When Gideon was called by God, his first response was to make a list of excuses. "I'm the weakest in my clan." "My clan is the weakest clan." He went on an on about how he wasn't capable of doing what the Lord asked him to do. The ironic part of this is that God didn't really care what Gideon's strengths were ... [Continue Reading]
Finding Your Strengths (Judges 3-4)
The story of Ehud is one of my favorite stories of the Old Testament - probably because Ehud is left-handed just as I am. In a world of right-handed people, we find ourselves having a disability. The great thing about Ehud, though, is that he didn't see his situation as a disability: he saw it as an opportunity. The king was not afraid of ... [Continue Reading]
The Path Only Goes One Way (Judges 1-2)
From my experience working in the church and just with people in general, there is often an intellectual disconnect between a person's actions and the consequences of those actions. We often think that we're the exception to the rule and that the consequences of our choices will somehow be eluded by us. We fail to realize that life is connected and ... [Continue Reading]
The Faith of Your Family (Joshua 23-24)
Joshua ends his life by sharing an important piece of wisdom with the Israelites: he says, "as for me and my house, we will serve the Lord." Joshua didn't say that only he would serve the Lord - he explicitly said that his entire house would serve Him. It's at this point that we are tempted to ask the question, "how could he make such a ... [Continue Reading]
Though None Goes With Me… (Joshua 11, 14:6-15, 15)
I think one of the reasons Caleb is a great character of the Bible is that he was able to stand up for what was right regardless of the opinions of other people. When he and Joshua stood before Moses with the other spies into the Promised Land, only those two were willing to see things through the perspective of God's eyes. As a result, only those two ... [Continue Reading]
Partial Obedience is Disobedience (Joshua 9-10)
There's a temptation to believe that partial obedience is still obedience. Unfortunately, that's not really the case. In the situation with the Israelites traveling into the Promised Land, they didn't fully obey God's instructions to destroy the indwelling peoples because of a foolish mistake. God didn't tell them to make covenants ... [Continue Reading]
Weighing the Consequences (Joshua 7-8)
Chances are that you have had to bear the consequences of somebody else's actions. It's bad when our actions affect ourselves, but it's even worse when they affect other people. Unfortunately, the sin of Achan cost a lot of lives for the Israelites, and there's a great lesson that we can learn here. So often sin isn't as personal as we ... [Continue Reading]
Whose Side? (Joshua 5-6)
Before entering Jericho, Joshua happens to run into the Command of the Lord's Army and asks him a question. Whether or not Joshua recognized who he was is uncertain, but that didn't keep Joshua from asking if the man was for Israel or for Jericho. The answer was kind of funny: neither. As the Commander of the Lord's Army, he was fighting ... [Continue Reading]
Getting Your Feet Wet (Joshua 3-4)
As it comes to faith, there are just certain things that are unknown: that's why it's called "faith." In the case of the Israelites crossing over the Jordan River, they were required to take a step of faith into the water, and it wasn't until the soles of the feet of the priests touched the water that they would be able to move forward. ... [Continue Reading]
Freedom (Joshua 1-2)
There's a temptation to think that the Book of the Law is a bad thing, but such is not the case. In fact, we're often very quick to look at laws and rules as oppressive rather than as freeing, but wisdom is found in the latter view rather than in the former. This idea is fresh in my mind because, as I was running down the road last week, I saw a dog ... [Continue Reading]
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