Joshua 14: God’s Purpose is Peace

Moses has left the stage and Joshua has been asked to step forward. Joshua was born a slave. Now, he takes charge of an invading army. He has been tasked by no less than the King of the Universe with the job of taking back his people’s rightful land from pagan inhabitants. It sounds like an upcoming summer blockbuster, only this story really happened.

Joshua was almost 80 years old when he took charge of Israel’s army. The book of Joshua chronicles his 30 year campaign to fulfill the promises God made to his people over 400 years ago. In the first chapter, God tells Joshua to “be strong and courageous! Do not tremble or be dismayed, for the Lord your God is with you wherever you go.” (1:9). At the end of his journey, Joshua says, “Not one of the good promises which the Lord had made to the house of Israel failed; all came to pass.” (21:45). In between are many great adventures and lessons for Christians today to learn and grow from.

Let’s take this journey together.

Detailed Outline of Joshua:

• Preparation of the Conquest (Joshua 1-5)
• Conquest of the Promised Land (Joshua 6-12)
• Division of the Promised Land (Joshua 13-21)
• Assignment of land to the tribes (Joshua 13-19)
• Assignment of specific cities (Joshua 20-21)
• Settlement of the Promised Land (Joshua 22-24)
• Eastern tribe settlement (Joshua 22)
• Western tribe settlement (Joshua 23)
• Covenant and farewell (Joshua 24)

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The More We Dig. The More We Find.

Scripture quotations taken from the Holy Bible, New Living Translation (NLT).
Copyright © 1996, 2004, 2015 by Tyndale House Foundation.
Used by permission of Tyndale House Publishers, Carol Stream, Illinois 60188. All rights reserved.

Chapters

• 0:00 Welcome & One-Chapter-a-Day Vision
• 0:57 Subscribe Goal & Community Invitation
• 1:51 Setting the Stage: Promised Land Reality
• 3:05 Remembering Caleb’s Faith
• 4:02 Judah’s Borders Explained
• 7:43 Caleb Claims Hebron with Courage
• 9:05 Names, Maps, and Meaning
• 14:48 Jebusites in Jerusalem—Until David
• 15:25 Dreaming the Long Dream
• 17:03 Prayer, Reflection, and Encouragement

Transcript

SPEAKER_00: 0:01

Hey everyone, and welcome to the Bible Breakdown Podcast. In this podcast, we will be breaking down the Bible one chapter a day. Whether you are a new believer or have been following Christ for a while, we believe that you will learn something new and fresh every single day. So thank you for joining us. Let's get into breaking down the Bible together.

SPEAKER_01: 0:23

Well, hello everybody. Welcome back to the Bible Breakdown Podcast with your host, Pastor Brandon. Today, Joshua chapter 14. And I love part of this chapter. You're going to find out when we get there. But if I were to give this one a title, it would be Dream a Long Dream. Like, like, I think that God loves when we just have a long dream that we just won't let go of. Because it seems like God loves it when we trust Him for a long time and we're faithful in the long haul. And we're going to get into that just a moment. I love what's about to happen and I don't love the next thing. But before we do that, make sure if you're watching this on the YouTubes, you like, share, and subscribe. We are on the road to 1,000 subscribers so that we can get some options from YouTube to do some like streaming stuff and all this live stuff. So make sure you are subscribing to the channel. Now, if to do that, if you can find the subscribe button, just go to the search bar and just type in Brandon Cannon. You'll see my face on there eventually. And subscribe to that channel. And we're we got a long way to go. But if you'll help us, we'll get to a thousand and we got some fun stuff that we would like to try. If you listen to us on the podcast, you're still my favorites. Make sure you are like, sharing, and subscribing this as well. Put it on the social medias. And don't forget to go to the Bible breakdown discussion on Facebook. Man, I'm telling you, I'm blown away by the insights and the ideas and the things that's coming out of that. And I just, I love the fact that we're building a community of people surrounded just by the idea of reading God's word together. Because the more we read and the more we dig, the more we find. And that's going to be the case today because there is a little piece right here that if you're not careful, you'll miss it. I missed it for the longest time. And now it might be one of my favorite parts of the entire book of Joshua. So if you got your Bibles, you want to open them up with me to Joshua chapter 15, get your coffee ready, let me set the stage for you and we'll jump in. Joshua has led the nation of Israel into the promised land. Now, don't let that word promised land, that phrase, like just like deceive you a little bit because it'll make you think that they just went everywhere and because God promised it to them, there were no problems. Everything was fine. Who lives that life, right? No, rather, they had to fight for everything that they got. But the idea was that if they stay faithful to God, that they were going to have people to stand against them, just none of them were going to win. I think that's a great way of trying to frame the idea of how we should see God's promises today. God's promises are not to get out of jail free cards, but they are God's open doors with God's power and God's purpose to do all the things that He wants to do in our life. God is determined to partner with us in this process. And I love this idea of dreaming the long dream. We're going to get there in just a second, but I want to remind you of somebody that maybe you've forgotten about. I know I did when I first read this, and that is back in Numbers and Deuteronomy, we remember how when Moses was looking at what was going to be the promised land, he sent out some scouts when they're about halfway there from the um from when they got the covenant of God at Mount Sinai, about halfway to the Jordan River, they sent 12 scouts out. Two of them was Joshua and a guy named Caleb. Well, ten of the 12 spies came back and was like, Oh, no, no, no, no, we cannot take this. That is too much. It's crazy, crazy. Well, two of them, Joshua and Caleb, came back and was like, Yeah, they're big, but God said we can take them. Let's go take them. Well, because of that, God judged the nation of Israel because they listened to the 10 instead of the two. And he said, None of you guys are going to get to go except for Joshua and Caleb because they had faith. Well, we know who Joshua is now. He ended up going and taking over for Moses and all this. Well, Caleb, he's still here too. We're about to find out what happened to Caleb. So here we go. You ready? Verse 1. The allotment of land for the clans of the tribe of Judah reached southward to the border of Edom, as far south of the wilderness of Zen. Now, also, don't forget, what we're doing is we are reading about the different border lines for the nation of Israel. They've conquered this land, and now it is time for them to divide it up amongst their families. And so that's what we're doing, is we're getting these different borders. And that's one of the reasons why God would have inspired Joshua to write this down. So for all future generations, if there was ever a squabble over who this land belonged to, could go back to the scroll of Joshua and go, this is exactly the way God did it at the beginning. Because every 50 years there would be something called the year of Jubilee. And no matter what kind of buying and selling of land would happen, at the year of Jubilee, all debts were forgiven, and all the land goes back to how it was written in the book of Joshua. So it makes this a very important document. So it's not as much to us today, but it was to them back then. Verse 2 The southern border began at the south bay of the Dead Sea, and it ran across of Scorpion Pass, which sounds like a really cool place, into the wilderness of Zim, and it went south of Kadesh Barnea to Hezron, and it went up to Adar, where it turned toward Karkah. From there it passed to Asmon until it finally reached the brook of Egypt, which it followed to the Mediterranean Sea, and this was their southern border. The eastern boundary extended along the Dead Sea to the mouth of the Jordan River. The northern boundary began at the bay of the Jordan River and it emptied into the Dead Sea. It went up from there to Beth Horgal, and then it proceeded north to Beth Arabah, to the stone of Borhan. Borhan was Reuben's son. From that point it went south of the valley of Ekor to Debir, turning north toward Gilgal, which is across from the slopes of Aduman on the south side of the valley. From there the boundary extended to the springs of Enesh Amesh and on to in Rogel. The boundary then passed through the valley of Ben Hemon along the southern slopes of the Jebusites, where the city of Jerusalem is located. Then it went west to the top of the mountain above the valley of Hermon, and on the and on up to the northern end of the valley of Raphim. From there the boundary extended to the top of the mountain to the spring at the waters of Nephthal, and from there went to the towns of Mount Hephron. Then it turned toward Baal, that is Kariath Jerim. And the boundary circled west of Baal to Mount Sair, and passed along the town of Keshlon on the southern northern slope of the Mount Jerim, and it went down to Beth Shemesh on and on to Timnah. The boundary from there proceeded to the slopes of the hill north of Ekron, and there it turned south or turned toward a Hishkeron of Mount Baal. It passed from Jebnil and ended at the Mediterranean Sea. The western boundary was a shoreline of the Mediterranean Sea. These were the boundaries of the clans of the tribe of Judah. So once again, this is the different way that they're trying to do this. So imagine, imagine wherever it is that you live. Imagine you had to stake out the boundaries of the city you live in, but you couldn't use roads. You couldn't use signs. You couldn't use man-made landmarks. You had to use mountains, valleys, and where people's houses were. You'd have to get kind of creative, right, on how you explained it. And so this is them explaining it without roads and without certain things like that. And so that's where he is saying, okay, these are the different areas where we're going to do it, right? Okay, here we go. This is what happened to Caleb. I love this so much. The Lord commanded Joshua to sign to assign some of Judah's territory to Caleb, the son of Jephune. So Caleb was given the town of Kariath Arbah, that is Hebron, which has been named after Enoch's ancestor. Caleb drove out these three groups, the Anakites, the descendants of Shemai, Haman, and Tammy, the sons of Anak. I love this. And from there he went up to fight against the people living in the town of Dabir, formerly called Kariath Sephar. And he said, I will give my daughter Akash on in marriage to the one who attacks and captures Kariath Sephar. So Onel, the son of Caleb's brother, Kinza, was the one who conquered it, and so Akash became Othel's wife. And when Akash married Othel, she urged him to ask her father for a field. So she got down from her donkey, and Caleb asked her, What's the matter? Give me another gift. You've already given me the land of the Negev. Now please give me the springs of water too. So Caleb gave her the upper and lower springs. Can you imagine? That's why I just I love this idea that for 40 long years, Caleb has been dreaming of this moment. He's dreaming of the opportunity to go and take this. And now there is a nation of bad guys in the way. You imagine after 40 years of waiting, he's gonna let these guys do it? No, no. It says from there, he drove these people out of there and he went. At this point, if he's as old as Joshua, it's an 80-year-old man, and he is going and he is fighting and he is taking that ground. I love that idea of he had that dream. I wonder if, I'm just just imagine for a moment. The Bible doesn't say anything about this. Let's just imagine for a moment that he looks at this land 40 years earlier as a kid, and he sees it and he loves it. And I wonder if he saw that territory right there. And then for 40 years he dreamed of that territory again. And I wonder if when it was time, God looked at Caleb and he's like, I know which land you've been dreaming about for 40 years. I'm gonna give it to you. Go take it. Can you imagine how exciting that must have been? Now the Bible doesn't say that specifically. He might have been dreaming about another land, but I guarantee you for 40 years, he was dreaming about this land. He was dreaming about the the land of Canaan, and now he had a chance to take it. I just think that's amazing, and I just love it so much. All right, that's the part of this chapter I love. This is the part of the chapter that I don't love because here we go again with a bunch of names. So if you're ready, we're gonna do this together. We're gonna get through this together. When we get through with the second half of Joshua, we're gonna feel so proud of ourselves because we're gonna know all these names. And if you're watching this and you're thinking about naming your baby something, you got a lot of choices coming up right here. So I want you to do this with me. I'm gonna try to read these slowly and painfully, and then let's see if they can get through these together. And some of these, I'm just gonna be honest with you. I'm just gonna make it up. Okay. I don't know if you probably think I make it up all the time, and I kind of do, but I'm definitely gonna make some of these up because I don't know how to say them. So here we go. You ready? Verse 20. This is the homeland allocated to the clans of the tribes of Judah. The towns of Judah situated along the borders of Edom in the extreme south were Kabzil, Eder, Jehur, Kadash, Dimnah, Adel, Kadesh, Hazor, Ithnan, Zif, Telim, Belor, Hazar Kanath, Kareath, Hezron, that is Hazor, because of course, Imam, Shema, Eloda, Hazar Kada, Heshman, Beth Pelet, Hazor Shalu, Bersheba, got that one, Bezothoth, Belal, Lim, Izim, El Tolad, Keshel, Horma, Ziklag, Medeman, Sah, Leboth, Sheliam, In, Rimam, and 29 towns with their surrounding villages. And once again, I think it's important to read these because all of these were mapping out the area that God gave them. They took over these areas. Every one of these is a name and a story that has a testimony. So this many years later, it's worth us struggling through it, right? Here we go. Verse 33, read it with me. Following towns situated, the western foothills were also given to Judah. Eshtol, Zorha, Ashha, Zanhol, Ingamim, Tepuah, Inam, Jarmuth, Edulum, Soko, Azka, Ashrim, Adelef, Gedir, and Edigalom, fourteen towns with their surrounding villages. Also included were Zenon, Hadasha, Megalgod, Dalin, Mizpah, Jokil, Lakish, Bozka, Eglon, Kabon, Lamath, Kitlish, Gerdurath, Beth Dagon, Nama, Mekada, and sixteen towns with the surrounding villages. Beside these there were Libna, Esther, that's not true, that's not how you say that, Hesh, Ashon, Ipat, Eshra, Nazib, Keliah, Ezum, and Emrioth, nine towns with their surrounding villages. The territory of the tribes of Judah were included Ichron and its surrounding settlements and villages. From Ekron and the boundary of the west, including the towns of Ashdod with their surrounding villages. It also included Ashdod with its surrounding settlements and villages, and Gaza with its settlements and villages, as far as the brook of Egypt, along the coast of the Mediterranean Sea. Judah also, Judah's getting all the land. Here we go. Judah received the following towns from the hill country: Shemir, Jatir, Soko, Dena, Kith Sana, that is Dibir, of course. Anab, Ashtar, Amin, Goshin, Holon, and Gilho, that was eleven towns with their surrounding villages. Also, Lord help us, included the towns of Arab, Demua, Ishhan, Jamim, Beth Tupa, and Afka, Humta, Kerith Arba, which is Hebron, of course, and Zoar, nine towns in the surrounding villages. All right, here we go. We're going to do this together. You ready? Beside these were also Maon, Carmel, Zif, Jutah, Jezreel, Joktim, Ezno, Cain, Debiah, and Timna, ten towns with their surrounding villages. In addition, because why not? There were Halhu, Beth Zu, Gedor, Merath, Beth, look, that one begins with the B. This one begins with the E. There were six of them jokers in the surrounding villages. There were also, because of course there were, Kirath Baal, that is Kirath Jerem, of course, and Rabbah, two towns in their surrounding villages. In the wilderness there were the towns of Beth, Arabbah, Midden, Zercah, Zebna, Zebshun, the Salt Sea, and Engadi, six towns with the surrounding villages. Here we go. But the tribe of Judah could not drive out the Jebusites who lived in the city of Jerusalem. So the Jebusites live among the people of Judah to this day. We finished it. Let me give you the rest of the story. The Jebusites did live in Jerusalem all the way until the time of David. When David came along, he saw the city of Jerusalem and he loved it. He loved where it was located, he loved everything about it. And I think God had put it on his heart to love it because that was going to be the center of Israel. And so he went and he took over the city of Jerusalem. He got rid of the Jebusites, and then it did eventually in the time of Judah, a few hundred years later, become all part of Israel. So I want to ask you this question as we finish. First of all, did you get any of those names right? But here's one that's a little more serious. I think God loves when we dream a long dream. I think that he loves when we have a long obedience in the same direction. And I want to ask you this. Have you been dreaming a dream for a long time? Have you been dreaming something and maybe to the point where you wonder, is it really going to happen? I wonder if Caleb thought that. Forty years is a long time. You imagine after 40 years, he watched all of his friends and family over a certain age pass away. All the people who maybe hoped God would change his mind. Only he didn't. And then eventually he saw his you know a mentor in his life, uh, someone that was just just so revered, Moses, pass away and wonder, Am I gonna live long enough? I've been dreaming this dream for 40 years. Am I going to be able to see God's plan? I know God said he would, but it sure has been a long time. I want to ask you this question. Do you feel like that? Do you feel like you've been dreaming a dream for a long time and you wonder if God's gonna be faithful? Well, I want to give you some good news, and that is this time is nothing to God. And when the time is right, he is ready to fulfill his promise. So don't let the passage of time stop you from believing that God is able and God is faithful. Because when the time is right, whatever God has put in your heart to dream, he will always fulfill. Let's pray together. God, thank you so much for your word. Thank you, God, that while those names are hard to say and I stumble over them a lot, every one of those names has a story, and it's a story of your faithfulness. And I can only imagine these slaves turn warriors as they are now settling into their land. Every one of those cities represented a kept promise by you. God, I'm thankful that you keep your promises, though they take a long time. I can't imagine how long it must have felt like for Caleb. It probably felt like a lot longer than 40 years. And I know maybe there's somebody listening or watching this that if it feels like they've been dreaming a dream for a long time. I pray you'll encourage them today to not stop dreaming, but to realize that if God is for us, nothing will stand against us, and you're always faithful to the end. In Jesus' name we pray. Amen. My hope for you is that as you end your time one day and you're telling your story to the next generation, you will say as Joshua did in Joshua 21, 45, he said, Not a single one of all the good promises that the Lord had given was left unfulfilled. Everything he had spoken came true. We're gonna take a few moments. We're gonna reflect on God's word together as the music plays, but I just want to encourage you to not give up. God is for you and not against you. And I will see you here tomorrow for Joshua chapter 15.