Clear Land for Yourselves

14The children of Joseph spoke to Joshua, saying, “Why have you given me just one lot and one part for an inheritance, since we are a numerous people, because Yahweh has blessed us so far?” 15Joshua said to them, “If you are a numerous people, go up to the forest, and clear land for yourself there in the land of the Perizzites and of the Rephaim; since the hill country of Ephraim is too narrow for you.” 16The children of Joseph said, “The hill country is not enough for us. All the Canaanites who dwell in the land of the valley have chariots of iron, both those who are in Beth Shean and its towns, and those who are in the valley of Jezreel.” 17Joshua spoke to the house of Joseph, that is, to Ephraim and to Manasseh, saying, “You are a numerous people, and have great power. You shall not have one lot only; 18but the hill country shall be yours. Although it is a forest, you shall cut it down, and it’s farthest extent shall be yours; for you shall drive out the Canaanites, though they have chariots of iron, and though they are strong.”

When a child is born, the parents must be faithful to the responsibility entrusted to them. While a mother carries her baby, the responsibility is entirely hers, but from the moment of birth, unless the whole family shares the roles and bears them together, the baby cannot be properly protected. Without anyone teaching them, babies meet people’s eyes, smile, eat, crawl, talk, and walk. Because every baby grows in such remarkably similar ways, mothers raising babies can share their experience and help one another.

Babies grow one stage at a time without knowing it. They respond to familiar voices and turn their heads toward the smell of their mother’s milk. Little by little they smile at faces they know, and they may push strangers away and cry. When they are hungry, they look for food, and when their diapers are wet, they cry to their mothers for help, so wonderfully that they seem to have been born knowing who will help them.

Protecting babies who depend on their parents by instinct, and showing them how to live in the world, are both the parents’ duty. So if there is even a one percent chance that something could harm a baby who can do nothing for themselves, parents must never do it. For if it harms the baby, a life born of love will in the end be made unhappy. Parents must teach their babies love by holding them often. They must speak kind words to them over and over and teach them what words mean and the range of human feeling. In other words, this is not about forcing things into a child, but about not missing what a baby must learn at each stage of growth.

Babies all grow in the same way, but the abilities and gifts that appear as they grow do not develop equally. Children differ in their talents, whether music, art, speech, or sport, so parents must watch closely to discover and develop the gifts each child has. They must help children make the most of their gifts so they can build a fine future, and instill in them sound values so that they can think and judge for themselves. They must also raise them to be people of good character, able to speak and act rightly in any situation. The person a child becomes at this stage seldom changes and shapes the rest of their life, which makes the parents’ responsibility all the greater.

Parents must also give their children opportunities to make their own way in the world, leading them gradually to independence. If parents still stand at the center of their children’s lives after they have grown, children who have never become independent in spirit will lack the ability to live on their own and will not be able to live their own lives. In infancy a parent’s protection is everything, but grown children must judge their own affairs, work through their own troubles, and learn life for themselves. If parents solve everything with their own strength, the child will become a weak person who cannot handle anything. Parents must keep this line clearly.

Parents raising children have a role and a calling: to help them depend on God, to teach them the Bible, to bring them to understand the word, and to instill in them the ability to break new ground in the world on their own. If parents love their children while drawing a line between where they must lead and where the child must live independently, they can build a household of faith that carries on from generation to generation. There is so much for parents to do as they raise children. They must teach a sincere and honest faith, help them think in healthy ways, and raise them to have hearts that are good and full of feeling.

God, as a Father, also wants you to become children with a mature faith. That is why he brings people across your path who can show you the good direction for your life, gives you wisdom to escape hardship, and has built up in you, through the experience of the years, the strength and ability to live on your own. That love becomes the strength by which you overcome the world. I pray you will never forget that you have abilities God has caused you to learn through people and circumstances, and that you will live with confidence.

Those who forget the grace God has given act haughtily, as if it had been their own ability from the start, and live proudly, as if they had always been wealthy. Thinking themselves superior in knowledge, they look down on their brothers and sisters, mock them, and judge them. So even if God wants to give them more wisdom and wealth, he cannot. This holds true not only before God but among people as well, for those who forget the kindness they have received from others turn arrogant and show the evil face of ingratitude.

God has two ways of dealing with those who have forgotten gratitude. He may leave their wicked hearts as they are and make them live a life that has nothing to do with salvation, or he may use hardship and trials that put them through the fire, the rod and discipline, to help them turn back to the good way.

You must confess to those who are weaker than you that you did not eat solid food from the start either, but that God waited for you a long time and encouraged you until you could. And you must humbly tell them that you were able to grow because, when you made foolish decisions, he showed you the right way again and again. When someone has this humility, God will entrust them with anything without holding back. Everyone grows by being broken and crushed through times like these. Someone who has grown well in faith rebukes a weaker believer who goes wrong and shows them the right way, and praises them warmly when they do well.

God helped Israel so that they would never forget the grace and miracles he had shown them and the joy of victory. He commanded them to teach the faith to their children in order to establish them as a people who would serve him generation after generation. But once life grew comfortable, Israel abandoned the God who had led them all the way, and abandoned Moses and Joshua too, who had taught them the word so faithfully and urged them so earnestly to live rightly.

We must learn to be grateful for the grace and love God pours out on us without ceasing, and to repay it by living it out. Those who will not give themselves sacrificially cannot be clothed in God’s grace. Without it they lose the strength and power to overcome the world, which leaves them unable to live as his people.

Joshua 17:15

15Joshua said to them, “If you are a numerous people, go up to the forest, and clear land for yourself there in the land of the Perizzites and of the Rephaim; since the hill country of Ephraim is too narrow for you.”

The descendants of Joseph formed two tribes, Ephraim and Manasseh, but when the land of Canaan was divided, they were given only one portion. When they did not receive a wide territory, they burst out in complaint. They had no gratitude toward the God who had led them so far, and so everything was a grievance to them. When they protested to Joshua that they were two tribes and asked how he could give them so little land, Joshua rebuked them: if the land was too small, they should go up into the forest and win land for themselves by war.

Their complaint against Joshua is not justified. According to the second census, which Moses took on the plains of Moab, the tribe of Manasseh numbered 52,700 and Ephraim 32,500. Since half the tribe of Manasseh was east of the Jordan, the half-tribe of Manasseh that had crossed the Jordan and the tribe of Ephraim together actually numbered fewer than the other tribes. Judah numbered 76,500, Dan 64,600, Issachar 64,300, and Zebulun 60,500, so the land the descendants of Joseph received was by no means small. What is more, the land allotted to them was the most fertile and choicest land west of the Jordan. Their present complaint to Joshua, then, was groundless.

With no heart to clear land for themselves, wanting a larger share so that they could live at ease, these people were full of greed. Set beside Caleb asking for the hill country of Hebron, the words of Joseph’s descendants show how little faith they had. Once in Canaan, it was only natural for God’s children to clear their own land. Yet they complained that their share was too small, which shows that human greed knows no end.

If Israel had the faith to conquer Canaan, God would readily help them take the land. The problem was that the Israelites no longer had any thought of fighting the Canaanites. Sadder still, because God had solved every difficulty for them until then, they came to think that conquering land in Canaan was not their work but God’s, something he ought to seize for them.

What is striking is this. God was patient and worked on their behalf, and after many twists and turns he brought Israel into the land of Canaan. Yet they thought all the credit was theirs: they had struggled to follow him this far, they had risked their lives on the battlefield, and they had waited patiently until peaceful times came. Small-minded and unable to see the larger picture, they never understood within what great design God had worked, or with what patience and love he had helped them, and in the end they spoke proud words.

When I counsel church members, there are times I sketch out the larger shape of a member’s life for them. Since I pray to God and pass it on with good intent, they do see their problems resolved. But it grieves me to see that once they get what they wanted, they are content and close their hearts to the pastor who led them there. Having achieved something small, they ought to keep growing within a larger plan, yet they stop where they are. Because they think the blessing they now stand in came from their own ability from the start, as if won by their own wisdom, they speak and act proudly without a second thought. This is true not only of pastors but of teachers and parents too. Once people have received every answer from God and settled into an easy life, they make the evil choice of treating carelessly those who still pray for them and counsel them as faithfully as ever.

Yet seen within the larger picture, it was the labor of the one who clung to God in prayer for them that enabled them to receive from God what they wanted. If they have grown to the point of praying to God directly, apart from the pastor, teacher, or parent who counseled them, that is indeed cause for joy. But growth in faith is possible because someone has interceded for them.

Joshua 17:16

16The children of Joseph said, “The hill country is not enough for us. All the Canaanites who dwell in the land of the valley have chariots of iron, both those who are in Beth Shean and its towns, and those who are in the valley of Jezreel.”

The descendants of Joseph offer an excuse that is hardly an excuse: they cannot conquer that hill country because the enemy has chariots of iron. Until now God had made them win every battle, and they had won by his grace rather than by their own swords. Yet they keep repeating that they cannot fight this war. It is like risking your life to rescue someone from drowning, only to have them complain that you came too late and say that if you had pulled them out a little sooner, they would not have caught a cold.

I am one of these people myself, of course, but I sometimes think the grace God gives to such wicked human beings is wasted on them. If he had simply kept them in Egypt as slaves forever; if he had not parted the Red Sea but made them suffer at the hands of the pursuing Egyptian army; if he had not given them manna in the wilderness and water from the struck rock but made them find their own; if he had not set up the bronze serpent when the fiery serpents came; if he had not parted the Jordan; if he had not brought down Jericho, then he would not have had to listen to their complaints.

Because they took for granted the grace of God that had brought them all the way to Canaan, they would not even think of fighting the chariots of iron. Instead they whine, asking God to conquer more land by his power and hand it over to them so that they can live in comfort.

Yet bringing them into Canaan was God’s grace, while living in Canaan was the task Israel now faced. In other words, God helped them within his great design for the sake of their own lives. They had not come to Canaan for God’s sake.

Israel is badly mistaken here. They think they never wanted this, that God dragged them to Canaan and they merely followed, so they complain at the smallest difficulty and say it is only right for God to help them. God had to overturn this way of thinking. He needed to teach them that all of this was their own life and the process of their salvation, and for that reason he gave them hardship. He put them through the fire to break their ungrateful hearts and make them hearts that could give thanks.

We too have entered a spiritual Canaan through the sacrifice of Jesus. God sacrificed himself and gave us salvation by that grace. He is the one who receives glory in himself and had no need to come to this earth, yet he came because he had compassion on souls fallen into death. And yet those who received salvation as a free gift now complain, asking for more land on which to live comfortably in the world, and have no thought of fighting the sin of the world.

God has worked in our lives all this time so that, with the experience we gained, we might overcome the world. Yet like the descendants of Joseph we complain: since you have come to our aid this far, fight the chariots of iron for us and give us wider land. God did not act for Israel and for his saints for his own sake. He did it so that, seeing the love he pours out, they would live mature lives as his children and receive a greater reward.

But because Israel tried to use God’s power to live comfortably in the world, they complained whenever they met a problem and made foolish decisions. Parents sacrifice themselves all their lives for their children so that the children can go out into the world with knowledge, wisdom, and the word and live boldly as God’s children. But if the children say that since their parents brought them into the world, of course they must teach them and of course they must support them, the parents will be crushed, because all those years of sacrifice and of giving their best will seem to have been for nothing.

Israel is now showing unbelief: they think they have no strength and so cannot fight the world. People like this will never succeed in life. Of course, the chariots of iron the Canaanites had were fearsome weapons. But if we fail to see God’s power, greater than the world’s chariots of iron, those chariots will look larger and more terrifying as time goes on.

You too will meet chariots of iron wherever you go: people, money, circumstances. Perhaps you think life is hard because of those chariots, and that you are not succeeding because you lack the strength to beat those who have them. But to think this way is itself a betrayal of God. If you believe that God has guarded your life until now and kept you so that you could live in this harsh world, then he will watch over the rest of your life as well.

If you look at the world’s chariots of iron through your own ability, knowledge, or possessions, you will never overcome them. Only when you see them through God’s power can you prevail. I have nothing. How could I ever stand against the chariots of iron that people in the world possess? With doubts and fears like these you will be defeated, but if you see the chariots of iron as toys, as God does, you can beat them easily. Of course, holding such faith is anything but easy. But since we cannot avoid every one of the countless chariots of iron we meet in life, we need to depend on the power of God, who in an instant covered the chariots of Pharaoh, a king of this world, with the Red Sea.

It is utterly shameless to do as Joseph’s descendants did: to be so afraid of chariots of iron that we will not even fight or stay faithful, and yet ask to be handed the land of Canaan for nothing. We must throw off the feeble faith that backs away, as they did, at the sight of chariots of iron. From now on, however many chariots of iron we meet, our resolve must be to drive them back by faith and conquer. We ought to show God the maturity of preparing our own land by our own strength.

You have lived by the word of truth, and God sees you as mature people who can clear any barren ground in the world for yourselves. He sees you not as babies who must be spoon-fed, but as grown children who know how to repay his love and grace. Just as Joshua told them that they would drive out the Canaanites, though they had chariots of iron and though they were strong, so God will encourage you that with your faith you can drive them out.

You can do it. With the faith you have, you can overcome the world. Now, holding fast to the holy word, I hope you will widen the land of faith yourselves, as God commands. Only the diligent can possess wide land. May you show your children the faith and power that is winning the battles of the world, so that they, too, can live driving out the chariots of iron.

Because God lives, there is nothing to fear. With the God who has led you this far beside you, you can win, however many chariots of iron there are. If you live for God’s glory, the world’s chariots of iron will break apart like toys. God does not fear chariots of iron, and neither need you. And since God says the battle is one he has already won, the battles of the world can be won if only you set your heart on it.

If you resolutely drive out the chariots of iron that have taken up residence in your heart, God will fill with grace the heart that has strained to live by faith. May you taste for yourselves how great that joy is, and come to know how peaceful the road is along which God leads. Then however the world attacks, your life will be at peace, and you will not be afraid in any situation.

May you always live by God’s grace and win great victories as his treasured saints. I bless you in the name of Jesus Christ.