When Joshua was near the town of Jericho, he looked up and saw a man standing in front of him with sword in hand. Joshua went up to him and demanded, “Are you friend or foe?” “Neither one,” he replied. “I am the commander of the LORD’s army.” At this, Joshua fell with his face to the ground in reverence. “I am at your command,” Joshua said. “What do you want your servant to do?” The commander of the LORD’s army replied, “Take off your sandals, for the place where you are standing is holy.” And Joshua did as he was told. (Joshua 5:13-15, NLT)
Put yourself in Joshua’s shoes for a moment. What would you do if you came face to face with the commander of the Lord’s army? We can learn several things from Joshua’s experience. His first response was to fall prostrate before the figure in worship. The second thing he did was surrender to him, confessing his submission. Notice that Joshua did not bother to reference his own command and the resources he had at his disposal. When you come face to face with ultimate power, who you are and what you have is of little importance.
When he submitted himself to the divine authority, he was then ready for God’s self disclosure. God disclosed himself as holy. I think one of the mistakes we make in our theology is to try to define God by our own units of measure. In other words, we try to see ways in which God is like us. Here’s an important reminder we each need to hear: God is not like you and me. God is God and we are not, for He is holy.
Finally, we see Joshua’s obedience. Upon God’s self disclosure of himself as the holy one and the request for Joshua to remove his sandals, the text tells the reader that Joshua simply did what he was told. He obeyed.
The point of this important passage is that Joshua had to learn to follow before he could learn to lead. Great leaders are followers first. We see that principal on the battle field as well as the field of play. We also see it affirmed in the New Testament. For example, in 1 Corinthians 11:1, Paul encouraged those believers to “imitate” him in the same fashion he “imitated” Christ. We also see this principle occur during the ministry of Jesus in his conversation with the centurion. In Luke 7:8, the centurion told Jesus that “he too was a man UNDER authority.” At first glance you might suspect that the centurion misspoke, or perhaps your Bible has a typo. But the centurion did not make a mistake. He realized the truth that any authority we possess to lead is rooted in one’s ability to follow first.
I think a lot of people, even in Christian circles, misunderstand leadership at this point. The Bible is filled with men and women who expressed leadership and made invaluable contributions to the work of the Kingdom of God. But they did so as followers first. When leaders forget to follow first, trouble is not far.
Tomorrow I’ll conclude this week’s series from Joshua 5 by briefly describing the importance of following first.