24:1-2 God initiated a historic journey. Joshua relates a message from God to the elders of Israel: this covenant began even before Abraham. God was with previous generations, establishing and preparing a covenant to bring to future generations.
24:3 God has been moving this group, and all of humanity, lovingly toward Him. Toward home. To willing participants, God is offering His Hand. He is offering to separate us from enemy and strife. He is offering to be a foundation for peace, a vehicle to abundance.
24:4-6 We have followed this family, our spiritual ancestors, since the start of their story on earth. God has brought increase to every family which will love and follow His philosophy. He has ensured space for these families to grow and thrive and praise.
God blesses with abundance and also the capability to maintain abundance. Large families need large homes and land areas. Peaceful people need protection and direction against opposition. God provides it all.
This verse speaks of an incredible journey. A lifetime of miracle and fulfillment. Even if we journey back to the pages on which it all was written, what occurred cannot be contained in a book. This philosophy of God is a lifestyle. His love expands life, love, laughter, hope and wisdom. From enslavement we arrive at a free people. God is the connection. The direction. The way and will from one to the other.
Abraham was willing to trust and love this beautiful Creator. Isaac was willing to follow and meditate on the philosophy of our brilliant spiritual Father. Family after family continued this covenant with God and now, with Joshua, we see a generation born knowing nothing other than the love and comfort and blessing of God. A desolate people is giving birth to a generation of babies blessed with freedom and abundance, hope and security.
6:7 God speaks here: I brought you out. God pulls us each out of the mud and cleans us off. He removes us from the quagmire and places us on solid ground. From the quagmire to a desert classroom. From a desert classroom, a graduation into a spiritual utopia.
24:8 The children of Israel witnessed God's triumphant, effortless, actions on their behalf. Fierce enemies made to cower and flee. Land cleared out for them to enter and establish as home.
24:9-10 And while they journey, and listened, and learned and followed and dealt with the everyday, day-to-day, circumstances of life... God protected their exterior. God blocked the enemy from penetrating the sphere of protection. Without even realizing they were being plotted against, the children of Israel fretted over lesser things. God protects us even from what we do not see being planned behind our backs, against our home.
He takes ownership ownership of all sides and aspects of our lives when we are willing to be obedient to His organization.
24:11-12 Huge, fierce nations and their armies united against the children of Israel and God diminished them all. In case you have not realized, this speech proclaims, you all have been living a blessed life. Not a coincidence. Not a lucky life. A blessed life.
The planet Jupiter is unreachable, almost inconceivable to the human eye and even perception. Yet the giant planet is our protector in the sky, absorbing with its gravity much of the space debris that would knock out our much tinier planet. It's possible that we might have been destroyed many times over if not for the fantastic, blessed circumstance of Jupiter's exact placement in our solar system.
Just as surely as God precisely placed each atom in our universe, Jupiter in our sky, He also protects us from the debris we do not see hurdling toward us. God is present even in the places we do not realize He is there. He is present when we remember Him. He is present when we forget Him. His is actively working on protecting and propelling our lives in ways we never realized we needed.
24:13 The children of Israel moved into cities build by their enemies. After the arduous work of the spiritual journey through the desert, God ensured rest as the destination. God does not want us to exert ourselves on things He can easily accomplish. He wants us to put all of our effort into hearing Him. Seeing Him. Understanding Him.
You see, God can do so much on our behalf: He can call into existence the conditions and materials and opportunities and space we need to live, grow and thrive. But He cannot call into existence our love for Him or our understanding of His philosophy. Love and understanding must be born and grown and maintained.
We were made in His image. Our purpose on earth is to properly reflect that image. Our purpose is to spiritually be of and like our Father, not just look like Him. As long as we are working on that, on our souls, He's going to construct everything else.
Because God is like one of those magical mirrors in fairy-tales. When we stand in front of a mirror, we see our external body. When God looks, He sees right into our soul. He can see if we are hard at work in there. Building compassion. Fostering peace and patience. Meditating on His philosophy. And if we are busy in there, He's going to do for us what needs to be done out there. He does not expect us to carry the burden of doing both.
If we, spiritually, become a person who can maintain great blessings then He supplies the great blessings. Great blessings come with great responsibility. Great responsibility comes with the need for a great capacity of patience, wisdom, strength, and faith. We build those things within us.
He's helping on both sides. He's in the classroom; He's in the learning. He is present and providing in the desert. But He is also present on the other side, on the destination. As we prepare, He prepares. And then the preparation converges. Here on earth Jeremiah 29:11, and in heaven as well, John 14:13.
Jeremiah 29:11
For I know the thoughts that I think toward you, says the Lord, thoughts of peace and not of evil, to give you a future and a hope.
John 14:13
And if I go and prepare a place for you, I will come again and receive you to Myself; that where I am, there you may be also.
24:14 Joshua speaks: “Now therefore, fear the Lord, serve Him in sincerity and in truth, and put away the gods which your fathers served on the other side of the River and in Egypt. Serve the Lord!"
Fear a life away from God. Fear a life outside of God. Fear a life in opposition to God. Because life away from, outside of and in opposition to God is a desolate life.
Serve Him sincerely and truthfully. Jeremiah 17:10 God knows your heart; He has examined it. If faith is inauthentic it is false. Commitment is reinforced by every detail. every detail. Every action. Every thought and word and interaction.
2 Corinthians 2:9 encourages us to be willing givers. To give out of a need and desire to help and gift others. Acting solely on duty or obligation or desire for reward does not count. Love is the same. Love Him cheerfully. Serve Him cheerfully because through servitude He establishes you as royalty, Matthew 23:12.
Serve Him exclusively. We cannot serve two masters: Matthew 6:24. We can only be truly, faithfully loyal to one Entity. Ensure that it is Him. Not some coveted thing, not some mortal celebrity not some selfish vanity. Fiercely, decidedly swipe all of the idols off the shelf of your heart and soul. Make room for one King, our King. Those inanimate things will not and cannot do for you what He can and will do.
And again: Serve the Lord. Our obedience allows God to perfectly direct our steps. When God gives an order, it is for our betterment. It is the emphatically direct us toward our blessing. Toward fulfillment.
24:15 Joshua leaves it with this: each individual can make a choice about Who/what they will faithfully follow. Will you serve an idol? Will you serve money? Will you serve vanity? Will you serve vengeance? Will you serve habit? Lust, desire?
24:16-18 Joshua's audience verbally profess their servitude to God. But will they actually live it? Joshua is sincere: he has lived a full life of loving God emphatically and listening to Him obediently.
The children of Israel have a history of completely abandoning God. Abraham did not. Isaac did not. Jacob did not. Moses did not. Joshua did not. When they proclaim to serve the Lord they mean for life. For eternity. Faithfully, in every moment and heartbeat. And if there truly are wings in heaven, every wing-beat.
24:19-20 But you can't serve Him if you're not serving Him... common sense right? But apply that to life, to every moment and decision and action and word and thought. Is is done, spoken, decided, thought in service of His will? Because if we are not serving Him in those little moments, we aren't serving Him in life.
God cannot lead a disobedient child. He cannot lead a child into blessing if the blessing is to the right and the child takes a left.
24:21 Joshua is skeptical of their authenticity: do they really love and trust God? They proclaim that they do. Will they go wayward after Joshua's death? (Spoiler alert: Yes! Very!)
Taking the lessons and love out of scripture only matter if they are taken back out into life. This chapter only changes a life if it is absorbed by a life.
24:22 Joshua tells the children of Israel that they have witnessed themselves commit to God. Should they break this covenant, it is their own fault. They are fully aware of the conditions on their life is places. They have accepted the responsibility.
24:23-25 The covenant is solidified as the children of Israel promise to be obedient students, children of God and to nothing else.
24:26-28 Joshua obediently, lovingly, perfectly carries out his last service to God. The children of Israel are sent back to their respective lands. Joshua places stone evidence of the covenant created with the words in the God's book of moral law.
24:29 Joshua fulfilled his purpose and, in his own words, goes the way of all the earth. He passes on into Spirit. He is buried within the border of his land inheritance, in the mountains of Ephraim.
24:31 The covenant God created through Joshua thrived during his life and after his life during the lives of the elders who lived during his command.
24:32 The children of Israel brought Joseph's bones out of Egypt (for he is a child of God, not an Egyptian) and bury him at Shechem, the land his father bought from Hamor, Genesis 33:19.
24:33 Eleazar, grandson of Aaron, also passes away. He was a leader and organizer of the faith on earth. He is buried in the land of his son, Phinehas.
