Is There Sin In Your Camp?

"The men of Ai struck down about thirty-six of their men, and pursued them from the gate as far as Shebarim and struck them down on the descent, so the hearts of the people melted and became as water.
Then Joshua tore his clothes and fell to the earth on his face before the ark of the LORD until the evening, both he and the elders of Israel; and they put dust on their heads.
Joshua said, "Alas, O Lord GOD, why did You ever bring this people over the Jordan, only to deliver us into the hand of the Amorites, to destroy us? If only we had been willing to dwell beyond the Jordan!
"O Lord, what can I say since Israel has turned their back before their enemies?
"For the Canaanites and all the inhabitants of the land will hear of it, and they will surround us and cut off our name from the earth. And what will You do for Your great name?"
So the LORD said to Joshua, "Rise up! Why is it that you have fallen on your face?
"Israel has sinned, and they have also transgressed My covenant which I commanded them. And they have even taken some of the things under the ban and have both stolen and deceived. Moreover, they have also put them among their own things.
"Therefore the sons of Israel cannot stand before their enemies; they turn their backs before their enemies, for they have become accursed. I will not be with you anymore unless you destroy the things under the ban from your midst." Joshua 7:8-12

"And others save with fear, pulling them out of the fire; hating even the garment spotted by the flesh." Jude 1:23

"Dear friends, if our hearts do not condemn us, we have confidence before God and receive from him anything we ask, because we obey his commands and do what pleases him." 1 John 3:21&22

"If I regard iniquity in my heart, the Lord will not hear me:" Psalm 66:18

Israel's defeat at Ai, what a scary event. Because understand, God told Joshua that He would be with him as He was with Moses, and the fact that this defeat took place suggested, for some reason, God did not back them this time. This event drove Joshua to his knees in prayer, seeking to find out what had happened which is a response God adores. It appears Joshua even subtly "threw in" a little blame because of a lack of understanding, we will discuss this below. Do we want to be a people that hear from the Lord when we pray? Joshua was heard but as the leader he was told to take care of some things before God would back them again, let's analyze these verses.

Everything was going peachy in Israel as far as battle was concerned. They were striking fear in the hearts of all the surrounding kingdoms... until Ai. God had told them not to take anything for themselves in the last battle they fought, but a man named Achan decided not to regard this command. Because of this mans sin, God decided to pull His power away from the armies of Israel. At the time though, Joshua was unaware of this sin, so he fell before the Lord in prayer. Notice he asks God why he even brought them there just to lose, sounds like he was throwing a little blame God's way. The reason I say this is because look at God's response to this statement,"So the LORD said to Joshua, "Rise up! Why is it that you have fallen on your face? Israel has sinned, and they have also transgressed My covenant which I commanded them." Whoa, a pretty harsh rebuke in my estimation, GET UP! Why have you fallen on your face? This is not my fault, it is Israels sin! Have you ever been there? Opened so many doors to the enemy through YOUR sin that you believe the Satanic lies that are being fed to you in blaming God for your condition? I think we all have probably at some point, but it is important to remember that God is perfect, He doesn't do petty things like we do and sometimes we interpret Him as such. I am not saying our bad conditions are always because of personal sin either, Job is a perfect example of that.

Now I love how the Old Testament gives us so much truth into God's character. Jesus quoted the Old Testament non-stop, so for any of us to say it is not necessary is arrogance. We have a few verses that still illustrate that God was the same yesterday, today and forever! In Psalms David said, "If I regarded iniquity in my heart, my prayers would not have been heard." And then in the New Testament we have John saying, "if our hearts do not condemn us, we have confidence before God and receive from him anything we ask" Does this mean God doesn't really hear us when we sin? Not in the sense of not actually hearing what we say but in the sense of response. And now, for probably the scariest part of this verse, "I will not be with you anymore unless you destroy the things under the ban from your midst." We must consecrate ourselves to the Lord! See the Bible is full of promises, but all of those promises have conditions. This should not sound foreign to us, we do it all of the time ourselves. "If you get good grades in school than I will reward you", see that "if,than" statement? That suggests a conditional promise. I have promised to reward you but only if you receive good grades.

And finally for the verse in Jude, "hating even the garment stained by the flesh". This is a challenge to all of us (me included), could we in fact substitute, "hating even the DVD stained by the flesh"? Or maybe this, "hating even the MUSIC stained by the flesh"? How can we partake in something that God absolutely hates? If God is up there pounding His throne in anger about a movie I have allowed myself to watch and I am down here laughing about what I am watching, I would assume something is wrong with my heart. We have accepted so much in our culture, we constantly quench the Spirit and then we wonder why we are not feeling used of the Lord. Or we convince ourselves we are being used in a very powerful way and God is up there going, "You have no idea what can actually be done with the power of my Spirit if you would not quench Him, if you would just allow me to cleanse you". Let's encourage one another to be careful what we watch and hear, maybe we are not actually doing what is being done on th silver screen, but make no mistake, we are becoming partakers with it by giving it our approval through laughter or merely enjoyment. We see how angry God was with Achan's disobedience, let's make sure we are not angering our God either! We need to turn our laughter into mourning and our joy to gloom (See devotional Joy and Gloom).

God revealed to me once that if I find something perverted funny there is a problem. Now I can force myself not to laugh, but forcing suggests I still thought it to be funny, so when this happens fall on your face and begin to seek out what is wrong in your heart. I don't know about everyone else, but I do not want to regard iniquity in my heart so I can see God really move in my life! Are we getting rid of things in our lives that are considered "banned" by God? If not, we probably can not expect too much in prayer. Remember, the same God that said "I will never leave you or forsake you" also said, "I will not be with you anymore unless you destroy the things under the ban from your midst." This is not a contradiction, as a whole God is faithful to us even to point out our sin, but God cannot condone our sin by giving us blessings and what we want if we refuse to deal with sin in our lives. Think if I reward bad behavior? All that will teach people is I am not really serious about what they are doing! I appreciate you brothers and sisters! Let's strive to perfect holiness in reverent fear of our God!