Joshua 24:14

_NOW THEREFORE FEAR THE LORD, AND SERVE HIM IN SINCERITY AND IN TRUTH: AND PUT AWAY THE GODS WHICH YOUR FATHERS SERVED ON THE OTHER SIDE OF THE FLOOD, AND IN EGYPT; AND SERVE YE THE LORD._ Now therefore fear the Lord, and serve him in sincerity and in truth. After having enumerated so many grounds for national gratitude, Joshua calls on them to declare, in a public and solemn manner whether they will be faithful and obedient to the God of Israel. He avowed this to be his own unalterable resolution, and urges them, if they were sincere in making a similar avowal, 'to put away the strange gods that were among them'-a requirement which seems to imply that some were suspected of a strong hankering for, or concealed practice of, idolatry, whether in the form of Zabaism, the fire-worship of their Chaldean ancestors, the scarabaei of Egypt, or the grosser superstitions of the Canaanites....

1-14 We must never think our work for God done, till our life is done. If he lengthen out our days beyond what we expected, like those of Joshua, it is because he has some further service for us to do. He who aims at the same mind which was in Christ Jesus, will glory in bearing the last testimony to his Saviour's goodness, and in telling to all around, the obligations with which the unmerited goodness of God has bound him. The assembly came together in a solemn religious manner. Joshua spake to them in God's name, and as from him. His sermon consists of doctrine and application. The doctrinal part is a history of the great things God had done for his people, and for their fathers before them. The application of this history of God's mercies to them, is an exhortation to fear and serve God, in gratitude for his favour, and that it might be continued....

Verse Joshua 24:14. _FEAR THE LORD_] Reverence him as the sole object of your religious worship. _SERVE HIM_] Perform his will by obeying his commands. _IN SINCERITY_] Having your whole heart engaged in his worship. _AND IN TRUTH_] According to the directions he has given you in his infallible word. _PUT AWAY THE GODS, C._] From this exhortation of Joshua we learn of what sort the gods were, to the worship of whom these Israelites were still attached. 1. Those which their fathers worshipped on the other side of the flood: i.e., the gods of the CHALDEANS, _fire, light_, the _sun_. 2. Those of the EGYPTIANS, _Apis,_ _Anubis_, the _ape, serpents, vegetables_, c. 3. Those of the CANAANITES, MOABITES, c., _Baal-peor_ or...

EXPOSITION THE LAST RENEWAL OF THE COVENANT.— JOSHUA 24:1 TO SHECHEM. The LXX. and the Arabic version read _Shiloh _here, and as the words "they presented themselves (literally, _took up their station_)_ _before God" follow, this would seem the natural reading. But there is not the slightest MSS. authority for the reading, and it is contrary to all sound principles of criticism to resort to arbitrary emendations of the text. Besides, the LXX. itself reads Συχέμ_,_ in Joshua 24:26, and adds, "before the tabernacle of the God of Israel," words implied, but not expressed in t

NOW THEREFORE FEAR THE LORD,.... Since he has done such great and good things, fear the Lord and his goodness, fear him for his goodness sake; nothing so influences fear, or a reverential affection for God, as a sense of his goodness; this engages men sensible of it to fear the Lord, that is, to worship him both internally and externally in the exercise of every grace, and in the performance of every duty: AND SERVE HIM IN SINCERITY AND IN TRUTH: in the uprightness of their souls, without hypocrisy and deceit, and according to the truth of his word, and of his mind and will revealed in it, without any mixture of superstition and will worship, or of the commands and inventions of men: AND PUT AWAY THE GODS WHICH YOUR FATHERS SERVED ON THE OTHER SIDE OF THE FLOOD, AND IN EGYPT; that is, express an abhorrence of them, and keep at a distance from them, and show that you are far from giving...

FEAR (_ See Scofield) - (Psalms 19:9). _...

THE SECOND ADDRESS CHAPTER 24:1-28 _ 1. The gathering at Shechem (Joshua 24:1)_ 2. Historic retrospect and exhortations (Joshua 24:2) 3. The answer given by Israel (Joshua 24:16) 4. Joshua's answer (Joshua 24:19) 5. The promise made (Joshua 24:21) 6. Joshua's appeal and the repeated promise (Joshua 24:22) 7. The covenant made and Joshua's final word ...

AND IN EGYPT. So that they were idolaters there. Compare Ezekiel 23:8. Three systems of idolatry referred to in verses: Joshua 24:14; Joshua 24:15, Chaldean, Egyptian, and Canaanite....

_Now therefore fear the Lord_ Comp. Job 28:28, "Behold, _the fear_of the Lord, that is wisdom; and to depart from evil is understanding;" Psalms 2:11, "Serve the Lord with fear, and rejoice with trembling;" Proverbs 1:7, "_The fear of the Lord_is the beginning of knowledge." _in sincerity and in truth_ "with perfite herte and most trewe," Wyclif. The Greek word here rendered "sincerity" in the LXX. occurs also in 1 Corinthians 5:8, "let us keep the feast … with the unleavened bread of _sincerity_and truth;" 2 Corinthians 1:12

_VER._ 14. _NOW, THEREFORE, FEAR THE LORD,_ &C.— Here it is no longer Jehovah that speaks; Joshua himself addresses the Israelites, and, after all that he had just represented to them in the name of God, concludes with exhorting them to _fear Jehovah; i.e._ to open their whole heart to his religion, and to render him, _in sincerity and in truth,_ with right and pure intentions, free from all hypocrisy, the worship due to him; and that without any mixture of idolatry, and according to his law, which is truth itself. "Put away from among you," says he, "those idols, the worship of which your ancestors, Terah, Nahor, Abraham, and others, formerly joined with the worship of the true God, while they remained on the other side of the Euphrates. Remove from you that unhappy propensity to idolatry which you acquired in Egypt: in a word, resolve to serve God, and Him alone." To the idols of the C...