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Joshua 5:6.
Tonight we are to consider the children of
Israel at Gilgal, and proceeding from there to
the fall at Jericho. At Gilgal they renewed
the covenant of circumcision, which covenant
reminded them of the promise to Abraham, and
was a token of their confidence in that prom
ise. They kept the Feast of the Passover,
which memorialized their liberation from Pha
raoh in Egypt. They began to eat the
fruit of the land; a new experience entirely
for them. They not only had a new country
in which to dwell, but new food to eat. Dur
ing their journey in the wilderness they were
enabled to eat manna, rained down from hea
ven as a special miracle of God for the feeding
of His people, Israel. He worked this miracle
for them because there was not enough in the
land to support them, and since God Himself
was responsible for their being there He must
see to it that they had food to eat. Hence the
manna-
But now they are across the Jordan, and in
Canaan, and it is distinctly said, “The manna
ceased.’' And there is good reason for it ceas
ing, because there is plenty of fruits of various
kinds and everything else for them to eat in
Canaan, and God never wastes His products.
He never bestows needless blessing on people.
It would be well for us to realize this perhaps
more than we do in prayer. There is no doubt
we are praying God constantly to give us things
we do not need. We ask God for blessings
when we have not used those He has already
given us. And this is one reason why God with
holds of times the answer to our prayers. Until
we use up what God has given in the way of
special blessings, we have no right to expect
Him to give us others. And so we find these
Israelites really in their Canaan experience,
without the manna they had lived upon hereto
fore, and now partaking of the fruit of the
land in which they have come to dwell. Then
we have the revelation of the Captain of the
Lord’s Host. If you have read the story I
have no doubt you have been struck with that.
It is one of the most striking things in the
whole of this story. As Joshua was meditat
ing, and thinking on what he was to do and
how he was to lead these Israelites now that
they were in this new land, there appears a
man before him in military attire with drawn
sword in his hand, and Joshua approaching him
asks a very significant question: “Art thou
with us or with our adversaries?” The man an
swers at once: “As Captain of the Lord’s Host
am I come.’ And then Joshua falls down and
worships before him-
Then we have the first part of the campaign
for the capture of Canaan revealed. Now, it
is well for us to stop here and ask this question:
What right had the Israelites to take possession
of the land of Canaan? Have you ever thought
of that? Here these people have invaded this
land that belongs to other people. AVhat right
had they to invade that land and take it from
THE GOLDEN AGE FOR WEEK OF JAN. 29, 1914.
THE FALL OF JERICHO
'Re*c>. Len G. "Broughton, T), D., of Christ Church, London
Reported for The Golden Age by M. P. H. —Copyright Applied For.
the people that occupied it? In the first place,
because God had promised the land to them.
And because of God’s promise they had a per
fect right to enter. Not only had God promis
ed, but God had commanded them to enter. So,
by virtue of the promise of God and the com
mand of God, they had a right to enter that
land. But let us go a step further. Upon what
law of equality had God the right to give them
a land that belonged to and was occupied by
other people? Surely that question must have
struck you as you have perused this story.
What right, I say, had God to give these people
somebody else’s territory? By what law of
justice can we justify that transaction First
of all, all lands belong to God and are for the
highest welfare of the race of man. We some
times talk about land as “the land of Ger
many,” “the land of France,” “the land of
America.’ There is no such thing, strictly
speaking. There is no “land of England,”
“land of France,” “land of Germany,” “land
of America.” These nations may occupy cer
tain lands but they are not their lands- They
are God’s lands. God has never transferred
His right of ownership of the universe. The
lands of the universe make up the universe,
and we no more own the land on the surface
of the globe than we own the globe. The earth
belongs to God, and never mind what man may
have done, how many battles he may have
fought, how many victories he may have won,
how much money he may have spent, how much
blood he may have shed, he can not wrest
from the hand of God that which is His.
The same thing is true with reference to in
dividuals. We talk about “our lands. ’’ There
is no such thing as “our lands.” Never mind
whether we are referring to the ground on
which the house we live in stands, or whether
we refer to huge agricultural possessions, or
what-not. These things are primarily God’s,
and the nation only has the right to occupy the
possession of God in proportion to the extent
that it gives itself to carrying out the purpose
of God in the possession, and that purpose is
to bless humanity. Whenever a nation, there
fore, ceases to use its territory as a blessing for
humanity, it ceases to have a right to occupy
the lands of God. But so long as a nation ad
ministers the property of God as their own oc
cupation for the welfare of the race, and thus
carries, out the plan the programme and the
purposes of God in the possession, they are at
liberty to possess, though they never can own.
Ihe same thing is true with reference to the
individual. An individual, just so long as he
uses it to carry out the purposes of God in the
possession of that property. And that purpose
is to bless humanity. I have no right to occu
py the property of God for my own individual
selfish needs. My right to occupy the property
of God in any sense is in proportion to the way
I co-operate with God in carrying out His pur
poses in blessing humanity-
According to this principle the Canaanites
had failed to use the property of God in Ca
naan, for the blessing of the race, but for the
damning of the race. For the inhabitants were
not climbing God-ward, but moving hell-ward.
And inasmuch as they were thus abusing God’s
property, He had a perfect ethical right to turn
other people on them and drive them out of
the land or bring them to subjection.
We have a number of illustrations of the
same thing occurring today. I think of one
tonight which is so close to my own heart.
Just over the border of the United States
there is the country of Mexico. A great coun
try. A country literally dotted with gold
mines, silver mines, coal mines and copper
mines, oil wells, and rich agricultural fields.
One of the richest countries in all the world.
And yet, today perhaps the poorest. Its pov
erty is the outcome of its miserable govern
ment, and its miserable government is the out
come of its miserable Church, and its miserable
Church is the outcome of miserable Rome. I
know what I am talking about. There is no
country on earth more priest-ridden than Mex
ico. There is no doing anything with these
people until the power of Rome is broken. They
are there, occupying God’s property—one of
the richest sections on the globe—occupying it,
and every day defeating the purposes of God
in giving to the world that rich country and
God has put up with that kind of thing until
He can not —I say it reverently—He is not,
going to put up with it any longer.. They must
either stop abusing the purposes of God or He
is going to turn some one else on them, as He
did in Canaan, and bring them to subjection,
or perhaps turn them out of the land entirely-
I have been of late giving my odd times to
studying certain phases of history, bearing up
on the work we are doing in connection with
our Bible Class, endeavoring so far as I can, to
get the movements of God in Bible history, that
Imay see the motive of God and the method of
God for our present-day life. And, my breth
ren, it is simply wonderful to see how, in the
ages of the world God has intervened when men
have persisted in perverting His purposes and
destroying the thing He has most at heart,
namely, the welfare of the race. God has
broken in on nation after nation, in all sorts of
ways, broken them to pieces, shattered them,
in order that His property may go to the pur
pose for which He intended it. Do you think
Cod is going to keep a rich country like the
country of Mexico with its great gushing oil
wells, enough oil in that country to support the
whole world—do you think He is going to keep
that country with its great agricultural fields,
its great gold and silver mines, as it is at the
present day? Why there is scarcely any pos
sibility of getting these things out of the coun
try. You can not work in the country. You
can not develop enterprise in the country, be
cause it is ever at war with itself, and at war
with everybody else around it. And God does
not propose to allow those rich treasures to go
idle on that account. There is a lesson here for
us m England. God is not going to allow any
people to occupy His property unless they use
it for His glory and for the upbuilding of the
race of men. That is the object of all this
possession of God.
(Continued on page 14.)