Resisting the urge to live with the enemy

When Joshua finally led the Israelites into the Promised Land, it was the fulfilment of a promise God gave to Abraham hundreds of years before and which he confirmed to Isaac and Jacob.  God would give them a land to live in and he would dispossess the nations that lived there.

Just as God had miraculously parted the Red Sea 40 years before to lead the people out of Egypt, God now parted the Jordan, flowing in full flood, for the nation to cross over into the land God had promised them.  This was the start of taking the land.

The Israelites were not meant to cross the Jordan and settle along its banks where the pastures would have been good and there was plenty of water.  They had to go to war and forcibly take the land.  God was with them and fought for them but they had to be obedient and do as God commanded.  If they had stayed by the Jordan, they would have had to learn to live with the enemy not overcome him.  Whenever the Israelites did that, it led to compromise and turning away from God. 

When we crossed our Jordan and came to salvation, God did not want us to settle down on the edge of our promised land.  He wants us to take all that he has planned and purposed for us, our families, our communities but it means going to war.  God will fight for us and teach us how to overcome the enemy but we must avoid compromise and not learn to live with the enemy.

The devil wants us to settle on the edge of God’s purposes and not press in and defeat his plans and strategies.  It takes Godly obedience but the rewards are great.  If the devil can persuade us to settle down, he can wrap us up in compromise and draw us further and further away from God.

I sense today there is a need to wake up from the peaceful sleep that the devil has lulled us into.  Let us look afresh at our lives and consider if there are promises we have let go of and land that we have still to take in our lives.  It took the Israelites a long time to finally get all God had planned for them because too often it was easier to settle down, make terms of peace with the nations around them and God had to constantly stir them to fresh action and fresh trust in him. 

Let God stir us from compromise and show us how to drive the enemy from our lives and take decisive action to press into the promises of God.