Ensign: The Laws Of War, Part 4

All ye inhabitants of the world, and dwellers on the earth, see ye, when he lifteth up an ensign on the mountains; and when he bloweth a trumpet, hear ye. Isaiah 18:3

AN ENSIGN ON THE MOUNTAINS 25 January 2013

But of the cities of these people, which the LORD thy God doth give thee for an inheritance, thou shalt save alive nothing that breatheth.

That's pretty straightforward. We see “these nations” from Deuteronomy 20:15 elaborated upon in verse seventeen printed below being singled out in verse sixteen above (my daughter was reading from the children's book Alexander and the Terrible, Horrible, No Good, Very Bad Day yesterday morning and the main character at counting time in his class left out sixteen. In Alexander's words, “Who needs sixteen?”) for complete and utter destruction, them and everything in them … save trees.

But thou shalt utterly destroy them; namely, the Hittites, and the Amorites, the Canaanites, and the Perizzites, the Hivites, and the Jebusites; as the LORD thy God hath commanded thee:

That weirds me out reading this and typing the last verses of Deuteronomy 20 for our study – almost sounds like campaigning against global warming long before it was an issue – but we'll get to that in a minute. This confederation of nations beginning with or containing the Hittites appears seven times previous in Scripture, and the fact that the children of Israel are told to utterly destroy them, leave no trace of them or any animal or good of theirs … talk about planned extinction!

That they teach you not to do after all their abominations, which they have done unto their gods; so should ye sin against the LORD your God.

It was not as though an army of Daleks of Doctor Who fame were commissioned to sweep through the Promised Land for the sheer pleasure of wiping out anyone who isn't a Dalek. (“EXTERMINATE! EXTERMINATE!”) Nor was this a divinely-ordained pest control; the generation to which the LORD through Moses was speaking these words was one generation out of Egypt, where every god under the sun was worshiped. That, and the children of Israel along with plenty of other people had been slaves to Egypt.

When thou shalt besiege a city a long time, in making a war against it to take it, thou shalt not destroy the trees thereof by forcing an ax against them: for thou mayest eat of them, and thou shalt not cut them down (for the tree of the field is man's life) to employ them in the siege:

And that was never going to happen again! The line between freedom and slavery – there is no middle ground – is only one generation. So who did/do the children of Israel decide to be, free or slave? Who do WE decide to be, free or slave? Well, you have the rest of Scripture to figure that out for yourself in Israel's regard … and for you too. Do we take the LORD and His Word seriously enough that we're willing to stand on the firing line for Who we believe in? Note I don't say “what we believe” for that's changeable.

Only the trees which thou knowest that they be not trees for meat, thou shalt destroy and cut them down; and thou shalt build bulwarks against the city that maketh war with thee, until it be subdued.

The same Jesus Who cursed the fig tree as He was going back into Bethany (Matthew 21:17, which occurred to me as I ready chapter twenty's end) is the same Jesus Who identified Himself to His disciples at passover (“I am the way, the truth, and the life:” John 14:6). Remember the second part of that? “No man cometh unto the Father, but by me.” Of course you can still talk to God without believing the whole story, but it's a very one-sided conversation when you do. No need for a communication breakdown in this war, is there?

There's a storm coming in,

David

P.S. I write this weekly devotional to keep in touch with all of you in my address book, and I hope to be an encourager to action too! If you find that I’m not or you want me to get lost, just let me know – thank you!

Thank You, Lord, that we can come to you in prayer and that You provide for all our needs, even when we don’t know what they are. We pray for the peace of Jerusalem on both sides of the fence there and around the world.

Thank You, Lord, for everyone in leadership and service, both here and abroad. Thank You for the opportunities we have and the promise of new life through You. I pray that we all seek and have a blessed week! Amen.