Joshua 24:23

_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....

23._Now, therefore, put away the strange gods, _etc How can it be that those who were lately such stern avengers of superstition, have themselves given admission to idols? Yet the words expressly enjoin that they are to put away strange gods from the midst of them. If we interpret that their own houses were still polluted by idols, we may see, as in a bright mirror, how complacently the greater part of mankind can indulge in vices which they prosecute with inexorable severity in others. But, as I do not think it probable that they dared, after the execution of Achan, to pollute themselves with manifest sacrilege, I am inclined to think that reference is made not to their practice but to their inclinations, and that they are told to put all ideas of false gods far away from them. For he had previously exhorted them in this same chapter to take away the gods whom their fathers had served b...

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 24:23. _NOW THEREFORE PUT AWAY_] As you have promised to reform, begin instantly the work of reformation. A man's promise to serve God soon loses its moral hold of his conscience if he do not instantaneously begin to put it in practice. The grace that enables him to promise is that by the strength of which he is to begin the performance....

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 PUT AWAY, [SAID HE],.... Which last words are rightly supplied, for they are the words of Joshua: THE STRANGE GODS WHICH [ARE] AMONG YOU; not their private notions and secret sentiments that some of them had imbibed in favour of idols, and the worship of them, as Ben Gersom thinks; but, as the Targum expresses it, "the idols of the Gentiles;'' either such as they had brought out of Egypt, or had found among the plunder of the Canaanites, and had secretly retained; or, as others think, their "penates", or household gods, they had privately kept and worshipped, such as those that were in Jacob's family, which he caused to be delivered to him, and which he hid under an oak in this place where Israel were now assembled, Genesis 35:2; and which Joshua by a prophetic discerning spirit perceived were now among them: and incli

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 ...

STRANGE GODS. strangers' (or foreigners') gods....

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