(Exo 23:20-33 NKJV)  "Behold, I send an Angel before you to keep you in the way and to bring you into the place which I have prepared.

 

 

(Exo 23:21) "Beware of Him and obey His voice; do not provoke Him, for He will not pardon your transgressions; for My name is in Him. {22} "But if you indeed obey His voice and do all that I speak, then I will be an enemy to your enemies and an adversary to your adversaries.

 

(Exo 23:23) "For My Angel will go before you and bring you in to the Amorites and the Hittites and the Perizzites and the Canaanites and the Hivites and the Jebusites; and I will cut them off.

 

(Gen 15:13-16 NKJV)  Then He said to Abram: "Know certainly that your descendants will be strangers in a land that is not theirs, and will serve them, and they will afflict them four hundred years. {14} "And also the nation whom they serve I will judge; afterward they shall come out with great possessions. {15} "Now as for you, you shall go to your fathers in peace; you shall be buried at a good old age.

(Gen 15:16) "But in the fourth generation they shall return here, for the iniquity of the Amorites is not yet complete."

 

God waited!  They did not get better, they only got worse until God, in His judgment, decided that they were so bad that they needed to be utterly destroyed.

 

(1 Sam 15:2-3 NKJV)  "Thus says the LORD of hosts: 'I will punish Amalek for what he did to Israel, how he ambushed him on the way when he came up from Egypt. {3} 'Now go and attack Amalek, and utterly destroy all that they have, and do not spare them. But kill both man and woman, infant and nursing child, ox and sheep, camel and donkey.'"

 

 

(Exo 23:24) "You shall not bow down to their gods, nor serve them, nor do according to their works; but you shall utterly overthrow them and completely break down their sacred pillars.

(Exo 23:25) "So you shall serve the LORD your God, and He will bless your bread and your water. And I will take sickness away from the midst of you. {26} "No one shall suffer miscarriage or be barren in your land; I will fulfill the number of your days.

 

These are wonderful promises:  “I will take sickness away!  No one shall suffer miscarriage

I will fulfill the number of your days.”  It was based on one condition: 

"So you shall serve the LORD your God,” 

That condition they failed to meet.

 

(Ex 23:27) "I will send My fear before you, I will cause confusion among all the people to whom you come, and will make all your enemies turn their backs to you.

 

It happened:  (Josh 2:9-11 NKJV)  and [Rahab] said to the men: "I know that the LORD has given you the land, that the terror of you has fallen on us, and that all the inhabitants of the land are fainthearted because of you.

(Josh 2:10) "For we have heard how the LORD dried up the water of the Red Sea for you when you came out of Egypt, and what you did to the two kings of the Amorites who were on the other side of the Jordan, Sihon and Og, whom you utterly destroyed. {11} "And as soon as we heard these things, our hearts melted; neither did there remain any more courage in anyone because of you, for the LORD your God, He is God in heaven above and on earth beneath.

 

{28} "And I will send hornets before you, which shall drive out the Hivite, the Canaanite, and the Hittite from before you.

 

"And I will send hornets before you.”  “The word is used figuratively for a cause of terror and discouragement. Bees are spoken of in the like sense, Deu_1:44; Psa_118:12.” A. Barnes

 

 (Exo 23:29) "I will not drive them out from before you in one year, lest the land become desolate and the beast of the field become too numerous for you.

(Exo 23:30) "Little by little I will drive them out from before you, until you have increased, and you inherit the land.

 

God had a plan, and He wanted them to know the reason for not taking all the land at one time. 

 

(Exo 23:31) "And I will set your bounds from the Red Sea to the sea, Philistia, and from the desert to the River. For I will deliver the inhabitants of the land into your hand, and you shall drive them out before you.

 

(Exo 23:32) "You shall make no covenant with them, nor with their gods.

 

(Josh 9:3-16 NKJV)  But when the inhabitants of Gibeon heard what Joshua had done to Jericho and Ai, {4} they worked craftily, and went and pretended to be ambassadors. And they took old sacks on their donkeys, old wineskins torn and mended, {5} old and patched sandals on their feet, and old garments on themselves; and all the bread of their provision was dry and moldy. {6} And they went to Joshua, to the camp at Gilgal, and said to him and to the men of Israel, "We have come from a far country; now therefore, make a covenant with us." {7} Then the men of Israel said to the Hivites, "Perhaps you dwell among us; so how can we make a covenant with you?"

 

So Joshua remembers (Exo 23:32) "You shall make no covenant with them”

 

(Josh 9:8) But they said to Joshua, "We are your servants." And Joshua said to them, "Who are you, and where do you come from?"

(Josh 9:9) So they said to him: "From a very far country your servants have come, because of the name of the LORD your God; for we have heard of His fame, and all that He did in Egypt, {10} "and all that He did to the two kings of the Amorites who were beyond the Jordan; to Sihon king of Heshbon, and Og king of Bashan, who was at Ashtaroth. {11} "Therefore our elders and all the inhabitants of our country spoke to us, saying, 'Take provisions with you for the journey, and go to meet them, and say to them, "We are your servants; now therefore, make a covenant with us."' {12} "This bread of ours we took hot for our provision from our houses on the day we departed to come to you. But now look, it is dry and moldy. {13} "And these wineskins which we filled were new, and see, they are torn; and these our garments and our sandals have become old because of the very long journey." {14} Then the men of Israel took some of their provisions; but they did not ask counsel of the LORD.

 

 

(Josh 9:15) So Joshua made peace with them, and made a covenant with them to let them live; and the rulers of the congregation swore to them. {16} And it happened at the end of three days, after they had made a covenant with them, that they heard that they were their neighbors who dwelt near them.

 

So how would you feel now if you were Joshua?  What do you do now?  How do you fix a mess?  “Fixed messes” are never as good as if you hadn’t messed up to start with!

 How many people make needless mess of their lives because

  “they did not ask counsel of the LORD.”

Are we helping people to ask counsel of the Lord?

 

(Exo 23:33) "They shall not dwell in your land, lest they make you sin against Me. For if you serve their gods, it will surely be a snare to you."

 

"They shall not dwell in your land.”  Interesting statement!  The land had belonged to the various people named.  God now calls it their land.  They need to understand this!  God is giving it to them.

 

For if you serve their gods, it will surely be a snare to you."

 

“A snare:”  A trap! Pagan gods were terrible.

 

(Ezek 16:20-21 NKJV)  "Moreover you took your sons and your daughters, whom you bore to Me, and these you sacrificed to them to be devoured. Were your acts of harlotry a small matter, {21} "that you have slain My children and offered them up to them by causing them to pass through the fire?

 

Bible Study with Harley    My Sunday Evening Lessons

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