Joshua 7: Sin in the Camp

Theological Proposition/Focus: Sin is contrary to God and as such God will use his blessings and lack thereof the root out sin

Homiletical Proposition/Application: The follower of Christ must ruthlessly root out sin and ask God to eliminate it from their life.

Introduction:

Setting the Stage:

The city of AI was a small fortress that stood 2 miles from Jericho.

In fact, Archeology suggests that the city was essentially uninhabited at this time but rather possibly the old walls were used as an almost temporary stronghold for the surrounding population.

One challenge is explaining the king of AI mentioned in Joshua 8. It may refer to just the ruler of that small group of people. The NIV discusses 12,000 people but it could also be 12 family clans.

Body

Reality: Sin often catches its prey when they least expect it (1-5).

After a stunning victory in Jericho, everyone was eagerly anticipating what would happen next. The next city on the march into Canaan was the city of AI and Israel was anxious to see a great victory here as well. The only problem was that sin is insidious, sin can sneak in when we least expect it and bring with it horrible devastation. In the case of Israel, sin in the camp brought about defeat and loss of life. The momentous victory of Jericho was dwarfed by the devastating defeat in AI. In order to understand this pendulum swing, we must understand how sin entered and took hold in the camp.

The first sin we see is

Achan's sin of commission

The text conveys the idea that in the midst of the great victory in Jericho there is a hidden problem. Something that Joshua does not know has happened. Something that is going to be devastating. A particular man, Achan, went against God's command to devote all of Jericho to the Lord through destruction. Achan, it seems had claimed some of the spoils of war for himself. What's more is that

Achan's sin became Israel's sin.

The entire nation was held accountable for the sin of one individual. This is an important principle. God expects his people to be disciplined and at times holds all his people accountable for the failure of one. A similar situation arises in

1 Cor. 5 we see this especially in verse 6

We often believe that our sin is our own sin, that our sin affects nobody but ourselves. I want to tell you that this is not the case. Our sin can have devastating consequences for those who we hold dear.

Moving onward, I believe that we often put a lot of blame on Achan, and Achan deserves a lot of blame, but Achan is not the only person who made a mistake here.

Joshua's Sin

The text does not directly say that Joshua sinned so I want to be careful not to assign too much blame, but at the same time, Joshua is the leader and leaders are judged by stricter standards. The problem is that

Nothing in the text suggests that Joshua went to God in prayer or dependence.

It seems that Joshua, in a state of overconfidence set out under his own power to win this victory.

Overconfidence can be devastating, we must realize that

Image: Failure often comes from multiple attacks together with overconfidence the crash of AA 1420.

Upon touching down on the runway the airplane began sliding, sliding off the end of the runway colliding with a structure and breaking apart.

The point of this story is that at any point, had the crew stopped and asked if they had made any mistakes they would have noticed the problems. Instead, the crew was overconfident and rushed without taking the time to check themselves. The results were devastating.

MTR: Take time right now, search for sin, and confess sin to God?

Sin is a reality for each and every one of us. We live in a fallen world and we ourselves are fallen. What I want to do now as we move through Joshua 7 is talk about how we can respond to that reality. Let's look at verses 6-9.

Response to Reality: The wrong response to the reality of sin often involves blaming God (6-9).

Joshua's initial response of going to God was good, his statements to God need some work.

Joshua's words reveal that he was blaming God -> that's bad

In these verses, I see essentially three errors that Joshua makes in his response to God.

These responses blame God and are actually very self-centered.

These responses to sin do not talk about the failure but rather what we did and what happened to us. In other words these responses are self-centered in that they fail to demonstrate humility but rather a sort of arrogance that blames God.

MTR: Ask yourself, how do I respond to sin in a self-centered way?

Example: God please give me victory over this sin instead of God you have already won the victory over this sin.

I love God's response to Joshua "Get up!"

Response to Reality: The proper response to the reality of sin is an invitation to God (10-18).

We like to think that we are masters of our own life. But I want to remind you of something

God is qualified to identify sin.

We are not even qualified to identify sin. Ultimately, sin is against God and so it is God who can identify it.

Notice the move from general to specific

Until this was resolved, the sin of one person was considered sin by the entire nation.

Next God provides the steps through which Israel can solve this problem. I want you to notice that

God cares more about a real solution than a quick fix. (13)

God could have immediately identified Achan as the problem but instead, he tells the people to consecrate themselves. To prepare themselves.

I think consecration this does two things

Consecration gives Achan time to repent.

Unfortunately, Achan did not repent and so we next see that

God is qualified to identify the sinner

Look at what happens, little by little the people are funneled down until only Achan and his family remains.

Image: Web MD - we like to think we are all sorts of qualified

We need to remember that only God is qualified to deal with sin. I am reminded of conversations I have had with Emily and various physicians I have known about Web MD or other medical diagnostic websites. These websites can be both a great help and a huge hurdle.

A patient walks into their doctor's office and informs the doctor that they believe they have a rare African disease. The doctor asks the patient why and the patient tells the doctor because all their symptoms match the symptoms they found on web MD. The doctor asks the patient if they have ever been to Africa to which the patient responds oh no, never, but I am sure I have it. The problem, the patient believes they are an expert on something they are not.

The expert on our sinful condition is God, we need to go to him for our diagnosis.

Response to Reality: Ruthlessly eliminate sin from your life (19-26).

Sin is sin against God.

These same steps are present in Eden (Gen 3:6) and David with Bathsheba (2 Sam. 11:2-4)

These steps of sin are fundamentally against God for they declare that what God has given is not sufficient. Within Achan, we see the same sin that lies within each of us.

Sin must be laid out before the Lord.

The solution to sin is to lay it out before God. Only God can take care of our sin problem.

Sin must be recognized and responded to for the trouble it brings.

It is interesting that while Achan does confess he sinned, there is no sign of remorse or asking for forgiveness. Achen simply states that he committed the act. The solution to this sin problem is the complete destruction of Achan and all that belonged to him. Why his son's and his daughters?

Deut. 24:16 declares that sons are not put to death because of their fathers.

Hence, I suspect that his sons were accomplices. It is interesting that his wife is not mentioned. Perhaps she was not involved or perhaps Achan was a widower. We simply do not know. The key here is that the solution to sin is the elimination of sin.

Image: Repairing rust on a car, cut it out!

I have a truck that has some rust. I will tell you that there are parts where I did the repair right, and parts where I need to redo the repair. You see, if you don't completely cut out the rust, it comes back. In order to repair the rust on a vehicle you must cut deep, cut hard, and grind out any hint at rust.

MTR: Ruthlessly eliminate sin from your life.

We need to be ruthless with sin. If you struggle with alcohol get rid of it, if you struggle with lust ruthlessly invite someone to hold you accountable. Remember

Matthew 5:29-30

We are not to take this literally but rather to understand that this is how seriously we should take sin.