WEBVTT 00:00:00.000 --> 00:00:13.000 Alright, so we're finishing tonight our series on Trusting Scripture in the Modern World. 00:00:13.000 --> 00:00:18.559 And Hunter very helpfully talked through the issue of slavery in the Bible last time. 00:00:18.559 --> 00:00:23.719 And tonight we're going to carry on with a similar issue and that's I want to talk about 00:00:23.719 --> 00:00:25.280 Holy War. 00:00:25.280 --> 00:00:29.240 So we'll end our time thinking about this very difficult issue of Holy War across the 00:00:29.239 --> 00:00:31.399 Old Testament especially. 00:00:31.399 --> 00:00:36.199 Now we've so far said we made really three or four big affirmations about the Bible. 00:00:36.199 --> 00:00:39.519 One, the Bible is inspired. 00:00:39.519 --> 00:00:45.519 And that means it's God breathed and we said that that means it's triune discourse. 00:00:45.519 --> 00:00:51.719 Remember that first week the father, the father speaks the word, the son is the word, the 00:00:51.719 --> 00:00:55.239 content and the spirit interprets the word. 00:00:55.240 --> 00:00:59.120 Remember that in every act of encountering the word of God and it's living in active 00:00:59.120 --> 00:01:02.280 form the trinity, the trine God is at work in us. 00:01:02.280 --> 00:01:04.480 That's what we said week one. 00:01:04.480 --> 00:01:07.159 After that we said the Bible is also true. 00:01:07.159 --> 00:01:12.680 So it's inspired therefore it's true meaning it's infallible but we also added inerrant 00:01:12.680 --> 00:01:14.400 as an even stronger suggestion. 00:01:14.400 --> 00:01:19.439 And then the third time we talked about the Bible being an earthly text. 00:01:19.439 --> 00:01:24.599 So it's not a text that was written in heaven and then dropped down onto earth but a text 00:01:24.599 --> 00:01:26.959 that was written on earth by human authors. 00:01:26.959 --> 00:01:31.399 So it's infallible in anerrant because it's got a divine author but it's also an earthly 00:01:31.399 --> 00:01:34.159 text full of numerous human authors. 00:01:34.159 --> 00:01:36.679 And that means that you have to read it contextually. 00:01:36.679 --> 00:01:41.079 You have to read it in the space of when it was written and where it was written according 00:01:41.079 --> 00:01:46.000 to the language of the time and the culture of the time. 00:01:46.000 --> 00:01:54.280 Now because of that two major issues come up quite often asking the question is the Bible 00:01:54.280 --> 00:01:57.719 is the contents of the Bible and therefore is the Christian religion that follows the 00:01:57.719 --> 00:02:00.519 Bible morally regressive. 00:02:00.519 --> 00:02:06.159 And those two issues very commonly are slavery and the assumption of slavery as Hunter pointed 00:02:06.159 --> 00:02:10.759 out last time but then also maybe even more significantly holy war this concept of holy 00:02:10.759 --> 00:02:13.560 war that we see across the Bible. 00:02:13.560 --> 00:02:18.439 So here's how one scholar asked the question how do we harmonize the warrior God of Israel 00:02:18.439 --> 00:02:22.800 with the God of love incarnate in Jesus Christ. 00:02:22.800 --> 00:02:25.560 And it's not a mere academic matter at all. 00:02:25.560 --> 00:02:31.020 It's a really significant question because this was what the crusades were built on. 00:02:31.020 --> 00:02:38.000 We even see language being used from the Joshua conquest of fighting in the name of the Lord 00:02:38.000 --> 00:02:43.000 in a holy war in things like the Rwandan conflict as recently as that. 00:02:43.000 --> 00:02:47.200 And so this language of holy war has been adopted from the Bible and used in all sorts 00:02:47.200 --> 00:02:52.360 of situations throughout human history and including the 20th and 21st century. 00:02:52.360 --> 00:02:54.640 And the question is what do we do with it? 00:02:54.640 --> 00:02:56.840 What do we say about it? 00:02:56.840 --> 00:03:03.320 And so tonight I want to focus in on a specific aspect of it which is the main thing which 00:03:03.320 --> 00:03:07.200 is what the Bible calls harem warfare. 00:03:07.200 --> 00:03:11.920 Okay, our friend out there. 00:03:11.920 --> 00:03:13.840 We should invite him in maybe. 00:03:13.840 --> 00:03:17.720 Yeah, talk about holy war. 00:03:17.719 --> 00:03:23.400 I'll be in a war I think with him the rest of the if he continues to stand there. 00:03:23.400 --> 00:03:24.400 Harem warfare. 00:03:24.400 --> 00:03:26.599 This is the Hebrew word for holy war. 00:03:26.599 --> 00:03:29.639 H R M in Hebrew harem warfare. 00:03:29.639 --> 00:03:32.599 You'll see it sometimes used as that language. 00:03:32.599 --> 00:03:41.079 And there are four explicit moments in the Old Testament of the command to harem warfare. 00:03:41.079 --> 00:03:43.079 Joshua six. 00:03:43.079 --> 00:03:44.079 Jericho. 00:03:44.079 --> 00:03:45.599 Joshua eight. 00:03:45.599 --> 00:03:46.599 AI. 00:03:46.599 --> 00:03:49.159 Joshua 10 to 12. 00:03:49.159 --> 00:03:51.879 And that's the war on the southern Amorites. 00:03:51.879 --> 00:03:54.959 Okay, and then one more time for Samuel 15. 00:03:54.959 --> 00:03:59.359 So these are the times where you see harem the language of holy war being used really 00:03:59.359 --> 00:04:00.359 explicitly. 00:04:00.359 --> 00:04:05.000 Now, let me begin by reading a passage, just a couple of verses from Deuteronomy 20. 00:04:05.000 --> 00:04:11.400 So if you have a Bible, you can turn there to Deuteronomy 20. 00:04:11.400 --> 00:04:18.920 All right, let me just read two verses to you Deuteronomy 20 verse 10. 00:04:18.920 --> 00:04:23.560 First, when you draw near to a city to fight against it. 00:04:23.560 --> 00:04:27.160 First offer terms of peace to it. 00:04:27.160 --> 00:04:32.040 So there are two different types of war being presented in God's law. 00:04:32.040 --> 00:04:37.240 One, normally when you come to a land, if they will not let you in or let you pass through 00:04:37.240 --> 00:04:39.879 offer terms of peace. 00:04:39.879 --> 00:04:43.560 If they don't, if they want to fight you, then you can engage in just war. 00:04:43.560 --> 00:04:44.639 Okay, that's one. 00:04:44.639 --> 00:04:49.279 Now jump down to verse 17, I believe it is 16. 00:04:49.279 --> 00:04:53.779 But in the cities of these peoples that the Lord your God is giving you for inheritance, 00:04:53.779 --> 00:04:58.120 you shall save alive nothing that breathes, you shall devote them to complete destruction 00:04:58.120 --> 00:05:03.560 the Hittites, Amorites, Canaanites, Parasites, Hibites, Jebusites, as the Lord your God has 00:05:03.560 --> 00:05:04.560 commanded. 00:05:04.560 --> 00:05:09.560 I said, on the one hand, you've got one type of war when you encounter a nation in general, 00:05:09.560 --> 00:05:11.360 all for peace. 00:05:11.360 --> 00:05:15.480 But when you encounter one of these six nations, which are all members of the Canaanite people 00:05:15.480 --> 00:05:18.959 groups, then you shall devote them to destruction. 00:05:18.959 --> 00:05:21.280 That's the language of harem. 00:05:21.280 --> 00:05:26.920 Harem means a ban, a complete giving over to destruction, something like that. 00:05:26.920 --> 00:05:29.160 It can be translated in lots of different ways. 00:05:29.160 --> 00:05:30.160 All right. 00:05:30.160 --> 00:05:34.819 First thing I want to do is give you some reflections on what this is exactly. 00:05:34.819 --> 00:05:37.160 What is harem warfare exactly in the Bible? 00:05:37.160 --> 00:05:40.640 I'm just going to rattle these off and try to get through way too much material in a 00:05:40.640 --> 00:05:41.640 short amount of time. 00:05:41.640 --> 00:05:42.640 Okay. 00:05:42.640 --> 00:05:43.640 All right. 00:05:43.640 --> 00:05:44.640 Trimper Longman is helpful here. 00:05:44.640 --> 00:05:46.000 He's an Old Testament scholar. 00:05:46.000 --> 00:05:49.520 He says this, first, harem war. 00:05:49.520 --> 00:05:55.879 In harem war, God always presents himself as present and active in the fight for Israel. 00:05:55.879 --> 00:05:56.879 Okay. 00:05:56.879 --> 00:05:58.480 So that's a key thing that we're going to see. 00:05:58.480 --> 00:06:01.760 So at Jericho, for example, the angel of the Lord shows up. 00:06:01.760 --> 00:06:02.760 You remember this? 00:06:02.760 --> 00:06:04.879 And Joshua says, who are you? 00:06:04.879 --> 00:06:06.480 Are you for us or against us? 00:06:06.480 --> 00:06:09.360 And he says, yes and no, no and yes. 00:06:09.360 --> 00:06:11.759 I just am. 00:06:11.759 --> 00:06:13.439 And he leads the battle. 00:06:13.439 --> 00:06:14.439 He's the angel of the Lord. 00:06:14.439 --> 00:06:17.480 He's the son of God himself. 00:06:17.480 --> 00:06:21.420 God always in the harem war fights the battle. 00:06:21.420 --> 00:06:22.420 He leads. 00:06:22.420 --> 00:06:24.480 He takes over for Israel. 00:06:24.480 --> 00:06:30.759 Secondly, that means then that there are often unique and absurd ways that the battles 00:06:30.759 --> 00:06:31.759 are won. 00:06:31.759 --> 00:06:32.759 Right? 00:06:32.759 --> 00:06:38.439 It's an absurd thing to do to fight the mighty people of Jericho by walking around the fortress 00:06:38.439 --> 00:06:39.439 seven times. 00:06:39.439 --> 00:06:40.439 That's an absurdity. 00:06:40.439 --> 00:06:41.439 They don't use weapons. 00:06:41.439 --> 00:06:43.439 That's not the way you fight a battle, right? 00:06:43.439 --> 00:06:44.920 Which is exactly the point. 00:06:44.920 --> 00:06:48.000 The Lord has to win, not the people. 00:06:48.000 --> 00:06:50.759 That's the idea in the harem warfare. 00:06:50.759 --> 00:06:57.719 Third, what you also see is that the Israelites always consecrate themselves for these battles. 00:06:57.719 --> 00:06:59.519 So they wash ritually. 00:06:59.519 --> 00:07:06.719 They prepare as if they're doing something that's holy, that's consecrated, that's sanctified. 00:07:06.719 --> 00:07:08.279 Why? 00:07:08.279 --> 00:07:12.439 And here's where we start to get to the big theological idea that's happening. 00:07:12.439 --> 00:07:19.879 What's happening in these moments is that God is presenting these moments as types or 00:07:19.879 --> 00:07:25.039 symbols in real history of the recovery of Eden. 00:07:25.039 --> 00:07:28.199 That's the big idea that's happening all throughout these harem conquests. 00:07:28.199 --> 00:07:30.319 And we'll come back to that in just a minute. 00:07:30.319 --> 00:07:37.800 Fourth, Trimper says, there's always more going on in these conflicts than you can see. 00:07:37.800 --> 00:07:42.360 And the thing that you realize when you read the text very closely is that they're meant 00:07:42.360 --> 00:07:47.800 to be read as cosmic conflicts, not just human conflicts. 00:07:47.800 --> 00:07:51.839 That the Lord is coming to battle with the gods. 00:07:51.839 --> 00:07:54.919 And that's the language the Bible uses, the gods, lowercase g. 00:07:54.920 --> 00:07:58.960 It's a very generic term and it's referring to evil spirits. 00:07:58.960 --> 00:08:01.160 It's referring to fallen angels. 00:08:01.160 --> 00:08:04.520 It's referring to Satan and his hordes and minions that have come down. 00:08:04.520 --> 00:08:10.720 And the idea is that Satan has actually gripped the heart of these nations entirely. 00:08:10.720 --> 00:08:14.360 And the idea that you see when you read it very carefully is that it's meant to be read 00:08:14.360 --> 00:08:21.000 as the Lord battling the gods, the evil that is in the midst of these nations. 00:08:21.000 --> 00:08:23.280 The idols that they worship are no mere idols. 00:08:23.279 --> 00:08:26.519 They actually stand and represent something that's real. 00:08:26.519 --> 00:08:30.959 And that's evil itself, Babylon that's infected these places in these nations. 00:08:30.959 --> 00:08:34.559 Now that's not only true in the harem wars, but one of the first harem wars that the words 00:08:34.559 --> 00:08:41.079 not used is God's war against Egypt and Pharaoh in the story of the Exodus. 00:08:41.079 --> 00:08:44.919 So this is very present, the tin plagues. 00:08:44.919 --> 00:08:50.679 How do you read what's going on in the strangeness of the tin plagues, the locust and the frogs 00:08:50.679 --> 00:08:54.839 and the river turning to blood and all these crazy things as modern readers that we think 00:08:54.839 --> 00:08:56.679 about what's happening here? 00:08:56.679 --> 00:09:02.239 Well every single one of those plugs is the Lord saying the Nile River is not the true 00:09:02.239 --> 00:09:04.679 God as it was worshiped to be the true God. 00:09:04.679 --> 00:09:08.319 The sun and when he blacks out the sun is not the true God. 00:09:08.319 --> 00:09:13.000 The sun was the principal deity and ultimately Pharaoh is not a God. 00:09:13.000 --> 00:09:14.000 The 10th plug. 00:09:14.000 --> 00:09:19.159 That's the idea and Moses actually makes this very explicit in Exodus 15 when they come 00:09:19.159 --> 00:09:22.759 out and Moses sings his song about the Exodus. 00:09:22.759 --> 00:09:28.839 He says in verse 11, Oh Lord God, you have defeated the gods, the evil spirits that have 00:09:28.839 --> 00:09:30.839 controlled Egypt. 00:09:30.839 --> 00:09:32.519 You've shown who the true God is. 00:09:32.519 --> 00:09:34.120 So that's the big idea throughout. 00:09:34.120 --> 00:09:39.519 All right, fifth and finally for this first part, I think, yeah. 00:09:39.519 --> 00:09:45.000 After the battle, oftentimes we'll see a ceremony, something that looks almost like a covenant 00:09:45.000 --> 00:09:49.480 take place and in it the true King enters the city. 00:09:49.480 --> 00:09:51.440 So this is what Psalm 24 is about. 00:09:51.440 --> 00:09:58.200 Psalm 24 is a song that remembers God the King entering into his land. 00:09:58.200 --> 00:10:05.320 And so the whole thing breathes out, expresses this idea of the recovery of sacred space, 00:10:05.320 --> 00:10:11.039 the recovery of Eden, the space, the land that has been lost because of human sin. 00:10:11.039 --> 00:10:14.360 And so Trimper Longman helps us, I think, thinking about that. 00:10:14.360 --> 00:10:20.360 Nevertheless, the problems remain. 00:10:20.360 --> 00:10:24.759 How do we read this well, especially as modern people? 00:10:24.759 --> 00:10:29.080 And I want to give you some qualifications because you still come to the language of 00:10:29.080 --> 00:10:30.080 the text. 00:10:30.080 --> 00:10:32.960 They devoted all to destruction. 00:10:32.960 --> 00:10:36.879 And you say what we asked if you were around Sunday night, how can we talk about a good 00:10:36.879 --> 00:10:40.279 God in the midst of these types of texts? 00:10:40.279 --> 00:10:44.559 And so I want to say the same thing I said Sunday night if you were there for that, that 00:10:44.559 --> 00:10:49.720 you've got to read this in light of the whole Bible, but you've also got to read very carefully 00:10:49.720 --> 00:10:52.759 and in the light of the entirety of the book. 00:10:52.759 --> 00:10:58.480 So it's never very helpful to isolate a single little sentence and fail to read it in the 00:10:58.480 --> 00:11:00.720 light of the story of the whole book. 00:11:00.720 --> 00:11:04.159 Because sometimes you realize down the road of the book that a different message is being 00:11:04.159 --> 00:11:08.600 told than the one that you thought when you just read the sentence by itself. 00:11:08.600 --> 00:11:11.040 And that's exactly what we get in these conquest narratives. 00:11:11.040 --> 00:11:13.759 Actually, there's a different story being told. 00:11:13.759 --> 00:11:19.000 All right, so a few qualifications here, two of three tonight, point two. 00:11:19.000 --> 00:11:20.200 How can we read this well? 00:11:20.200 --> 00:11:26.759 All right, the first thing to say is these wars are not carried out on the basis of race. 00:11:26.759 --> 00:11:29.440 The wars are never carried out on the basis of race. 00:11:29.440 --> 00:11:34.759 So in the very first encounter we see Rahab, for example, is brought into the people of 00:11:34.759 --> 00:11:36.200 God. 00:11:36.200 --> 00:11:41.160 When God makes his purposes very clear, he says it's to break down the idols, to defeat 00:11:41.160 --> 00:11:45.360 the evil spirits that have rebelled against him. 00:11:45.360 --> 00:11:51.200 Judges two verse two, which is reflecting back on the Canaanite conquest, that eviction 00:11:51.200 --> 00:11:56.480 notices were being given by God, the ban on pagan religion. 00:11:56.480 --> 00:11:58.200 That was the primary idea. 00:11:58.200 --> 00:12:00.040 It's never based on race. 00:12:00.040 --> 00:12:04.000 The goal actually was always to bring in the nations to the land. 00:12:04.000 --> 00:12:07.600 It was always about that, and that's very clear. 00:12:07.600 --> 00:12:11.600 That means also then it's not about imperialistic expansion. 00:12:11.600 --> 00:12:16.480 So sometimes modern people will come to these texts and say, well, look, look at the colonialism. 00:12:16.480 --> 00:12:20.559 Look at Israel just making their way through this space and taking away from people that 00:12:20.559 --> 00:12:21.879 had been there prior. 00:12:21.879 --> 00:12:23.320 What colonialism is at place? 00:12:23.320 --> 00:12:24.799 What imperialistic expansion? 00:12:24.799 --> 00:12:26.360 Well, a few things. 00:12:26.360 --> 00:12:29.759 One, Israel is told you are not allowed to plunder. 00:12:29.759 --> 00:12:31.600 You cannot take any of the goods. 00:12:31.600 --> 00:12:36.200 You cannot be wealthy because of the conquest. 00:12:36.200 --> 00:12:41.440 But more importantly, and this is the big point, it's important to understand that we 00:12:41.440 --> 00:12:46.159 have the picture completely backwards if we think of these texts in the imperialistic 00:12:46.159 --> 00:12:47.680 or colonial way. 00:12:47.680 --> 00:12:53.720 Because what's actually happening is Israel is not the strong fighting the weak, which 00:12:53.720 --> 00:12:57.440 is exactly the case in colonialism or an imperialistic move. 00:12:57.440 --> 00:12:59.680 Israel is not the strong fighting the weak. 00:12:59.680 --> 00:13:01.480 Israel is exactly the reverse. 00:13:01.480 --> 00:13:07.759 The point is that Israel is the weakest trying to enter into the land and fighting the strong. 00:13:07.759 --> 00:13:12.720 So David and Goliath becomes the paradigm of the whole concept of this across the Old 00:13:12.720 --> 00:13:14.120 Testament. 00:13:14.120 --> 00:13:19.080 If you want to fight Goliath, the representative Cain and I down the line, how do you fight 00:13:19.080 --> 00:13:20.080 him? 00:13:20.080 --> 00:13:22.000 Well, God says, throw away your sword. 00:13:22.000 --> 00:13:25.039 David, you can't carry a big shield. 00:13:25.039 --> 00:13:26.440 He doesn't put armor on. 00:13:26.440 --> 00:13:29.120 He's the smallest guy in the war. 00:13:29.120 --> 00:13:31.720 It's exactly the idea of what happened in the conquest. 00:13:31.720 --> 00:13:34.360 The whole point is that this doesn't make sense. 00:13:34.360 --> 00:13:38.039 These people cannot win. 00:13:38.039 --> 00:13:39.039 They're the weakest. 00:13:39.039 --> 00:13:40.039 They're not the most powerful. 00:13:40.039 --> 00:13:41.519 They've got the worst weapons. 00:13:41.519 --> 00:13:43.200 They have the worst army. 00:13:43.200 --> 00:13:49.399 They're going up against fortresses that are well established and built up like Jericho. 00:13:49.399 --> 00:13:51.399 And what's the identity of these people? 00:13:51.399 --> 00:13:53.399 They are slaves. 00:13:53.399 --> 00:13:55.399 Remember that they've come out of Egypt. 00:13:55.399 --> 00:13:57.680 They've been in slave for 400 years. 00:13:57.679 --> 00:13:59.439 Their population is low. 00:13:59.439 --> 00:14:01.159 They are incredibly weak. 00:14:01.159 --> 00:14:02.359 They're hungry. 00:14:02.359 --> 00:14:05.679 The entire idea is that none of this makes sense. 00:14:05.679 --> 00:14:08.239 It's not imperialistic expansion, not at all. 00:14:08.239 --> 00:14:09.679 It's David fighting Goliath. 00:14:09.679 --> 00:14:10.679 That's the whole point. 00:14:10.679 --> 00:14:13.199 These people are giants. 00:14:13.199 --> 00:14:21.039 It would be more like, imagine historical reality that the Spanish enter into the early 00:14:21.039 --> 00:14:26.439 Americas as they did through the Gulf and they start to take over the lands of the Native 00:14:26.440 --> 00:14:27.920 Americans. 00:14:27.920 --> 00:14:29.040 Let's not pick on the Spanish. 00:14:29.040 --> 00:14:32.360 Many, many people groups did this. 00:14:32.360 --> 00:14:38.240 The story that's being told is more like the Native Americans taking back their land after 00:14:38.240 --> 00:14:40.280 the Spanish forts were built. 00:14:40.280 --> 00:14:43.760 That's the actual story we're reading about, not the other way around. 00:14:43.760 --> 00:14:46.080 That's the images that were being given. 00:14:46.080 --> 00:14:52.680 Now, it's important then also to note that Israel was not going to leave Egypt and go 00:14:52.679 --> 00:14:58.479 find a territory of land to live in and not be fought against. 00:14:58.479 --> 00:15:00.639 There was no chance of that. 00:15:00.639 --> 00:15:05.919 It wasn't as if a people group that had been enslaved for 400 years could march through 00:15:05.919 --> 00:15:08.919 the desert and finally find fertile ground. 00:15:08.919 --> 00:15:12.719 The people that lived there just say, come and take this plot. 00:15:12.719 --> 00:15:13.719 Not at all. 00:15:13.719 --> 00:15:15.359 The plots were occupied. 00:15:15.359 --> 00:15:20.719 Even in the spaces that were available, the Canaanites wanted to kill Israel. 00:15:20.720 --> 00:15:24.519 It wasn't as if Israel was merely going on conquest. 00:15:24.519 --> 00:15:27.840 It was that they weren't going to be given a space. 00:15:27.840 --> 00:15:30.240 There was no place for them to live. 00:15:30.240 --> 00:15:34.240 They had no territory and no one was going to give it. 00:15:34.240 --> 00:15:35.840 A few more of these qualifications. 00:15:35.840 --> 00:15:41.840 Another one is, and this is very important, cities in, let's say, the Joshua stories are 00:15:41.840 --> 00:15:44.960 not what we think of as cities today. 00:15:44.960 --> 00:15:51.280 We read about Israel, the troops marching on to AI or Jericho. 00:15:51.280 --> 00:15:57.040 It's important to say that when we read about the city of Jericho, that is idiomatic of 00:15:57.040 --> 00:15:58.920 a military fortress. 00:15:58.920 --> 00:16:05.840 It's talking about marching on to a military fortress, not into the city center of Edinburgh. 00:16:05.840 --> 00:16:09.280 This isn't Israel going to the Royal Mile. 00:16:09.280 --> 00:16:12.200 This is Israel fighting the Pentagon. 00:16:12.200 --> 00:16:15.720 This is military fortresses that they're marching on. 00:16:15.720 --> 00:16:19.680 Never cities full of all these civilians. 00:16:19.680 --> 00:16:22.680 The archaeology plays this out really helpfully for us. 00:16:22.680 --> 00:16:27.800 Ancient Jericho, we've learned, was about a six acre plot of land. 00:16:27.800 --> 00:16:28.800 That's not big at all. 00:16:28.800 --> 00:16:31.560 I can't remember if we think in acres in the UK. 00:16:31.560 --> 00:16:32.560 Do we? 00:16:32.560 --> 00:16:33.560 Yeah. 00:16:33.560 --> 00:16:35.080 I can't think in square meters. 00:16:35.080 --> 00:16:36.080 I cannot do it. 00:16:36.080 --> 00:16:39.240 I don't know if people can. 00:16:39.240 --> 00:16:40.640 I have to convert. 00:16:40.640 --> 00:16:41.640 Acres. 00:16:41.639 --> 00:16:42.639 It's not big. 00:16:42.639 --> 00:16:46.559 It's very small, which is why in one day you could march around it seven times. 00:16:46.559 --> 00:16:47.559 How is that possible? 00:16:47.559 --> 00:16:48.559 It was six acres. 00:16:48.559 --> 00:16:49.559 It's not big at all. 00:16:49.559 --> 00:16:55.360 I had a two acre plot of land that I lived on in Mississippi before moving here. 00:16:55.360 --> 00:16:56.360 It was easy. 00:16:56.360 --> 00:16:57.360 It was small. 00:16:57.360 --> 00:16:58.360 Why? 00:16:58.360 --> 00:16:59.360 Because it's a military fortress. 00:16:59.360 --> 00:17:03.120 In other words, the roads and the highways that had been built would pass through military 00:17:03.120 --> 00:17:05.599 fortresses, cities. 00:17:05.599 --> 00:17:07.279 The civilians did not live there. 00:17:07.279 --> 00:17:09.319 The civilians lived in the mountains and the valleys. 00:17:09.319 --> 00:17:10.319 They farmed. 00:17:10.319 --> 00:17:11.319 They lived in the hills. 00:17:11.319 --> 00:17:12.319 They lived all around. 00:17:12.319 --> 00:17:15.559 They're not going and attacking civilian villages. 00:17:15.559 --> 00:17:16.799 This is a military fortress. 00:17:16.799 --> 00:17:17.799 It's soldiers. 00:17:17.799 --> 00:17:21.399 Who's the one civilian that we know about that lived in Jericho? 00:17:21.399 --> 00:17:22.399 Rahab. 00:17:22.399 --> 00:17:25.079 What happened to Rahab? 00:17:25.079 --> 00:17:26.579 She became an Israelite. 00:17:26.579 --> 00:17:28.960 She was allowed to live with her family. 00:17:28.960 --> 00:17:36.679 She was running some type of space, place for the soldiers in the midst of this city, 00:17:36.679 --> 00:17:37.679 this fortress. 00:17:37.679 --> 00:17:39.439 That's why she was there. 00:17:39.440 --> 00:17:44.400 It wasn't a city in the way we think about cities today. 00:17:44.400 --> 00:17:47.440 Now two more before we move on to the last thing. 00:17:47.440 --> 00:17:53.480 It's also important to note that what we have in the book of Joshua, the scholars, evangelical 00:17:53.480 --> 00:18:00.200 scholars included, very much agree that it's what we call ancient trash talk. 00:18:00.200 --> 00:18:05.480 When you come to something like AI, the battle of AI, and Israel finally wins, and Joshua, 00:18:05.480 --> 00:18:12.160 who's likely the writer there, says something like, we defeated all the kings of Canaan, 00:18:12.160 --> 00:18:15.160 and we destroyed everyone. 00:18:15.160 --> 00:18:20.960 The point of the text is to realize something, which is flip the page, and what do you find 00:18:20.960 --> 00:18:22.720 out? 00:18:22.720 --> 00:18:24.880 They didn't do that. 00:18:24.880 --> 00:18:28.319 In other words, it was a form of ancient trash talk. 00:18:28.319 --> 00:18:31.799 The whole point of the book of Joshua was that when you get to the end, you realize 00:18:31.799 --> 00:18:38.279 tons of Canaanites are living with the Israelites, that most of the kings, they did not defeat, 00:18:38.279 --> 00:18:40.879 that they failed in this mission. 00:18:40.879 --> 00:18:43.839 That's exactly the idea, is that they went to these military fortresses, they conquered 00:18:43.839 --> 00:18:48.440 some of them, but they did not devote everybody to destruction. 00:18:48.440 --> 00:18:54.000 This is a complicated issue because it raises other problems, but the Hebrew text that's 00:18:54.000 --> 00:18:57.799 being translated there is idiomatic. 00:18:57.799 --> 00:19:03.480 We see it outside the Bible as well, that when a person wins a victory, they often speak 00:19:03.480 --> 00:19:08.680 in hyperbolic fashion, and that was normative for the ancient Near Eastern world. 00:19:08.680 --> 00:19:12.680 It wasn't seen as an issue, it was seen as normative. 00:19:12.680 --> 00:19:17.759 That comes out very clearly in Joshua, but then Joshua makes the point that they didn't 00:19:17.759 --> 00:19:18.759 actually do that. 00:19:18.759 --> 00:19:23.119 The text, the book itself, makes that clear that some of those same people groups are 00:19:23.119 --> 00:19:29.159 still living with the Israelites, and that's the big idea that's coming out through Joshua. 00:19:29.159 --> 00:19:31.199 It's the same thing. 00:19:31.199 --> 00:19:34.439 It's a similar way that we might try to think of an example here. 00:19:34.439 --> 00:19:42.759 In the contemporary world, a football club comes into the locker room after beating, 00:19:42.759 --> 00:19:46.839 hearts beats somebody, and it's 5-0. 00:19:46.839 --> 00:19:49.399 Hibs, let's say, beat somebody, and it's 5-0. 00:19:49.400 --> 00:19:54.880 You come to the locker room afterwards, and what did they say? 00:19:54.880 --> 00:19:57.640 We devastated them. 00:19:57.640 --> 00:19:59.480 We showed them no mercy. 00:19:59.480 --> 00:20:05.600 We use idiomatic language to describe the types of victories that we've won. 00:20:05.600 --> 00:20:11.560 That's often what's happening in war talk, and even in the Bible. 00:20:11.560 --> 00:20:15.360 Joshua goes out of its way to make the point that actually there were plenty of Canaanites 00:20:15.360 --> 00:20:16.360 still around. 00:20:16.359 --> 00:20:22.240 Lastly, and we'll move on to the final thing, what we see in the Canaanite conquest is the 00:20:22.240 --> 00:20:25.879 language of driving out. 00:20:25.879 --> 00:20:29.839 That's what harem refers to, is a driving out. 00:20:29.839 --> 00:20:31.159 That's the big idea. 00:20:31.159 --> 00:20:39.359 God is saying, I am choosing to reestablish what ought to be good, eaten, in this particular 00:20:39.359 --> 00:20:40.359 place. 00:20:40.359 --> 00:20:44.279 In order to do that, I have to push out, drive out evil. 00:20:44.279 --> 00:20:46.839 Remember if you were around Sunday night, we talked about the fact that these are no 00:20:46.839 --> 00:20:54.359 idyllic societies, that the Canaanite societies are being represented and chosen because they 00:20:54.359 --> 00:20:59.000 have completely given themselves over to absolute evil. 00:20:59.000 --> 00:21:04.639 Leviticus 18 and 21 are both places you can go read about this, that these societies had 00:21:04.639 --> 00:21:11.799 given themselves to the deity, the concept of molek or molok in the Hebrew Bible, which 00:21:11.799 --> 00:21:14.919 is a deity that was worshiped by human sacrifice. 00:21:14.919 --> 00:21:19.279 God makes it very clear that this is the situation that's happening in Canaan, and that this 00:21:19.279 --> 00:21:25.519 is the land that God has chosen to reestablish, eat and to work out salvation. 00:21:25.519 --> 00:21:28.359 The language of being driven out is used. 00:21:28.359 --> 00:21:31.960 Where is this language of being driven out first found? 00:21:31.960 --> 00:21:35.039 This exilic concept, it's found in Genesis 3. 00:21:35.039 --> 00:21:38.759 The first time we see this verb, it's used for Adam and Eve. 00:21:38.759 --> 00:21:40.720 God drove them out. 00:21:40.720 --> 00:21:44.480 He drove them out so that he might save them. 00:21:44.480 --> 00:21:49.279 He pushed them away so that they could not eat of the tree of life and eternalize their 00:21:49.279 --> 00:21:51.200 sinful condition. 00:21:51.200 --> 00:21:57.000 This is the verb that gets used in this conquest, that he's doing this, he's pushing out injustice 00:21:57.000 --> 00:21:58.839 in order to save. 00:21:58.839 --> 00:22:02.799 The ultimate idea here is redemptive for all the nations. 00:22:02.799 --> 00:22:06.079 That's the big idea. 00:22:06.079 --> 00:22:15.279 Let me finally, thirdly try to, in five or six minutes, just give then back away from 00:22:15.279 --> 00:22:21.439 that a bit and give a few broader theological principles in the Bible that might help us 00:22:21.439 --> 00:22:27.000 think about this, especially maybe as we're talking to someone that brings up an issue 00:22:27.000 --> 00:22:28.799 like this. 00:22:28.799 --> 00:22:35.279 It might not be the easiest thing to rattle off the most detailed prose about this issue. 00:22:35.279 --> 00:22:39.879 I think the thing always to remember when we're talking to non-Christians that want 00:22:39.879 --> 00:22:46.759 to talk about this issue is step one, always bring them back to what's most important first. 00:22:46.759 --> 00:22:51.960 What's most important is what I've called Jesus simplicity and other pastors have referred 00:22:51.960 --> 00:22:52.960 to that in the past. 00:22:52.960 --> 00:22:53.960 Jesus simplicity. 00:22:53.960 --> 00:22:56.680 Did Jesus Christ, is Jesus Christ real? 00:22:56.680 --> 00:22:58.279 Did God become man? 00:22:58.279 --> 00:23:00.160 Did he rise from the dead on the third day? 00:23:00.160 --> 00:23:02.720 That's the most important question. 00:23:02.720 --> 00:23:05.519 What to do with the Canaanite conquest is secondary. 00:23:05.519 --> 00:23:09.279 It's something that needs to be talked about with a person if they're interested in honest 00:23:09.279 --> 00:23:12.759 discussion, but it needs to come down the road. 00:23:12.759 --> 00:23:18.519 Step one is always to get to the basics, get to what's most important. 00:23:18.519 --> 00:23:21.799 Sometimes people do want to have honest discussion about this. 00:23:21.799 --> 00:23:23.759 These are the types of things you can talk about. 00:23:23.759 --> 00:23:27.519 Here's some broad theological principles that I think can help us in an honest discussion 00:23:27.519 --> 00:23:32.160 with people and with our own selves, our own hearts as Bible readers on this. 00:23:32.160 --> 00:23:35.920 Step one, I'm just going to rattle these off for time's sake. 00:23:35.920 --> 00:23:43.360 One, remember from Genesis two to three forward, no one deserves to live. 00:23:43.360 --> 00:23:51.720 Anytime we're alive, anytime T one that we are living, we do not deserve it. 00:23:51.720 --> 00:23:53.759 No human being deserves it. 00:23:53.759 --> 00:24:00.560 Every single moment that the world continues to operate after human rebellion is a moment 00:24:00.559 --> 00:24:04.519 of grace and we call this common grace. 00:24:04.519 --> 00:24:08.119 God gifts us life despite ourselves. 00:24:08.119 --> 00:24:12.399 It's always important to remember that according to the Bible, we never have gotten the justice 00:24:12.399 --> 00:24:14.079 we deserved. 00:24:14.079 --> 00:24:19.319 That no matter what comes to us in life, true justice would be non-existence. 00:24:19.319 --> 00:24:21.240 That's exactly the promise of Genesis two. 00:24:21.240 --> 00:24:24.480 If you eat of it, you shall surely die. 00:24:24.480 --> 00:24:30.519 Yet out of any live nine times as longer as the rest, than any of us will live. 00:24:30.519 --> 00:24:34.200 Grace is operative from the very beginning and grace is the fundamental ground that we're 00:24:34.200 --> 00:24:36.160 walking on at all times. 00:24:36.160 --> 00:24:39.599 We call this common because it's not salvific. 00:24:39.599 --> 00:24:42.200 There's a difference. 00:24:42.200 --> 00:24:46.759 Salvific grace, special grace comes on the cross of Christ alone, but everybody stands 00:24:46.759 --> 00:24:47.960 on the ground of common grace. 00:24:47.960 --> 00:24:49.240 All of us do. 00:24:49.240 --> 00:24:51.359 So common grace is drawing breath. 00:24:51.359 --> 00:24:54.319 It's living it all. 00:24:54.319 --> 00:24:57.879 Whether you're a Christian or not a Christian, no matter what you believe in, not only do 00:24:57.880 --> 00:25:01.240 you get food to eat, but that food also tastes good. 00:25:01.240 --> 00:25:02.340 That's common grace. 00:25:02.340 --> 00:25:04.120 That's a gift that God gives to the world. 00:25:04.120 --> 00:25:06.120 So that's a really important idea. 00:25:06.120 --> 00:25:11.800 So Trimper Longman says, God's holiness shines bright against the opposition of Satan and 00:25:11.800 --> 00:25:14.320 the knowledge of evil in the Old Testament. 00:25:14.320 --> 00:25:18.880 Everything and everyone that stands against that holiness, both individually and corporately, 00:25:18.880 --> 00:25:22.280 deserves death, though rarely gets it. 00:25:22.280 --> 00:25:23.640 Though rarely gets it. 00:25:23.640 --> 00:25:29.160 I remember, again, a reference to Sunday night is patient with the Canaanites. 00:25:29.160 --> 00:25:34.120 Why does God keep Israel in Egypt for 400 years, his children? 00:25:34.120 --> 00:25:38.240 Do you know what he says to Moses? 00:25:38.240 --> 00:25:42.000 What he says to the patriarchs before Moses? 00:25:42.000 --> 00:25:46.160 My people will be enslaved for 400 years because the iniquity of the Amorites, the Canaanites, 00:25:46.160 --> 00:25:47.880 is not complete. 00:25:47.880 --> 00:25:54.360 Meaning, I am giving the Canaanites my patience and a chance for repentance. 00:25:54.360 --> 00:25:58.640 And so my people remain enslaved for 400 years while I let them live. 00:25:58.640 --> 00:26:00.760 That's the logic that God gives. 00:26:00.760 --> 00:26:01.760 All right. 00:26:01.760 --> 00:26:10.640 Secondly, God gives humanity life after the fall so he can save it. 00:26:10.640 --> 00:26:14.200 We've got to remember at all times across the Old Testament that everything is serving 00:26:14.200 --> 00:26:19.640 the purpose of special redemption, of the work of Jesus Christ that's going to come. 00:26:19.640 --> 00:26:21.960 I mentioned that already. 00:26:21.960 --> 00:26:27.360 But God is seeking to restore his holy city in this conquest and that's the big idea. 00:26:27.360 --> 00:26:32.920 Third, of five, we're almost there. 00:26:32.920 --> 00:26:39.400 Remember that God has chosen historically to do this work of salvation through choosing 00:26:39.400 --> 00:26:43.400 a lineage, through which to save the whole world. 00:26:43.400 --> 00:26:45.640 So all of this comes from Genesis 2 and 3, right? 00:26:45.640 --> 00:26:49.480 And in Genesis 3, immediately when humanity sins, what happens? 00:26:49.480 --> 00:26:52.240 God chooses a people. 00:26:52.240 --> 00:26:56.360 He says, I'm going to save people who don't deserve to be saved, but I'm going to do it 00:26:56.360 --> 00:27:01.160 through one family line, the weakest among all the nations. 00:27:01.160 --> 00:27:06.920 And that family line begins at the moment that God says to Eve, through you, your son, the 00:27:06.920 --> 00:27:08.920 serpent's head will be crushed. 00:27:08.920 --> 00:27:11.519 And so there's a principle that runs throughout the whole Old Testament. 00:27:11.519 --> 00:27:14.879 You've got to have this principle to read the Old Testament well. 00:27:14.879 --> 00:27:21.639 And that's that there's what we call a seed theology, the theology of the son of Eve and 00:27:21.639 --> 00:27:26.639 the theology, the seed of the serpent, two different family lineages. 00:27:26.639 --> 00:27:27.639 And you see that represented. 00:27:27.639 --> 00:27:32.319 You flip the page, Genesis 4, and you've got the separation between Cain and Abel, the 00:27:32.319 --> 00:27:34.839 seed of the woman, the seed of the serpent. 00:27:34.839 --> 00:27:37.680 And that plays out throughout the whole of the Old Testament. 00:27:37.680 --> 00:27:39.200 Who is the seed of the woman? 00:27:39.200 --> 00:27:43.440 How are we going to get to the one that will crush the head of the serpent? 00:27:43.440 --> 00:27:47.319 And the Canaanites ultimately are the seed of the serpent. 00:27:47.319 --> 00:27:48.799 And they embrace that holistically. 00:27:48.799 --> 00:27:50.120 They follow the serpent. 00:27:50.120 --> 00:27:55.319 They do horrific things that in God's patience with them. 00:27:55.319 --> 00:27:59.480 And nevertheless, they embrace that role. 00:27:59.480 --> 00:28:04.200 And so that's a theology that carries us throughout the whole Old Testament, all the way to the 00:28:04.200 --> 00:28:06.920 birth of Jesus Christ, the seed of the woman. 00:28:06.920 --> 00:28:10.440 That's why the New Testament begins in a genealogy. 00:28:10.440 --> 00:28:16.039 That's why the last book of the Hebrew Bible Chronicles is a series of genealogies. 00:28:16.039 --> 00:28:20.360 That's why the structure of Genesis is 10 genealogies. 00:28:20.360 --> 00:28:24.640 If you map out the structure of Genesis, you'll see that it follows 10 genealogies, every 00:28:24.640 --> 00:28:28.240 section there's 10 sections, and they all begin with a new genealogy. 00:28:28.240 --> 00:28:29.240 Why? 00:28:29.240 --> 00:28:31.680 It's following the seed of the woman. 00:28:31.680 --> 00:28:33.360 Where's the Messiah going to come from? 00:28:33.359 --> 00:28:37.559 It begins all the way back in Genesis 3, and this conquest is a part of that. 00:28:37.559 --> 00:28:42.000 All right, two more. 00:28:42.000 --> 00:28:50.359 That means that Harim War, this conquest, is birthed through God's covenant promises. 00:28:50.359 --> 00:28:56.439 He says, I'm going to take a people that doesn't deserve to be my people, and I'm going to 00:28:56.439 --> 00:29:00.000 put them in a place, a new Eden, that they don't deserve. 00:29:00.000 --> 00:29:02.839 And I'm going to give them my presence that they don't deserve. 00:29:02.839 --> 00:29:06.639 And I'm going to give them a program of blessing that they don't deserve, the coming of the 00:29:06.639 --> 00:29:08.240 Messiah. 00:29:08.240 --> 00:29:11.199 That's what God is doing in the conquest. 00:29:11.199 --> 00:29:12.199 That's the big idea. 00:29:12.199 --> 00:29:13.359 That's the big picture. 00:29:13.359 --> 00:29:18.519 All right, lastly, theological principle number five. 00:29:18.519 --> 00:29:25.839 I think that it's helpful to think of what's going on in Joshua and this idea of holy war 00:29:25.839 --> 00:29:34.279 in the Old Testament as not only historically true, but also a type, a symbol, something 00:29:34.279 --> 00:29:41.799 that points forward, something that we find ultimate fulfillment of later in history. 00:29:41.799 --> 00:29:49.079 And in two ways, we call this an intrusion ethic that what's coming in the future intrudes 00:29:49.079 --> 00:29:52.039 actually into the past. 00:29:52.039 --> 00:29:57.000 God's judgment on these nations for their evil is an image and a picture of the fact 00:29:57.000 --> 00:30:01.759 that one day he's going to do this, he's going to purge evil from all the world. 00:30:01.759 --> 00:30:04.839 This is all about the book of Revelation, but in the middle of history, it's about something 00:30:04.839 --> 00:30:05.920 else. 00:30:05.920 --> 00:30:09.159 And that's that when you get to the end of the book of Joshua, you realize something 00:30:09.159 --> 00:30:14.559 that Joshua and the Israelites are never going to make Eden happen. 00:30:14.559 --> 00:30:18.680 That they're complete failures, that they become just like the Canaanites, and that God 00:30:18.680 --> 00:30:24.160 is patient with them for 400 years and 200 more years and hundreds more years. 00:30:24.160 --> 00:30:29.039 And eventually Jerusalem is going to be destroyed because they embrace the same things. 00:30:29.039 --> 00:30:32.560 Babylon runs through their heart just like it did through the original Babylonians, the 00:30:32.560 --> 00:30:34.240 Canaanites. 00:30:34.240 --> 00:30:45.640 And that's why this military leader, Joshua, the ultimate failure has his name repurposed 00:30:45.640 --> 00:30:48.000 in the New Testament. 00:30:48.000 --> 00:30:52.400 It's no coincidence that the one that was born in the middle of history, Jesus Christ, 00:30:52.400 --> 00:30:56.960 bears the exact same name as the one who led this conquest. 00:30:56.960 --> 00:30:59.240 Jesus name is Joshua in Hebrew. 00:30:59.240 --> 00:31:02.240 Yeshua, God saves, Yahweh saves. 00:31:02.240 --> 00:31:03.640 That is who Jesus Christ is. 00:31:03.640 --> 00:31:07.440 He brings the conquest into true history, right? 00:31:07.440 --> 00:31:12.200 And that conquest ultimately is one that's brought upon his own body and his own soul. 00:31:12.200 --> 00:31:16.839 And so he's the ultimate fulfillment of everything that the conquest of Canaan was about. 00:31:16.839 --> 00:31:22.480 All right, we must stop. 00:31:22.480 --> 00:31:23.980 We must stop. 00:31:23.980 --> 00:31:25.279 This is a big issue. 00:31:25.279 --> 00:31:26.599 It's an important thing. 00:31:26.599 --> 00:31:32.879 And so let me say that if you ever have somebody in your life that is really wrestling with 00:31:32.879 --> 00:31:38.279 us and really, really struggling with us, or you are, right, which happens to all of us 00:31:38.279 --> 00:31:42.079 as Christians, we read, you know, you're going through your Bible reading plan and you come 00:31:42.079 --> 00:31:47.639 across these passages and you say, oh boy, I don't know. 00:31:47.639 --> 00:31:50.159 Remember that there's resources. 00:31:50.159 --> 00:31:52.079 There's people to come and talk to. 00:31:52.079 --> 00:31:58.279 There's books and people that have thought about this for a long time and really carefully. 00:31:58.279 --> 00:32:01.639 So don't doubt by yourself. 00:32:01.639 --> 00:32:07.519 Seek out help and reflection on this from multiple sources and multiple ways because 00:32:07.519 --> 00:32:14.799 it really is out there and God really is good.