The God Who Tested Israel

When all the elders who had served alongside Joshua had died, the people did not drive out the Canaanites but settled among them. God used the nations that remained as instruments to train Israel, and Israel took their daughters as wives, served their gods, and slowly crumbled.

It was a rod that would never have been needed had they driven those nations out from the beginning, as they were commanded. God tested his people because, watching them do what was right in their own eyes, he longed for them to turn back. Daniel passed through the same test. Knowing he would be thrown into the lions’ den, he still opened his windows toward Jerusalem and prayed, and God shut the lions’ mouths and spared his life.

Even the temple and long years of faith can be shaken when the test comes. Yet had they obeyed from the start, grace and rest would have been theirs, and God is with those who endure to the end. Daniel’s confession, “If I perish, I perish,” must become the confession of those who believe today.