Achan, Unchanged Even After Receiving Grace

1But the children of Israel committed a trespass in the devoted things; for Achan, the son of Carmi, the son of Zabdi, the son of Zerah, of the tribe of Judah, took some of the devoted things. Therefore Yahweh’s anger burned against the children of Israel. 19Joshua said to Achan, “My son, please give glory to Yahweh, the God of Israel, and make confession to him. Tell me now what you have done! Don’t hide it from me!” 20Achan answered Joshua, and said, “I have truly sinned against Yahweh, the God of Israel, and this is what I have done. 21When I saw among the plunder a beautiful Babylonian robe, two hundred shekels of silver, and a wedge of gold weighing fifty shekels, then I coveted them and took them. Behold, they are hidden in the ground in the middle of my tent, with the silver under it.” 22So Joshua sent messengers, and they ran to the tent. Behold, it was hidden in his tent, with the silver under it. 23They took them from the middle of the tent, and brought them to Joshua and to all the children of Israel. They laid them down before Yahweh. 24Joshua, and all Israel with him, took Achan the son of Zerah, the silver, the robe, the wedge of gold, his sons, his daughters, his cattle, his donkeys, his sheep, his tent, and all that he had; and they brought them up to the valley of Achor. 25Joshua said, “Why have you troubled us? Yahweh will trouble you today.” All Israel stoned him with stones, and they burned them with fire and stoned them with stones. 26They raised over him a great heap of stones that remains to this day. Yahweh turned from the fierceness of his anger. Therefore the name of that place was called “The valley of Achor” to this day.

The Israelites marched around Jericho for seven days, as God had commanded. The priests blew the rams’ horn trumpets, and the armed men advanced ahead of the priests and the ark, ready to die. As they had been told, the people said nothing at all, neither words of hope for a miracle nor words of complaint. Their silence had a reason: God’s work has no need of human words.

Achan, too, was marching around Jericho with his mouth shut alongside everyone else, so to others he must have looked like a man obeying the word. But Achan was already planning what he would do the moment the walls fell.

Both the Israelites and the people of Jericho heard the trumpets the priests were blowing, but the hearts of those listening were as far apart as heaven and earth. Jericho was gripped by fear and dread, since no one there knew when the attack would come. Israel, already told everything by God, was eager and expectant. Now the trumpets needed only to sound, and Israel would enter the city and see God’s work with their own eyes.

In the same way, Jesus said that no one, not even he himself, knows the time of his return. Yet he promised that he will surely come again. Those who take Jesus at his word can live in peace in this life, helped by the Holy Spirit, because if they are living by faith it makes no difference when he comes. But those whose faith is uncertain, who cannot fully believe the word, will live each day in unease, like the people of Jericho, counting the days until his coming. That kind of faith will not be blessed even when Jesus comes.

The fall of Jericho was a miracle brought about by a people who gave themselves to obeying two commands: to circle the city in silence for six days, and to shout on the seventh. In the same way, we live the life of faith for six days, and on the seventh, brothers and sisters in the faith gather in one place to worship God in the Spirit and in truth. Yet being human, we cannot help building up a wall of sin over those six days, and it is through the worship we offer God that the wall comes down.

It therefore matters a great deal that we live by faith through those six days, lest the wall of sin rise again. If our six days are no different from the lives of worldly people, then rather than enjoying the grace God gives, we must first repent to tear down the walls we have built in the world, and we are left repeating the cycle of sin and repentance like the people in the days of the judges. But if we strive to live holy lives for six days, the worship we offer on the seventh can be whole worship, in which we meet God. This is the living sacrifice offered by a holy life.

Being comfortable thanks to one’s many possessions in the world is not the same as being at peace in spirit because one has understood God’s will through the word. Worldly wealth has its appointed end, but spiritual peace lasts forever.

Joshua 6:27

27So Yahweh was with Joshua; and his fame was in all the land.

Joshua believed God’s promise, and that belief made him bold before the surging Jordan and before the massive walls of Jericho. When the Jordan parted and laid bare dry ground, and when Jericho fell, he was always at peace, for his faith did not waver. Knowing that God is almighty and keeps his promises, he trusted God with all his heart, and God exalted him. Had Joshua not believed the word and kept doubting whether the river would part or the walls would fall, he would have been filled with worry and anxiety right up to the moment he saw the miracle.

But since he took it as given that God works for everyone who believes in him, Joshua was thinking less about the answer he would receive than about how he, as leader, should act once he had received it. That is why, when Jericho fell, he could boldly command the people to go into the fallen city.

I hope that you, too, will not be taken up only with receiving answers as you go through life, but will think hard about how to return each answer to God as glory. Only by living by faith can you mature, and only then can God trust you.

Unlike Joshua, who showed his faith, Achan entered fallen Jericho, saw the miracle, and did the evil thing of turning that miracle into an opportunity for himself. If we judge his character by how he broke God’s command and took the goods after entering Canaan, he was probably a wicked man from the start.

Achan had seen the spies come back from exploring the land of Canaan and complain that, compared with its people, they were as feeble as grasshoppers and could not go in. He had also watched as their fathers came under God’s anger for their unbelief and spent forty years suffering in the wilderness, shut out of Canaan. Having seen all this, perhaps Achan had learned that God’s commands must be obeyed, and he would have known well what judgment falls on those who disobey. Seen this way, Achan might seem to have had quite a mature faith. More likely, though, he simply resented being stuck in the wilderness because of others who had not obeyed God’s word. For his desire to hurry into Canaan, flowing with milk and honey, and live well there, rather than stay in that grueling wilderness, was strong.

As I always tell you, and as the apostle Paul taught, those who have not died in the Lord never change. I hope you will keep this in mind as you hear this sermon. Achan had met firsthand the God who was leading Joshua and Israel. Had he lived as one dead in God, he would never have committed the sin of stealing, however dazzling the gold, the silver, and the robe he saw. He belonged to the people of the God who moves heaven and earth to do his work, so Jericho had already fallen without his stealing a thing. And because Canaan belonged to Israel, he could have possessed far better things than gold, silver, and a robe.

That is why the only way for sinners like us to be born again is to die in Christ. If Achan had believed God, he could have shared in the blessing Joshua enjoyed without grasping for anything. God would have exalted Achan as he exalted Joshua, and had Achan only changed his mind, he would have been blessed both in this world and in heaven. But his sin made his whole family suffer judgment with him. He stole only a little, yet Achan lost everything he owned and even the lives of his family.

If you and I do not live as those who have died in Christ, we can only remain sinners forever. Those who press on believing that God will lead, believing that God will provide, and believing that God will work, can receive his blessing and enjoy it. Perhaps no one was angrier than Achan when the Reubenites, the Gadites, and the half-tribe of Manasseh announced, before Israel entered Canaan, that they would take the land east of the Jordan. Even in his own eyes it was good land for livestock and a fine place to raise little ones, and that is what angered him. But believing Canaan to be a far better place, he must have been able to hold himself back.

When the Jordan parted, the most excited of all those crossing was probably Achan. What thrilled him was not gratitude for God’s amazing grace but the prospect of entering Canaan, full of food and wealth. He ought to have helped the children and women who were falling behind, worn out, but he would more likely have scolded them for not walking faster. Blinded to God’s grace by his greed, he must have been impatient to get into Canaan quickly, even if it meant leaving the weak behind.

Would it not have been wonderful if his trust in God and his love for him had been as steady as his greed? Some of you may think I am making Achan out to be too wicked, when I hardly know the man. But Achan watched Jericho fall and saw God keep every promise he had made to Joshua, and still chapter 7, verse 1 records his sin. From that we can infer what kind of man he was.

When they had entered Canaan and the manna stopped, Joshua and the others would have worried about where their next meal was coming from. Achan, on the other hand, likely believed that God had promised them Canaan, flowing with milk and honey, and that now that they were in the land, they would prosper. To others, this side of Achan may even have looked like strong faith. Those who saw only his outward appearance might well have respected him as a man who trusted the promise.

But when he was alone, Achan would have complained against God for making them circle Jericho for seven days instead of acting quickly. Since they had the commander of Yahweh’s army on their side and had been circumcised as the word commanded, they would win if they simply marched on Jericho, so why waste time going around the city for nothing? That was how he thought. Achan also poured out his discontent to his family, saying that God, Joshua, the commander of Yahweh’s army, and the people of Israel were all fools. He was so convinced that he alone judged rightly and was wise that he probably shared his thoughts with his family, and his children likely took their father’s side.

When we see how readily Achan’s children, too, threw away God’s grace, we must always be watchful and careful, because sin is sure to spread. God does not put children to death for their father’s sin. Each one dies for their own sin. Achan’s sons and daughters must also have joined in their father’s thinking and poured out their grumbling against God and Joshua. At that moment they were sure their own thinking and judgment were right, and so they became one in sin.

Joshua’s failure to judge as wisely as they did must have frustrated them. With Jericho full of gold, silver, and treasure for the taking once it fell, they would have found it absurd that he was still only circling the city. Yet as Achan marched around the city, he kept his mouth shut and blended in with the others, pretending to obey the word and pretending to be holy, so no one rebuked him, and he was able to enter the city.

If only Joshua had caught this wicked heart early, perhaps the whole family would not have had to suffer the sorrow of being wiped out. But now there is no chance left for them. Seeing Achan’s tragic end, we must always guard our words and deeds, knowing that because of us our families, or those beside us, can go down to death.

In chapter 7, Joshua attacked the small city of Ai, and when he suffered a heavy defeat, he prayed to God and learned that the cause of the defeat was Achan’s sin. Joshua and the Israelites found the things that Achan, a descendant of Zerah, had hidden. Then they took him, his sons and daughters, and everything that belonged to him to the valley of Achor, stoned them, and raised a great heap of stones over them. In this way Israel came to face an event that brought misery upon the whole nation.

Achan, who had planted his wicked thoughts in his sons and daughters, was put to death with his beloved children in the valley of Achor. He had come all the way to Canaan to live well, but in the end he died without enjoying the blessing God had prepared for him. Had Achan’s children confronted their father’s false faith, the God who spared even Rahab the prostitute would have spared them.

Again and again the Bible tells us how dreadful the consequences can be when we harbor discontent and deceit toward God and toward his servant. Because the thoughts of parents pass on to their children, parents must always prepare themselves in prayer to discern God’s will. If parents act contrary to God’s will, the children they raise will not learn his will from them either, and in the end they will go down to death.

Joshua 6:18

18But as for you, only keep yourselves from what is devoted to destruction, lest when you have devoted it, you take of the devoted thing; so you would make the camp of Israel accursed, and trouble it.

In 6:18, God commanded that when they entered Jericho they must take nothing at all, since everything in it had been devoted to God and was his. The reason was that if anyone took for themselves what belonged to God, even if only one person did it, he would count all Israel as having sinned.

This word is a warning not to covet even when a lump of gold lies before our eyes. Achan, of course, did not listen, because greed had blinded him: although God had said that his sin would bring disaster on all Israel, he stole all the same.

The greatest problem here is that Achan thought God would not know about his sin. What is so sad is that all the wealth spread across Canaan would have belonged to Israel if only they had obeyed the word. Yet Achan could not give up his greed to make things his own, and so he would not listen, even though it was God’s word. But God’s command had been proclaimed, and whether one sinned blinded by greed, out of discontent, or because one could not lay down one’s own righteousness, the price of breaking the word would surely be paid. Dreadful as this is, people defy the word all too easily, thinking it has no immediate effect on them.

Achan must have fought harder than anyone, eager to seize more wealth quickly once inside the fallen city. When the battle was won, what caught his eye was not the grace of God, who had worked for them all the way to this point, but the glittering world the Canaanites lived in. God had said they must never take the things that were to be devoted to him, but the beautiful robe and the gold and silver right before his eyes smothered his faith. Hiding the goods in his tent, far from repenting, he felt safe, since no one had caught him. It never occurred to him that God was watching everything he did. He did not know that though he could deceive Joshua, he could never deceive God.

When we see Joshua later weeping and praying before God, it seems that no one had seen Achan steal. That makes it all the sadder. Had people caught him, they would have helped him repent, and though he would have been severely rebuked, he and his children would not have been put to death. In this life there are cases that look like perfect crimes, for people count as sin only the sins that come to light.

But for those who believe in God and live by that faith, there is no such thing as a perfect crime. People who had not seen Achan steal could be fooled, but God was watching every breath he took, so Achan could never deceive him. How can a human being deceive God the Creator? From Achan we can learn that however we justify our actions, if God calls it sin, it is sin.

When people who have sinned make their confession, they say that after sinning they were so troubled that they wanted to leave the place of sin and turn back. But they never took that step of faith and never left the place of sin, and that is how sin swallowed them up. We must therefore hold fast to God’s word from the very beginning, and discipline ourselves and bring ourselves into submission in order to live by it.

If we obey God’s command, though we may feel we are losing out, in the end we can have everything; if we defy it, though we may seem to have everything, in the end we will have nothing at all. Achan’s family, who had depended on him alone and come with him all the way to Canaan, were buried with him in the valley of Achor. For Israel, who had come all that way together, there could be no greater misfortune.

I hope you will look into your own heart now. Let us each ask whether we are still clinging to sin because we have not given up a heart like Achan’s, whether we are forever calculating with God, judging and criticizing with a hardened heart. If there is such a heart in you, may you be the first to throw that sinful heart into the valley of Achor. If there is an Achan within you, I would ask you to pray for the strength to master the sinful desire to steal what is God’s. Then, even when Satan tempts you, you will be able to overcome.

Whether we live as Joshua did, honored in the place of leadership and enjoying blessing, or as Achan did, failing to withstand Satan’s attack, sinning, and coming under judgment, the choice is ours. God has already won. He has conquered Canaan, and as the King of Israel he is protecting us. Whether we receive and enjoy that love or receive judgment instead, all of it is our choice.

I hope you will not miss the blessings God gives, but enjoy them. May you drive out Achan and live as God’s people, trusting in God together with Joshua. Then God will entrust you with a greater calling and fill your life with blessing. I pray that you will never take Achan’s foolish seat, sinning and bringing ruin on your whole family, but will be faithful to death and never leave the place of blessing, where God’s grace is yours to enjoy in full.

God has already given every one of us the blessings of heaven. So may you always live in his peace. I bless you in the name of Jesus Christ.