Joshua 24:21

_AND IF IT SEEM EVIL UNTO YOU TO SERVE THE LORD, CHOOSE YOU THIS DAY WHOM YE WILL SERVE; WHETHER THE GODS WHICH YOUR FATHERS SERVED THAT WERE ON THE OTHER SIDE OF THE FLOOD, OR THE GODS OF THE AMORITES, IN WHOSE LAND YE DWELL: BUT AS FOR ME AND MY HOUSE, WE WILL SERVE THE LORD._ No JFB commentary on these verses....

15-28 It is essential that the service of God's people be performed with a willing mind. For LOVE is the only genuine principle whence all acceptable service of God can spring. The Father seeks only such to worship him, as worship him in spirit and in truth. The carnal mind of man is enmity against God, therefore, is not capable of such spiritual worship. Hence the necessity of being born again. But numbers rest in mere forms, as tasks imposed upon them. Joshua puts them to their choice; but not as if it were indifferent whether they served God or not. Choose you whom ye will serve, now the matter is laid plainly before you. He resolves to do this, whatever others did. Those that are bound for heaven, must be willing to swim against the stream. They must not do as the most do, but as the best do. And no one can behave himself as he ought in any station, who does not deeply consider his...

Verse Joshua 24:21. _AND THE PEOPLE SAID - NAY; BUT WE WILL SERVE, C._] So they understood the words of Joshua to imply no moral impossibility on their side: and had they earnestly sought the gracious assistance of God, they would have continued steady in his covenant....

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

AND THE PEOPLE SAID UNTO JOSHUA, NAY,.... We will not serve strange gods: BUT WE WILL SERVE THE LORD; according to his revealed will, and him only....

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 ...

Reply of the People to Joshua's Address 16. _And the people answered and said_ Struck by the solemn earnestness of the address of their leader, the entire people, with one voice, responded to his call by loud and hearty declarations of their determined faithfulness to their covenant with Jehovah....

DISCOURSE: 260 JOSHUA’S COVENANT WITH ISRAEL TO SERVE THE LORD Joshua 24:21. And the people said unto Joshua, Nay; but we will serve the Lord. And Joshua said unto the people, Ye are witnesses against yourselves, that ye have chosen you the Lord, to serve him. And they said, We are witnesses. Now therefore put away, said he, the strange gods which are among you, and incline your heart unto the Lord God of Israel. And the people said unto Joshua, The Lord our God will we serve, and his voice will we obey. So Joshua made a covenant with the people that day, and set them a statute and an ordinance in Shechem. And Joshua wrote these words in the book of the law of God, and took a great stone, and set it up there under an oak, that was by the sanctuary of the Lord. And Joshua said unto all the people. Behold, this stone shall be a witness unto us; for it hath heard all the words of

_VER._ 21, 22. _AND THE PEOPLE SAID—NAY, BUT WE WILL SERVE THE LORD,_ &C.— To these fresh protestations of fidelity on the part of the whole assembly, Joshua replies, that he receives them as a holy and solemn declaration, which, thus publicly and deliberately made, will for ever witness against the Israelites, and condemn them if they become unfaithful to the Lord. In answer to this, they again express their consent, that if they ever forsake Jehovah their words may bear testimony against them. Thus we have a sacred renewal, an authentic confirmation of the covenant into which their forefathers had entered with God, as their king, Exodus 12:24 :; a covenant, which, after this, they could not again infringe, without being in the higher degree guilty of perjury....

_A Reminder of God's Blessings Joshua 24:1-25_ And Joshua gathered all the tribes of Israel to Shechem, and called for the elders of Israel, and for their heads, and for their judges, and for their officers; and they presented themselves before God. 2 And Joshua said unto all the people, Thus saith the Lord God of Israel, Your fathers dwelt on the other side of the flood in old time, even Terah, the father of Abraham, and the father of Nachor: and they served other gods. 3 And I took your father Abraham from the other side of the flood, and led him throughout all the land of Canaan, and multiplied his seed, and gave him Isaac. 4 And I gave unto Isaac Jacob and Esau: and I gave unto Esau mount Seir, to possess it; but Jacob and his children went down into Egypt. 5 I sent Moses also and Aaron, and I plagued Egypt, according to that which I did among them: and afterward I b