19 And Joshua said to Achan, My son, give glory and praise to the Lord, the God of Israel; give me word now of what you have done, and keep nothing back from me.
Say to the children of Israel, If a man or a woman does any of the sins of men, going against the word of the Lord, and is in the wrong; Let them say openly what they have done; and make payment for the wrong done, with the addition of a fifth part, and give it to him to whom the wrong was done.
If we say that we have no sin, we are false to ourselves and there is nothing true in us. If we say openly that we have done wrong, he is upright and true to his word, giving us forgiveness of sins and making us clean from all evil. If we say that we have no sin, we make him false and his word is not in us.
Last of all, see that you are all in agreement; feeling for one another, loving one another like brothers, full of pity, without pride: Not giving back evil for evil, or curse for curse, but in place of cursing, blessing; because this is the purpose of God for you that you may have a heritage of blessing.
And crying out to the Lord his God in his trouble, he made himself low before the God of his fathers, And made prayer to him; and in answer to his prayer God let him come back to Jerusalem and to his kingdom. Then Manasseh was certain that the Lord was God.
Then they said to him, Now make clear to us what is your work, and where you come from? what is your country, and who are your people? And he said to them, I am a Hebrew, a worshipper of the Lord, the God of heaven, who made the sea and the dry land. And the men were in great fear, and they said to him, What is this you have done? For the men had knowledge of his flight from the Lord because he had not kept it from them.
Go, and give out these words to the north, and say, Come back, O Israel, though you have been turned away from me, says the Lord; my face will not be against you in wrath: for I am full of mercy, says the Lord, I will not be angry for ever. Only be conscious of your sin, the evil you have done against the Lord your God; you have gone with strange men under every branching tree, giving no attention to my voice, says the Lord.
And Ezra the priest got to his feet and said to them, You have done wrong and taken strange women for your wives, so increasing the sin of Israel. So now, give praise to the Lord, the God of your fathers, and do his pleasure; and make yourselves separate from the peoples of the land and from the strange women.
Worthy.Bible » Commentaries » Matthew Henry Commentary » Commentary on Joshua 7
Commentary on Joshua 7 Matthew Henry Commentary
Chapter 7
More than once we have found the affairs of Israel, even when they were in the happiest posture and gave the most hopeful prospects, perplexed and embarrassed by sin, and a stop thereby put to the most promising proceedings. The golden calf, the murmuring at Kadesh, and the iniquity of Peor, had broken their measures and given them great disturbance; and in this chapter we have such another instance of the interruption given to the progress of their arms by sin. But it being only the sin of one person or family, and soon expiated, the consequences were not so mischievous as of those other sins; however it served to let them know that they were still upon their good behaviour. We have here,
Jos 7:1-5
The story of this chapter begins with a but. The Lord was with Joshua, and his fame was noised through all that country, so the foregoing chapter ends, and it left no room to doubt but that he would go on as he had begun conquering and to conquer. He did right, and observed his orders in every thing. But the children of Israel committed a trespass, and so set God against them; and then even Joshua's name and fame, his wisdom and courage, could do them no service. If we lose our God, we lose our friends, who cannot help us unless God be for us. Now here is,
Jos 7:6-9
We have here an account of the deep concern Joshua was in upon this sad occasion. He, as a public person, interested himself more than any other in this public loss, and is therein an example to princes and great men, and teaches them to lay much to heart the calamities that befal their people: he is also a type of Christ, to whom the blood of his subjects is precious, Ps. 72:14. Observe,
Jos 7:10-15
We have here God's answer to Joshua's address, which, we may suppose, came from the oracle over the ark, before which Joshua had prostrated himself, v. 6. Those that desire to know the will of God must attend with their desires upon the lively oracles, and wait at wisdom's gates for wisdom's dictates, Prov. 8:34. And let those that find themselves under the tokens of God's displeasure never complain of him, but complain to him, and they shall receive an answer of peace. The answer came immediately, while he was yet speaking (Isa. 65:24), as that to Daniel, Dan. 9:20, etc.
Jos 7:16-26
We have in these verses,