Look! I Have Given Sihon Into Your Hand

So right before we get to the sermon, I was struck both in the Apostles' Creed and in our scripture lesson this morning. There's this phrase having to do with the forgiveness of sins. In the Apostles' Creed, we confess it's one of the things that we believe. We believe in the forgiveness of sins. And when Peter was at Cornelius' house, he was talking about the forgiveness of sins, that those who believed would receive forgiveness of sins. And so our sermon this morning is about some of the sins of the people. the Israelites that we'll get to in the book of Deuteronomy that had led to their travelings and their wanderings in the wilderness. But before we come to that, I want to ask you, do you believe in the forgiveness of sin? Do you actually believe in it? I think we'd all say, yes, we believe in it. The Apostle Scree said so, and we said so, and we read in pages of Scripture that sins can be forgiven. But what is prerequisite? What's required before the believing in forgiveness of sins? What do you have to believe in before that?

You have to believe in the reality of sin. And when I'm asking you, do you believe in the forgiveness of sins? I don't mean to be asking you a question, do you believe in the concept or the doctrine of forgiveness? I'm asking a very personal question. Do you believe in the forgiveness of your sins? Or in another way, and I'll be saying it just a little different, do you believe that you sin? I think even then we would say, yes, I do believe that I sin. But I think you would agree with me in confessing that oftentimes we define our sins ourselves. And it's not God's word that defines them. There are many things that we do or participate in or desire, and we just go, well, that's just how it is. Whether that's anger or laziness or pride or lust or gluttony or greed or lying, there's all kinds of things. And we just go, well, that's just part of it.

If you have that sentiment inside of you, well, that's just part of it, of who I am, there is some sense in which you're redefining the sin and you're saying, well, I don't feel as though that's a sin. Some sins we're more sensitive to than others. But some we've become accustomed to. Some we've become familiar with. Some sins we love and don't want to have them exposed. We don't want to be freed of them. The reason I'm asking these questions before we get to our sermon text this morning is that It's an interesting passage. It's not one where the application or the implication for us is just obvious. It's really just a section that accounts for the Israelites wandering through a land on their way to the promised land and ending up in a war, though that we'll actually talk about that war next week. They're just wandering through the wilderness, and it could just be sort of narrative. It's just they're going from here to there.

But I don't think that's all there is to it. I think there's a lot to be gleaned or for us to learn from their wanderings and from the differences in God's instructions to them as they go into the land of the Amorites, as they leave the land of Moab. And I think that their sin has a lot to do with this and our sins. I don't know that we're all that different from them in terms of the sort of disciplines that they were coming under in this passage. They're oftentimes sort of disciplines that we need to come under. and that God would be merciful to put us under. So, as I said this morning, we're going to be returning to our study of Deuteronomy, picking up where we left off in chapter 2. It's been a while since I've preached from Deuteronomy. A month? We've had Holy Week and Eric preaching and a couple of other things, and so it's been a little while.

And so I want to give you a little bit of context or backstory to where we're at. Leading up to our text this morning, Israel is toward the end of their wandering in the wilderness, 38 plus years through the 40 years of wandering. They're coming to the promised land. They're preparing to enter. At the beginning of the book of Deuteronomy, where Moses gathers together all of Israel as they're about to make their final approach into the promised land, he gathers them together at Mount Horeb. which is quite a ways south of the promised land. And there he retells the law. Deuteronomy means the second giving of the law. And so this whole book is him retelling what he had said to them 40 years previously before the wandering. So they gather together there at Mount Horeb, south of the promised land, and he's speaking to them. And so after they receive the law, they're on this trek.

to the north. And as they go to the north, they travel through the land of Edom, where Esau's sons had settled. North of the land of Edom, as they continue to travel north, they come into Moab. And that's where the children of Lot, you remember the incident between him and his daughters and the children that were the resultant children. These are the sons of Lot. These are the inhabitants of Moab. They live just north of Edom and to the east of the Jordan, the promised land. And so this brings us up to the Israelites' current location. They're at the north end of Moab, and they're about to enter into the land of the Amorites. The land of the Amorites is larger than both the land of Edom and Moab, and it's divided basically into a northern and southern kingdom. And the king of the south is Sihon, and the king of the north is Og. And the Israelites are going to travel north through Sihon's land, through Og's land, and then west into the promised land.

As the Israelites had traveled through Edom and Moab, they were told that they were not to make war, that they were not to steal or take what they wanted, but rather that they were to purchase their food and their water, that they were to stay on the road and they were not to sort of stop and say, this is a nice place to pitch my tent. This is where I'm going to stay. I'm not going any further. You're supposed to go through the land. You're to buy your food and your water. You're supposed to keep moving on through both Edom and Moab. And the reason the Lord tells them this is he says, I have given those lands to those peoples as a possession, which is to say, I have not given it to you. In our text this morning, the Lord gives the Israelites a different instruction where he acknowledges that something different is going to happen as they enter into the land of the Amorites. As they continue to travel north, they're told that the Lord is giving them or beginning to give to them the land that they're traveling through.

And so the question that we have to answer this morning is, what does this passage teach us about how to live as a Christian and to serve God more fully? The answer to that question and my hope this morning of what God will do for us is that he'll help each one of us to spend our lives seeking to obey his commands carefully and more fully. That we'd spend our time seeking them out and not just going through our lives thinking about what we want or what we desire or what we deserve. But what has God given us and what ought we to be content with and what should we be saying yes to and no to? Our text this morning is Deuteronomy 2, verses 24 to 29. Would you please stand now as we read the word of the Lord? This is the word of the Lord and it is eternally true. Arise, set out, and pass through the valley of Arnon. Look, I have given Sihon the Amorite, king of Heshbon, and his land into your hand. Begin to take possession and contend with him in battle.

This day I will begin to put the dread and fear of you upon the peoples everywhere under the heavens, who, when they hear the report of you, will tremble and be in anguish because of you. So I sent messengers from the wilderness of Kedemoth to Sihon, king of Heshbon, with words of peace, saying, Let me pass through your land. I will travel only on the highway. I will not turn aside to the right or to the left. You will sell me food for money. This is the word of the Lord. You may be seated. There's two striking parts to this passage. The first is where the Lord says through Moses, Look, I have given you Sihon and his land.

And the second is later on where he says, you're going to contend with him in battle, and then Moses sends letters of peace. It's a strange thing. You kind of wonder if Moses is doing the right thing or the wrong thing, whether that's an obedient or disobedient thing for him to do. The Lord says, you're going to contend with these guys in battle, and Moses sends them a note saying, hey, we're here for peace, and we're going to come to that. But we're going to start with the first striking. section, which says, look, I have given Sihon the Amorite, king of Heshbon, and his land into your hand. The part that's most striking is that the Lord says, I have given. What do we have that has not been given to us? I think in theory, if you're a student of scripture, you'll know that the Bible tells us that we don't have anything that hasn't been given to us. What do you have that you did not receive, is the question that Paul poses in 1 Corinthians chapter 4. You remember the Israelites' position.

That when they left Egypt, they were leaving to be given a land. And when they had traveled from Egypt up to the land, up to the border, they refused to go into it. They sent spies and they were scared. And they said, no, no, we will not receive what you have to give to us for fear. They were scared. And then the Lord got angry and the Lord said, okay. And he says that I'm going to wipe you guys, I'm going to wipe out all the men in your nation. 20 years older and above, and you're going to wander for 40 years, and I'm not going to give you the land. And you remember then what the people did. They said, we're going to repent. We're sorry. We're going to go in. And they were not supposed to go in. And when they went in, in their own strength, they were routed. They were destroyed. They died. Why did they die at that point? If just before that, they were supposed to go into the land and receive it, how come when they actually did it, they were destroyed?

The answer is they had refused to receive it when God had given it to them, and they tried to take it in their own strength. And it turns out they weren't strong enough or mighty enough to take it themselves. And then as they traveled and wandered through Edom and Moab, the Lord sort of, or at least Moses, sort of recalls to their minds, you can't have this land. And to be fair, Edom and Moab were not nice places. They were not lush, fertile lands. They were arid. They were rocky. They were not particularly desirable places to live. But when you've been wandering in tents for 40 years, simply being able to stop and rest and set up your life might be nice. I went hiking with my oldest son and some of his friends over spring break.

And we didn't camp in a particularly nice place, except that it was after a long hike. And that made it very nice. There was rain. There were rocks. There was a nice root that ran right under the middle of my tent. It was wonderful because it was the end of the hike. I was like, we finally have arrived. But as the Israelites are going through Edom and they're going through Moab, they're told, you may not stop. You must keep going. Don't turn off to the right or to the left. And the reason is that I've given this land to those people. And you'll remember that Esau was cursed, hated by God, and yet he was given a land and received it. And if you were to go back and to read it, he took it through battle. He didn't just walk in and set up camp. He eradicated the inhabitants and took the land that God had given to them. The same thing with the descendants of Lot in the land of Er.

They come in, they've taken the land, but have they taken it? No, they've been given it. And Moses is pointing out to the Israelites that these wicked people, those who are not gods, have received what's been given to them. And as it's been given to them, it is not given to you. So you're to carry on and you're to go through it. You're not to feel entitled to it or entitled to rest or entitled to stop. You're to carry on buying food and water as you go. And then they come to the northern end of it, and the Lord says, set out, arise and set out, pass through the valley of Arnon, which was the boundary, the northern boundary of Moab, the southern boundary of the kingdom of Sion. Pass through the valley. Look, I have given Sion. I didn't look at the topography of all of this, but you get the impression that as they pass through this valley, they're looking up and they can see the kingdom that's to be theirs, the land that's to be theirs. Look, I've given it to you. After all of their wanderings,

They're finally entering into something that's going to be theirs. It was and is the only way that we get anything in this life. It's for God to present us with a gift, whatever it is. Sometimes the gifts are joyous to us. Sometimes they're severe, they're hard, they're difficulty, they're heavy. But everything that they had was given to them by God. As they wandered in the wilderness, what did God give them? He gave them food and he gave them water. He gave them shelter. He gave them guidance. He gave them protection. He sustained them up to this point. And now they've come to the point, sort of the low point in terms of a society. All of their old men, all of their strength of age is gone. All except for Joshua and Caleb. All of the older men are gone and there's this young crop of generation of young men. Lots of women, not many children, right?

because there's been a dying off of all of the husbands and fathers. Many women, some young children, a bunch of middle-aged men who are without their fathers and have largely been without their fathers for their growing up years. In the passage just before this, it says that the men of war had perished, had finally perished, that now as they're entering... into the promised land. And to begin this conquest, all of their men of war have perished. They were worn down and now inexperienced. Have you ever felt that way? Worn down at the end of yourself? Can't handle another round of the puking bug? It doesn't take much for us to feel that way, does it? As much as we might think we're strong, it doesn't take too much for us to realize our strength will fail us. Our resolve is not all that sturdy. And now, and now.

They've come to their weak point, and the Lord says, look, look up. I have given Sihon and his land into your hand, and they're going, how? How? Maybe your boss, maybe you've been feeling overwhelmed at work at some point, and your boss comes and says, hey, can you do something for me? Maybe you're behind at work at home, and all of a sudden you're like, if I had to go out and cut the grass, and you go out and your lawnmower doesn't start, or your washing machine breaks, or your drain backs up and floods your house. I mean, whenever something happens, you're just like, this is the worst possible time for it to happen. There couldn't be a worse time for this extra burden to show up. Have you ever had a burden show up and you go, you know what? I think I do have the extra strength for this right now. We never do, right? We're never like, and I think I could have a little more hardship. It's always the worst time. And that's how it is for the Israelites as they come. All their men of war have perished. They've wandered for 40 years. They're bedraggled. They're worn out. And now,

they're supposed to fight for the land. In what strength? With what skill? With what hope? Well, the good news for them is that they're being given the land. Now, that doesn't mean that they're not going to have to fight. There actually is a battle to come. But that through the battle, they are going to be given what God has promised to give to them. And he tells them this. It's an interesting thing. He says, this day, I will begin to put dread and fear of you upon the peoples everywhere under the heavens. Now you might read that and think, there must have been something fearful or dreadful about the Israelites. There was nothing to be afraid of when you look at this group of people, except what their God had done for them. That was scary. What had happened to the Egyptians, bringing them through on the Red Sea, that was fearful. That was terrifying.

that people whose God would do that for them are now coming into your land, that could cause you to be scared. That could cause you to tremble. What in the world is their God going to do to us? The Lord says, today I will begin to put the dread and fear of you in the people so that they tremble and are in anguish because of you. God's going to do something for them that they don't have the ability to do for themselves. You ever feel like you've run out of strength? Of course we all do. in our work, in our homes, with our children, in our marriages, in our society. You say, I don't have the strength. I don't have the influence. I don't have the intellect. I don't have the energy or the wisdom to do it, whatever it is. Does that mean you don't have to do it? No. Your reckoning of your own strength really has very little to do with what God requires of you or what God's going to give to you. Children are a funny thing. When you get pregnant,

whether it's your first baby or a subsequent child, there's this mixture of joy and fear and being very overwhelmed. It's why they take so many pregnancy tests. Is it really true? Is it really, really true? Like, is this really what is happening? It's just scary. It's overwhelming. There's tears. And the tears are tears of joy and they're tears of fear. And you think, well, maybe if it had been just a few more months or maybe if it had been later or maybe if we could have gotten out of this season of sickness or this project at work or there's always a circumstance in which we say, we just need to be freed of this so that we can carry this extra burden. I find it amusing, at least in other people's lives, not in my own so much, when God doesn't pay any attention to that. I think he's wise and he loves his people and he pushes them.

to be holy. And this, you know, children is just one example. This happens really in all of our lives, in every area of our lives. He pushes us in ways that we're like, I can't handle anymore. And the Lord says, it can. And we're going to come to our response to those pressures in a moment. But for now, do you feel it? Have you felt it in your own life? I can't handle one more thing. I'm carrying all that I can carry. What I'm really asking is, are our lives really that different from the Israelites as they're entering into this land? They're told that Sion and those that hear of them are going to be afraid of them, and they're sitting here thinking, we're afraid of this, we can't do more. There's no indication in Scripture that they were excited and like, yes, finally, this is great. We also don't have record of them grumbling and complaining. They are simply brought to the place through 40 years of discipline.

To do what God says and to not grumble about it. They go through the land of Edom and they're told you can't eat there. You can't just take what's not yours. And they say, okay. And they pay for the food and they pay for the water. And they just go through and don't set up camp. And now they're come to this place. They're come to the land of the Amorites and they say, okay, well, if we're going to go into battle, it's going to have to be the Lord who gives it to us. Because our strength is gone. We have no more of it. It's all left in the wilderness, buried in the ground. All of our men of war have perished. They understood that if they were going to receive any good thing, it was just going to have to be given to them. That whatever their actions were, it was going to have to be given to them in spite of them. And our lives are not that different.

The Israelites, you'll remember, are accustomed to grumbling and complaining. This sort of sentiment in them is not a normal sentiment. They're often grumbling and complaining. Even throughout the wilderness, they grumbled and they complained. As they left, even before that, as they left Egypt, they grumbled and complained at Moses to the point that they wanted to kill him. Why have you brought us out here into this wilderness to die? Oh, that we could go back to the land of Egypt where our pots were full of meat. It didn't take them any real effort to grumble and complain. It's true of us as well. It's extraordinary. It's extraordinary to see people go through a hardship without grumbling and complaining out loud. I'm sure we grumble and complain in our hearts, but maybe we should keep our mouths shut. But if we could record the conversations in your house, if your children could tell us what you say, which one of us can say we don't just grumble and complain at the first possibility of hardship? Even as blessings are coming to us,

We don't receive them with gladness. We complain about the work that they will be in. Good things coming. Time for your annual review. Come on in. Okay, you've done a good job. Here's a raise, and here's the new responsibilities that go along with that. We'll be happy about the raise for a little while, but we'll grumble about the work for a long time. And it's just how it is with us. It's how it was with them. It's how it is with us. You know what I think is behind all of that? I think there's this question of, of when responsibility or when work or when duties are put on our plate, we understand that something is going to be required of us, that we're being told, you need to say yes to these things, which means we have to say no to another set of things. And what we're saying yes to, what the Israelites have to say yes to, is the commands of God. So what do they have to say no to?

They have to say no to their own desires. Well, we just don't want to walk anymore and we just like to set up camp here and we think it'll be fine. But the Lord says no. So as they say yes to God and to obeying him, they have to say no to their own desires. And the reason we often don't have the strength to say yes to the things that God requires of us is because we've spent all our energy pursuing the things that we want. I mean, if we were honest and we looked at how you spent your time this last week, I bet every one of you has been pursuing.

Hard something. Paying close attention to it. Doing Google searches about it. Seeing what everybody on X or Facebook or wherever it is you get your news. You're paying attention. What is going on here? I need to know. I'm curious. It's important. This is you exerting energy and demonstrating your priorities. But if you were to ask how your spiritual life has been this last week, simple things like Bible reading and prayer. and loving your neighbors, we say, well, I just have had a busy week. Doesn't it sound pathetic when I say it out loud? Doesn't it sound damnable to say, I had a busy week? I couldn't. When the truth is, we weren't busy with work. We were busy with chasing after our own desires. And we view the work that God requires of us as burdensome, onerous, too hard, and too heavy. Not because...

It in and of itself is that difficult, but because trying to pursue that in addition to all the other things that we must have is more than we can carry. And what is it that we give up? What is it at the end of the week that's left undone? Were we tracking with March Madness? The latest politics going on? Do we know anything more this week than we did last week about what God requires of us or who God is? What did we learn this week? What did we exert ourselves toward? These are the questions we have to answer. You remember at the beginning of my sermon, I asked, do you believe in the forgiveness of sins? All I'm trying to do now is show you our sins in a way that you may not feel them yet. You may be like, well, that's just how it is. I mean, it's like, I mean, if I wasn't keeping up, everybody does it. That doesn't make it right. Not in God's sight. Where do you spend your energy? In America and in the American church, there's this idea that if you want something, you just have to work for it. You just have to work for it. If you want something, you just go get it.

If you need something, you just save up your money and you go buy it. We don't like to receive things. We don't like to have things given to us. We certainly don't like other people having to help us or do for us the things that we are embarrassed for anyone to see. Our messes are our messes, and our messes are private messes. And if they're to be cleaned up, we'll clean them up ourselves, which is just another way of saying, if I'm going to enter into the land, I'm going to get there by my own strength. How's that going for you? That's the question. How's that going for you? You making good progress? I suspect you are making good progress in the things that are important to you. The question is, are the things that are important to you important to God? That's really the question. If you can't work for it and get it yourselves, are you willing to receive it as a gift? Many times we would rather go without it and become frustrated and angry when God says no to our plans.

In those moments, I'm often reminded of the Apostle James' words in chapter 4. He says, you do not have because you do not ask. I mean, if you're asking, what is the transaction going to be like? If you're asking, you're saying, Lord, would you give me this thing? I need this thing. Would you give it to me? James says, you do not have because you do not ask. And then he talks about when you do ask. He says, you ask and do not receive. because you ask with wrong motives. And then he describes those wrong motives thus, so that you may spend it on your pleasures. You do not have because you do not ask. You ask and do not receive because you ask with wrong motives so that you may spend it on your pleasures. It really is deeply ingrained in us and has been ingrained in all of humanity since the time of the Israelites that we will work for and take by our own strength the things that we'll have.

without any regard to whether God would give them to us. And when God says, no, I won't give them to you, we become angry. In the same way that the Israelites were sick of the manna and they say, we don't want this manna, we're sick of this stuff. We want meat. So the Lord gives them meat. Meat until it's piled up around them and rotting and awful. In the end, I think if we were to summarize it, we could simply say, whatever it is that the Lord gives to me, I struggle to receive it with gladness. And that when I get things that I want, I don't give God the glory that he deserves for having received it. I take it myself because I worked hard for it. And it's owed to me. Not owed to me by those in this world, but ultimately owed to me by God. He owes me the things that I want. You might think that there are times in the past, maybe earlier on in your life, where you've been more open.

or willing to receive the things that the Lord would give to you. And when he gives things to you, you may well have learned the lesson that the things that the Lord gives you often come with work and difficulty and burden. And that may be part of the reason you don't want to receive anything else from God, is because you found his blessings to be burdensome. And yet the Scripture tells us that when Jesus speaks in the Gospel of Matthew, he says, come to me, you all who are weary and heavy laden, and I'll give you rest. Come to me, for my burden is light. My commandments are easy. And we go, yeah, but they get in the way of the things that I want out of this life. So the Israelites are coming into this land, and they're being given this land, this kingdom, this battle. What are they to do with it? It's not really even a question. What are they supposed to do?

they're supposed to do what God says. If the Lord's giving them this land, then they're to go and take it. That's what they're supposed to do. It's pretty simple, isn't it? If you asked your five-year-old, if you read them this passage in the section that comes after the rest of the chapter, where they do go to battle and it says, then the Lord gave them the land. And you said, what did God require of the Israelites at this point? Your kids would say that they get in a fight and win because it was the Lord's fight. And God's people always win. God's fights. The problem is God's people don't fight God's fights. They fight their own fights. And those they lose. The last thing I'll say about this point of receiving from God is that everything that we have, both good and difficult, heavy and light, things that make us smile and things that make us cry, our God has given them to us. He's allowed them. And you'll spend most of your life not knowing why.

You have the hard things in your life. That's actually the truth. Why are my parents divorced? Why is my spouse rebellious? Why doesn't my boss appreciate me? Why am I sick with cancer? Why did they die? Why? These are the questions we ask, and we're not capable of holding many of those answers. In fact, many of those answers, if we had them, because of our inability to entrust ourselves to God, we would take those answers and do worse with them if we had them. We would behave, we would be more tempted by Satan to curse God if we knew the answers to those questions. Because we're living very short-sighted lives, very in the present, with very real burdens. And as I talk to you, some of you know me, some of you don't. I grew up without a dad, ever having one. I grew up in an unbelieving home. I grew up in a very difficult, poor, dangerous place. And so the questions aren't theoretical to me.

Life has not always been easy. Life's not easy now. But the things that we have, the things that you have, both good and hard, have come to you from the hand of God. And it's not your parents' fault or your spouse's fault or your boss's fault or the government's fault that you are where you are and you have what you have. It's God in his infinite wisdom who's given and withheld certain things from each one of us. And it's our place not to question and grumble at those things, but to trust that he will care for us and love us and see us through. And that our work and where our energy should be exerted is not in trying to answer questions that the Lord hasn't seen fit to give us the answer to, but rather to say, what has God required of me now? For the Israelites, it was to go into this land and to fight and take over this kingdom that they didn't have the strength in themselves to do. Seemed like an insurmountable task, and yet that's exactly what they did because the Lord gave it to them.

So the Lord says, you're going to go and you're going to do battle with these men, the Israelites, with Sion and his armies. And then Moses said, so I sent messengers from the wilderness of Kedemoth, which is just where they're at, to Sion, king of Heshbon, with words of peace. And it seems like, Moses, what are you doing? The Lord just told us we're going to go to battle and now you're sending words of peace. You're telling them we don't want to fight, which is true. Israelites don't want to fight. So how is what Moses is doing? How does it make sense? If God is making war with Sion, why is Moses sending messengers of peace? Well, if you remember the last time that Israel went to war, when they barged over the border themselves and in their own strength to wage war, the Lord wasn't with them. They initiated it without God's blessing, and as a result, they fell. This would have been the last memory they had of going to war.

getting into a battle. And they were much stronger at that point than they are at this point. And so what the Lord is telling them about going to battle is not a commandment to go and to provoke war, but rather not to surrender or give up when the battle comes. And so they're not to initiate, but they're not to surrender either. God has an interesting way of doing things. This is very similar to the way God worked with with the Israelites as they were leaving Egypt. What were Moses and Aaron supposed to go do? Let us go out into the wilderness, a three days journey so we can worship our God. And what does God do then? He tells Moses, go say this, right? And then he turns around and does what? He hardens Pharaoh's heart so Pharaoh won't let him. So go ask them for this thing. And then God works in the one who's hearing to not allow them to do it. Why? I don't know. So that God would receive the glory of the outcome of that.

of those plagues and that battle. If we're honest, God does a lot of things we don't understand. We read in scripture and we're like, I don't know why he's doing that. This doesn't make any sense. This is one of those situations. Why are you sending us into battle? And also, why are we in turn sending letters of peace? Well, in the next passage, after verse 29, it says that God worked in Zion to stir him up and to make him angry. That these letters of peace were coming as a as an acknowledgement that we are going to be passing through your land, which Sihon would either have wanted and been okay with, like Edom and Moab. This is Moses saying, hey, we're coming through. We don't want you to understand this to be a hostile invasion. We don't want you hearing tell that we came across the border without acknowledging it. So we're sending messengers and letters ahead to tell you, hey, we're coming in. We're just passing through and we'll buy our food and drink.

That's what the letter of peace is. That's basically what he says in these passages. He doesn't say a word about fighting. He doesn't say a word about battle. He just says we're not here as a military conquest. And yet God worked in Sion or through Sion to aggravate him and to cause him to attack the Israelites. And so through Sion's aggression, God is giving this land, this portion of territory to Israel. In addition to the land beyond the Jordan, this land that they're going to occupy, that is the land of the Amorites, actually, once they go up, they conquer these two kingdoms, they actually go across the river and they conquer all of the promised land proper, this land is still under their possession, and Reuben and Gad and the half-tribe of Manasseh actually occupy this land. And then the question arises, should Gad and Reuben and Manasseh settle in that land since it's not part of the promised land. As far as I can tell, it was wrong for them to desire to settle in that land. Eric and I were talking about that. Eric asked me, he's like, do you think it was sinful for Reuben and Gad and Manasseh to settle over there? And I was like, well, it was assigned to them by God. And he said, well, yeah, but they asked for it. And it wasn't part of the promised land. And the best I can tell from my study is that it was sinful for them to ask to dwell in that land because it wasn't part of the land that God gave to them. And yet they asked for it as they were passing through.

They said, this seems like a nice place. We may be a little too crowded over there. And so they took this land. So they end up receiving this land from God. They end up inhabiting it. And they're living in it. These tribes may well have been sinful. This is complex. And yet there are many things that are difficult for us to understand, hard for us to wrap our brains around. It takes time. It takes exertion, doesn't it? Some of what I'm saying, I'm realizing, like if you go to small group or if you talk around your dinner table tonight, hey, what'd you think about the sermon? And what was all that stuff about Reuben and Gad and Manasseh, the half tribe of Manasseh? What's that all about? We're all gonna be like, I don't know. Well, will we exert ourselves to remember and to search out and to figure it out? Or are we just like, yeah, I got, you know. Isn't there a game to watch? The final thing I'll say about Sion and his aggression was that when Moses sent words of peace to him,

God was offering him terms of peace and he refused it. And that was foolish. And that's one little example here in the Old Testament of what God does in the gospel, which is he offers us terms of peace. And many people respond like Sion. They receive terms of peace and they say, I'll have no peace with you. I won't have peace with you. Sion responded foolishly and fatally. But this is God's way. He sends his word out into the world through his people, not just his pastors, but through his people. And it accomplishes the purpose for which he sent it. And we're told in Scripture that to some, it's a pleasing aroma of life. And to others, it's the stench of death. And how is that stench responded to? Well, it's responded to in much the same way that Sion responded to Israel. They make war.

Are you making war with God? Do you have better things to do than hear him and obey him and believe him? Are you smarter than him? When difficulty comes or questions arise or desires well up inside of you, do you know better than God what's good and what is safe and what will please him? I think a lot of times we act like we do, and that's the foolishness of unbelief and pride. And may God help us to repent of it and turn away before we get caught in our own pit. You will get caught in your own pit. That's what Proverbs tells us time and time again, is that the fool digs his own pit and he lies in wait for his prey, but he is the one who falls into it. Sion went to battle thinking he was going to win and destroy and received exactly what he intended to give to someone else.

Instead of being like Sion, we would be better to be like the Israelites who through 40 years of discipline and hardship, when given one more difficult thing to do, like it wasn't like, and now we're entering into retirement. It's like now we're entering into battle to say, if battle is what the Lord has for me, then where's my sword? It's really the only Christian response. If this burden is what the Lord has given to me, not anyone else, even if he used some intermediary to dispense it, this is what God has given to me, then this is what I will carry. And I will seek to do exactly what he says as I carry it. If only he'll give me the strength and the ability to do it. Otherwise, I won't be able to. That was absolutely the truth of the Israelites as they went into this battle. They didn't have the strength or the wisdom or the might or anything they needed to win. And yet the Lord gave it to them. So will you receive from God the things that he gives to you the way that the Israelites received them?

Or will you stiffen your neck and be rebellious like Zion and pay for it? That's the question of this text to us. May the Lord help us to answer it faithfully and humbly and not with pride and arrogance. Let's pray.