Tag: complete destruction

51.p. Wilderness – 15.v. “You shall save alive nothing that breathes”

 

Deu 20:16-18  But in the cities of these peoples that the LORD your God is giving you for an inheritance, you shall save alive nothing that breathes, but you shall devote them to complete destruction, the Hittites and the Amorites, the Canaanites and the Perizzites, the Hivites and the Jebusites, as the LORD your God has commanded, that they may not teach you to do according to all their abominable practices that they have done for their gods, and so you sin against the LORD your God.

To them no offer of peaceful submission was to be made, and when the city was taken, all the inhabitants without reserve were to be destroyed. This was in accordance with God’s command to Israel and as a precaution against the risk of the people being seduced into idolatry by the heathen should they be allowed to remain in the land. (Unkown)

The horrors of war must fill the feeling heart with anguish upon every recollection; and are proofs of the wickedness of man, the power of Satan, and the just vengeance of God, who thus scourges a guilty world. But how dreadful their case who are engaged in unequal conflict with their Maker, who will not submit to render him the easy tribute of worship and praise! Certain ruin awaits them. (Henry)

But of the cities of those people, which the Lord thy God doth give thee for an inheritance,…. The cities of the seven nations, six of which are mentioned by name in the next verse: thou shalt save alive nothing that breatheth; the reason of this severity was because of their wickedness, the capital crimes and gross abominations they were guilty of, and for which they deserved to die; and on account whereof they were reserved to this destruction, when the measure of their iniquities was full. (Gill)

The previous commands regarding warfare did not apply to the upcoming conquest of Canaan. There, not only was Israel not to offer peace to the cities, but they were also to destroy everything, not only the adult males. This was a unique war of judgment, more than a war of conquest or defense. This explains why such a complete destruction was commanded. The culture of the Canaanites was so corrupt – socially, morally, and spiritually – that God considered it irredeemable, and ripe for judgment. In this unique war, the armies of Israel were to bring that judgment upon the Canaanites. (Guzik)

There were other times of God’s judgment upon mankind when God judged them irredeemable. In the time of Noah God judged all of mankind and destroyed every living thing but those on the Ark. Noah proclaimed God’s judgment for 120 years while he built the Ark. What did the people do? They mocked, ridiculed, and laughed at him and the thought of pending judgment coming. 

Sodom and Gomorrah were judged and destroyed. The Assyrian army lost over 100,000 men in one evening. Jericho was judged and destroyed. There are other examples of God’s judgment and destruction that occurred on this side of eternity. The things that were an abomination to God for which these peoples were destroyed are not much different from what we see being declared. No reverence for God. Love of self. Self-reliance. Self-worthiness. Arrogance. Lusts of the flesh. Covetousness. Strife. Doing evil. Calling that which is good, bad. Calling that which is godly and holy, foolishness. Worshipping things other than God. Rejecting and denying God. Rejecting and denying Jesus Christ. Living in sin without a thought of God’s judgment. However, there is coming a time when everyone will stand before God and be judged.   

Denying that judgment is coming allows a person to live according to whatever seems right in their own eyes. In this denial, everything seems permissible. No one ever born will be excluded from judgment. Everyone will stand before God to give account. 

When people should be asking what can we do to be saved, they are proclaiming their sins, making excuses for their sinful ways, and encouraging others to do the same. Judgment is coming and those found in Jesus Christ will pass into eternal life, and those who chose to reject and deny Jesus Christ will be cast into the lake of fire and be tormented forever. 

50.c. Wilderness – 14.i. “To deliver you and to give up your enemies before you”

 

Deu 7:1  “When the LORD your God brings you into the land that you are entering to take possession of it, and clears away many nations before you, the Hittites, the Girgashites, the Amorites, the Canaanites, the Perizzites, the Hivites, and the Jebusites, seven nations more numerous and mightier than you, and when the LORD your God gives them over to you, and you defeat them, then you must devote them to complete destruction. You shall make no covenant with them and show no mercy to them. You shall not intermarry with them, giving your daughters to their sons or taking their daughters for your sons, for they would turn away your sons from following me, to serve other gods. Then the anger of the LORD would be kindled against you, and he would destroy you quickly. But thus shall you deal with them: you shall break down their altars and dash in pieces their pillars and chop down their Asherim and burn their carved images with fire.

Joshua 6:17   And the city and all that is within it shall be devoted to the LORD for destruction.

 Joshua 10:30   And the LORD gave it also and its king into the hand of Israel. And he struck it with the edge of the sword, and every person in it; he left none remaining in it. And he did to its king as he had done to the king of Jericho.

 Joshua 10:42    And Joshua captured all these kings and their land at one time, because the LORD God of Israel fought for Israel.

 Joshua 21:44    And the LORD gave them rest on every side just as he had sworn to their fathers. Not one of all their enemies had withstood them, for the LORD had given all their enemies into their hands.

Deuteronomy 23:14   Because the LORD your God walks in the midst of your camp, to deliver you and to give up your enemies before you, therefore your camp must be holy, so that he may not see anything indecent among you and turn away from you.

Israel wasn’t in the land yet, but Moses still instructed them as if it were a certainty. This was based on the faithful promise of God, but it was also according to His principle of preparation. “Sure,” Moses said, “the Canaanite nations are greater and mightier than you. But they are not greater and mightier than God.” God brought Israel to face a challenge that was impossible in their own strength – but entirely possible in Him. God could be counted on. Yet, God would not do it all for them. The extent of the work would depend on their faithful response to what God would do. 

This principle of battle until absolute victory is the key to victory as we take the Promised Land of blessing and peace God has for us in Jesus. We show no mercy to our enemies in the land, but we destroy them utterly. Many of us, truth be told, simply do not want to completely destroy the sins which keep us from God’s Promised Land of blessing and peace – we want to weaken them, and have some control over them, but we do not want to utterly destroy them. (Guzik)

Here is a strict caution against all friendship and fellowship with idols and idolaters. Those who are in communion with God, must have no communication with the unfruitful works of darkness. Limiting the orders to destroy, to the nations here mentioned, plainly shows that after ages were not to draw this into a precedent. A proper understanding of the evil of sin, and of the mystery of a crucified Saviour, will enable us to perceive the justice of God in all his punishments, temporal and eternal. We must deal decidedly with our lusts that war against our souls; let us not show them any mercy, but mortify, and crucify, and utterly destroy them. (Henry)

2.y. Because he ordered his ways before the Lord his God.

2 Chronicles 27:1 Jotham was twenty-five years old when he began to reign, and he reigned sixteen years in Jerusalem. His mother’s name was Jerushah the daughter of Zadok. And he did what was right in the eyes of the Lord according to all that his father Uzziah had done, except he did not enter the temple of the Lord. But the people still followed corrupt practices. He built the upper gate of the house of the Lord and did much building on the wall of Ophel. Moreover, he built cities in the hill country of Judah, and forts and towers on the wooded hills. He fought with the king of the Ammonites and prevailed against them. And the Ammonites gave him that year 100 talents of silver, and 10,000 cors of wheat and 10,000 of barley. The Ammonites paid him the same amount in the second and the third years. So Jotham became mighty, because he ordered his ways before the Lord his God.

2 Chronicles 17:3-6    The LORD was with Jehoshaphat, because he walked in the earlier ways of his father David. He did not seek the Baals,  but sought the God of his father and walked in his commandments, and not according to the practices of Israel.  Therefore the LORD established the kingdom in his hand. And all Judah brought tribute to Jehoshaphat, and he had great riches and honor.  His heart was courageous in the ways of the LORD

2 Chronicles 12:12    And when he humbled himself the wrath of the LORD turned from him, so as not to make a complete destruction. Moreover, conditions were good in Judah.

Ezra 7:10    For Ezra had set his heart to study the Law of the LORD, and to do it and to teach his statutes and rules in Israel.

Having God with us, guiding us, leading us, and helping us for good does not happen by chance or good luck.  It does not happen because we earned it as if God is in debt to us and owes us something.  He created us for His glory and honor and praise.  In this creation, He gave us (mankind) a free will to honor and glorify Him.  He allowed His creation to choose to do this, or not.  Not only did He create us but He also revealed Himself to us through creation, angels, prophets, works of miracles, His written word, and His Son Jesus Christ.  We have been given free will to choose to honor, glorify, follow, serve, trust, and obey Him.  He has given us words to live by so that in our life this side of eternity we demonstrate our love for Him as creator and worthy of all honor and praise.  He has given us precious promises too.  He is steadfast in His love toward us.  He blesses us and disciplines us with righteousness.

Mankind, we, were created for His honor and glory.  We are created to bring honor and glory to Him alone.  We are created to worship and praise Him above all else.  He gave us His written word so that through it we might gain wisdom, understanding, knowledge of Him and His purpose and plans and continually grow in this so that our honor and glory of Him consume and directs our every thought, word, and action.

He is worthy of so much more than lukewarm lip service from us.

1.x.

2 Chronicles 12:1  When the rule of Rehoboam was established and he was strong, he abandoned the law of the Lord, and all Israel with him. In the fifth year of King Rehoboam, because they had been unfaithful to the Lord, Shishak king of Egypt came up against Jerusalem with 1,200 chariots and 60,000 horsemen. And the people were without number who came with him from Egypt—Libyans, Sukkiim, and Ethiopians. And he took the fortified cities of Judah and came as far as Jerusalem. Then Shemaiah the prophet came to Rehoboam and to the princes of Judah, who had gathered at Jerusalem because of Shishak, and said to them, “Thus says the Lord, You abandoned me, so I have abandoned you to the hand of Shishak.’” Then the princes of Israel and the king humbled themselves and said, “The Lord is righteous.” When the Lord saw that they humbled themselves, the word of the Lord came to Shemaiah: “They have humbled themselves. I will not destroy them, but I will grant them some deliverance, and my wrath shall not be poured out on Jerusalem by the hand of Shishak. Nevertheless, they shall be servants to him, that they may know my service and the service of the kingdoms of the countries.”

So Shishak king of Egypt came up against Jerusalem. He took away the treasures of the house of the Lord and the treasures of the king’s house. He took away everything. He also took away the shields of gold that Solomon had made, and King Rehoboam made in their place shields of bronze and committed them to the hands of the officers of the guard, who kept the door of the king’s house. And as often as the king went into the house of the Lord, the guard came and carried them and brought them back to the guardroom. And when he humbled himself the wrath of the Lord turned from him, so as not to make a complete destruction. Moreover, conditions were good in Judah.

So King Rehoboam grew strong in Jerusalem and reigned. Rehoboam was forty-one years old when he began to reign, and he reigned seventeen years in Jerusalem, the city that the Lord had chosen out of all the tribes of Israel to put his name there. His mother’s name was Naamah the Ammonite. And he did evil, for he did not set his heart to seek the Lord.

Deuteronomy 8:10-14    And you shall eat and be full, and you shall bless the LORD your God for the good land he has given you.  “Take care lest you forget the LORD your God by not keeping his commandments and his rules and his statutes, which I command you today,  lest, when you have eaten and are full and have built good houses and live in them,  and when your herds and flocks multiply and your silver and gold is multiplied and all that you have is multiplied,  then your heart be lifted up, and you forget the LORD your God, who brought you out of the land of Egypt, out of the house of slavery,

Deuteronomy 32:18    You were unmindful of the Rock that bore you, and you forgot the God who gave you birth.

1 Kings 9:9     Then they will say, ‘Because they abandoned the LORD their God who brought their fathers out of the land of Egypt and laid hold on other gods and worshiped them and served them. Therefore the LORD has brought all this disaster on them.’”

Jeremiah 2:31   And you, O generation, behold the word of the LORD. Have I been a wilderness to Israel, or a land of thick darkness? Why then do my people say, ‘We are free, we will come no more to you’?

Hosea 13:6-8    but when they had grazed, they became full, they were filled, and their heart was lifted up; therefore they forgot me.  So I am to them like a lion; like a leopard I will lurk beside the way.  I will fall upon them like a bear robbed of her cubs; I will tear open their breast, and there I will devour them like a lion, as a wild beast would rip them open.

After 5 years of prosperity and blessings, Rehoboam abandons God.  Remember for three years the Levites, priests, and others who fled the idol worship brought on by Jeroboam gave security to Rehoboam.  He received and the influx of God-honoring, God following, and God obeying fellow Israelites.  What has happened that drew Rehoboam away from following God and all of the blessings that had come during Solomons time?

We never know how slippery the slope is away from God.  We never know what it is that fills the first void of the heart that no longer seeks and desires God.  What we do know is that we need to be on guard of our heart and mind.  We must take inventory of what is actively trying to pull us away.  It would be nice if this pulling came like a roaring lion and gave plenty of notice of how it will attack our seeking and desiring God.  We would have reason to fear and run to the arms of Jesus Christ.  We would know of our pending destruction and see a reason to stay close to God.

However, it is never like this.  The pull comes like the sweet taste of honey and what can be wrong with a bit of honey?  It slips into our inner being disguised and satisfies some natural desire or lust.  It plants a seek and we don’t even know it and before long the seed has taken root in our heart and mind.  The leaves blind our eyes and plug our ears so that we no longer see things of God or hear His call to us.  We have been over grown by what appeared to be sweet honey because we chose that first step away from God.  Had we stayed close to Him we would have tasted and known the bitterness temping us.  It would have been clear as the sun at noon.

Why do you think these examples were given to us in God’s word?  They were given to us to keep us aware of the temptations of our heart and soul if we do not intentionally choose to give all our heart, soul, and mind to God.  Seek and desire Him above all else and He will give you the desire of your heart.  How many lives come to disaster by the lure of the sweet taste of honey?