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Evangel Series: Biblical
Lives to Live By
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Lives Index
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Joshua Exodus 17:8-13, Exodus 24:12-19, Exodus 4:1-17, Exodus 32:15-20, Numbers 13:1-4 and 8 and 21-33, Numbers 14:26-34, Deuteronomy 31:23 and 32:44, Deuteronomy 34:5-9, Joshua 1:1-9 and 16-18, Joshua 11:16-23, Joshua 24:1-2 and 14-15 Discuss the following questions:
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In our lessons, we have read about several biblical characters whose lives were characterized by waiting. It took several years for Noah to build the ark: he had to wait on the Lord during those years, hoping his work was not in vain. Abraham and Sarah waited many years before God's promise that they would have a son was fulfilled in Isaac. Jacob had to work several years before he finally decided to leave his uncle Laban. Joseph spent many years as a servant or in prison before the promises made by God in his early dreams came to pass. And Moses spent forty years tending sheep before God called him to go back to Egypt. This pattern of waiting continues with Joshua. We meet Joshua fairly early in the story of Moses. He was a commander of the army when the Israelites fought against the Amalekites in the wilderness. He waited part way up the mountain when God was giving the Law to Moses further up the mountain. He was one of the spies Moses sent into the promised land while Israel still waited in the wilderness, and he was one of only two men (the other was Caleb) who were adults when they left Egypt and survived to enter the promised land. So, at a minimum, Joshua played second fiddle to Moses for forty years in the wilderness before God elevated him to leader of Israel. Why is it that God seems to ask his people to wait so often and for such great lengths of time before He brings them into the position He has in mind for them? It is not always clear. For Abraham and Sarah, it seems that God was testing their faith. For Joseph, it seems that God was waiting until all of the conditions were right--many things had to line up before Joseph could step into power. For Joshua, however, we can see clearly that God used the time of waiting as a time of training. He worked closely with Moses as his assistant for many years and saw how Moses handled the rebellion of the Israelites, how he trusted God to perform miracles like parting the Red sea, supplying bread from heaven, and opening a rock to give water. He saw how Moses spent time alone with God in prayer, how he interceded for the people, how he delegated responsibility to others. All of these practices were skills that a good leader needs. Instead of going to a military school or a seminary, Joshua went through an apprenticeship. Apprenticeships are ways of learning in which a novice is brought into the service of an older, more accomplished person, who is traditionally called the master. The younger person was called the apprentice. People who go through apprenticeships learn a great deal about how to do things, but they do not learn it from books. Rather they learn it by example, by listening to the master explain things, and by asking questions. The level of learning is usually much deeper in an apprenticeship than in a normal school because the apprentice learns more than content; he or she also learns "tacit knowledge," or things that are never explicitly taught but are learned anyway. Another way of thinking about this time of learning is to think of it as a discipleship. A disciple is like an apprentice in that he or she spends a lot of time with the person doing the discipling. All of us learn by some kind of apprenticeship, usually from our parents. However, it is also a good idea to ask ourselves, "Who is the one that I look to as my teacher?" "How can I be a better example for people who may be looking to me as a teacher?" We also learn from Joshua's life that God takes time to prepare his servants. We grow impatient. We think four years of college is a long time. But look at how long Joshua served as an apprentice. We need to be patient as we wait on God, but while we wait, we need to be learning. |