. And if you had asked me then who I thought Jesus was, I would have laughed out loud, …what does Jesus have to do with us? I’m Jewish!

Little did I know that Jesus was actually our messiah and savior. That was for later discovery. And little did I know that some like Caleb and Joshua went and spied out the land, and yes, there were giants of antagonism and war. Yes, there were walled cities of hostility to our message, and yet, there were also fruit. I believe, if I can be allegorical for a moment, and only for a moment, that we have a choice to listen to the 10, the Majority Report, or to the Two, the Joshua and Caleb’s of faith who tell us to go forward and take the land. They tell us to live for God. They tell us that no matter the opposition, we can live abundant lives in the midst of troubles. 

Yes, there are giants who oppose us. Yes, there are defenses to our message, and some simply will not listen, will they? But we can go in. We can believe the minority report and we can succeed. 

God insists that (14.21) all the earth will be filled with his glory as the waters cover the sea. How awesome is that! We can have confidence, not in what we see, that is, the minimal effect of God and his word on the planet, the dangers of hurricanes and bush fires still abounding in the USA, and COVID’s 30 million sufferers since February, but on what we will see in the end of days in the age to come. And that’s our hope. A true biblical person is one who sees with eyes of faith and hope.

In a surprise label, God called the Jewish people “this evil congregation” (14.35) If it weren’t God saying it, we might think this was an anti-Semitic comment. Evil congregation? What made those Jews ‘evil’—was it just because they listened to advise by some Jewish leaders? Actually, God clarifies this throughout the Bible. And his answer would be, ‘yes.’ Good is faith and evil is unbelief. Faith is the evidence of things hoped for and the assurance of things unseen. Faith is what made Abraham our father righteous before the Almighty.  Faith is taking God at his word, no matter what others say. No matter what you see in your espionage, no matter how many folks tell you Jesus is not the messiah, no matter how many folks tell you cannot be Jewish and believe in Jesus, no matter what the world tells you about what really matters in life: money, fame, power, accomplishments, human glory… no matter what they say. What really matters is what God says, and your believing him. 

Listen, there are bad reports (14.36) and good reports. Choose to listen to what God says and you will find success, not only here in Sydney, but wherever the Lord should call you. Follow him and you will flow with milk and honey. You will give pleasure to others. You will have an abundance to share with others. 

And that will make God happy, today and throughout your days. 

L’shana tovah tikatevu v’saychatemu, um’tooka. Have a blessed 5781. Amen!