Scripture Daily

Context No. 1267 of 4322 · Joshua

Context · Reflection

Joshua 7:22-26: in context

22So Joshua sent messengers, and they ran to the tent. Behold, it was hidden in his tent, with the silver under it. 23They took them from the middle of the tent, and brought them to Joshua and to all the children of Israel. They laid them down before the LORD. 24Joshua, and all Israel with him, took Achan the son of Zerah, the silver, the robe, the wedge of gold, his sons, his daughters, his cattle, his donkeys, his sheep, his tent, and all that he had; and they brought them up to the valley of Achor. 25Joshua said, “Why have you troubled us? The LORD will trouble you today.” All Israel stoned him with stones, and they burned them with fire and stoned them with stones. 26They raised over him a great heap of stones that remains to this day. The LORD turned from the fierceness of his anger. Therefore the name of that place was called “The valley of Achor” to this day.

Israel has been defeated at Ai, and God has revealed that the cause is hidden sin: someone has taken the devoted things from Jericho, which were to be destroyed. The lot falls on Achan, who confesses that he saw a beautiful robe, silver, and gold, coveted them, took them, and buried them in his tent. Messengers find the loot exactly as he described, hidden with the silver underneath. Achan, his family, and his possessions are brought to the Valley of Achor and stoned, and a great heap of stones is raised over them; the place is named Achor, which means trouble.

This is a hard passage, and its lesson is sobering: one man's hidden sin brought defeat and trouble on the whole nation. Achan thought his theft was private, buried in his own tent, his business alone; but Israel had lost a battle and men had died because of it, and the sin could not stay hidden. What we imagine is our own private compromise, tucked out of sight, buried in our tent, is rarely as contained as we think; sin has a way of affecting the whole community we belong to. And notice the name of the place, the Valley of Achor, the Valley of Trouble. Achan's covetousness troubled all Israel, and it troubled him; the thing he coveted became his undoing. But there is a remarkable grace note in scripture's later use of that place. The prophet Hosea, promising restoration, says God will make the Valley of Achor a door of hope. The very valley named for the trouble sin brought becomes, in God's redemption, a doorway of hope. God does not leave his people permanently in the Valley of Trouble; even the place of judgment can become the threshold of hope. But the passage first insists on the hard truth: hidden sin is not as private as we think, and it troubles more than ourselves.

What sin am I keeping hidden and private, imagining it affects only me, when Achan's buried loot troubled the whole camp, and will I bring it into the light before it becomes my Valley of Trouble?

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