Read: Joshua 22:21-23:16; Luke 20:27-47; Psalm 89:14-37; Proverbs 13:17-19
The tribes of Reuben, Gad, and the half-tribe of Manasseh were confronted by the other tribes about the monument they had set up. They were able to explain that that was not an altar to worship at but a memorial to remind them all God had done. The didn’t want their future generations to forget that they were a part of Israel since the Jordan separated them.
Joshua gave them instructions that would help them stay true to the Lord:
1) don’t deviate to the left or the right
2) don’t associate with the other people still in the land
3) don’t mention the name of their gods or swear by them
4) cling tightly to the Lord
5) don’t intermarry with the people of the land
If they were not careful to do these things then God would stop driving them out and they would be a snare to them. Eventually, their enemies would trap them and become their masters and they would cloud their understanding. The blessing of God would fade from their reach.
He reminded them that God had made good on every promise he had given them.
What a great reminder to us of the snares of the world. When we engage with sin then it seeps into our soul and becomes a trap to us. We walk out of God’s blessings into the curses and things begin to go wrong. The answer is in clinging closely to the Lord.
In Luke, the Sadducees tried to trap Jesus in a scenario about the resurrection. They didn’t believe in the resurrection. Jesus silenced them when he gave them scriptures that proved that God was not a god of the dead but of the living, and to him all are alive.
It is interesting to me that the Old Testament is all about remembering and looking back at what God had done for them when the New Testament is all about looking forward to what God is going to do. It is about expectation.
Lord, help us to live today with expectation of what you are going to do today.
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