Jericho

It occurs to me that the Israelites were battle tested warriors. I don’t think any depiction of round-table knights or the world of elves and men have anything on the Israelite army. The descriptions of their battles in Exodus and Joshua are often so familiar, or maybe utterly unfamiliar, that there was a time that I kind of glazed over them.

Today I got to be in Joshua again. How like my abba to gently teach me a lesson I absolutely do not want to hear in a place where it would fall on familiar, comfortable, well worn ground.

I think when we teach our flannel-graph lessons about the fall of the walls of Jericho we do the Israelites and Joshua little justice. When Joshua approached the siege-ready city of Jericho he was an experienced and victorious military strategist. There is ample evidence that he submitted to his God in all things and knew to whom the credit belonged. He was also likely heavily muscled, weathered, wise and a terror with a blade. I love Joshua!

At Jericho God told him (I paraphrase) “Get the whole army up and armed at the crack of dawn, line everyone up. Place the ark of my covenant in front with seven priests, each with a ram’s horn. March around the city while the priests blow their horns. Then go back to camp. Do this every day for six days. On the seventh day do it seven times, then shout.”

Wait, what?

We’ve all heard this story so many times, like from the crib on up, that we just accept that the Israelites marched around the city for seven days, yelled and “the walls came tumbling down.”

This was insanity!! Imagine Joshua, battle tested commander of God’s earthly army hearing these words. Do you think he stuck his fingers in his ears to make sure they weren’t clogged with 40 years worth of sand? Every morning an ENTIRE ARMY got up, laced into their 40-50-60? pounds of armor and marched around the walls of a city! And NOTHING HAPPENED for DAYS!

Every morning I get up and battle check my armor.

Finally, be strong in the Lord and in his mighty power. Put on the full armor of God, so that you can take your stand against the devil's schemes. For our struggle is not against flesh and blood, but against the rulers, against the authorities, against the powers of this dark world and against the spiritual forces of evil in the heavenly realms. Therefore put on the full armor of God, so that when the day of evil comes, you may be able to stand your ground, and after you have done everything, to stand. Stand firm then, with the belt of truth buckled around your waist, with the breastplate of righteousness in place, and with your feet fitted with the readiness that comes from the gospel of peace. In addition to all this, take up the shield of faith, with which you can extinguish all the flaming arrows of the evil one. Take the helmet of salvation and the sword of the Spirit, which is the word of God. Eph. 6:10-17

And I march…

This morning I told God “at least Joshua knew what he was marching around, at least he could see the corners and knew when and where to turn. He knew when he made that final turn of the day it was time to head back to camp and rest… until tomorrow. I don’t even know what I’m marching around!! I’m turning circles in the dark.”

The lamp lighting my path (Ps 119:105) only reveals one agonizing step at a time. Never in my life has it ever been so true “everything rides on faith now, everything rides on hope somehow.”

Yet, I am encouraged. Joshua who fought so many battles for the Lord was also told to wait. In God’s time the walls came crashing down. I long for the booming, crashing, deafening sound of the destruction of the walls of my Jericho.