Joshua 5 Devotional

And the Lord said to Joshua, “Today I have rolled away the reproach of Egypt from you.” And so the name of that place is called Gilgal to this day.

While the people of Israel were encamped at Gilgal, they kept the Passover on the fourteenth day of the month in the evening on the plains of Jericho. And the day after the Passover, on that very day, they ate of the produce of the land, unleavened cakes and parched grain. And the manna ceased the day after they ate of the produce of the land. And there was no longer manna for the people of Israel, but they ate of the fruit of the land of Canaan that year. Joshua 5:9-12

This generation of Israel who have spent their lives wandering in the desert is here reminded of their identity as the people of God, as they celebrate the feast of Passover on the plains of Jericho. In explaining to their children why they sacrifice a lamb on this night, they must have been reminded that the God of their fathers is also their God and they are his people, called to be holy as he is holy. This generation is presented as a fresh start, a renewed hope for Israel as they camp within the borders of Canaan and eat of the fruit of the land. Egypt can no longer exult over them, but cowers before them even as do those in Jericho whose hearts, we are told by Rahab, melt before Israel and her God. Similarly Jesus, in Matthew’s Gospel in particular, is presented as Israel, and yet a new Israel—Israel as she was always meant to be, fulfilling the word spoken to her by Moses and all the prophets as she never could.

After his baptism in the Jordan, Jesus was driven by the Spirit into the desert for forty days and there he was tempted by Satan. As Satan tempts him a third time, Jesus banishes him with the words of Moses in Deuteronomy as he has each time before, pulling from Moses’ warning to this generation not to forget God once they are in Canaan and eating of the fruit of land. Moses says in Deuteronomy 6:12-13, “then take care lest you forget the Lord, who brought you out of the land of Egypt, out of the house of slavery. It is the Lord your God you shall fear. Him you shall serve and by his name you shall swear.”

Israel here begins to eat of the fruit of the land, which is both a beautiful fulfillment of the promises of God, and also an ominous hearkening back to Moses’ warning to them, that they not forget the Lord their God as they begin to eat of the fruit of the land he will bring them into. Is this not an ominous warning for us also? We are certainly many of us in danger of feasting on all the good things our God has given us and forgetting from whose hand they come. As Israel was commanded to come continually in repentance and thanksgiving to the Lord with burnt offerings and sacrifices, even as our Lord Jesus showed his own dependence on the Father in prayer and fasting and participating with his disciples in the Passover and the other feasts and sacrifices commanded by God, may we not neglect to gather together, but feast on him our Passover Lamb that we might be strengthened to live a life of dependence on God in prayer, repentance, and faithful obedience, following our risen Lord Jesus who as the prophet Isaiah foretold, “will not grow faint or be discouraged, until he has established justice in the earth” and even into every dark corner of your heart and mine.

Rebekah