“Adonai said to Y’hoshua, “’Don’t be afraid or fall into despair! Take all the people who can fight with you, set out, and go up to ‘Ai; because now I have handed over to you the king of ‘Ai, his people, his city and his land.'”-Joshua 8:1
In the Scriptures, the Lord often tells His People to “not fear” or “don’t be afraid”.
Fear is an interesting subject because for the most part it’s a learned response.
I remember the first time I burned my hand on a hot stove when I was a young child.
Before that incident, I had no fear of fire or stoves.
I had to learn that putting my hands into the flames of a fire or placing them on top of a turned on stove was dangerous.
Or how about teenagers who after seeing their first Bruce Lee movie think they can go out and get into a fight with a gang of knife-wielding punks and come out unharmed?
Young soldiers are also the same.
Amazingly, they have no fear of war (personally, I’d be quaking in my boots) because they have no idea what to expect.
I’m sure they’d be a bit nervous but feelings of exhilaration and wanting to prove themselves are stronger.
It’s almost as if going to battle is some kind of Disney Land like adventure for them.
They’re overconfident that their strength, training and passion are gonna win out in the end.
Well, this is kind of how the 2nd Generation of Israelites felt once they entered the Land of Canaan to conquer it.
They were still inexperienced and hadn’t yet tasted defeat and the more tragic and bitter aspects of life like the 1st generation of Israelites who were slaves in Egypt had.
In fact, all they had experienced up until this point was pretty much nothing but one victory after another.
The 2nd generation had made mince meat out of the armies at the Trans-Jordan.
They were able to miraculously cross over the Jordan River without getting so much as even their pinky toes wet.
They had defeated the whole city of Jericho just by marching around it and then watched with jaw-dropping astonishment as the walls just toppled over.
As far as they were concerned, their leader Joshua was unstoppable.
But then the bomb dropped.
Achan had secretly stolen God’s holy property at Jericho.
Then, a confident and arrogant Israel unaware of Achan’s sin attacked the city of AI thinking it was going to be another easy victory.
They were in for a rude awakening.
We all know what happened next.
The army of Israel was soundly defeated outside the borders of AI and sent packing.
After that, Israel LEARNED fear and the terrifying realization came over them that if they weren’t careful to obey the Lord’s commands, great danger and harm would be the result.
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