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Desire to be a vessel of honor unto the Lord Jesus Christ?
Join For His Glory for a discussion on how
https://christianforums.net/threads/a-vessel-of-honor.110278/
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Taking the time to pray? Christ is the answer in times of need
https://christianforums.net/threads/psalm-70-1-save-me-o-god-lord-help-me-now.108509/
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Why the whole family?
- Thread starter Winnie
- Start date
Jim Parker
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Because everyone in the family was aware of and in tacit agreement with what he did and, thereby, participated in his sin. He had hidden the loot in his tent. The whole family must have known.
You must purge the evil from among you. (DT 13:5; 17:7, 12; 19:19; 21:21; 22:21, 22, 24; 24:7)
th1b.taylor
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Jim Parker beat me to it so what he said!
chessman
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The short answer is:
Josh 7:1, 11, etc. LEB But the Israelites broke faith concerning the devoted things. Achan son of Carmi son of Zabdi son of Zerah, of the tribe of Judah, took from the devoted things; and Yahweh’s anger was kindled against the Israelites.
11 Israel has sinned and transgressed my covenant that I commanded them. They have taken from the devoted things ...
11 Israel has sinned and transgressed my covenant that I commanded them. They have taken from the devoted things ...
The Israelites broke faith, sinned. Every single one of them, in their own way and at their own time. Achan (of the tribe of Judah) was really just an example of the bigger (universal) problem (sin!). A problem (sin) common to us all. Achan's sin just happens to be detailed for us to read about. How it was specifically exposed by God (casting lots starting with the tribes, then the clans, then the family, then the tent, then the person) for all the others to see is an interesting read too. It points out, in fact, exactly what God said. "Israel has sinned"!
AND it points out that the fact is, we all sin. (do I really need to post the Scripture to back that up???)
Can you imagine the whole nation watching as Joshua followed God's instructions going through the process of finding Achan's loot? Is it me, is it me???
It's only by the Mercy of God that the entire nation wasn't burned, much less Achan's family and livestock.
Of course there's something more to it. The 'more' is not conducive to short post length, however. It's quite an in-depth study required if someone wanted to completely understand why the livestock (and everything else) belonging to a sinner such as Achan was burned.
BTW, the Texts doesn't say they were "destroyed". Merely that they were "burned with fire, he AND all that belongs to him". Plus, guess what, there were others left standing there that also deserved to be "burned with fire" too! Lot's of them. That one event/sacrifice was a mere smidgen of the expiation for sin that needed/needs to occur. Fortunately, we have The Propitiation for our sins (Jesus Christ). So did they. They just didn't realize it.
The 'issue' is the difference between expiation versus propitiation. Hint: Jesus Christ does both for us in HIS atonement.
There's no way to explain it all in a post or two or three and I don't fully understand it all anyway. I'd suggest reading all about the atonement (expiation versus propitiation). But again, the 'short answer' is that Achan's 'stuff' being burned was a type of the Sacrifice Jesus has made for us all.
http://www.reasonablefaith.org/which-is-explanatorily-prior-propitiation-or-expiation
Or just wait, we can ask Jesus one day.
Oh, and we might ask Achan or his family (if he/they had salvific faith in God) what he thinks about it all one day.
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smaller
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It doesn't bother God to kill the human flesh. Look what happened to His Own Son.
God essentially wiped out nearly the occupants of the entire planet in a single event at one time.
Nobody is going to avoid the death of their flesh. That much is certain. Circumstances may vary, but it's all on God in any case.
Deuteronomy 32:39
See now that I, even I, am he, and there is no god with me: I kill,
The applicable term is Divine Sovereignty.
smaller
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God reserves the right to kill sinners at any time for any reason, and no one by their "positive decisions" avoids being a sinner i.e. their complicity to the events in question didn't have A THING to do with their being killed as well.
All those killed were sinners regardless and everyone watching were likewise sinners. The notion that God kills because of "bad decisions" is totally untrue.
God has actually promised to eradicate sinners, all. And guess what?! ALL are sinners! Romans 3:9.
Psalm 104:35
Let the sinners be consumed out of the earth, and let the wicked be no more. Bless thou the Lord, O my soul. Praise ye the Lord.
Isaiah 13:9
Behold, the day of the Lord cometh, cruel both with wrath and fierce anger, to lay the land desolate: and he shall destroy the sinners thereof out of it.
No amount of "freewill applied" has turned anyone, NO NOT ONE from being a sinner into a non-sinner or a sinless person. THAT is a religious fairy tale that most of freewill theology land entertains. In short, just another LIE sold to the masses in the Name of Jesus.
- Dec 11, 2010
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A bit off topic but I think it does bother God. I think it bothered Him so much that He provided a way through His Son not to have to destroy us all.
smaller
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People read about what seems like extra judicial killing in the Bible, such as the case in point, and think God unfair.
Scripture does tell us, flat out, that the Spirit is against and contrary to the flesh. Gal. 5:17.
And further, the Spirit has remedied death, often without specific trial or notice or trial more times than can be counted, as noted in the prior post.
In today's world the populace in general scoffs at such notions.
rpguy
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God hasn't destroyed anyone. People only perceive such things about God, do you understand what I mean?
Jim Parker
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We face physical death (unless we are alive when Jesus returns) but it is no longer a permanent condition. All of mankind will be raised immortal and incorruptible. (You "Eternal Address" is up to you. John 3:36; 5:28-29; Ro 6:2-10; Mat 25:31-46; 1 Pe 1:17)
1Co 15:51-57
Behold, I tell you a mystery: We shall not all sleep, but we shall all be changed—in a moment, in the twinkling of an eye, at the last trumpet. For the trumpet will sound, and the dead will be raised incorruptible, and we shall be changed. For this corruptible must put on incorruption, and this mortal must put on immortality.
So when this corruptible has put on incorruption, and this mortal has put on immortality, then shall be brought to pass the saying that is written: “Death is swallowed up in victory.”
“O Death, where is your sting?
O Hades, where is your victory?”
The sting of death is sin, and the strength of sin is the law. But thanks be to God, who gives us the victory through our Lord Jesus Christ.
th1b.taylor
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Amen! Folks get all up tight about The Resurrection or what is the Second Resurrection when there are Four Resurrections, two completed, and I feel, to assure us of the truth. Jesus in John 11:38-44 performed the First when He called out to Lazarus to come out of his tomb. Imagine if God had not said his name, would graves all over the planet have been emptied?
The Second Resurrection was when Jesus, the man, was resurrected from the tomb. Right now Christians await the third Resurrection and their change into their Heavenly Bodies. After that comes the Resurrection of the Lost Man. He will visit the Great White Throne Room and recieve his sentence into the Lake of Fire there to be eternally tormented because he or she chose not God.
Jim Parker
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sigh
There are two resurrections, IMHO
(1) In Baptism we are buried into Christ's death and raised to new life. (Ro 6:3ff)
(2) The general resurrection when Christ returns and judges all of mankind. (Mat 25:31-46)
If you're going to count Lazarus then you also have to count the daughter of Jairus, (Luke 8:54-55) the son of the widow, (Luke 7:12-15) Dorcas (Acts 9:36-41) and Eu'tychus (Acts 20:9-10) so that makes 8 resurrections.
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Mike S
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In the Old Testament, the Hebrew writings, we see where God is calling His people, the nation, to righteousness. The sins and punishments of individuals, and even individual families, is understood in how it effects the nation. It's not that individuals are unimportant, but God's concern is clearly with the righteousness or unfaithfulness of the nation.
It's in the New Testament that we see a greater concern for the righteousness or unfaithfulness of individuals and consequences for the individuals themselves, and relatively less concern for effect on the nation. Our Christian understanding of God, and His mercy and wrath, is informed primarily by the themes of the New, rather than the Old, Testament. It is sometimes difficult, therefore, for us to understand God's will as expressed in the Old Testament as concern with corporate sin where the individual is relatively less important than the nation.
"For so it was that the children of Israel had sinned against the LORD their God, who had brought them up out of the land of Egypt, . . . and they had feared other gods, and had walked in the statutes of the nations whom the LORD had cast out from before the children of Israel." - II Kings 17:7-8
It's in the New Testament that we see a greater concern for the righteousness or unfaithfulness of individuals and consequences for the individuals themselves, and relatively less concern for effect on the nation. Our Christian understanding of God, and His mercy and wrath, is informed primarily by the themes of the New, rather than the Old, Testament. It is sometimes difficult, therefore, for us to understand God's will as expressed in the Old Testament as concern with corporate sin where the individual is relatively less important than the nation.
And you have forgotten the exhortation which speaks to you as to sons:
“My son, do not despise the chastening of the Lord,
Nor be discouraged when you are rebuked by Him;
6 For whom the Lord loves He chastens,
And scourges every son whom He receives.”
you endure chastening, God deals with you as with sons; for what son is there whom a father does not chasten? - Hebrews 12:5-7
“My son, do not despise the chastening of the Lord,
Nor be discouraged when you are rebuked by Him;
6 For whom the Lord loves He chastens,
And scourges every son whom He receives.”
you endure chastening, God deals with you as with sons; for what son is there whom a father does not chasten? - Hebrews 12:5-7
th1b.taylor
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LOL! Yes, but try to get somebody else to read the scriptures that closely.
Jim Parker
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The nation (ethnos, family group) Israel was called to be a nation of priests. (Exo 19:6) Priests are those who intercede to God on behalf of others, in this case, the other nations. (Gentiles)
The covenant they have was a covenant between God and the descendants of Jacob. (AKA: Israel)
The new covenant is between God and whoever believes. The congregation of believers are still a nation, an "ethnos" but in a different manner from those who were the physical descendants of Jacob.
Jhn 1:12-13 But to all who received him, who believed in his name, he gave power to become children of God; who were born, not of blood nor of the will of the flesh nor of the will of man, but of God.
Those who believe, are baptized, and are filled with the Spirit are a new race (ethnos) of men who bear within them the presence of God.
As Jesus is filled with the Holy Spirit (Luk 4:1) and the Father is in Jesus (Jhn 14:11), so those who are born again bear within them the Father, Son and Holy Spirit. (Jhn 14:20, Acts 2:38)
Rom 8:29 For those whom he foreknew he also predestined to be conformed to the image of his Son, in order that he might be the first-born among many brethren.
The people of the new covenant are now the holy nation (ethnos) and royal priesthood of God who bear the presence of God to the world. Believers are the brothers and sisters of Christ who, like Christ, were born by the work of the Holy Spirit.
Luk 1:35 And the angel said to her, "The Holy Spirit will come upon you, and the power of the Most High will overshadow you; therefore the child to be born will be called holy, the Son of God.
Act 1:8 But you shall receive power when the Holy Spirit has come upon you; and you shall be my witnesses in Jerusalem and in all Judea and Sama'ria and to the end of the earth.
Jhn 3:6, 8 That which is born of the flesh is flesh, and that which is born of the Spirit is spirit. ... The wind blows where it wills, and you hear the sound of it, but you do not know whence it comes or whither it goes; so it is with every one who is born of the Spirit.
The righteousness of the individual always (OT and NT) has a positive influence on the community and the sin of the individual always (OT and NT) has a negative, destructive effect upon the community. No one's sin is only against himself. It is like the "rotten apple" which spoils the whole barrel of apples. That is the reason that God commanded Israel to purge the evil from among them. (Deut 13:5; 17:7,12; 19:19; 21:21; 22:21,22,24; 24:7) Tolerating sin will destroy the individual, the family, the community, the nation and the world.
And so believers are called to be the "salt of the earth" which keeps it from rotting and the light of the world to so that the world can see Christ in us, the hope of glory.
iakov the fool