The Pulpit Commentary — Joshua — Section 238

Yers. 14.-A day of wonders. The Canaanite kings were slow in gathering their forces together to repel the advance of Joshua, but they were ready enough to come down in vengeance upon the Gibeonites for having made peace with hi.in. The men of Gibeon found the advantage of having a strong and generous protector, one -who would be trne to his pledges, even though they had been extorted from him by francl. Joshua responds at once to the cry that comes to him from the beleaguered , cit;-·, and God makes its deliverance the occasion for -a signal display of His power and the furtherance of His pw-pose in the overthrow of the kings. The blending of the natural and supernatural in the events of this day is very remarkable. The mo elements are so interlaced and interwoven that it is not for us to say where the one ends and the other begins. We only feel, in following the course of the narrative, that we are in the presence of a marvellous Divine power that carries all resistance before it. Such records as this, however, have their true effect upon us when they lead us the more clearly to recognise the supernatural force in the natural, to discern behind the common, familiar order of things the mystery and majesty of the Divine. With the vexed question ·as to the historic truth of the declaration that "the sun stood still in the midst of heaven," we have not now to do (see Exposition). We siinply note that, if the use the historian makes of the poetic quotation from the Book of J asher compels us to regard it as having some basis of fact, there is no need on that account to believe in any actual arrest of the order of the universe. May not natural agents and natural laws be used miracu- lously by Him who is the Author of them? Just as He who created the hailstones could, ·without injury to the Israelites, turn them as engines of destrnction against their foes, so surely He who at the beginning "commanded the light to shine out of darkness" could, in ways to us unknown, prolong the day in answer to Joshua's prayer. Two broad lessons grow out of this: I. THAT Gon·s SOVEREIGNTY OVER NATURE IS SUBSERVIENT TO THE HIGHER PUR· POSES OF Hrs SPIRITUAL KINGDOM. We look through these outward incidents to the Divine end wl.t.ich they were all helping to work out. God was "forming a people for his praise." Giving them a local habitation, that they might the better con- serve His truth and show forth His glory. He drove out the heathen before them, and planted them tLere tLat they might bear rich fruits of blessing to the world, that in them and in their seed all the eartli might be blessed. Everything is to bo looked at in the light of that moral purpose. (1) The whole visible universe ex..ists for spiritual ends-the revelation of the invisil,le Divine beauty and order; the m0,g- nifying of the law of eternal righteousness. Its activity and its rest, its discords and its harmonies, its terror and its loveliness, all have a moral meaning and intent. (2) The forces and laws of the universe are against those who are against God. You must Le morally one with Him if you would have them befriend you. " Tlic stars in their courses fight again6t Sisera." llow terrible to think of some of OB. x. 1-43.] THE BOOK OF JOSHUA. 181