Vers. 1-9.-Josll/Ua the successor of Moses. The very name Joshua, Jesus, " God's salvation," is enough of itself to awaken special interest in the man who, on the page of Scripture, first bears it. It is suggestive at once of the nature of his life-work, and it leads us to anticipate some points of analogy between him aml the Saviour of the world. Joshua is one of the few Old Testament characters 11,gainst whose name there is no reproach. Not that this Book presents any formal delineation of his character or pronounces bis praise. It is but a simple, matter- of-fact record of great events in which he took a leading part. His illustrious deeds are their own eulogium. He stands before us as the type of a godly warrior, reverent in spirit yet full of practical energy, blameless and fearless, gentle ancl strong, spending a long life in unselfish and unwearied devotion to the cause of the people and of God. He was the brave soldier whose work, dark and terrible as it was, was consecrated by the inspiration of a Divine call and of a beneficent purpose. A general view of Joshua's position in the annals of the Hebrew race is suggestive. I. IT REMINDS us BOW, Ar CRITICAL PERIODS IN BUMAN BISrORY, Gon RAISES UP MEN AS FITTING INSTRUMENTS FOR THE ACCOMPLISHMENT OF His PURPOSES. The death of Moses marks a crisis in the ca1·eer of the chosen people. He who has been their "_leader and commander" through all the forty years' wandering in the wilderness and has brought them to the borders of the land of promise, is taken from them just when they seem most to need him. Only Jordan now rolls between them and the fruition of their hopes; the prize is within their reach. Shall they fail, and, after all, come short of it? They would have failed if God had not been with them, moving, working among them, fulfilling His own will, magnifying His own name. Joshua's uprising is itself a Divine interposition. He is not the product of the mere natural working of events and second causes. He is a deliYerer whom God has provided, well named God's salvation. The lesson is an important one. When God has any great work for men to do, He ilncr fails to call forth those who can do it. The history of the Church, the general course of the workl's life, establish this law. The demand and the supply, the hour and the man, always meet. When those who are in the high places of the field fall, others step forth, often from very unlikely quarters, to fill the gap and carry on the work to riper issues. This continuity of the Divine purpose and of the path of its development is very wonderful- " The voice that from the glory came To tell how Moses died unseen, And waken Joshua's spear of fie.me • To victory on the mountains green, Its trumpet tones are sounding still,"
kindling our expectations, rousing our energies, rebuking our distrust. Through the shifting clouds of circumstance we catch "glimpses of the unclrnngiug sky." God's redeeming purpose shines on through all human aml earthly changes. We need not fear but that He "will plead his own cause," anll when new emergencies arise provide some new instrument or agency to meet them. II. IT REMINDS US OF THE PROCESS BY WHICH GOD IS WONT TO PREPARE MEN FOR THE WORK HE HAS FOR THEM TO DO. Joshua was II divinely chosen and ordained deliverer (Num. xxvii. 18-23; Deut. xxxi. 14-23). But God's choice is never arbitrary, reasonless. There is genemlly some native quality, or circmn- stantial advantag~, that makes the chosen man the more fitting instrtuue".t. (Examples: Moses, David, Cyrus, Paul, Luther.) Joshua grew up as a slaYe m the brick-fields of Egypt. Bom about the time when Moses fle,t into Midian, he must have been forty years old at the exodus. It may seem strange that such greatness as his should have been nursed amid such associations. But when God has fixed His choice on a man He can make what seem to be the most adverse conditions a school of preparation. And, perhaps, the rough influences of such a lot were, after all, the best school. In servitude 11,s 11, youth, he learnt how to COlll· mand as a man. No doubt sudden eme1·gencies have often developed unlooked-for qualities in men. Tender spirits, nursed in the lap of huury, have been found 10 THE BOOK OF JOSHUA. [cH, I, /i-9,