The Real Battle:: 1

If I were to make a motion picture based on the battle of Jericho, it would open with Joshua standing in a briefing room before his Israeli Joint Chiefs of Staff. “Men,” he would say, “I’ve just spoken with the commander of the Lord’s army, and here is the battle plan for our first objective, Jericho.”

Stepping up to the white board, Joshua would continue. “This is Jericho. It has fortified walls with gates located here, here, and here. We’re going to divide our forces, placing half in formation along this perimeter, then line up the priests who will blow trumpets behind them. Following the priests, we will place the ark of the covenant, then place the other half of our forces behind them. On day one, we will march around the city in total silence, and I mean complete quiet!”

“We’ll repeat the same pattern on day two, three, four, five, and six. Then on day seven, we’ll march around the city seven times. When the priests blow the long blast on their trumpets, we will shout in unison as loud as possible and the walls will fall down.”

“Any questions?”

One can’t help but imagine that one of the military leaders leaned over to his neighbor to whisper, “Are you kidding me?”

Joshua is a book that chronicles the battles the Israelites incurred as they possessed their possession. The most famous of those battles, obviously, was the battle of Jericho. But was Jericho and the battles that followed the real threat this emerging nation faced? This week I’m going to post what I believe were two greater threats to Israel than the enemies that stood before them. Those same threats linger today and threaten the 21st century church. I hope you’ll check back in from time to time this week and check it out.