His Promise!
- May 9, 2025
- 6 min read
We said last week, Joshua’s overarching theme is 'God’s Faithfulness.' This we said speaks of PARTNERSHIP (see last week's blog).
Reading - Joshua 1:1;7-9
God’s faithfulness is also seen through His PROMISE
This book emphasises the roles of faith and obedience in securing victory and receiving God’s promised blessings. This promise was 500 years in the waiting! God had spoken to Abraham, “to your offspring I will give this land” (Gen 12:7)... Now they’re on the edge of that promise.
The land promised to their forefathers was right ahead of them. “Joshua – be strong and courageous because YOU will lead these people to inherit the land, I swore to their forefathers to give them” (v6). Wow!
Did you know, the whole of the ‘Promised Land’ (approx’ 300,000 square miles) has never been taken, from that day to this. They only claimed about 30,000 of it! They were given as much as they were willing to claim (v3). The only limit was their faith! Same is true with us!
The extent of how much of God’s plan we see fulfilled in our lives is based on His power and sovereignty but also our willingness to do His will.
Israel is facing a most momentous experience, which literally sets the scene for the rest of their lives. (Check out Psalm118, which records two major scenes in the life of Israel, crossing the Red Sea and crossing the Jordan!)
Do you know, unbelief cost so many everything! As a result, they missed out on the blessing of God. That generation of Israel that came out of Egypt doubted God, and never entered the Promise. All died except Caleb and Joshua.
What is interesting is they believed His promise enough to come out of Egypt, but not enough to enter Canaan. How sad not to believe God enough to enter the promise!
What are you not believing God enough for?
So, after 40 yrs, the Israelites are on the verge of entering the Promise.
However, notice that God’s promise comes with a condition (see vs7-9). Joshua and the people must be careful to obey God’s word.
The commands are simple: Know it! (v7). Share it! (v8a). Meditate on it! (v8b). Live it! (v8c).
We need to LIVE by design not default! How many of us as God's people have the mistaken idea that salvation, being delivered from the bondage of Egypt, is all that is involved in the Christian life? Being saved is just the beginning.
In spiritual growth and in service for the Lord, how many still need to claim the PROMISE, and apply the word that God spoke: yet, " ...There remains yet very much land to be possessed" (Josh 13:1).
John MacArthur writes, “Israel had travelled down the dead-end road of popular opinion already and it cost them almost forty years.”
God’s Faithfulness speaks of POWER!
“Have I not commanded you? Only you be strong and very courageous. Do not be afraid; do not be discouraged, for the Lord your God will be with you wherever you go” (Josh 1:9).
Three times God says, “Be strong and courageous” in this chapter. Each time God gives the command to Joshua, He gives a reason why –
a) The people will inherit the land (I’ll keep my promises through you)
b) I’m the one who has commanded you (I know what I’m doing)
c) I will be with you wherever you go (I’ve got this)
“Be strong and courageous”. The word “strong” comes from twisting ropes together, and “courageous” means to persist and conquer.
In Joshua 1:7, God tells Joshua, “only be strong and very courageous.” The use of “only” has the idea of the “only thing to be done”, and “very” means, “abundantly or exceedingly.”
The word “only,” one writer translates it as “just one thing.”
G. H. Morrison said, “The victorious Christian life is a series of new beginnings.”
It’s a time for new beginnings, of breaking out of the confines of the past (wilderness), from shattered dreams and the might-have-beens’ that can imprison us and stunt our growth. Power to be - God's agent of change.
God is telling Joshua that he can have courage because He has already guaranteed victory. God had given the land to the people. It’s theirs! It wouldn’t be easy, but Joshua would succeed by the power of God.
Maybe we need to discover that “new thing” which God wants to do with us, or become what God was creating us to be!
We may feel beaten, battered, bruised, but God promises something entirely new and radically different, and a release from the past.
For us to truly reclaim the future, we must come back to God. There is no limit to God’s restoring love. From what many would consider to be a hopeless situation, God can restore a family, a church, a nation. It’s His story of reclaiming the future! How is that to happen in your own life? In your family life? In your work life? Church life?
What do you believe about the life God wants for you? What is it that you need to overcome in order to get there?
God’s Faithfulness speaks of POSSESSION
"Every place that the sole of your foot will tread upon I have given you" (Josh 1:3).
The thing is, the Promised Land had already been given to them, their task was to take possession of it.
To the whole nation He promised,"Every place where you set your foot will be yours." (Deut 11:24). The setting of feet would occupy the land. It was to step into enemy territory and conquer it. So, it is in our lives He must come and occupy enemy territory. It’s living a life of integrity, constantly clearing out the rubbish from the cellars of our lives.
Joshua 2:9-11 reveals that the land had virtually been theirs for 40 years. It was just waiting to be possessed. Although it is promised, it wasn’t theirs until they possessed it.
Do you realise, that from the moment of salvation, God has provided each believer with every spiritual blessing and provision? “Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who has blessed us with every spiritual blessing in the heavenly places in Christ.” (Eph 1:3).
Have you received them, or are possessing them?
But as the book of Joshua makes clear, having title deeds to the land (or blessings in Christ) does not mean we’ll be without struggles and problems.
The life of victory isn’t a life of perfection, but of growing in grace and gaining victories over unconquered areas in our own life. How is it, that after receiving such a promises (vs7&9) we can still have doubts and prefer to stay as we are and not move on to possessing what He has.
Notice that verses 12-13 actually refer to land on the wrong side of the Jordan, and some of the tribes wanted to stay there! This wasn’t the Promised Land. No doubt it was good land, fertile, close to the river, but it wasn’t what God had given to them, or what He wanted them to POSSESS.
Can you imagine what that must feel like? On the verge of the PROMISED Land yet they’d got stuck! Simply, satisfied with staying just as they were.
Warren Wiersbe writes ,“When you walk by faith, you will claim all that God has for you, but unbelief is always content to settle for something less than God’s best.”
Where have we settled for less than God’s best?
With the Promised Land in sight, they give up, shut down, moments away from victory! How many end up here in the ‘didn’t quite make it’ category?
I also accept that the future may look more daunting than exciting to some because you were expecting something else! So, I’m asking you not to allow anything to stop you from taking possession all that God has for you.
‘You are more than you have become!'
Perhaps just stop for a moment and allow yourself to hear the promises of God on and over your life, and then step out with your eyes fixed on Him.
Corrie Ten Boom said, “Never be afraid to trust an unknown future to a known God.”
Comments