It is interesting how the first twelve verses of Joshua 5
are so often overlooked in our Sunday school lessons and morning messages. They
don’t appear to be very exciting verses and we are more interested in the walls
of Jericho miraculously coming down and the giants being conquered. These
verses might not jump out at us as exciting, but they are very crucial for us
to remember that before there can be victory in our Christian journey there
must be proper preparation!
We need to remember that our warfare is not with “flesh and
blood” but it is spiritual, and really “against principalities, against
powers, against the rulers of the darkness of this age, against spiritual hosts
of wickedness in the heavenly places.” (Ephesians 6:12). We might have
experienced the miraculous crossing of both the Red Sea and the Jordan River spiritually
but before we truly enjoy the victorious Christian life, we need to remember
that the “Battle is the Lord’s”.
As believers we still have an old Adamic nature, a fleshly
carnal nature, that Paul often reminded the believers in the New Testament
churches about. In Romans 7:18, Paul said that “no good thing dwells in our
flesh.” In Galatian 5:17, he reminds us that “the flesh lusts against
the Spirit, and the Spirit against the flesh; and these are contrary to one
another, so that you do not do the things that you wish.” (Galatians 5:17).
Before Israel could attack and conquer Jericho, the males
had to be circumcised (Joshua 5:1-8). It was a covenant reminder that their
bodies did not belong to them but to the LORD. “…We are not our own for we
have been bought with a price and we belong to the LORD…” (1 Corinthians
6:17-20). Paul made it clear in Colossians 2:11-13 that we have a “spiritual
circumcision” in Christ: “In Him you were also circumcised with the
circumcision made without hands, by putting off the body of the sins of the
flesh, by the circumcision of Christ, buried with Him in baptism, in which you
also were raised with Him through faith in the working of God, who raised Him
from the dead. And you, being dead in your trespasses and the uncircumcision of
your flesh, He has made alive together with Him, having forgiven you all
trespasses”. This is why we practice
the ordinance of baptism in our churches to remind us that we have be set apart
from the flesh and the world by the power of the death, burial, and
resurrection of Jesus Christ!
In verses 10-12, the people then observed the Passover! In
his farewell address to the nation, Moses had repeatedly commanded the Jews to
remember that they were once slaves in Egypt and that the Lord had delivered
them and made them His own people (Deut. 6:15; 15:15; 16:12; 24:18, 22). This
great truth was embodied in their annual Passover feast. They were never to
forget that they were a redeemed people, set free by the blood of the lamb. Forty
years before, Israel had celebrated the Passover on the night of their
deliverance from Egypt (Ex. 11-14). They also celebrated Passover at Mount
Sinai, before leaving for Kadesh Barnea (Num. 9:1-14); but there is no evidence
that they commemorated the Passover at any time during their years of
wilderness wandering. Many Bible scholars believe this is because of the fact
that the new generation wasn't circumcised prevented them from participating,
and God had temporarily suspended His covenant with His people because of their
rebellion at Kadesh Barnea.
If we are to live in victory we need to regularly be
reminded, with the observance of the Lord’s Supper in our local church, that it
is only by the blood of Christ we are redeemed and set free from the “law of
sin and death”. That we are “crucified with Christ” and it is only
by His resurrection power and the Holy Spirit in us, that we can face the
Jericho’s and giants that get between us and God’s will and best for our lives!
May the Lord help us to remember our warfare is spiritual.
God bless!
