Christian Unity - some lessons from Joshua 22

Text Joshua 22 Time 27 06 21 Place Childs Hill Baptist Church (Zoom)

There is a fascinating account in Luke 9:49, 50 of a conversation between Jesus and John. It begins with John saying Master, ... we saw someone driving out demons in your name and we tried to stop him, because he is not one of us. Do not stop him, Jesus said, for whoever is not against you is for you. That attitude of 'he is not one of us, let's stop him' is more common than you might think and it is the very opposite to the kind of unity that Jesus wants us to know and enjoy.

We are working our way through the Book of Joshua and our chapter tonight is Joshua 22. In this chapter the fighting men of the tribes Reuben, Gad and half of Manasseh, whose land lay east of the Jordan, return home to their wives and children, having played their part in supporting their brothers in conquering the land west of the Jordan.

A problem arises, however. The Trans-Jordan tribes decide to build an imposing altar at Geliloth on the west bank of the Jordan river. They build it not for burnt offerings or sacrifices but as a witness between them and the West Jordan tribes that they too worship the LORD. Their concern was that in the future West Jordanians may say to the Trans-Jordan tribes 'You have no share in the LORD.' If that happened, they could simply point to the replica altar and say, look, this is a proof that we are really one with you.

However, this attempt at unity backfires and the West Jordanians come chasing after them with war in their bones. They believe this is a rebellion, an apostasy, and they challenge the Trans-Jordanians on it. Thankfully, they are able to explain themselves and war is averted.

So what we have here is a chapter about unity among the people of God. How easy it is to fall out, how easy for there to be misunderstandings. Such misunderstandings must be dealt with, however, and not allowed to smoulder. Three things then this evening

1. Christian unity - be thankful for others, urge them to obedience and bless them

Three things regarding Christian unity come out in the first nine verses.

1. Be thankful for others

We read first in verses 1-3 how Joshua summoned the Reubenites, the Gadites and the half-tribe of Manasseh and said to them, You have done all that Moses the servant of the LORD commanded, and you have obeyed me in everything I commanded. For a long time now - to this very day - you have not deserted your fellow Israelites but have carried out the mission the LORD your God gave you. Their mission, of course, was given to them by Moses and we can read about it back in Numbers and Deuteronomy. It is spoken of in Joshua 1, before the conquest gets underway. There, Joshua reminds the Reubenites, Gadites and half tribe of Manasseh of their commitment. Their wives, children and livestock were welcome to stay in the land that Moses gave them east of the Jordan, but all their fighting men, ready for battle, must cross over ahead of your fellow Israelites. You are to help them says Joshua until the LORD gives them rest, as he has done for you, and until they too have taken possession of the land the LORD your God is giving them. After that, you may go back and occupy your own land, which Moses the servant of the LORD gave you east of the Jordan toward the sunrise. Now their mission was complete and it was time to return to their families. Before they leave Joshua expresses the thankfulness of all the community for all that they have done.

A similar sense of thankfulness ought to possess us when we think of what others have done for us. We should be thankful for our leaders who have the rule over us. We should be thankful for our predecessors and what they have provided us with - buildings and other assets. We should be thankful for those who do things like cleaning and preparing and helping us in evangelism. It is all done only through people making great sacrifices. Be thankful and show you are thankful.

J A Broadus was a nineteenth century American Baptist pastor who became President of the Southern Baptist Theological Seminary. I like the story of how as soon as he was converted he witnessed to his red haired school friend Sandy Jones and Sandy was also converted. Sandy was a little awkward but as soon as he was converted he went straight to Broadus and held out his hand and said, “I thank you, John, I thank you, John.”

Dr Broadus went on to became a great scholar, president of a theological seminary but every summer he would go back home and whenever he did an awkward, red-haired old farmer, in his plain clothes, with red sand on his boots, would come up to him, stick out his great bony hand and say: “Howdy, John. Thank you, John, thank you, John. I never forget, John.” We all have reasons to be thankful to one another. Let's not forget it.

2. Urge one another to obedience

Next, in verses 4 and 5 we see how Joshua urges them to future obedience Now that the LORD your God has given them rest as he promised, return to your homes in the land that Moses the servant of the LORD gave you on the other side of the Jordan. But be very careful to keep the commandment and the law that Moses the servant of the LORD gave you: to love the LORD your God, to walk in obedience to him, to keep his commands, to hold fast to him and to serve him with all your heart and with all your soul. Joshua does not simply assume that they will continue to obey. Rather, he urges them to continued and broad obedience. Love God, obey him, stick with him and serve him with all your heart and soul.

Again, this should be reflected in the way that we interact with each other. Let's encourage each other to obedience as best we can.

3. Bless each other

The last thing is what he says to them in verses 6-9. We are told Then Joshua blessed them and sent them away, and they went to their homes. A footnote in verse 7 points out that Moses had given land in Bashan to one half of the tribe of Manasseh, while the other half inherited land on the west side of the Jordan along with their fellow Israelites. It goes on When Joshua sent them home, he blessed them, saying, "Return to your homes with your great wealth - with large herds of livestock, with silver, gold, bronze and iron, and a great quantity of clothing - and divide the plunder from your enemies with your fellow Israelites." So that is what happened the Reubenites, the Gadites and the half-tribe of Manasseh left the Israelites at Shiloh in Canaan to return to Gilead, their own land, which they had acquired in accordance with the command of the LORD through Moses. The point here, however, is that they went with Joshua's blessing.

I don't know if you know the name of Benjamin West (1738-1820) an American artist who settled in London. There is a story of West that when he was a young boy he decided to draw a picture of his sister. He got out bottles of ink and succeeded in making a big mess. When his mother got home, she said,“What a beautiful picture,” and kissed him. Later in life he said, “That kiss made me a painter.” It was the way his mother blessed him that made all the difference. We can't always say 'how beautiful', sometimes we need to come out and say 'what a mess' but if we do it right we can be a great blessing to people.

We ought to show the same willingness to bless our brothers and sisters in what they do. We are not all doing the same thing. Some are working at this and some at that but we ought to pray for one another and seek to bless one another whatever they are doing. Certainly it does not help if we criticise others or are envious of them.

So here are three things to help us in the matter of Christian unity - be thankful for each other, exhort each other to do right and bless or encourage each other as best you can.

2. Christian unity - beware of giving the wrong impression or of over reacting to something

So then we read in verses 10-20 of what happened next and the reaction to it. We read that When they came to Geliloth near the Jordan in the land of Canaan, the Reubenites, the Gadites and the half-tribe of Manasseh built an imposing altar there by the Jordan. Now we will find that this was done in perfect innocence but that is not how it seemed to the Western Israelites.

It is the easiest thing in the world to misinterpret the actions of another person or group of people. This happens all the time. You see someone in the street staggering about, their legs all wobbly, and you assume they are drunk. In fact they had been affected by their medication or they have Parkinson's or some other disease that is slowly causing them to lose muscle control.

The young man you saw racing to push the woman over was actually pushing her out of the way of the bricks about to fall on her from above.

I have told you how many years ago when my father-in-law was pastor in Aberystwyth there was a couple in another church and they were very taken with all the Charismatic teachings that were so popular then. He thought that some of the things they had gone for were rather silly and embarrassing. Then one Saturday morning he was in town and he saw this couple pass in their car and on the windscreen sunstrip they had placed their names Ken and Barbara - a bit of a fad in the late seventies and early eighties as people tried to personalise their cars inexpensively, usually young people. My father-in-law thought to himself "Typical! Another charismatic excess!" But then he bumped into the man a few days later and he said he'd seen him driving around and Ken said "Oh so embarrassing". Their teenage daughter had bought the customisation kit for them as a present and although they felt silly with their names up, they did it for their daughter's sake!

I've mentioned to you before a deacon in my home church who often slept during the morning service - but not because he was bored but only because he had just come off a late shift and would prefer to be in church than in bed.

11-14 And when the Israelites heard that they had built the altar on the border of Canaan at Geliloth near the Jordan on the Israelite side, the whole assembly of Israel gathered at Shiloh to go to war against them. First, however, they wisely decided to send a delegation. Jaw jaw before war war, as Churchill might have put it. So the Israelites sent Phinehas son of Eleazar, the priest, to the land of Gilead - to Reuben, Gad and the half-tribe of Manasseh. With him they sent ten of the chief men, one from each of the tribes of Israel, each the head of a family division among the Israelite clans.

We are told (15ff) that When they went to Gilead this is what they said to Reuben, Gad and the half-tribe of Manasseh - ... The whole assembly of the LORD says: 'How could you break faith with the God of Israel like this? That's the way they saw it. How could you turn away from the LORD and build yourselves an altar in rebellion against him now? Was not the sin of Peor enough for us? A reference to the apostasy with the Moabites in a previous generation. Up to this very day we have not cleansed ourselves from that sin, even though a plague fell on the community of the LORD! And are you now turning away from the LORD? It's the same thing all over again they argue.

They go on If you rebel against the LORD today, tomorrow he will be angry with the whole community of Israel. They saw very keenly the unity of Israel even though some tribes lived one side of the Jordan and some the other. They are racking their brains to think of how things could have gone so wrong and so they generously say If the land you possess is defiled, come over to the LORD's land, where the LORD's tabernacle stands, and share the land with us. But do not rebel against the LORD or against us by building an altar for yourselves, other than the altar of the LORD our God. They think of another instance of rebellion in the life of the nation to make their point that what one part did affected the other part - When Achan son of Zerah was unfaithful in regard to the devoted things, did not wrath come on the whole community of Israel? He was not the only one who died for his sin.

At this distance, it does seem like a lot of fuss about nothing but you must see it as they saw it then. On the one hand the Eastern Israelites had done something very simple, very innocent, that they never thought would be considered rebellious. On the other hand, you can see how the western Israelites thought the easterners were forming some sort of break away group that was going to start worshipping at a new altar (although having said that the altar appears to have been on the western bank of the Jordan not the eastern and so the western interpretation was rather harsh.)

The lesson no doubt is that on one hand we should seek to avoid doing anything needlessly offensive and on the other not be too quick to jump to what may be the wrong conclusion. That is particularly so at this time when many churches have had disagreements over covid and how to react and some have even left churches. It is easy to think on one hand that someone is being rather cavalier about dealing with the pandemic or on the other that someone is being too cautious. Let's just give one another the benefit of the doubt as best we can. More generally people do tend to jump to conclusions - he uses the AV or the NIV, so he can't be any good. They use this hymn book or that hymn book or no hymn book at all, so they must be bad. Avoid such knee jerk reactions

3. Christian unity - the importance of talking and understanding differing points of view

Finally in verses 21-34 we read of how the situation was resolved. First, the men from east of the Jordan explain themselves and their altar. 22-29 The Mighty One, God, the LORD! The Mighty One, God, the LORD! He knows! they begin And let Israel know! If this has been in rebellion or disobedience to the LORD, do not spare us this day. If we have built our own altar to turn away from the LORD and to offer burnt offerings and grain offerings, or to sacrifice fellowship offerings on it, may the LORD himself call us to account. But then they explain No! We did it for fear that some day your descendants might say to ours, 'What do you have to do with the LORD, the God of Israel? The LORD has made the Jordan a boundary between us and you - you Reubenites and Gadites! You have no share in the LORD.' So your descendants might cause ours to stop fearing the LORD. That is why we said, 'Let us get ready and build an altar - but not for burnt offerings or sacrifices.' On the contrary, it is to be a witness between us and you and the generations that follow, that we will worship the LORD at his sanctuary with our burnt offerings, sacrifices and fellowship offerings. Then in the future your descendants will not be able to say to ours, 'You have no share in the LORD.' They go on And we said, 'If they ever say this to us, or to our descendants, we will answer: Look at the replica of the LORD's altar, which our ancestors built, not for burnt offerings and sacrifices, but as a witness between us and you.' Far be it from us to rebel against the LORD and turn away from him today by building an altar for burnt offerings, grain offerings and sacrifices, other than the altar of the LORD our God that stands before his tabernacle.

Far from rebelling then, they were simply trying to avoid future misunderstanding.

When Phinehas and the other leaders heard this, we read, they were pleased. They say to the men of Reuben, Gad and Manasseh, Today we know that the LORD is with us, because you have not been unfaithful to the LORD in this matter. Now you have rescued the Israelites from the LORD's hand.

With that they were happy to return west where they explained things to the rest of the Israelites who were glad to hear the report and praised God. That was the end of all talk of war. Finally, there is a footnote to say that the Reubenites and the Gadites gave the altar this name: A Witness Between Us - that the LORD is God.

I have told you how I was once in a supermarket when someone wanted to buy several boxes of Paracetamol but they were told you can only buy one or two packs at a time. Now at first I thought, what is the point? If you are keen to take an overdose you can just go to several chemists and buy two packs in each. Apparently, however, this rule does make a difference. People tend to try and commit suicide on impulse when feeling low and if you make it more difficult you can prevent deaths. It's like jumping of a bridge. You might think that if you put barriers at one bridge people will just go to another one but apparently that is not what happens.

In 1985 "baby on board" stickers in backs of cars became popular (this is long before tfL began giving out badges with the words). Parodies soon emerged - "Baby I'm Bored", "Pit Bull on board", and "Mother-In-Law in Trunk" were popular. It began in America but waned there, although you see them here still - plus "Princess on board" and "Little Person on board". I always used to think the signs were rather silly. But then I was told that they are put there to guide any rescuers if there is some sort of an accident. Apparently this is wrong too and they were just designed to encourage other drivers to drive more sensibly. The thing is, they were never intended just for people to show off about their baby.

So, as we said before, jaw jaw is better than war war. Here is a reminder of the importance of keeping the channels of communication open and talking to one another. Once things are explained they can take on a very different complexion to what we had at first thought.