Ten Minute Bible Talks Devotional Bible Study - God Defeats Your Enemies | Historical Books | Joshua 10:16-28

Episode Date: January 22, 2025

How does God respond to his enemies? Why do the Israelites stand on the necks of the kings? In today's episode, Jensen shares how Joshua 10:16-28 points us forward to King Jesus, who defeated our enemies on the cross. Read the Bible with us in 2025! This year, we’re exploring the Historical Books—Joshua, Judges, 1 & 2 Samuel, and 1 & 2 Kings. Download your reading plan now. Your support makes TMBT possible. Ten Minute Bible Talks is a crowd-funded project. Join the TMBTeam to reach more people with the Bible. Give now. Like this content? Make sure to leave us a rating and share it so that others can find it, too. Use #asktmbt to connect with us, ask questions, and suggest topics. We'd love to hear from you! To learn more, visit our website and follow us on Instagram, Facebook, and Twitter @TenMinuteBibleTalks. Don't forget to subscribe to the TMBT Newsletter here. Passages: Joshua 10:16-28

Welcome to 10-minute Bible Talks, where we connect the Bible to your life. And the time it takes to get to work. I'm Jensen Holt McNair. The second half of Joshua chapter 10 continues the narrative of the battle against five kings who tried to attack the Israelites' unlikely ally, Gibbon. The Israelites have just won an astounding victory, ending in a miraculous act of God. Their victory is so complete that we read in chapter 10, verse 21, no one uttered, word against the Israelites. No one wanted to stand up against them, to speak out against them,

so clear was God's presence and power among his people. And before we go on, this is a gentle reminder that if at any time you're wondering, what's going on with all this violence? Go back to Patrick's episode from January 16th to explore that topic head on. But today, after the close of this massive battle, our focus is on the five kings of these cities, the kings who conspired together to attack Gibbon, who led their armies into battle only to suffer complete defeat. And we find these kings hidden in a cave. Joshua orders that they be trapped and held in the cave until they've completed their defeat of the retreating armies, these kings men, still in battle while they hide themselves away in a cave. Now, I hope you can see that these kings,

are the kind of kings who are attempting to save themselves at the expense of their people's very lives. They didn't stand strong with their people, hold fast their decision to stand firm in a battle that they ordered. No, they ran away. They're hiding in a cave. It reminds me of a scene from the Titanic movie, when Mr. J. Bruce Ismay, the chair and managing director of the White Star Line, the maker of the Titanic, quickly jumps aboard a lifeboat meant only for women and children and cowardly escapes death. This scene is merely a scene in the movie, although people wonder how he survived when so many others did not. But the scene is powerful nonetheless. What kind of person responsible for the disaster around them hides to save themselves?

Now I say all of this to help us better understand what comes next, the decisive judgment on these kings ordered by Joshua. These men were enemies of God, opposed, to his ways, bent on standing in his way, attacking his people. Their self-focused, self-serving narratives and agendas led them to cowardice and abandonment of their post. And so when we see Joshua summoning the kings from the cave in verse 22, we need to keep that understanding in focus. Versus 22 to 25, Joshua said, open the mouth of the cave and bring those five kings out to me. So they brought the five kings out of the cave, the kings of Jerusalem, Hebram, Jarmouth, Lakers, and Eglon. When they had brought these kings to Joshua, he summoned all the men of Israel and said to the army commanders who had come with him,

come here and put your feet on the necks of these kings, so they came forward and placed their feet on their necks. Now, it would be easy to miss the symbolism happening here. From our modern vantage point, were we to just skim this passage, we could be tempted to just find ourselves stuck in the shock of the matter, the violence, the killing, the weird command to put their feet on the necks of another human being. I get it. But this practice isn't just because Joshua felt like doing it. In that time, putting your foot on the neck of defeated foes was symbolism of your victory, of your supremacy over your enemies. Joshua calls forward the people, and he brings their commanders and has them symbolically place their feet over the king's necks, showing God's people a tangible image, a symbol of God's

supremacy over all who would oppose him, over his enemies. And this imagery is baked into the story of God's people all the way from Genesis to Revelation. Genesis 49-8, God speaking to Judah, the father of the 12 tribes of Israel. Judah, your brothers shall praise you. Your hand shall be on the neck of your enemies. Your father's son shall bow down before you. From their very beginning, God had promised, via this imagery, that he would be with his people and give them victory over their enemies.

And now, of course, in Joshua, we're seeing the actual physical deliverance of enemies into the hands of his people. This is a very clear picture of God's faithfulness in this specific time to specific people for his specific purposes. He has been with Judah, with his descendants the Israelites, and given them supremacy over their physical enemies. But as we chart the course of this imagery throughout Scripture, we also see this imagery being applied forward to a coming Messiah in Psalm 110. 10. The Lord says to my Lord, sit at my right hand until I make your enemies a footstool for your feet. There's this promise that one day God would send someone, someone whom even the king, King David, would call his Lord. And this someone would sit beside God at his right hand until he made all his enemies a footstool for his feet.

And in the New Testament, we see Paul in 1 Corinthians 15 make the connection, of that Messiah, from Psalm 110, being Jesus. For he must reign until he has put all his enemies under his feet. Jesus came to reign on earth, to defeat his enemies, those who would oppose his kingdom and ultimately the final enemy, Satan. All who stand against God, who are his enemies, oppose true justice, goodness, and mercy. And they will be put under his feet, fully defeated when Jesus returns again. We find the account and prophecy of this in the book of Revelation. But what I find so compelling is Paul's account in Romans 16 as he is giving his final greetings and instructions. He writes this, for your obedience is known to all so that I rejoice over you,

but I want you to be wise as to what is good and innocent as to what is evil. So he's commending the people for their obedience, their faithfulness. He implores them to use wisdom, to keep to good, to stay far from evil. And then, he encourages them with this. The God of peace will soon crush Satan under your feet. The grace of our Lord Jesus Christ be with you. So as faithful followers of Jesus, Paul reminds them that the God of peace will crush Satan under their feet. Paul is inviting his reader into the story, into the narrative of victory, not over a physical foe or a foreign nation this time, but over Satan himself, the bringer of death, destruction, the curse on all creation, humanity and nature alike. He's reminding them that the God of peace will not stand

for violent, evil wars waged by men for their own glory and power and gain. He will crush Satan under the feet of his people. He will stand in complete supremacy, complete victory over his enemies and over evil one day through the rule and reign of Jesus Christ. And so just as Joshua invited the people of God into the imagery to stand there, to see God's faithfulness, to deliver his people, to give their enemies over to them, Paul also invites us to do the same, to trust in the faithfulness of God to deliver you from your enemies, to believe with just a bit more belief than doubt, that one day he will return and cast out all who would oppose him, all evil, that he will reign with love, justice, and mercy, that his kingdom will be the final kingdom,

and it will bring liberation and freedom to all of creation from the curse that binds us, that drags us into darkness, death, and decay, that through the imagery of a foot on a neck, we would see the beauty and gift of God's complete power over all, all oppressors and all injustice. May it be so. May we believe it. May we wait in expectant hope for the coming of our king. May the parting words of Paul bring you comfort today. Evil has an end date. The Lord will be faithful. The God of peace will soon crush Satan under your feet. the grace of our Lord Jesus Christ be with you.