We have purposed together to move forward together into the land of promise.  We have heard promises of God’s presence.  Promises like “The Lord your God is with you wherever you go.”   We have thanked God for such promises, and we have known them.  Promises of peace and rest.  We have heard a proclamation and demonstration of God’s hesed – God’s lovingkindness, steadfast love, mercy – come from a most unexpected source (Rahab).  We have listened as God said, “Follow me,” because we have not passed this way before, and we have taken heart.  We celebrated the truth that the God to whom we belong is the God who dries up the ground beneath our feet – the One who makes a way when there is no way.  The One to whom the battle belongs.  We have taken heart. We have set up our stones just as the people of God did at Gilgal to remember God’s mighty delivering acts.  This morning we read of another set of stones that is set up in a valley called Trouble to act as a warning.  Oftentimes, it is at a high point that things go wrong.  The Song of Moses and the Song of Miriam and all the singing and dancing on the other side of the Red Sea give way to complaining  - “Did you bring us out to this wilderness to kill us with hunger?”  Moses comes back from his mountain-top experience with God, commands in hand, to be met with worship by the people of God that has turned to a golden calf.  The 1^st century church in Jerusalem continued in the apostles’ teaching and breaking of bread and fellowship and the prayers, and they held all things in common, and thousands turned to Jesus, and then Ananias and Saphira.  We are praying here, “Not our will, but yours be done, Lord,” and want to be faithful people who show and tell of God’s love and want to seek God’s will for us together, and… how much would the Liar like to mess that up?  The battle has been won, and the battle will be won, and the battle goes on, and we’re in it, and Satan still goes about like a roaring lion seeking whom he may devour.  We take heart, and we’ll get to the reason why this morning.  Together.  If you are a person who says, “Why don’t they talk more about sin in church?” this is the morning for you!  It’s the morning for all of us.  Let’s ask for God’s help as we look at God’s word.

One of my favourite writers once said, “Before the gospel is good news, it’s bad news.” 

It has been so far so good for the people of Israel in the land of promise.  Last week we looked at how Joshua’s response to being in God’s presence was proper and fitting.  He got down on his face and worshipped.  We looked at how God promised victory in the battle of Jericho.  How the foundational thing for the Israelites had to do was worship.  We talked about the devoted thing, or herem in Hebrew.  How the entire city was to be devoted to God.  All in the city to be devoted to destruction or given into God’s treasury as a sign of the covenant relationship that the people of Israel had with God, and ultimately a sign of their dependence on him.  No spoils were to be taken from Jericho that would entitle a person to profit from the God-given victory, or imply that the victory was a result of human endeavour, and thus somehow deserved.

But

This is where things begin to go wrong for the Israelites in a serious way.  Chapter 6 ends with “So the Lord was with Joshua; and his fame was in all the land.”  This is followed by an ominous “But” – “But the Israelites broke faith in regard to the devoted things: Achan son of Carmi son of Zabdi of the tribe of Judah, took some of the devoted things; and the anger of the Lord burned against the Israelites.”  Expectations are turned around here just as they were with Rahab – a Canaanite who proclaimed the sovereignty of God and the truth that God’s presence was with the people of Israel.  The one who by faith received the spies in peace.  Achan’s credentials are well established - son of Carmi, son of Zabdi, son of Zerah of the tribe of Judah. Unfortunately, credentials alone are no guarantee that one is going to be faithful.  We understand that all too well, don’t we?  I remember talking about lying at one point and our neighbour Christopher once talking about lying saying, “Pastors don’t lie” and thinking “Oh gosh maybe we’d better qualify that somewhat…” and him seeing my look and he added “In church!” Credentials alone are no guarantee of anything. 

Achan took some of the devoted things.  He fell short of what God expected.  He missed the mark when it came to God’s design for how God’s people were to live in the land of promise.  We can define sin most simply as missing the mark or failing to fulfill what God has made us for”  When it comes to what we have been created for, Jesus broke it down to its essence in response to a question about the greatest commandment: “You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, and with all your soul, and with all your mind…You shall love your neighbour as yourself.”(Matt 22:36) We have not been made to go through life on our own, trusting in our own adequacy.  Trust me, says God.  Depend on me, says God.  Live in such a way that others can trust in you, can depend on you.  We fail in this.  We’re all too painfully aware of this.  People fail us, and we fail people, and it makes trusting hard.  We say “The only one I can depend on is myself.”  Someone has said that a sense of human adequacy is the primary barrier to faith.  The belief that “we’ve got this” along with inclination to put all our trust in things, in money, in systems, in knowledge – wherever we are tempted to put our trust.

For Achan, this manifested itself in taking some of the devoted things.  A beautiful mantle from Shinar.  Two hundred shekels of silver.  A bar of gold.  What did he think?  I’m going to need these at some point?  I had a hand in this battle; I deserve to get something out of it.  What was it for Achan that made it impossible for him to see his need to depend on and trust in God?  What makes it difficult for us to trust and depend on God?  What would make us start to think “I know best”? Often they’re not bad things in and of themselves, no more than the mantle or silver or gold in this story were.  They can be gifts, talents, experience, stuff.  What makes it difficult for us to remember they are all from God?  What makes it difficult for us to know our need to trust and depend on God?  What in our lives acts as a barrier to trust?

Broken Faith

This is an important question not only for ourselves, but for our entire faith community.   Our missing the mark may be hidden, just as the goods that Achan took were.  The whole community was affected, though.  It was an individual act, but it didn’t just affect the individual. Look at v 1 – it doesn’t say that Achan broke faith in regard to the devoted thing, it says the Israelites broke faith with the devoted thing.  The whole community was affected.  Unity is broken.  The men who scout Ai come back reporting, “Not all the men need go up; about two or three thousand men should go up and attack Ai.  Since they are so few, do not make the whole people toil up there.”  The sense of human adequacy is the primary barrier to trust in God.  I’ve got this, God!  No problem here!  I’ve got this.  God’s not going to coerce faith; coerce trust. God will let us say “I’ve got this.”  I’ve often said for me I have to watch that I don’t approach Sunday morning with this kind of attitude.  I’ve got this, God.  I’ve been trained how to exegete, how to put a service together.  I need to come before God week after week saying “What would you have me do here, what would you have me say.”  Human adequacy is the primary barrier to faith.

Consequences

The consequences of Achan’s sin are a matter of life and death. Thirty-six men are killed in the failed attack on Ai.  In no way is sin a victimless crime or something that only affects the individual.  We may like to think this in our highly individualized society, but it just isn’t true.  Stanley Grenz describes sin as the disruption of community; a disruption of relationship.

“…sin entails an improper valuation.  In sin, the self rather than God becomes our criterion of value.  We may simply refuse to see ourselves as God’s good creation, or we may actually elevate the creation rather than the Creator as our sovereign.  Sin’s improper valuation extends to human relations as well.  Insofar as we erroneously view ourselves as either better than or less than others, our sin leads to broken relationships and the sense of personal insecurity or insignificance.  Sin likewise affects the way we view the creation around us, as we see nature as having value insofar as it serves us.”

We know these things are true, don’t we?  We see the effects of sin all around us.  We’ve seen the effects of our own sin.  We know what happens when we see ourselves as better or less than others.  To view people as more or less deserving.  To view people as commodities.  These days, our attention has been commodified.  To view God’s creation foundationally as a means for profit.  

Sin is serious.  It’s pernicious.  It can be hidden.  Its effects are far-reaching.  What is the answer?  The answer for Joshua in our story was to seek God’s presence at the ark.  To get down on his face. This is a good start.  He’s asking the wrong question, though.  Instead of “What have we done?” it’s “What have you done, God?”  The problem with unfaithfulness is not with God.  “Israel has sinned; they have transgressed my covenant that I imposed upon them.  They have taken some of the devoted things; they have stolen, they have acted deceitfully, and they have put them among their own belongings.  Therefore, the Israelites are unable to stand before their enemies…”  Their defeat was not the result of God’s unfaithfulness, but their own.  God tells Joshua to stand up and take action.

Action is taken.  Aachan is brought before Joshua. Note that Joshua doesn’t condemn the man.  “My son, give glory to the Lord God of Israel and make confession to him.”  These are Joshua’s words.  Aachan makes a confession.  The mantle, silver, and gold are found under his tent.  All Israel stoned him to death, they burned them with fire, cast stones on them, and raised a great heap of stones that remains to this day.  Then the Lord turned from his burning anger.  Therefore, that place to this day is called the Valley of Achor, or trouble.

This is difficult stuff, isn’t it?  Why did his whole family have to die?  Even the animals?  Perhaps it has something to do with how seriously God takes sin.  Perhaps it has something to show about the corporate nature of sin and its effects.  We read this story from the other side of the cross, and consider that God takes our failure, our guilt, our shame, so seriously that God came among us to do something about it.  We consider Jesus, who, when a crowd wanted to stone to death a woman who was caught in adultery, told them, “Let him who has no sin among you cast the first stone.”  Jesus who “made you alive together with, when he forgave us all our trespasses, erasing the record that stood against us with its legal demands.  He set this aside, nailing it to the cross.”  Jesus who instructs us to confess our sins in the prayer that he taught.  The Holy Spirit – God with us – is sent to change our hearts and make us more like Jesus.  Jesus stood in our place, and for this we give thanks and come to this table and remember and hear the words “and be thankful.”  

Be Thankful

We take our sin seriously too, and examine ourselves.  There’s a spiritual discipline called the examen in which, at the end of the day, you look back on it in prayer.  Part of this discipline is examining where we missed the mark that day.  Recognizing it and asking for forgiveness.  Recognizing that the hidden, the unaddressed sin can be poison in a faith community.  It’s not about beating ourselves up.  It’s about resting in God’s grace.  Asking God to change us – to create in us clean hearts and renew right spirits within us. To recognize, believe, trust in the truth that grace and forgiveness come from God.  One pastor put it like this: “It’s hard to know why the good news is so good unless we’re super clear on why the bad news is so bad… There is no reason to be ashamed about our jagged edges and the things we’ve done, because they are these spaces that God’s grace comes in and fills in the cracks.  Why would we be ashamed of that?”

Friends in the light of God’s grace, we’re called not to a spirit of fear but a spirit of love and thanksgiving.  We should talk sin in church.  If we’re not going to talk about it here, where are we going to talk about it?  We need to cling to the promise that “If we confess our sins, he is faithful and just to forgive us our sins and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness.”  To fill in our cracks.  For this, may we always be thankful.

Amen