S154P12 – Sincerity in prayer: Joshua
Jos. 7:7-11a
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! O Lord, what can I say, when Israel has turned their backs before their enemies! 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?” The LORD said to Joshua, “Get up! Why have you fallen on your face? Israel has sinned; they have transgressed my covenant that I commanded them…”
Joshua did not enter into his position in Israel out of nowhere. He had spent time working with Moses as a kind of spiritual apprentice. During those years, Joshua had seen the Lord deliver his people through battles. Joshua himself had been victorious with the sword over the Lord’s enemies. He had a front row seat to the interactions between Moses and the Lord. Joshua watched his teacher have these direct conversations with God, and he had these kinds of conversations with the Lord himself. By the time of this passage, Joshua had taken the mantle from Moses and had seen God work through his obedience and the people’s obedience time and again. Perhaps that is why God’s response to this prayer seems corrective.
After seeing God come through with victory after victory time and again, Joshua was faced with a conundrum. What should have been another victory was a sound and suprising defeat. His scouts even said that the people of Ai were few and that not many men were needed to defeat them. Joshua was heartbroken and immediately went to the Lord for an answer. What I gather from God’s response is that Joshua was asking God why He had let this happen, but God is not the reason they failed. This defeat came because of the people’s disobedience in Jericho. If Joshua was asking God why He brought them to a place of defeat, God is responding by saying that He of course did not bring them to a place of defeat. The reason must be something else.
Joshua is not the only person in the scriptures to ask God a question like this or to be rebuked by God’s answer. The Lord did not lead Israel through Joshua to these battles in order to lose. The Lord did not lead Israel from Egypt across the Red Sea to starve and die. When we find ourselves in similarly bleak circumstances, we might be tempted to ask God the same question. We should learn from these examples that God does not move us forward to fail or lose. He has shown his faithfulness. Failures and disappointments are the result of something else. Father, give us the wisdom to recognize that You are not the source of our troubles and to seek revelation of the truth in times like these.