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Joshua 15-19

Joshua
15:1-63  -  ‘The land of  Negeb’ had little water. The request was made - ‘Give me also springs of water’. The request was granted. Trusting in the Lord’s promise - ‘the heavenly Father will give the Holy Spirit to those who ask Him’, we receive His blessing - ‘rivers of living water’ (19; Luke 11:13; John 7:38-39). ‘The people of Judah could not drive out’ the Jebusites. We may contrast Judah’s failure with Caleb’s faith - ‘the Lord will be with me, and I shall drive them out as the Lord said’. Learning from Judah’s failure - ‘Do not be conformed to this world’ - , we must build on Caleb’s faith - ‘Be transformed by the renewal of your mind’. Let us commit ourselves to doing ‘God’s will - His good, pleasing and perfect will’ (63; 14:12; Romans 12:2). Do His will. Let His ‘rivers of living water’ flow freely.
16:1-17:18  -  Compromise is a poor substitute for obedience. Fail to obey God, and you may have to live with the consequences of your disobedience: ‘they did not drive out the Canaanites... so the Canaanites have dwelt in the midst of Ephraim to this day (16:10). Settling for anything less than God’s very best will surely lead us far from Him and His blessing: ‘He gave them what they asked, but sent a wasting disease among them’ (Psalm 106:15). If we are to make real spiritual progress, we must not rest on our laurels’ - ‘We are a numerous people’. We must do the work of God: ‘you shall drive out the Canaanites’. Our obedience must be more than ‘empty words’. We must not live as ‘the sons of disobedience’. We must ‘live as the children of light’ - ‘God’s own people’ (14,18; Ephesians 5:6-10; 1 Peter 2:9).
18:1-19:51  -  ‘How long will you be slack to go in and take possession of the land, which the Lord, the God of your fathers, has given you?’ (18:3). God has given us so much: ‘His divine power has given us everything we need for life and godliness’. How much are we giving ourselves to Him? - ‘Make every effort to add to your faith... If you do this you will never fail; so there will be richly provided for you an entrance into the eternal Kingdom of our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ’ (2 Peter 1:3-11). In Joshua, we see a fine example of the Christlike spirit - ‘not to be served but to serve’ (Mark 10:45). After ‘they had finished distributing the... land’, Joshua received his ‘inheritance’. He led with the attitude of a servant. He wasn’t ‘in it only for what he could get out of it’ - the city he chose had to be ‘rebuilt’ (49-50)!
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