Don't Take It It's Not Yours

Don’t Take It, It’s Not Yours

Joshua 6: 18 & Chapter 7: 19 – 27

Focus Verse 7:21

Don’t take it its not yours! My mind began to go back to a game that we use to play back in B.V.G., that’s before video games called Hot Potato. Hot Potato was a game that you would sit in a circle or stand across from each other and you would pass this Red Plastic Potato. As soon as someone tried to pass you the potato you hurried and passed it off to someone else, because you didn’t want it, it didn’t belong to you, and you knew that if you got caught holding the potato when the buzzer went off that you would be out of the game.

It’s like that in the spiritual, if you take something that’s not yours you could end up out of the game. Don’t take it, It’s not yours.

To take something that is not yours is a sin, because God said in Exodus 20:15 “Thou shalt not steal” that is the 8th commandment

The word steal comes from a Hebrew word called “ganab” it means to thieve or deceive; the etymology of the word steal is to take and carry away without permission.

The word take means to get into ones hands or possessions, to accept into the mind or understanding, to assume or undertake, to receive or derive from another source, to become impregnated with or to absorb, to do, to make, or perform.

A thief is one that steals. If you receive something that is not yours you are as a thief because you accepted into your mind and you assumed it into your possession from another source, you have received stolen property; therefore you are as a thief. The Bible says in Luke 12:33 “No thief approacheth heaven.” Why because their intention is only to steal, kill, and destroy. When you take something that’s not yours you can’t approach heaven, you will be out of the game. Unlike hot potato when you are out of the game you can still encourage you friends, you can say come on you can do it you can win the game, but when you are out of this game of life the only thing you will be able to say is death fall on me, but death will turn and laugh at you because you got caught with something that wasn’t yours and now you have to pay the price in hell, retribution must be paid for taking something that wasn’t yours, Don’t take it, it’s not yours.

We find in our text a man by the name of Achan that took something that wasn’t his and because he took something that wasn’t his all Israel suffered. DON’T YOU DARE THINK THAT oh it’s o.k. if I do this or if I take that, I’m not hurting nobody, If I sneak over to sister halter tops house I’m not hurting anybody, If I sneak off with brother blue suit I’m not hurting anybody, If I take just a little drink I’m not hurting nobody that’s a lie because we are all the body of Christ, we are the only Jesus this world will ever see and just like in the natural body if I smash my finger my toes know that something is wrong, they might not have felt the impact or the direct pain, but they know that something has affected the body. When you take something that is not yours you affect the whole body of Christ, if you don’t believe that that just look at the Catholic Church, I’m not putting them down, because we all make up the body of Christ, but because of a few doing something they had no business doing, eventhough they are Catholic the whole body of Christ has been affected by it WHY because they took something that wasn’t theirs. Don’t take it, it’s not your.

Achan took something that was not his. In Joshua 6:17 Joshua said “And the city shall be accursed, even it, and all that are therein, to the LORD: only Rahab the harlot shall live, she and all that are with her in the house, because she hid the messengers that we sent. “ Everything and everyone had to be destroyed. Rahab and her household were spared because of what she did to protect the messengers that were sent into the city to spy out the city, the gold silver, iron and brass were to be put into the treasury of the Lord and consecrated to the Lord. In verse 18 Joshua said “And ye, in any wise keep yourselves from the accursed thing, lest ye make yourselves accursed, when ye take of the accursed thing, and make the camp of Israel a curse, and trouble it.” Achan took something that wasn’t his, he became a thief. Then it came time for Israel to fight against Ai and like they did with Jericho spies were sent out to survey Ai, they came back to Joshua and said “Let not all the people go up, but let about 2 or 3 thousand men go up and smite Ai surely they are no match for us, but because of Achan taking something that was not his, little tiny Ai smote 36 men and chased the rest of them unto the valley of Shebarim, which means broken place, and smote them there, all because Achan took something that didn’t belong to him.