Rensselaer Semi-Weekly Republican, Volume 40, Number 18, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 8 November 1907 — Joshua Renewing the Covenant With Israel [ARTICLE]

Joshua Renewing the Covenant With Israel

; Sunday School Lesson for Not. 18,19*7 Specially Prepared for This Paper

LESSON TEXT.—Joshua 24:14-28. Memory verses 22-24. GOLDEN TEXT.—“Choose you this day whom ye will serve.”—Joshua 24:15. TlME.—Near the close of Joshua's life,, According: to our Bible margins, B. C. 1427, 25 years after crossing the Jordan, and 18 after our last lesson. Prof. Beecher thinks that the time since the crossing of Jordan w-as mueh briefer. — —— PLACE.—The religious capital was at 3hiloh (Josh. 18:1). The great assembly for renewing the covenant, was at Shecliem, between Mounts Ebal and Gerizim. JOSHUA was nearly l!lO years old, living at Timnath Serah, not far from Shechem. Comment and Suggestive Thought. The conquest of the country took several years, not of uninterrupted warfare, but of wars Intermingled with cultivating the fields and making homes and* becoming citizens. Although the Canaanites were not wholly exterminated (Josh. 23:12; Judg. 2: 2,3), yet the war was nraetically ended, and the people- gave-themselves to the positive work of settling down as prosperous citizens of the Promised Land (Josh. 21:43-45). Joshua was drawing near to the close of a long and useful life of 110 years. He had been watching the tendencies of the times, and knew well the character of his people and the peculiar dangers to which they would be exposed. Therefor he determined to make, before he died, one more appeal to them, under the most solemn circumstances possible. It is uncertain whether the last two chapters of Joshua are two different addresses or two reports of the same address. The only importance of the question is its bearing on the structure of the book. The Polychrome Bible, the Expositor’s Bible, and others regard them as two trustworthy reports of the Shechem address, given separately as the editor received them, and not interwoven according to the plan usually adopted. Others regard them as two similar addresses on the same great occasion to different audiences, the first to a mass meeting of the people, and the second to the officers and judges of all the tribes assembled at Shechem, probably on the sloping sides of Mts. Ebal and Gerizim, where they had gathered 25 years before, s>n the first I entrance into the promised Land, and I made the most solemn promises to | God.

Vs. 1-13. No circumstances could be more' impressive, as, amid these hallowed associations and memories, the white-haired, beloved leader, saintly In character and touched with the light of a near eternity, arose and made his dying appeal, sonlewhat as the Apostle John, when very old, went feebly among the disciples, saying continually: “Little children, love one another.” In this place all the assembled multitudes could see and hear him. For the air is so clear that a “single voice can be heard by many thousands.” The longest recorded distance at which a man’s voice has been heard is 18 miles in the Grand Canyon of Colorado. Dr. Young records that at Gibraltar the human voice has J>een heard at a distance of ten miles.

Joshua first proclaims what God has done in the past, as a motive for trusting and obeying him in the present. Gratitude and love are awakened by his wonderful goodness to them. Faith in him and reverence and awe are inspired by the manifestations of his divine power (vs. 1-13). Joshua’s Conference with the People.—Vs. 14-24. Urges the people to choose you this day whom ye will serve. Vs. 14, 15. V. 14. “Now therefore,” in view of these facts, “fear the LORD.” Not be in terror before him, nor driven from him by fright, but, hold him in reverential awe and respect, realize his power to help and. to punish, so as to devote yourselves to him in perfect trust There can be no trifling. “Serve him in sincerity and in Truth.” Not in outward farms merely, but also in the heart and the life (John 4:23, 24). The idea, says Prof. Beecher, is rather of wholeness, integrity, than sincerity. The Double Witness. Vs. 25-28. First. The Covenant. —V. 25. “Made a covenant with the people that day,” i. e., “he solemnly ratified aad renewed the covenant of Sinai (Ex. 19:20), as Moses had done before him in the plains of Aloab (Deut. 29:1).”—C00k. “Set them a statute.” He determined and established “what in matters of religion should be with Israel law and right,””

V. 26. “And Joshua wrote.” As Moses at Sinai wrote all the words that Jehovah had spoken In a book, probably a papyrus-roll (Ex. 24:4), so Joshua now inscribed ‘minutes’ of the transactions connected with the renewal of the covenant at Sechem. “In the book of the law of God.” This protocol he placed inside the roll of the Law of Moses.” —Cambridge Bible. Practical Points. There is only one right principle of living, and that la loving and choosing God with, .all the heart. After one has made this choice, then there is need of confirming him In the choice, and guiding him In Its expression in life. The need of all others—of the majority of persona—is an Impulse and reenforcement of motives which lead to this choice. There are great advantages In large public meetings where every possible appeal can be made to persuade men to decide to aerie God.'