Israel's obedience and Jericho's fall

"For if we sin wilfully after that we have received the knowledge of the truth, there remaineth no more sacrifice for sins, but a certain fearful looking for of judgment and fiery indignation, which shall devour the adversaries. He that despised Moses' law died without mercy under two or three witnesses: of how much sorer punishment, suppose ye, shall he be thought worthy, who hath trodden under foot the Son of God, and hath counted the blood of the covenant, wherewith he was sanctified, an unholy thing, and hath done despite unto the Spirit of grace? For we know him that hath said, Vengeance belongeth unto me, I will recompense, saith the Lord. And again, The Lord shall judge his people. It is a fearful thing to fall into the hands of the living God" (Hebrews 10:26-31).

Last week, we noticed from 2 Kings 5:1-17 the example of Naaman, a leper. The Scripture tells us of the cure, given by God through His servant, the anger of Naaman at the commandment, and the ultimate result of total obedience to the command. Is not the situation the same in every command God gave man, from the beginning to the present? God gave a command; man either obeyed it or disobeyed it; man received a blessing for obeying, or he received the consequences of disobeying.

The very first example recorded for us is Adam and Eve. God said don't eat of the fruit of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, for the day you eat thereof, you will surely die. God did not say, nor did He mean, "don't eat of it unless you want to." He said, "don't eat," and "if you do, you will surely die." At the time Adam and Eve disobeyed God's command, they died spiritually. Being driven from the garden, in which was the tree of life, they began to die physically. So, it has even been with mankind; all die physically.

There is another example of the goodness and the severity of God in the book of Joshua. Read Joshua 1:7: "Only be thou strong and very courageous, that thou mayest observe to do according to all the law, which Moses my servant commanded thee: turn not from it to the right hand or to the left, that thou mayest prosper whithersoever thou goest." Joshua 1:9 tells us God commanded Joshua. Joshua 6:2 says God had given Israel the city of Jericho. Then, read Joshua 6:3-5: "And ye shall compass the city, all ye men of war, and go round about the city once. Thus shalt thou do six days. And seven priests shall bear before the ark seven trumpets of rams' horns: and the seventh day, ye shall compass the city seven times, and the priests shall blow with the trumpets. And it shall come to pass, that when they make a long blast with the ram's horn, and when ye shall hear the sound of the trumpet, all the people shall shout with a great shout; and the wall of the city shall fall down flat, and the people shall ascend up every man straight before him." We know Israel did exactly what the Lord commanded regarding the bringing down of the wall of Jericho. It was not until they had marched around the city the seventh time on the seventh day that the wall fell. Just as Naaman the leper was not cleansed until completing his obedience to God's command, so Jericho's wall did not fall until the Israelites had completed the commandment of God. Complete obedience was, and is, necessary!