JERICHO

I find that doing the will of God leaves me no time for disputing about His plans.¹

—GEORGE MACDONALD

Throughout history, the Old City of Jerusalem has been viewed as the heart of the world. Today as you leave the Old City and drive east on the winding Highway 1, you begin a dramatic descent from the hill country into the desert. The change in elevation has a significant effect on weather conditions, creating a visible distinction between the lush, green Jerusalem to the west and the severe, dusty, desert climate of the West Bank to the east. The change in vegetation is so drastic that it can be seen from satellites in space.

As you enter this desert, where Bedouin shepherds have roamed for thousands of years, you soon come across the security checkpoint separating Israel from the West Bank. As you enter Area A of the West Bank, an area under full Palestinian control, a red sign forbids entrance to Israelis at the risk of death. Here Highway 1 joins the historic Jericho Road.

Continuing on, you enter the Jordan Rift Valley. The Jordan Rift is distinct but connected to the Great Rift Valley that extends all the way from Mozambique through Egypt and reaches its lowest point at the Dead Sea. Just eleven miles from Jerusalem you’ll pass an archaeological site of a hostel halfway between Jerusalem and Jericho. Tradition says it is the inn where the parable of the good Samaritan took place, and hence is named the Inn of the Good Samaritan.

Another fourteen miles from there, in an oasis of the Jordan Valley, lie the ancient ruins of what is said to be the oldest continually inhabited city in the world—the city of Jericho.²

This area, a part of the larger Judean wilderness, is characterized by rugged terrain that offered safe hiding for rebels, bandits, and outcasts in ancient times. The first inhabitants were nomads who transitioned from the hunter-gatherer lifestyle among the caves and hills to a city-dwelling society, as agriculture was made possible by the proximity of the Jericho oasis.³ With a warm climate year-round and natural springwater irrigation allowing for lush agriculture, “the city of palm trees”⁴ was in a desirable location worth settling in and certainly worth protecting.

Historically, Jericho was a walled city known throughout antiquity for its defensive capability.⁵ If you go there now and walk to the middle of the mound where there has been extensive excavation since the early 1900s, you can look over the ledge and see an exposed portion of one of the original towers of Jericho that dates back to the Neolithic period.⁶ The tower is said to be the oldest stone-built structure of its kind in the world.⁷

Jericho is mentioned fifty-nine times in Scripture. It was the city of refuge where David told his servants to stay until their beards grew back, after they were publicly humiliated by the Ammonite king.⁸ Jesus healed the blind man Bartimaeus along the roadside outside of the city,⁹ and it was in Jericho that Zacchaeus climbed up into the sycamore tree in an attempt to see Christ.¹⁰ There’s an old sycamore tree in the center of town today that tourists visit, and many believe it is the one Zacchaeus climbed.

But the most prominent and important narrative associated with Jericho deals with the events leading up to and immediately following its conquest by the Israelites under Joshua.¹¹ It is not only a history with significance for the people of Israel; it also offers profound lessons for the church and for every believer who is moving forward in faith toward the calling God has given.

As a foundation for The Grand Paradox, we can look at the events surrounding Joshua and Jericho. Before we can discuss the many aspects of walking by faith, we need to ground ourselves in the very same lessons that God took such pains to teach Joshua and the generation of Israelites that were with him at Jericho.

JERICHO FALLS

After forty years of wandering, Moses died and leadership was passed to Joshua. God gave Joshua very specific instructions about how the Jordan River crossing was to take place. The priests bearing the ark of the covenant were to lead the crossing, thus demonstrating to everyone that the presence of the Lord of all the earth was to go first.¹²

After the entire camp crossed the river, men from each tribe were sent back with instructions to retrieve twelve large stones from the riverbed to be piled up and to serve as a memorial; the people were commanded to never forget the miracle—of holding back the Jordan River waters—God performed that day and to tell it to their children for generations to come.¹³

Rather than rushing into the military campaign, God took the time to illustrate something important to His people: He goes first, and they are to follow.

He leads, and we follow.

Upon crossing the Jordan, the Israelites renewed their covenant vows of obedience to God, spending their first weeks in the promised land realigning their relationship with Him. They were ready to take the land, starting with the city of Jericho. But Joshua was about to undergo a dramatic course correction.¹⁴ An angel with an unsheathed sword appeared to Joshua just outside Jericho. Apparently that wasn’t enough to intimidate Joshua, so he challenged, “Whose side are you on: ours or our enemies’?”

But Joshua was missing the point. The angel responded, “Neither . . . but as commander of the army of the LORD I have now come” (Joshua 5:14). And Joshua fell to his face in reverence.

Engrossed in the stress and sweat of planning the first military conquest in the promised land, Joshua was literally brought to his knees by God’s reminder that it wasn’t his battle. Likewise, any of us can forget that we are part of a bigger narrative. We can easily fall prey to stress, pain, or pressure, allowing obstacles to loom larger in our vision than the God who is trying to lead us. We are reminded through Joshua’s example: the battle is the Lord’s.

Israel’s soldiers gathered to hear the plan. Their courageous leader delivered the brilliant strategy: March in circles around the city for seven days. Blow horns, make music, and yell. Wait for the walls to collapse.¹⁵

I doubt the plan was received well. This is not a brilliant military strategy; this is a death wish. The city of Jericho was well fortified and difficult to assault.

Yet, instead of relying on human strength and ability, Joshua gambled on obedience and trust in God, and the walls fell on the seventh day.

There is no question about the source of the victory. God went to great lengths to show Joshua and the Israelites whose battle it was. He has sent the message over and over—“This enterprise is Mine, not yours.”

As the Israelites invaded Jericho, God gave them specific instructions to set aside any precious metals among the spoils as a sacrifice to Him. Everything else was to be destroyed.

“But the Israelites were unfaithful in regard to the devoted things.”¹⁶ One man in particular, Achan, did not trust in the goodness of God’s commands.¹⁷ He was overtaken by greed. He began to rationalize his desires, and in the end, he chose to ignore God’s command, break the covenant, and keep some of the spoil. He took what he saw—put himself at the center and pushed God out to the margins.

This one seemingly small slip of individualism and greed caused a domino effect of pain and suffering for Achan, his family, and the entire army of Israel.

The covenant was broken and God’s anger burned against the nation.

We’re not much different from Achan. We labor and contrive, grounding our plans in our own reason and intellect, our own sense of entitlement. We struggle with our greed and desires. We want to pocket more stuff. After all, we have earned it, haven’t we?

But that’s not how it’s supposed to be.

THE LORD AT THE CENTER

It is God who goes first, and as He leads, we follow. We stand on God’s side—not Him on ours. God razes the walls; only in His strength do we find victory.

As with Joshua and all God’s children, we need to acknowledge that He demands the place of primacy in our lives—in our communities, our conquests, our achievements, our thoughts and desires.

This message—that the Lord is at the center—reverberates throughout Scripture, from the account of Jericho to the narratives of the judges, the kings, and the exile. When the Lord was placed at the center, the people flourished and were blessed; whenever they turned their backs on Him, they experienced defeat, turmoil, slavery, and exile.

We find the same message in imperative form in the Ten Commandments delivered a generation earlier to Moses. Of the ten, the first three deal with the centrality of God.¹⁸

This theme is delivered poetically in numerous psalms and proverbs, such as Psalm 111:10, “The fear of the LORD is the beginning of wisdom” (KJV).

Even the name of the lead character in the Jericho account teaches a lesson. The Hebrew name Joshua literally means, “The Lord is salvation.”¹⁹ And as the metanarrative of scripture rolls on, we see this same message in the person of Christ. From the Hebrew name Joshua comes the Greek name Jesus—the One who is our salvation.

In the end, as Paul penned in Romans 11:36: “For from him and through him and to him are all things.”

For much of history, Christians have seen the crucifixion as humanity’s crucial moment. Christ’s death and resurrection are the most important events not only in church history, but in all of human history. (As a side note, crucifixion, crux, and crucial share the same Latin root, all pointing to the idea of a cross.)

All scripture points to one thing: life is about God. The process of moving from confused wandering to purpose and joy is marked by faith, by waiting on the Lord in ready obedience.

Recently, my wife, Tamara, and I circled up with our four girls for bedtime prayers. As is the norm, I asked the girls what they were thankful for, and then proceeded to see who would be willing to pray for the family.

Our youngest, Ashlin, who was a week away from five years old enthusiastically asked to pray. We all smiled and waited for her to begin.

She started off in a loud and happy voice: “I’m thank you for my sister Mary Joy. I’m thank you for my sister Esther. I’m thank you for my sister Sara. I’m thank you for my mommy, Mommy. And I’m thank you for my daddy, Daddy.”

It was hard to keep her sisters from giggling, but we all appreciated her words and heart enough to keep the chuckles in and allow her to finish as she “thank-you’d” God for the rest of our family and church.

Her transposition of thankful into thank you seemed like an innocent and sincere slip of phrasing. It made me think, however, that it was also deep and maybe theological.

Ashlin has the faith of a child. The things she is thankful for are truly, in her mind, thank-yous to God.

It reminded me of the book of James, where Jesus’ brother wrote, “Every good and perfect gift is from above, coming down from the Father of the heavenly lights.” Paul also encouraged us to present our requests to God “with thanksgiving” (Philippians 4:6).

Maybe there’s a subtle difference between thankful and thanksgiving. Perhaps the former is more about my emotion and experience of gratitude than the latter, which is directed toward the one responsible for our blessing.

Maybe there’s a difference in our hearts between thankful and thank you.

Whether there’s a deep theological distinction here or not, that night my little angel brought tears to my eyes and taught her dad about purity of heart and what it looks like to truly be thank you to God.

WHERE WE’RE HEADED

Life finds its harmony when we’re centered on God, walking in faith, and experiencing the fullness of life He designed for us to experience.

From here we’ll begin examining what the Bible and some of the great Christian thinkers have to say about faith, and what that means in light of preconceived ideas about Christianity and given our place in the context of contemporary culture. In doing so, we will answer some of Christians’ most heartfelt questions:

• Do we have the wrong definition of faith? (chap. 3)

• How do I talk to God? More important, how do I hear from God? (chap. 4)

• What is God up to in this world? (chap. 5)

• Do I have to give up the things that make me happy to have faith? (chap. 6)

• I have doubts . . . does that mean I don’t have faith? (chap. 7)

• What is God calling me, personally, to do? (chaps. 8 and 9)

• This world is crazy . . . how am I supposed to live for God? (chaps. 10 and 11)

• Do we really need church? (chap. 12)

• What is it all for? (chaps. 13, 14, 15)

But first we need to look at how irrational and upside down walking by faith can truly seem.