Fully Devoted to God

Joshua 7:11-12 (NIV) -

"Israel has sinned; they have violated my covenant, which I commanded them to keep. They have taken some of the devoted things; they have stolen, they have lied, they have put them with their own possessions. That is why the Israelites cannot stand against their enemies; they turn their backs and run because they have been made liable to destruction. I will not be with you anymore unless you destroy whatever among you is devoted to destruction."

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RECAP:

- There is a hole in every human, an infinite gap which can only be filled by the infinite God.

- Everything else we try to fill the hole with, rather than putting God first, is an idol.

- Idolatry's effects are not just long-term, but separate us from God's power here and now. This is actually made even clearer by the passage above, where God also shows us how to get back on the right track with Him...

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The Israelites were given an instruction before taking Jericho: "The city and all that is in it are to be devoted to the Lord... All the silver and gold and the articles of bronze and iron are sacred to the Lord and must go into his treasury." (Joshua 6:17, 19 NIV) There are two Hebrew words used here that are important to understand: cherem and kodesh.

Kodesh is the word used to refer to the treasure. It can't be burned, so God tells the Israelites to set it apart, considering it as holy. It's worth noting that this word is also used to refer to the Most Holy Place (Kodesh HaKodeshim) in the tabernacle, the place where God's Presence rested above the ark of the covenant, and also to the Holy Spirit (Ruach HaKodesh). That gives you an idea of how serious this was - these valuables were to be treated as if they had been in the Presence of God.

Cherem is the word translated as 'devoted'. However, that translation misses out on a lot of what this word really entailed. If something was declared as cherem, then it was meant to totally, utterly, and irrevocably be dedicated to God. What's the surest way to make sure that you can never take something back? By destroying it. This 'dedication through destruction' is one of the most common ways that this word is used in the Bible (though there are exceptions). With this in mind, when Achan took a bar of gold and a robe, he was essentially stealing directly from God.

God wanted Israel, and wants us today, to be completely separated from idolatry. Often He uses yeast as a symbol of sin - even the smallest amount can contaminate an entire batch of dough. In the same way, sin and idolatry may start small, but they will quickly tear through every area of our lives. If we want to live holy lives, we need to purge the idolatry from every area of our lives. For the Israelites, that meant that the entire nation needed to execute Achan, all of his family and belongings, and then burn the lot of it. Achan had taken what was charem, so he needed to be treated as charem so the entire nation wouldn't be corrupted by his sin.

Thanks to Jesus, we don't need to kill anyone to purge ourselves - we have been given the Holy Spirit, who reveals our sin and sanctifies us! However, we need to be just as ruthless as the Israelites were with our own idols. The Israelites could not settle for anything less than a complete, total dedication to God, and neither can we. If we haven't fully submitted our idols to God, we haven't submitted them at all. Now that is not an easy task, but God gives us grace to help us do what we can't do on our own.

There are two categories to keep in mind here: there are the things that will never be healthy, then there are the things that are only healthy for us once we've submitted them to God. When the Israelites attacked Jericho, everything in the city was meant to be devoted - men, women, children, livestock, clothing, treasure. However, when they destroyed Ai, God let them keep the animals and objects as long as they destroyed all of the people. The people of Ai fit in the first category of things that would never be healthy - those people, if left alive, would lead the Israelites into idolatry and sin. The animals and the objects, however, weren't inherently bad. Once the Israelites had put God first by dedicating the first town to Him, they were free to use what God had given them, because their focus was on the right thing.

To take an example from my own life (because like I said, God has been challenging me on this stuff as well), I often let myself get distracted by my phone and computer. Now, they are helpful things to have, but they've been taking my attention away from the things that matter most, in particular from my time with God. So I've been needing to submit those to God all over again which might mean not using them as much for the next few days - only for essential things such as uni assignments and posting these devotions. Once I've got my focus back in the right place and have devoted my devices to God again, then I can start using them for enjoyment again because I'll know it's not going to pull me away from my time with God.

However, whenever a gap opens up, something will always try to fill it. If you aren't choosing what goes in that gap, then something else will, and often it will not be what you want it to be. So we need to make intentional decisions to fill the gaps in a way that won't lead to more idolatry. That will be our next focus.