Christians are not called to spread their faith on the battlefield anymore, but that doesn’t mean we don’t have enemies. Today, the world faces many invisible foes – the COVID-19 virus immediately comes to mind, but we must also stand against the fear, the lack of trust, the social breakdown that have revealed themselves in its wake. Stores are not empty of toilet paper and bottled water because so many sick people have needed those supplies.
No, the sad truth is that all too many Americans have surrendered to fear and to lack of confidence that others will purchase only what they need. At the same time, fractured families have been forced to shoulder the burden of caring for their children’s dietary and educational needs, a burden they have long assumed that state and local governments would handle for them. And many, unconnected to traditional networks of extended family and friends, are just not able to handle the strain.
So, how do we face our problems, problems that are every bit as dangerous as those armies that faced God’s Old Testament people (Joshua 11:4)? By the same sort of radical trust in God that they demonstrated. For even as God enabled them to destroy their enemies on the battlefield, He insisted that they not put their faith in their armaments or their military prowess.
For why else would God tell them to destroy the horses and chariots of their enemies (Joshua 11:6)? In the days before the invention of the stirrup, those were the most fearsome weapons known to man – they allowed the speed of a horse to be combined with the power and skill of a soldier. But God wanted His people to rely on Him alone for their safety and success. And so they obeyed Him by doing the ancient equivalent of smashing all the tanks and planes and automatic rifles they had just captured.
In the same way, Christians must never adopt the tactics and tools of God’s enemies. We must never use fear or force to impose God’s will on those who do not yet trust in Him. Instead, as our Lord Jesus showed us, we are called to love our enemies, to do good to those who hate us, to pray for those who hurt us (Matthew 5:44). We are to do good and lend, expecting nothing in return (Luke 6:35) – for that’s the only way to emulate our Father in Heaven, Who gave His only Son to an ungrateful, undeserving world full of sinners like us.
The darker the world becomes, the more the light of kindness, generosity, and self-sacrificial love becomes visible. May we use these, God’s weapons, to fight against the tide of loneliness and fear that is rising all around us.
Joshua 11:6-9 (ESV)
When Jabin, king of Hazor, heard of this, he sent to Jobab king of Madon, and to the king of Shimron, and to the king of Achshaph, 2 and to the kings who were in the northern hill country, and in the Arabah south of Chinneroth, and in the lowland, and in Naphoth-dor on the west, 3 to the Canaanites in the east and the west, the Amorites, the Hittites, the Perizzites, and the Jebusites in the hill country, and the Hivites under Hermon in the land of Mizpah. 4 And they came out with all their troops, a great horde, in number like the sand that is on the seashore, with very many horses and chariots. 5 And all these kings joined their forces and came and encamped together at the waters of Merom to fight against Israel.
6 And the LORD said to Joshua, “Do not be afraid of them, for tomorrow at this time I will give over all of them, slain, to Israel. You shall hamstring their horses and burn their chariots with fire.” 7 So Joshua and all his warriors came suddenly against them by the waters of Merom and fell upon them. 8 And the LORD gave them into the hand of Israel, who struck them and chased them as far as Great Sidon and Misrephoth-maim, and eastward as far as the Valley of Mizpeh. And they struck them until he left none remaining. 9 And Joshua did to them just as the LORD said to him: he hamstrung their horses and burned their chariots with fire.
