Joshua 11:23 So Joshua took the entire land, just as the Lord had directed Moses, and he gave it as an inheritance to Israel according to their tribal divisions. Then the land had rest from war.

I was just catching the headlines – more tornados – over 50 dead in one state alone – devastation and wow…  so sad… That is one of those questions I (we) have for the Lord: why? 

There is no answer that will come in a lifetime of wondering – just a wonder of when that type of devastation won’t happen anymore – and yet I know there will be a time when it will get worse, a time when that type of devastation will be rampant across the globe, even more than now…  If you read prophetic scriptures, and many do, you will see that things will get worse before they get better.

What did their spokesman for the state police just now say on TV? When asked how he deals with it, after he and his family emerged from their own hunkering down during the storms, he said: “[We just get to work. You get the call and you just start into your work, to spring into action]”.

Reading Joshua this morning – he spells out a recap of the wars that the God wanted the Israelites to wage. Remember, these wars were ALWAYS for He Lord God Almighty to win. His Ways are above our ways. I have to say this duplicate phrase really stood out: “Then the land had rest from war.”  Joshua took his marching orders from God’s power completing Moses’s path. It was not just one battle but so many… There were many kingdoms defeated and in one section 31 kings are listed as defeated – and that includes all the armies too.  I am not surprise that it was surely different each time in how God waged the war and in how He won it. He’s God – why wouldn’t He personalize the plan.

That must be true of us too – why wouldn’t it be God winning the wars we are fighting – and why wouldn’t God have a personalized attack strategy for each of our problems. And why wouldn’t God have a Plan that we are just to accept and start on. The constant here is: “[we just get to work. You get the call and you just start into your work, to spring into action.]”  YES – 

Like Caleb as an example of a loyal servant in Moses’s and Joshua’s time, God will reward us for our commitment to HIM and to LOVE HIM WHOLEHEARTEDLY and to LOVE HIS PEOPLE.

I believe we will truly see a time when the land [has] rest from war. BUT NOT YET… We still have a battle today… We must keep fighting by listening and follow God’s Ways above ours –  if we are in a moment of rest, then we must absorb that rest for our next steps when we are called into battle again.

I know it is Advent, Christmas-time HOPE LOVE PEACE JOY, and we must think of Whom sprung into action, a battle of His Own to be known and make Our Father be known. Jesus is the ultimate action and result of Love. and yes, as end times on earth prophesies state: Jesus will come again – that is when we will see a phase of “the land will have rest from war.” – then a phase of God’s ultimate victorious war –  and after that? a WHOLE NEW BEGINNING…  

Keep marching into God’s Rest. Follow His Lead.

Amen

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Joshua 11:23 So Joshua took the entire land, just as the Lord had directed Moses, and he gave it as an inheritance to Israel according to their tribal divisions. Then the land had rest from war.

…

Joshua 12:9-24

these were kings defeated:

the king of Jericho one

the king of Ai (near Bethel) one

the king of Jerusalem one

the king of Hebron one

the king of Jarmuth one

the king of Lachish one

the king of Eglon one

the king of Gezer one

the king of Debir one

the king of Geder one

the king of Hormah one

the king of Arad one

the king of Libnah one

the king of Adullam one

the king of Makkedah one

the king of Bethel one

the king of Tappuah one

the king of Hepher one

the king of Aphek one

the king of Lasharon one

the king of Madon one

the king of Hazor one

the king of Shimron Meron one

the king of Akshaph one

the king of Taanach one

the king of Megiddo one

the king of Kedesh one

the king of Jokneam in Carmel one

the king of Dor (in Naphoth Dor) one

the king of Goyim in Gilgal one

the king of Tirzah one

thirty-one kings

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Chapter 14:6-15

Allotment for Caleb

Now the people of Judah approached Joshua at Gilgal, and Caleb son of Jephunneh the Kenizzite said to him, “You know what the Lord said to Moses the man of God at Kadesh Barnea about you and me. I was forty years old when Moses the servant of the Lord sent me from Kadesh Barnea to explore the land. And I brought him back a report according to my convictions, but my fellow Israelites who went up with me made the hearts of the people melt in fear. I, however, followed the Lord my God wholeheartedly. So on that day Moses swore to me, ‘The land on which your feet have walked will be your inheritance and that of your children forever, because you have followed the Lord my God wholeheartedly.’

“Now then, just as the Lord promised, he has kept me alive for forty-five years since the time he said this to Moses, while Israel moved about in the wilderness. So here I am today, eighty-five years old! I am still as strong today as the day Moses sent me out; I’m just as vigorous to go out to battle now as I was then. Now give me this hill country that the Lord promised me that day. You yourself heard then that the Anakites were there and their cities were large and fortified, but, the Lord helping me, I will drive them out just as he said.”

Then Joshua blessed Caleb son of Jephunneh and gave him Hebron as his inheritance. So Hebron has belonged to Caleb son of Jephunneh the Kenizzite ever since, because he followed the Lord, the God of Israel, wholeheartedly. (Hebron used to be called Kiriath Arba after Arba, who was the greatest man among the Anakites.)

Then the land had rest from war.