DAD'S RAMBLINGS -- TOLERANCE

DAD'S RAMBLINGS – TOLERANCE

"So Joshua conquered all the land: the mountain country and the South and the lowland and the wilderness slopes, and all their kings; he left none remaining, but utterly destroyed all that breathed, as the LORD God of Israel had commanded." (Joshua 10:40)

In occupying their new land, God had commanded Israel to completely destroy all of the inhabitants of the land. The phrase "he left none remaining," or similar phrases, is used seven times in chapter 10.

This seems to be overkill, pardon the pun. It would seem reasonable to get rid of the kings and army commanders so that there would be no insurrections. But to kill everyone? That seems extreme. But God knew that if the ungodly nations were not completely destroyed, they would teach Israel to do according to all their abominations (Deuteronomy 20:15-18).

God's aim was to keep the nation of Israel as a peculiar people, set apart. He knew that if they did not cleanse the land, that the people of the land would corrupt the nation with ungodly ways and worship. But over and over read that they did not utterly drive them out (Joshua 17:13; Judges 1:21, 28, 32). They tolerated the ungodly nations, and sure enough, there were compromised in their worship of the true God.

There is a lesson here for us. We need to be intolerant of things in our culture that would draw us away from serving the true God. We live in a tolerant society, and it is easy to become immune to things that are ungodly. It's a truism that what we tolerate becomes acceptable.

I have talked with Christians who do not even recognize immorality around them. They can watch movies that have degenerate language, sexual content, or ungodly worldview. When I question them, they say, "I didn't hear or see that."

We need to stay sensitive to ungodly things and resist them. What God declares to be unholy, we must declare unholy. If I am intolerant of the unholy, so be it.

Love, Dad