FROM TODAY’S RECAP: - Deuteronomy 20:10-18 - Deuteronomy 7:1-2 - Exodus 33:19 Note: We provide links to specific resources; this is not an endorsement of the entire website, author, organization, etc. Their views may not represent our own. SHOW NOTES: - Follow The Bible Recap: Instagram | Facebook | TikTok | YouTube - Follow Tara-Leigh Cobble: Instagram - Read/listen on the Bible App or Dwell App - Learn more at our Start Page - Become a RECAPtain - Shop the TBR Store - Credits PARTNER MINISTRIES: D-Group International Israelux The God Shot TLC Writing & Speaking DISCLAIMER: The Bible Recap, Tara-Leigh Cobble, and affiliates are not a church, pastor, spiritual authority, or counseling service. Listeners and viewers consume this content on a voluntary basis and assume all responsibility for the resulting consequences and impact.
Full Episode
Hey Bible Readers, I'm Tara Lee Cobble and I'm your host for the Bible Recap. Before we launch into today's recap, we need to remember something we read in Deuteronomy 20 to help it all make sense. In that chapter, God gave very different instructions on how the Israelites were supposed to handle cities outside of the Promised Land versus cities inside the Promised Land.
For cities outside Canaan, they were supposed to greet the cities with peace and kill only the males, and only if they opposed them. But for those inside Canaan, they were supposed to operate by a principle called cherim, where everything is dedicated to Yahweh and devoted to destruction. As we've talked about before, God used this practice to serve multiple purposes.
Today we meet another group of people from Gibeon. They're called the Gibeonites or the Hivites, and they've apparently gotten word of God's instructions to the Israelites. They lived in Canaan, but decided to pretend like they didn't so they could get the more lenient treatment and not be entirely destroyed. Pretty sneaky. They ask Israel to enter into a protective covenant with them.
Remember yesterday how Joshua won the battle against Jericho then failed to ask God for guidance when fighting against Ai and they lost? Then he won against Ai when he followed God's commands? It seems like he learned very little from that incident because here he is, failing to ask God for guidance again and just forging out on his own.
So he gets duped into making a covenant with his enemies, which is in direct violation of God's commands to Israel in Deuteronomy 7. Pretty quickly, the Israelites find out they've been deceived, and they want to destroy the Gibeonites.
But the Israelite leaders tell them that they have to keep their covenant, and that they'll just have to sever the consequences of their sin in entering into the covenant. But they don't kill the Gibeonites slash Hivites, and instead just assign them to do manual labor in the service of the temple, which makes the Gibeonites pretty happy because they know they've avoided being destroyed.
One thing I find interesting about this is that even God's enemies who have deceived God's people end up serving God's purposes and glory. Some other local kings get wind of what happened, and they gather together to go to war against the people of Gibeon because they had made peace with the Israelites. the Gibeonites panic and beg Israel to help them out. So Joshua talks to God about it.
Good call. And God says, I love it when God speaks of the future in past tense. I have given them into your hands. It's almost like he wrote the story before it happened. In this battle, God uses some miraculous tactics, confusion and hailstones and cosmic events, and he wins the war for Israel. Joshua knows how to proceed because he listened to and believed God.
He remembers what God said to him, and he quotes God's words to his people as they wrap up the battle. After this, they defeat six more cities in southern Canaan. As a result, the kings of the north get pretty nervous, as you can imagine. As Joshua talks to God about things, God tells him that the next day he'll give all of them to Israel in battle. And he does.
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