Joshua 24:27

_AND JOSHUA SAID UNTO ALL THE PEOPLE, BEHOLD, THIS STONE SHALL BE A WITNESS UNTO US; FOR IT HATH HEARD ALL THE WORDS OF THE LORD WHICH HE SPAKE UNTO US: IT SHALL BE THEREFORE A WITNESS UNTO YOU, LEST YE DENY YOUR GOD._ 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 24:27. _THIS STONE - HATH HEARD ALL THE WORDS_] That is, the stone itself, from its permanency, shall be in all succeeding ages as competent and as substantial a witness as one who had been present at the transaction, and heard all the words which on both sides were spoken on the occasion....

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 JOSHUA SAID UNTO ALL THE PEOPLE,.... The chief of them now gathered together, and who represented the whole body: BEHOLD, THIS STONE SHALL BE A WITNESS UNTO US; of the covenant now made, and the agreement entered into, as the heap of stones were between Jacob and Laban, Genesis 31:45; FOR IT HATH HEARD ALL THE WORDS OF THE LORD WHICH HE SPAKE UNTO US; this is said by a figure called "prosopopaeia", frequent in Scripture, by which inanimate creatures are represented as hearing, seeing, and speaking, and may signify, that should the Israelites break this covenant, and disobey the commands of the Lord they had promised to keep, they would be as stupid and senseless as this stone, or more so, which would rise in judgment against them. Nachmanides d a Jewish commentator, interprets this stone of the Messiah, the same as in...

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 ...

BEHOLD. Figure of speech _Asterismos._ App-6. IT HATH HEARD. Figure of speech _Prosopopmia_. App-6....

Solemn Renewal of the Covenant 25. _So Joshua made a covenant_ "Percussit ergo Josue in die illo fœdus," Vulgate. "Thanne Josue smoot a boond of pees," Wyclif. A covenant had been concluded by God on Sinai with Israel (Exodus 19:20) and solemnly ratified with (_a_) burnt-offerings and peace-offerings at the foot of the mount; (_b_) the reading of every word of the Law in the ears of the people; (_c_) the sprinkling of one half of the blood of the victims on the altars and the roll containing the covenant conditions, and the other half on the people (Exodus 24:3-8; Hebrews 9:19-20). This covenant Moses had renewed in "the field" of Moab ...

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._ 27. _FOR IT HATH HEARD ALL THE WORDS,_ &C.— "If ever you so far forget yourselves, as to act as if you had not this day chosen the Lord for your God, this stone shall convince you of falsehood, and shall witness as strongly against you, as if it had heard all that I have been saying to you, and all that you have replied in answer; and had assumed a voice to contradict you to your face." How strongly figurative soever this discourse may appear, it is not too much so for the taste of the orientals, with whom it is common to give sentiments to the most insensible creatures, and, as it were, to animate all nature by their expressions. See for instance, Deuteronomy 4:26; Deuteronomy 32:1.Psalms 19:1