Joshua 9 The Cost of Compromise

Dr. Terry greets the audience and introduces a map of the southern and northern conquest of Canaan in the Bible. He explains the military engagements and the importance of the map for understanding the events in the book of Joshua. The lesson covers battle plans, deception, discovery, punishment, and results, highlighting the consequences of not seeking God's guidance. Personal anecdotes and philosophical reflections are shared, emphasizing the need to rely on God's wisdom rather than one's own plans. The lesson warns against deception and the importance of seeking God's guidance to avoid negative consequences. Good morning. Try that again. Good morning. How are y'all doing? I used to say to my classes when I'd go to teach them, I'd say, good morning, and they'd kind of like... I'd look at them and say, y'all been studying all night? You don't look like it. Good morning. Good to see you. On the last page of your lesson today is a map. Would you please carefully remove it and keep it in your Bible? Because this map is a map of the southern and northern conquest of the land of Canaan. And it will go through chapter 27. In fact, it picks up today because today's lesson with the destruction of Jericho and eventually the fighting of the five kings on the lowland side will be the first battle of the southern conquest. And there will be two military engagements. The first one from about now through about chapter 15-16 will be the southern conquest where you'll see, on the map, you'll see an arrow going south toward Bethlehem, toward Jerusalem, and toward Hebron. And, I don't know, I did mine in color. I was hoping yours would come out in color. But when Ray got the stuff to the machine today, it's all black and white. So you see the southern arrow? Okay, that's the southern conquest. And then the northern arrow going up north toward Dan and toward Lebanon and toward Mount Hermon is going to be the northern conquest. So they're going to have two different military activities. The one beginning today, the southern conquest, which took part when Jericho was destroyed and later on when Ai was taken. The southern conquest is on its way. And you can see on the map, the little circle, most of the cities of major importance are in the southern part of Israel. Basically in Judah, which will later be named Judah when the tribes are dispersed. And most of the big cities, Hebron, Jerusalem, which is what's called Jephthah. Anyway, the southern conquest is the arrow to the south. And the northern conquest is the arrow to the north. And everything that will be happening in Joshua from this point on will be relational to this map. That's why you need to take it off your lesson. Tuck it neatly into your Bible and keep it. Because when Dr. John Mann, next week and the next couple of weeks, speaks on the conquest of Israel, he'll be talking about the southern conquest because he'll be talking about Jebus, Jebus being Jerusalem later. And then he will be talking about those cities in the south. And then later on when Dr. Jimmy takes on, he'll probably be kicking into the cities in the north. And before you know it, Joshua is over. And it gets to moving pretty quickly. And Brother Jim and I have no idea how many chapters John's going to try to cover next week. Only one. Only one. Okay, Jimmy's taking on one. And we're still going one at a time. Okay, that's fine because I like to do it verse by verse. Even the military movement, I like to do verse by verse. So, I wanted you to get your map out. I didn't want you to fold it up and put it in your Bible and say, well, I wish I had that map. Well, you do. And it's in the back of your lesson. And just be aware of the fact. Now, there are a lot of little cities that are involved. And there will be five of them being involved today, which are very important to the conquest of the southern kingdom. Actually, Gibeon was a city state. And they had a city king. In fact, all of these cities had kings in various areas. And I'll tell you in a few moments, as we get into the lesson about the areas, there are basically four areas in Israel. There's the mountainous area up where we are now, up where Ai was, on the Scarp, looking down to the Jordan River. And just below them is an area called the lowlands, called the hill country. And there are a lot of little hills going up to the top of the mountain, going up to Jerusalem. And Jerusalem, of course, is 2,500 feet above sea level, whereas Jericho is 3,600 feet below sea level. And so you've got a great Scarp there on that side, on the eastern side of Israel. And there are some kings that are in some little areas in what you call the kind of the, not the foothills, but basically the foothills. Then you have the lowlands that are going toward the sea. And there are a number of kings that are in the lowlands. And then you have a number of kings that are along the coast, all the way from Cilicia, all the way up to Lebanon. And so basically there were those sections of Israel, the mountainous area, the hill area, the lowland area, and the sea area. And so all of these kings have to be conquered. And therein lies the problem with the lesson today. In fact, the lesson begins today. Actually, the lesson has four parts today, five parts. First we're going to talk about a battle plan for the southern cities. And then we're going to talk about a deception by one of the southern cities. And then we're going to talk about the discovery of that deception by Joshua. And we're going to come to understand something that I want you to understand. If you move without discussing your movement with God, you may end up in a problem. Right? And so what happens here is Joshua and his leadership and the elders of Israel evidently forgot what happened at Ai. And they forgot what they did in order to once and for all eliminate Ai. And they forgot that it is very important to talk to your father before you do something. Amen? And how many of us are living in consequences because of something we didn't talk to the father about. We did it anyway. And we have the residue thereof still dragging behind us. And that residue will not go away. You just heard the chapter nine of Joshua. That's what's going to happen here. So you have a deception. And then you have a discovery of that deception. And when the discovery is made, Joshua comes to realize what he and the elders did. They did not inquire of the Lord. A very simple little statement. Did you inquire of the Lord? Did you ask him what you were supposed to do? Did you ask him what was supposed to happen? Now God gave Joshua the battle plan for Ai eventually. But when he gets up here with these people, Bithavi, the Gibeonites, he's going to forget. Now, in your paper somewhere, I think it's maybe on page, don't turn there, but you'll run into it. It's on page three later on. No, it's on page two. You'll run into it. You're getting some of the Terry Household philosophy. Okay? Now, I'm sorry, but we have a little bit of philosophical stuff running around our house. And Barbara and I laugh about it, and I'll say to Barbara, Good morning, sweetheart. Have you read the message on the refrigerator? Good morning. This is God. I will take care of all your problems today. I will not need your help. Have a good day. That's the Terry Household philosophy. We kind of think about that regularly in our house. Now, on the wall, we have several plaques in our house. And one of the plaques on our walls is the book of Ephesians, chapter three, verse 20, 21. For he is able to do exceedingly abundantly. Two adverbs in order. He is able to do exceedingly abundantly above all. What part of all do you not understand? He is able to do exceedingly abundantly above all that you ask or even think according to his riches in whom? In Christ Jesus. That is the philosophy of the Terry Home. We have it on our wall. We say, Lord, you are able to do exceedingly abundantly above all. What part of all do you not understand? We ask or think. Now, there is another little piece of philosophy that Barbara uses with me a lot. When I do something stupid. And she uses it quite often because I do something stupid quite often. She has a little phrase that she found when we first married. She loved to share this with me. And she said, Jack, there are times when I, and it is on page two and I wrote it out for you. She will say, Jack, I buy you books and I buy you books and you just tear the pages out. Okay? Now, you know what she is saying? I try to help you. I try to tell you. I try to be a part of you. And you just tear the pages out. You don't even read them. Buy your books and buy your books and you just tear the pages out. Now, you've got some of the Terry Household philosophy. He is able to do exceeding abundantly above all. Good morning. This is God. We need your help today. Have a good day. And buy your books and buy your books, Joshua. And guess what? You just tore the pages out. Okay. Today's lesson is Battle Plan, Deception, Discovery, Punishment, Results. And this happens every time we go against the will of God in our lives. Because, you see, we develop our own battle plans and we refuse to go to the refrigerator. We refuse to read the little sign on the refrigerator door. This is God. I will take care of all your problems today. I don't need your help. So, you see, we get our own battle plans. Now, I want you to know, our lives are in complete order with these five activities that happened to Joshua and to the Gibeonites in this chapter. We get our own battle plans set. We do it without talking to God. And then we do them and then it fails and then we deceive God and say, well, we didn't do it that way, Lord. It's your fault. I mean, how many times have you heard Trump being blamed for everything that's happening? And he's not even around there when it's happening. You've got to blame somebody. And if your battle plan goes to the pits, who are you going to blame? You're not going to blame yourself. And so we, you know, we have a deception with God. And then we discover that God already knew about it. And he starts talking to us about it. He starts telling us, now you're going to have some residue that's going to happen because you did this. I mean, I'm going to give you an illustration that may be great, may be helpful. We moved to Baytown, Texas, and we were having a wonderful ministry at Central Baptist Church in Baytown. They gave us a beautiful little parsonage. And my sweet darling, because the deacon said to her, now, Barbara, we can do your parsonage any way you want us to do it. We'll paint it any color you want us to paint it. Our best friend was a master painter out at Umber Oil, Bill Stegall and his sweet wife. And he was going to paint our house for us. Barbara decided, we had a meeting, we had a battle plan for the kitchen. Barbara decided in our battle plan that she wanted the kitchen yellow. And Bill came in and sat with her and sat with me and the battle plan was set. And he said, are you sure you want it yellow? Barbara said, I want it as yellow as the sun. Bill said, okay, I'll paint it. He did, but he didn't like it. We had to live with it for a while, the residue thereof. And finally, Bill came in one day and he said, now, Barbara, that you've lived in the yellow for a while, what color would you like to have your kitchen? And then we did it beautiful white. And that was wonderful. But we had to live with the residue of our battle plan. I thought yellow was pretty too, sweetheart. I thought yellow was going to be great. You're walking there and going, ah! I mean, you didn't have to wake up in the morning. It woke you up when you walked in the kitchen. So, you understand what I'm talking about? Now, isn't it interesting that all of us do that? We have our own battle plans. And then God finds it out, and he talks to you about it, and you're trying to hide it. And finally, he comes to me and he says, you know what? You have to live with it. Now, I'm sorry to say this. There are some things that we do in life that we have to live with the residue thereof for the rest of our lives. That's tragic. That's tragic. The Israelites are going to have to live with this, what they're going to do in this chapter, forever. They're not going to get out of it. In fact, I will show you at the end of chapter 10, the end of chapter 9, where it says, one little word, to this day. You remember I told you that phrase comes through there a lot? To this day, what you have done is still there. And sometimes the residue thereof of the bad decisions that we make without the counsel of God, without discussing it with him, building our own battle plan, doing our own thing, and suffering the consequences of that decision, sometimes that residue will stay with us forever. Are there some things that you think about in your life that you wish you hadn't done? Yeah. You see, the residue is there forever. Still there. Now, God has forgiven you, that's for sure. God has forgiven you that you made your own battle plan, that's for sure. God has forgiven you that you made a mistake, that's for sure. But God said, you know what? Every decision has a consequence. And if you do it with me, God says, the consequences will be less, more palatable than they are if you do it without me. And so, buy your books, buy your books, and we just tear the pages out. And Joshua knew better. He knew better when God took him to Ai and totally destroyed Ai. God knew better. Joshua knew better. But Joshua decided that he knew what to do. And so did the elders of the people of Israel. And because of that, as we get to the end of the chapter, you will see the residue on and on. Okay. Chapter 9. Now we're going to talk about a battle plan. All these cities have kings. They have city kings. There's a city king in Jebus, which will later on be Jerusalem. And there's a city king in all of these little cities. There were city kings on the eastern side. But the children of Israel came up the eastern side of Jordan, and they conquered Ammon and Edom. And Bashan was the king, and there was another king down there. So every one of these little areas had a king. And the king had a pretty nice little group of people under him. Maybe three to five cities, maybe ten cities. But there were many, many kings. And so this scripture begins, And it came to pass, when the kings who were on this side of Jordan. Now what he's saying is, they're on the western side of Jordan where the children of Israel are. Jericho and Ai were on the western side of Jordan. And all of these kings now are up in the mountains. They're in the hills. They're in the lowlands. And they're along the coast. And these kings are kings over all city states. And they have an army. Each of them has armies. And each of them have protected their people. And many of them have cities under which their big city, like Gibeon, is the central city. And these cities are part of Gibeon. It's like Northridge and Hills and Hearst and Bedford and Eunice are part of the Dallas-Fort Worth area. If we were identified, we'd say, well, we're in the mid-cities. Well, that's true. We are in the mid-cities between Dallas and Fort Worth. So we're identified. Well, if you lived somewhere just near Gibeon, you would be identified with Gibeon. And before this chapter is over, you're going to find four other cities that are identified with Gibeon. And they're all part of the deception. They're all part of what's going to happen. So now, it says that these kings on this side of Jordan, in the hills and in the lowland and in the coast of the Great Sea toward Lebanon, they were the Hittites and the Amorites, the Canaanites, the Perizzites, the Hittites, and the Jebusites. Now, they were the Amorites and the Canaanites of that particular part of Canaan. And he just introduced you to everybody that was in Canaan. All of the kings who were in the mountainous areas from Jerusalem going up to Lebanon. All of the kings who were in the hill country on the slopes of the mountains going up to Lebanon. All of the people who were down in the lowlands down south of the hills and moving toward the sea. And all the people who were on the sea. You've got a lot of people living there. And there are a number of kings, cities, and a number of kings. And they said, and they assembled themselves together to fight with Joshua in Israel. With one accord. They built a coalition. They were getting ready to set up shop against the Israelites. Pause. Why didn't they do it when Jericho was destroyed? Have you had an idea? Why didn't these kings get together when they saw the children of Israel walk around the city one time a day for six days, and seven times a day for seven days? Lord Trumpet yelled, Lord God of Israel, he reigns. And God wiped out the whole city. Not a sword was drawn. God wiped out the whole city. Now, why didn't these kings do something about it when that happened? They were scared. They figured out if their God can wipe out the whole city of Jericho, when they get up here. Oh, by the way, just for your forward notion of what John's going to be telling you about. Just for your forward notion is God's going to keep on doing it. But he's going to have to do it in a sporadic process because they keep forgetting. It's amazing how we keep forgetting. And so the kings get together. They're going to draw a coalition. They're going to set themselves up against Israel because they believe that when Israel comes up there, they believe when Israel got to Ai, the first time God would have done what? Destroyed them. Same thing he did in Jericho. Oh, something happened. Buy your books and buy your books. And Joshua tore the pages out. And when he went against Ai, guess who he didn't speak with? He didn't ask God about it. He just picked him out 3,000 men. Didn't ask God about how many men he should pick out. Oh, by the way, if you just look at that battle plan and look at God's battle plan, when God gets his battle plan ready, he sends 30,000 troops on the other side of Ai. Joshua, you send 3,000? An eternal God who is the God of creation sends 30,000 north, 10 units to the west, 5,000 in the valley, and all of these 250,000 troops coming up from the bottom? And you go to Ai with 3,000 men? Goodness, fella, what are you thinking about? Well, when Joshua got up there to Ai the first time, and they beat the living daylights out of him and put him to rout, the kings of the north and the mountainous areas began to be emboldened. Look, they can be defeated. Now, when a city king thinks that you can be defeated, they watched Ai, a little bitty city not near as large as Gibeon, they watched a little city, Ai, put them to rout, but the next time they come up there, the little city doesn't put them to rout, he totally destroys it, he puts the city on the ground, makes it big, he bears the king, bears it up off rocks and destroys it. Now they're coming north, and these kings said, well, if Ai can beat them, so can we. And they get set up for battle. Now, here's an interesting thing that we have to remember. At Kadesh Barnea, before God sent the 12 spies into the land of Canaan, God said, I don't want you to send those spies in there. I want you to keep on walking. I just want you to keep on going. You're coming up from Sinai, you're coming to Kadesh Barnea, here lies in front of you the whole land of Canaan. I just want you to keep on walking. We'll wipe out all of your enemies in front of you. What part of all did they not understand? And so they said, nah, we've got a better plan. We're going to send 12 spies in there, and they're going to come back and tell us what we can do. Well, you know the story. They spent 38 years in residue getting over that stupid decision. When, by the time they got over it, 38 years later, they could have already taken Canaan and been in the promised land. If they had just trusted God. Joshua, quit trying. Start trusting. Look what I did to Jericho. Look what I did to Ai. Now you have emboldened all of these kings. And now, God, you're going to have to fight. I'll fight for you. And later on, he's going to fight for them by making the sun stand still. In chapter 10, oh, by the way, there's a cute story about that. It said there was a young man in the hills of Kentucky that had a liquor business. He was making brew and selling brew. And they called him and brought him to court. And his name was Joshua. He was a young Kentucky hillbilly. They brought him to court, and the magistrate looked at him and said, son, what's your name? To which the young man said, sir, my name is Joshua. And the judge looked back and said, are you the Joshua that made the sun stand still? He said, no, your majesty, I'm the Joshua who made the moon shine still. That's the different Joshua. Now, Joshua is going to get the sun to stand still in John's message. I won't get there, I'll mess him up. So all of these kings have come together. They have coalitionized. They're ready because they know that the first part of this part of Canaan they have to take is the southern part. If they can solidify the southern part where all the big cities are, they can solidify the northern part where the smaller cities are not as bad. And so they know they're coming. So this coalition in verses 1 through 3, they know they're coming. And they're getting ready for them to fight. When the inhabitants of Gibeon heard what Joshua had done to Jericho and now to Ai, now they figured out something. They worked craftily and pretended to be ambassadors. Now, here's the deception. They said, let's put on old sacks. Let's put old sacks on our donkeys that are dusty and dirty. And we've repaired them. And let's make our donkeys all dusty. Let's look like we've been on a trip for a long, long time. Let's take all of our clothing and make it look like it's old and falling apart and all tattered and torn. Let's take our wineskins and let's sew them up and make it look like they've come apart and fallen in. And let's take some of our old dead bread here that has mold and dust on it and let's put it in the bag. And let's play like we are a nation that is there as, watch this word, we are here not as ambassadors, although that's what they call themselves. We are here as strangers. Now, what does the word stranger in deference to ambassador to the Israelites mean? You see, ladies and gentlemen, the Israelites are always strangers. That great ambassador song says, I am a stranger here within a foreign land. My home is far away upon a golden strand. Ambassador to be of realms beyond the sea. I'm here on business for my king. You see, folks, the word stranger had a real hard tug to Israel. Because when Abraham came down into Canaan, he was a stranger. When they went down into Egypt, his son, the trickster, whose later name was changed to Israel, and several hundred thousand people were strangers in Egypt. And when they were extricated from Egypt, they were strangers in the wilderness. And when they headed for Canaan, they were supposed to just keep on walking and they would be now strangers in a foreign land. That word stranger had a real touch to the Israelites. It really touched Joshua's heart. And they said to him, now look, we're going to put all this old stuff, we're going to come together and we're going to go talk to Joshua and we're going to tell him that we don't belong to this particular country. We are strangers. We are ambassadors from another country. Look, look how tattered and torn our bags are. Look at our clothing. Look at our sandals. They're all broken and beaten up. Look at our food. Our wine is in patch bags and our bread is moldy. We are here. We need your help. We need your help. And they went to Joshua in verse 6 at Gilgal. Now, there is a question as to whether that's the Gilgal in the south or is there another little city up there? I have no idea. The scripture says they went to Gilgal. If they went to the south and they went down on the Jordan River, I don't think so. I think they met Joshua up in the hills in a little city that might have been named Gilgal. Anyway, they went to Gilgal and met Joshua and they told him the story. They told him the deception. We are not of this nation. They lied. They were Gibeonites. If you look on your map, Gibeon is the first little big city right there. It's right below Bethel. And now they've already destroyed Bethel. They destroyed it when they destroyed Ai. Gibeon is right there. Gibeon has several little cities around it. And Gibeon is a city state. And Gibeon is a pretty solid little place. And they're now at Gibeon. And these Gibeonites are saying, we are ambassadors from a nation outside of here. Look how long we've been traveling. And we're here. We need your help, Joshua. We've come from far country. Now, verse 7. But the men of Israel said to the Hivites, perhaps you dwell among us, so how can we make a covenant with you? You see, some of the people had an idea this was a trick. But enough of them did not have an idea that it was a trick. Some of them thought it was a deception, but enough of them did not think it was a deception. By the way, that's the same problem with the twelve spies. Some of them thought they couldn't. Or some of them thought they could. And here again, the greater of the two succeeded. And perhaps you're, how should we make a covenant with you? Then they said to Joshua, we are your servants. Who are you and where do you come from? And they said, we're from a far country. Lying through their teeth. We're from a far country. We've heard about the Lord, your God, for we heard of his fame. Now they're going to really touch Joshua's heart. We heard of your God. We heard of his fame. We heard what happened in Egypt. We've heard the story of what happened in the wilderness. We heard of how you all have destroyed Jericho. We've heard how you're now here with this people. And we have heard and we want you to know. We are doing what he did is the two kings of the Amorites beyond Jordan, King of Hezbollah and the king of King of Bashan and all of Ashtaroth. Therefore, the elders and the inhabitants of our country spoke to us, saying, take provisions and go talk to Joshua. Lying through their teeth. So look, here's bread. Smoldy. You got some of it. It's got mold on it. See how old it is. See our clothing. It's tattered and torn. Our shoes are falling apart. We're just so happy to be with you. We're strangers in a foreign land, just like you. And these wineskins, which we still knew. Look how they're falling apart. Verse 14. Mark, verse 14. Verse 14 is the hinge pin of this chapter. Verse 14 is buy you books and buy you books and you just tear the pages off. Therefore, then the men of Israel took some of the bread. You've had it. When you take it, you're theirs. They took some of the bread, but they did not ask counsel of the Lord. You can write out of that verse. Buy you books and buy you books. Just tear the pages off. Now Joshua should have had enough sin. He'd been tricked so many times. And yet Joshua didn't have enough. So Joshua made peace with them. Uh oh. Bad news. He made peace with them and made a covenant with them and let them live. You see, God said everybody in Canaan will be what? Annihilated. Annihilated. Everybody in Canaan will be annihilated. If you don't do it, I will. Look at Jericho and look at Ai. God said everybody will be annihilated. Because I want you to go into that land and I want you to live in houses that you did not build. I want you to be able to glean fields and gardens that you did not plant. I want you to be able to tend vineyards that you did not tend. I want you to have cattle and sheep and goats and all kinds of livestock that you did not bring with you. I want to, what part of give do we not understand? I want to give it to you. Now, Jimmy, Johnny Beard had a favorite verse in Galatians. And one day I was talking with John when I was working with him in Lake Jackson. John and I were very, very close friends. And Jimmy and I both had part in his funeral. And we were talking and I said, you know, Johnny, I just love you so much and I just trust you for everything. He said, don't trust me, Jack. Don't trust me at all. And then he quoted. He said, the arm of flesh will fail you. He said, even me, Jack. I can fail you. The scripture says, the arm of flesh shall fail you. You dare not trust your own kind. Don't trust anybody around you. They will fail you. The arm of flesh will fail you. You dare not trust your own kind. The arm of flesh failed Joshua. He did not trust his own kind. So he's made a covenant. What does the covenant mean to God? God made a covenant with Abraham, 15th chapter, book of Genesis. Where is that covenant today? Still on the hill of Jerusalem. Still in Israel. Still very much alive. Ladies and gentlemen, a covenant never goes away. When someone makes a covenant with you, it never goes away. I made a covenant with that little lady back there in 1955. Jim, I've been thinking about writing a book. I'm thinking about writing a book, The Things To Which I Have Died. And one of the first things I'm putting is that on a summer night in 1954, in the First Baptist Church of Terrell, Texas, I saw a black-headed gal in that choir, and I fell in love with her that night, and all other women died. And that is the correct answer. You got it? I need to write that book, Jim. The Things To Which I Have Died. I love to play golf. I have died to golf. I love to play football. I love to play baseball. I love sports. I've died to all of them. My back won't let me. My legs won't let me. I have died. Think about it, folks, all the things to which you have died. Not going to die. You're already there. So, here we are. Here's a covenant. A covenant never dies. That covenant with that little black-headed gal never dies. Your covenant with your bride never dies. That covenant is solid. It's forever. So, you see, that was the deception. Joshua has discovered it, and now we've got a problem. Do you realize, or have you figured out, that the children of Israel now have picked up some people who are going to be hooked to their side for the rest, underline this, rest of their lives. They're going to have to put up with Gideonites forever. In fact, you go over to the end of this chapter and it says, to this day. This was not written until the period of the judges. This is to this day. We're still doing it with the Gideonites. A covenant never goes away. It never fails. It's never done with. And Joshua just did something. He swore by God to them that he would take care of them. Now, they keep on marching toward Gideonite, toward Gibeon. And verse 16 says, And it happened. They were three days away. And it happened at the end of three days, after they had made a covenant with them, that they heard that they were neighbors. Hello, federal. They heard that they were neighbors. And they dwelt near. Then the children of Israel journeyed and came to their cities the third day. Now the cities were Gibeon, Shibion, Beroth, and Keres Yerim. And the children of Israel should have done what? Totally annihilated them. They were there at Gibeon, at surrounding cities. God said at Kadesh. God said at Sinai. God said at Jordan. Annihilate the people in Cana. Joshua's got a problem. He made a solid covenant with these people, with eternal God the Father, that he would protect them. And look what it says. And they came to their cities on the third day. But the children of Israel did not attack them because the rulers of the congregation had sworn to them by the Lord God of Israel. All the congregation murmured against the rulers. And all the rulers said to the congregation, We've sworn. We've done it. We did it by the Lord God of Israel. Now therefore, don't touch them. And then Joshua says, This is what we will do with them. Now watch the residue. You saw the war. You saw the deception. You saw discovery. You saw now the penalty. Here comes the penalty. Verse 20. What shall we do with them because of their oath which we swore to them? Verse 21. And the rulers said to them, Let them live, but let them become woodcutters and water carriers for all the congregation as the rulers had promised. And Joshua called for them and he spoke to them and he said, You have deceived us. We are very far from you and you dwell near us. Now therein from this point on you will be cursed and none of you shall be anything but a slave. Get that word? None of you shall be anything but a slave. Woodcutters and water carriers for the congregation and the house of our Lord. Does that mean anything to you? Woodcutters and water carriers? Would you like to answer a question for me? How much water would they have to carry for two and a half million people? Every day. Residue. See now these people have gotten themselves in a pickle. Here comes their punishment. But they don't just use water for drinking. Have you ever heard of what happened in the tabernacle? And on the great altar at the tabernacle? And have you ever heard of how many animals were slain in the tabernacle, on the altar of the tabernacle and how much blood was around the tabernacle? How are they going to get rid of that blood? They've got to carry water. Now you think about it. These people are under oath to carry water whatever is needed every day for the congregation and for the house of the Lord. Every day they're going to have to carry water to take care of all the needs. That's a lot of water folks. That's a lot of buckets to carry. And they're going to have to do it because God said they would and Joshua said if you don't we're going to destroy you. You are our slaves. And they had to carry water every day for the people to drink and for the congregation of Israel house of the Lord to be cleansed and taken care of and the water had to be a big libation pan and they had water to clean all the blood. That's not the end of it. How are they going to make an altar fire? How are two and a half million people going to cook their meals? What do you have to have to cook with? Wood. Isn't that interesting? Now not only are these people going to have to carry water they're going to have to cut wood. They're going to have to cut wood for 250,000, 250 million Israelites to cook their meals and they're going to have to cut wood for the altar in the tabernacle and they're going to have to cut wood for any other altars. These people have a 24-7 job cutting wood and carrying water. Ladies and gentlemen that's a pretty heavy punishment. And Joshua said to them you're going to do this because you lied to us you deceived us and you told us who you were not and you caused us to make a covenant with our God therefore the residue of your deception is going to be for the rest of your lives you are going to be our slaves and for the rest of your lives you're going to haul water and cut wood. Wow. Have you ever heard the adage oh don't worry about him he carries water for me. Have you ever heard a business person talk about some of their colleagues sort of like lackeys he's my lackey oh don't worry about him he carries it. Did you ever figure out where that came from? You just heard it. If you're a business person have you ever said oh he carries water for me. You know what you mean? Anything I ask him to do he will do it or she will do it. He carries water for me. That comes from here folks. Anything Joshua said to these Gibeonites they had to carry water for him. And we say it today in our world he carries water for me. We know what you mean. We know he's your lackey. We know he's under your thumb. We know that you have him in your control. He carries water for me. I've heard that a thousand times from some business people. That's where it came from. From Joshua. Nice chapter. And so these Gibeonites have their penalty. Now then. It says in verse 24 they answered Joshua because it was a certainty that your servants as the Lord your God commanded his servants Moses to give you all the land and to destroy watch what they're saying and to destroy all the inhabitants of the land before you. We know that was your purpose. We lied to you. We deceived you. We'd rather carry your wood and carry your water than be dead. Seems to me like they picked up a pretty sound death as it was. Carrying water and carrying wood to me is no fun time. And the rest of the verse says and therefore therefore we were afraid of you for our lives and now here we are. You got us. Want us or not we're yours. You got to deal with us. Now Joshua didn't only have to feed the Israelites now he has to feed the Gibeonites. And when Joshua moves he cannot move the calf unless he moves who with him. Do you see what the residue is? They made a bad mistake. They did not ask God. God gave them what they asked. God told them what the problem was. God said you got a problem and it's going to be with you for the rest of your life. Remember a minute ago I asked you to think about some things that you wish you hadn't done. It's still there. The residue is still there. We can wipe it out of our memory but all of a sudden it comes back again. Ladies and gentlemen all you have to do is trust God. That's all. Not yourself. Not anybody else around you. Galatians says the arm of flesh shall fail you. You dare not trust your own. And since we know that who do we trust? And my good friend 3 Raymond Edmond said Jack quit trying and start trusting. Don't try to do God's work. Trust God to do His work through you. Let Him work out of you. Let Him be part of you. Trust Him. The arm of flesh will fail you. So He did to them as He delivered them out of the hand of the children of Israel so that they would not be killed. And that day Joshua forever forever made them woodcutters and water carriers. They were His lackeys. He had to take care of them. He had to feed them. He had to move them. He had to protect them. They were His because He made a covenant with them. And the scripture says at the last of this word for the fear of the Lord in the place which He would choose even to this day. There it is again. The writer out of the book of Judges who wrote this book of Joshua said I am writing several years from this particular activity and guess what the Gibeonites are still doing? They're still chopping wood and bringing water to the tabernacle at Shiloh. They're still chopping wood and bringing water to all of our people of Israel. They're still chopping wood and bringing water. Congratulations Gibeonites and we're still carrying our trash because we tried and didn't trust. Amen? It's a great chapter folks. It is so true of all of us. So here's your takeaway. Don't ever do anything without talking to God. You say, but Jack he's so far away. No he's not, he's right here. He's not up there, he's right here. Major decisions have their residue. Don't belabor the fact. But decisions have their trust. The scripture says trust in the Lord. Barbara you like this one? This one is on our cabinet in our house. The more carried philosophy. Trust in the Lord with all of your heart. Lean not to your own understanding. In all, what part of all do you not understand? In all of your ways acknowledge Him and He shall direct your path. That's on our cabinet every time I pour a cup of coffee I read that thing. You know why? Because that little sweetheart back there has told me Jack we live by faith not by sight. Amen? So your takeaway quit trying you're going to fail. Start trusting you're going to succeed in God. I promise you that's His word. Father heaven and Father we've done it so many times and oftentimes the residue that trails our lives is so hurtful because of the stupid mistakes we made and the times we didn't talk to you. Father forgive us. We know we're flesh and we know that we fail you. But Father you dwell in us and you are able to provide for us all of the necessary information we need if we simply say Lord God hear me I need your help today. And you'll give it to us. And you'll give it to us in the name of your only begotten Son Jesus Christ for whom you said I will give you all things. Trust me I'll give you all things. And for that we give you praise in the name of Jesus our Lord. Amen. See you next week. Keep your mask handy.