The Listening Stone

12-Nov-23

Joshua 24:14-28

Joshua is getting ready to die, and this is his farewell address to the people of God. Moses has died, God has buried him, and Joshua has successfully led the people of God into the promised land, and they have taken possession of it. On one level, everything is just dandy. The long standing promise of God has been fulfilled, and the people of God are living comfortably and with prosperity in their own homeland. What more could anyone ask for? Why mess with a lovely, wonderful, almost Hallmark quality situation? Why stir the pot? Why kick the hornet’s nest?

Mess with it, stir it and kick it about, because God’s people have already grown lazy in their faith. Their new land has been too good for them. They have enjoyed too many of God’s blessings, and the gloriously comfortable situation in the land has caused them to become comfortable in their faith. And, unfortunately, a comfortable faith is a faith that is on its way to becoming dead. We live in a comfortable land with a comfortable faith, also. Is our faith on its way to becoming dead? Sometimes I fear that it is.

Faith on the decline seems to be an age old problem, but it is a problem that Joshua confronts head on. And he does it by creating a crisis. “Choose this day whom you will serve, whether the gods your ancesters served in the region beyond the river, or the gods of the amorites in whose land you are living; but as for me and my household, we will serve the Lord.”

And the people are stunned and shocked, and no doubt deeply offended. They have just been thoroughly insulted. Joshua, what are you saying, what are you thinking? Why do you speak so? “Far be it from us that we should forsake the Lord to serve other gods; for it is the Lord our God who brought us and our ancestors up from the land of Egypt, out of the house of slavery, and who did great signs in our sight. He protected us along the way as we went, and among the peoples whom we passed; and the Lord drove out before us all the peoples, the Amorites who lived in the land. Therefore we also will serve the Lord, for he is our God.” What a history we have had! And what a wonderful answer! What a glorious and complete statement of faith! It is a nearly perfect history of God’s faithfulness to his people. It has all of the right words. But, sadly, while the voice is good, the heart is lacking. And being rather astute, Joshua is not believing this handsome statement of faith. His response is direct and alarming: “You cannot serve the Lord, for he is a holy God. He is a jealous God; he will not forgive your transgressions or your sins.”

What do you mean, Joshua? We’ve already told you that we will serve the Lord. How loudly do you need to hear us say it? How many times do we need to tell you? Why will you not believe us?

Twice in this passage, Joshua warns the people about the futility of serving other gods. Twice he orders them to put away the foreign gods that they are serving, and once he tells them that because they are hard at it serving other gods that they cannot serve the Lord. Tough words; very tough words.

Do you think that they had a problem with idolatry? Do you think that they had other priorities in their lives that took away from their proper worship of God? Do you think that they had actual false gods that they bent the knee to? The answer to all of these questions is yes. God was being crowded out of their lives.

Now, another more difficult question, one to ponder in our own hearts: Do you think that they thought that it really mattered one way or another? Do you think that their statements of faith were genuine? I don’t think so. Their voices were loud, but their hearts were silent. And it is, of course, the heart, and not the voice that matters to God.
Joshua has created a crisis of decision, but nobody is responding with their hearts. I am convinced that the people intend to go on serving all of their gods in their own comfortable way. They will remain unchallenged by Joshua’s demands. Oh they’ll have God, but they’ll not give anything else up, either. They will keep all of their other gods handy by. They will put their faith in other things, mostly because one should be reasonable and rational about these things and never rash. But mostly I’m convinced that they are not going to put their faith completely in God because of their enthusiastic response. Three times in this passage they assure Joshua of their intentions by telling him exactly what they expect that he will want to hear, but not once do they indicate that they will put away their own gods. In spite of what Joshua has said to them, they fully intend to live in the best of both worlds. The reality is, however, if they persist in their idolatry, they will die in the worst of those two worlds. God is a jealous God. We will never be comfortable with a jealous God. But we must learn to be at peace with one. Someday we will fully understand. And so, partly in desperation, Joshua sets up the “listening stone.” I can’t help but be intrigued by this. It is so downright unusual, even though the New Testament has stones that can become the children of Abraham, stones that can become bread, and stones that can sing praises, this is different.

The people have heard their own words, and of course Joshua and God have heard their words, and a covenant has been made, and statutes and ordinances have been set up, and Joshua has written the promises of the people in the book of the law of God. And all of that is very serious stuff, and it speaks of commitment in an awesome and powerful way. The people are now bound by their words, even if they don’t really mean them.

But now, we have the listening stone. Joshua says that this stone has heard the words of God that God spoke to them, but I also believe, implied in that, is that the stone has also heard the words that the people have spoken to God. And the stone will not stand as a defender, but rather as a witness against the people of God, if they do not put away their other gods. Perhaps then, one day, the stone will also become a speaking stone.
For the people that day, the listening stone was a powerful reminder to them that all of creation depended on the decision that they made. All of the created order was affected that day by their choice to follow God, or to leave things the way that provided the most comfort for them. Even a stone, normally assumed to be both deaf and dumb, was a participant in their actions, and ultimately in their decision. Being so familiar with idols, I can’t help but wonder if the people might have been more in fear and in awe of that stone, than they were of God. The stone they could see. God is invisible.

Even today, the listening stone lives; as surely as we do. Nothing that we do or think or believe or say is done privately or without consequence. None of our statements of faith and none of our acts of idolatry go unnoticed. As in the days of old, all of creation is affected by the decisions and choices that we make.

And I guess that’s why I’m so impressed with the listening stone. I can’t help but believe that the listening stone here in Joshua chapter 24 is none other than a pre-embodiment of our Lord Jesus Christ himself. On numerous occasions in the New Testament, Jesus is described as being a stone or as a rock. I believe that Jesus was there that day listening to the perhaps hollow promises of his people, taking it all in, but fully understanding and knowing that they desperately needed a Savior.

The Savior has come. The most important decision that we will ever make in our lives is the decision to follow him, and to become one of his disciples. It is not a decision to make lightly or half-heartedly, for if we make it, it will require the giving over of our whole lives; body, mind, soul, and spirit. And it will require the putting away of even our most cherished idols. But that decision will also give us a true home and a true inheritance that no idol can ever promise. Joshua said, “Choose this day whom you will serve.” When all was said and done, Joshua sent the people away to their inheritances, to this day, I wonder what those inheritances were. Were they inheritances made by their own hands, or were they inheritances crafted by the very hands of God?

We can know for sure what our inheritance will be, if only we will put our faith and trust in the Lord Jesus Christ, and him only serve.