"Dealing With Doubt" -3

"Thou makest us to turn back from the enemy: and they which hate us spoil for themselves." (Psalms 44:10) Why not just call it dealing with sin, since sin is what God was dealing with? Because as we witnessed, Joshua was doubting God's promise, which was not the issue; God was not the issue, the issue was sin, yet it was because of the sin issue that Joshua began to doubt God's promise, not even realizing that there was a sin issue that was to blame. Whether you can accept this or not, but God has used Israel to show us how we are as a person; every single flaw, every single aspect of insecurity, and every single issue that our hearts need to be dealt with, they are all played out in the life of Israel. You can call it spiritualism of the text if you want to, but it is all given as a road map or a manual for our lives; where do you need to go for direction, but to a map? and where do you need to go for leaning what is wrong, but to a manual? Therefore, if there is any kind of doubt as to what God has said or promised, then according to the manual, we need to search out the sin that we have hidden in our hearts. For some of us, that will not be very difficult, but for some, it will take a lot of deep searching by a process of elimination. I will go back to what Paul said in 1 Corinthians 5:7, where he speaks about purging out the old leaven; it is the fact that we have been made unleavened in Christ, that we must not allow leaven to exist in us; just as with the model of the church, there really is no difference, the same goes for the example given through the children of Israel. They were delivered by God and given a new land for an inheritance, which was the promised land; the land was not only promised to them by God, but God told them that He would protect them in it, and that He would deliver the enemy into their hands. Yet Joshua had doubt in his heart as to the choice to have crossed the Jordan, which was not only what God instructed them to do, but promised them victory in gaining control of the land; so if there was a problem, why do we automatically think that God has taken back His promise? God's way or getting our attention can sometimes hurt a little... "Israel hath sinned, and they have also transgressed My covenant which I commanded them: for they have even taken of the accursed thing, and have also stolen, and dissembled also, and they have put it even among their own stuff. Therefore the children of Israel could not stand before their enemies, but turned their backs before their enemies, because they were accursed: neither will I be with you any more, except ye destroy the accursed from among you. Up, sanctify the people, and say, Sanctify yourselves against tomorrow: for thus saith the LORD God of Israel, There is an accursed thing in the midst of thee, O Israel: thou canst not stand before thine enemies, until ye take away the accursed thing from among you. In the morning therefore ye shall be brought according to your tribes: and it shall be, that the tribe which the LORD taketh shall come according to the families thereof; and the family which the LORD shall take shall come by households; and the household which the LORD shall take shall come man by man. And it shall be, that he that is taken with the accused thing shall be burnt with fire, he and all that he hath: because he hath transgressed the covenant of the LORD, and because he hath wrought folly in Israel." (Joshua 7:11-15)