Read Joshua 6:6-20
“So the people shouted when the priests blew with the trumpets: and it came to pass, when the people heard the sound of the trumpet, and the people shouted with a great shout, that the wall fell down flat, so that the people went up into the city, every man straight before him, and they took the city” (v. 20).
It can be easy to look at familiar Bible stories with the end already in mind. We learned about the march around Jericho back in Sunday school, and we watched the cardboard-block wall tumble.
So I have to ask myself the question—if I had been among the Israelites marching around the city on the seventh day, how loud would I have shouted? Maybe I would have waited until others started before I opened my mouth; maybe I would have matched my “hurrah” with the person’s next to me; maybe I would have only pumped my fist about halfway in the air, just in case. I know what I should have done. If I were a part of that multitude, I should have shouted as if the God I served were all-powerful, as if He were fighting for us, as if He were giving us the victory.
On that seventh day, after that seventh trek around the city, those nomadic descendants of ex-slaves “shouted with a great shout.” But how could they be so sure? Was there a brief moment, while their shout still echoed in the silence, that they wondered whether God was going to come through? They were walking in obedience to a God who had promised them the victory; they added that little mustard seed to an otherwise certain defeat, and the walls of their impossibility came crashing down (ASE)
“Faith . . . laughs at the impossibilities, and cries, ‘It shall be done’ ” (Charles Wesley).
This week's featured devotional is the Monday, March 17, 2014 entry of Opening the Word. Order your copy!
Photo Credit: "IMG_1240" by shildsen used under CC BY 2.0 / Cropped.
