Seek God's Mouth (Joshua 9:1-27) Series

Let's start this morning by reading Joshua 9:1-4:

(1) And then, as soon as the kings heard who were beyond the Jordan in the hill country and in the Shephelah and in all the coast of the great sea in front of Lebanon--the Hittites and Amorites, the Canaanites, the Perizzites, the Hivites and the Jebusites-- (2) they gathered themselves together to fight with Joshua and with Israel, united,

(3) while the inhabitants of Gibeon heard what Joshua had done to Jericho to Ai,

(4) and they acted-- also they-- with wisdom/cunning,

Imagine that you're a Canaanite king, and you've heard the report about what Joshua and the Israelites have been doing. They wiped out Jericho, and after an initial setback, did the same to Ai. They killed everyone, hung the kings, and made the cities a desolation. If I'm a king, I'm nervous. If they'd simply conquered these two cities, and moved in to them, I'd maybe try telling myself that it's time to greet my new neighbors. Maybe bring over a cake. But people who conquer cities, only to destroy them, have some larger goal in mind. They aren't going to be content with what they've accomplished.

AJ begins chapter 9 by very deliberately creating a contrast between two different responses to what Joshua has been doing. In verses 1-2, AJ describes the first group. All the kings of the land, hearing about Joshua, have joined together with one accord to fight him. They've put aside whatever differences they have-- whatever century-old grudges-- to unite against their common enemy. Perhaps the Canaanites' problem to this point has been a lack of numbers. Maybe they've lost to these escaped slaves because they've been overwhelmed numerically. Maybe if they join together, they will crush Israel.

These kings then disappear until chapter 10. Why does AJ tell us about these kings, when they play no further role in chapter 9? I think the answer is, AJ has given us this to help us view the second group differently. In verse

3, again, we read this:

(3) while the inhabitants of Gibeon heard what Joshua had done to Jericho to Ai, (4) and they acted-- also they-- with cunning/shrewdness/foresight,

When the Gibeonites heard about what Joshua did, they drew a completely different conclusion. They looked at Joshua, and they looked at their own strength, and they knew that fighting was hopeless. They'd never win. Normally, when a foreign army invades a country, there are only two options. You either fight, or run. But the Gibeonites try to find a third way-- they will act with cunning.

Now, how we understand this word "cunning" makes an enormous difference in how we read the story that follows. At some point, when we think about how we will apply this passage, I'll come back to this in more detail. But for now, let's use this as a working definition: "Cunning" means knowing what you want, and knowing how to get it. The Gibeonites want two things. (1) They want to live. They don't want to die. And death, at this point, looks inevitable. (2) They want to keep their cities. Who wants to leave everything, and become a refugee?

So as we read the story that follows, we find ourselves curious-- how will the Gibeonites try to pull this off?

What's the plan?

Verses 3-6:

(3) while the inhabitants of Gibeon heard what Joshua had done to Jericho to Ai,

(4) and they acted-- also they-- with wisdom/cunning,

and they went,

and they prepared provisions,

and they took old/worn-out sacks for their donkeys and leather bottles of wine--old/worn-out and torn and mended,

(5) with old/worn-out and patched sandals on their feet,

with old/worn out clothing on them,

while all of the bread of their provisions had dried up.

It was crumbly,

(6) And they went to Joshua to the camp at Gilgal,

and they said to him and to the men of Israel,

"From a far land we have come,

and so then, cut a covenant with us,"

The Gibeonites know their OT extremely well. There are two different sets of rules for how Israel is supposed to treat nations, depending on whether they are near-- inside of the promised land-- or far--outside of the land.

We read this in Deuteronomy 20:10-18 (ESV?):

10 “When you draw near to a city to fight against it, offer terms of peace to it. 11 And if it responds to you peaceably and it opens to you, then all the people who are found in it shall do forced labor for you and shall serve you. 12 But if it makes no peace with you, but makes war against you, then you shall besiege it. 13 And when the LORD your God gives it into your hand, you shall put all its males to the sword, 14 but the women and the little ones, the livestock, and everything else in the city, all its spoil, you shall take as plunder for yourselves. And you shall enjoy the spoil of your enemies, which the LORD your God has given you. 15 Thus you shall do to all the cities that are very far from you, which are not cities of the nations here.