Lesson 11: “Living In the Land”
COLLEEN TINKER | Editor, Proclamation! Magazine |
When you hear the words “Keep His commandments; His commandments are not burdensome”, what comes to your mind? Do you think of the Ten Commandments? Do you think about the Fourth Commandment and the edges of the Sabbath? Or when you hear someone remind you to practice unity in the church, what does that “unity” look like? Does “unity” look like working to support the Adventist message and lifestyle? Does it look like keeping your questions suppressed and staying loyal to the organization? Does it look like supporting the church leadership even if you know they have ethical problems because Jesus, not the leaders, is our example—and the Church is God’s church? And while we’re asking questions, what IS the definition of God’s church?
Leading With Application
This week’s lesson is based on Joshua 22, the chapter where Joshua gives final instructions to the tribes of Reuben, Gad, and the half-tribe of Manasseh whose tribal territory lay on the eastern side of the Jordan River. Moses had granted them permission to settle their territories outside the boundaries of Canaan on condition that they would help the remaining tribes conquer their territories inside the bounds of Canaan on the west of the Jordan.
The land distributions were completed, and the tribes had moved into their territories. Joshua blessed the two-and-a-half tribes and sent them back to their territories east of the Jordan, admonishing them:
“Only keep yourselves very carefully to do the commandment and the law which Moses the servant of Yahweh commanded you, to love Yahweh your God and walk in all His ways and keep His commandments and cling to Him and serve Him with all your heart and with all your soul.”—Joshua 22:5 LSB
As the tribes returned east, they built a large altar on the western shore of the Jordan. The nine western tribes saw the altar after it was built, and they completely misunderstood what those three tribes were doing. They thought that the three tribes that had their territories OUTSIDE of Canaan were apostatizing. Finding their large altar on the shores of the Jordan, they immediately thought that those three “outsiders” were building an altar to a pagan god. After all, the last altar they had built on the shores of the Jordan had been a memorial structure which all twelve tribes had built together as a reminder to future generations that God had kept His promise and had delivered the Promised Land to the nation of Israel. Even the three tribes who lived on the eastern side of the River had participated in building the memorial altar!
The nine tribes sent a delegation, led by Phinehas, the son of Eleazar the priest, and they confronted the three eastern tribes and revealed their fear that, because they were living outside the bounds of Canaan, the land which God specifically claimed and promised to give to His people, they might be vulnerable to embracing paganism. The nine tribes were worried that, if those three eastern tribes worshiped a false god, the whole nation might be punished! They said,
Yet you are turning away this day from following Yahweh. Now it will be that, if you rebel against Yahweh today, He will be angry with the whole congregation of Israel tomorrow. … Did not Achan the son of Zerah act unfaithfully in the things devoted to destruction, and indignation fall on all the congregation of Israel?—Joshua 22:18, 20 LSB
The three eastern tribes explained that, far from being an altar to a pagan god, they had built their new altar as a sign of solidarity with the nine tribes living in Canaan. They said,
“Therefore we said, ‘Let us build an altar, not for burnt offering or for sacrifice; rather it shall be a witness between us and you and between our generations after us, that we are to perform the service of Yahweh before Him with our burnt offerings and with our sacrifices and with our peace offerings, so that your sons will not say to our sons in time to come, “You have no portion in Yahweh.’” “Therefore we said, ‘It will also be that if they say [this] to us or to our generations in time to come, then we shall say, “See the copy of the altar of Yahweh which our fathers made, not for burnt offering or for sacrifice; rather it is a witness between us and you.”’—Joshua 22:26–28 LSB
The nine tribes were calmed by this answer; they had been prepared to go to battle against their eastern tribal brothers to rid Israel of apostasy!
Moralized Lesson on Unity
The lesson, however, takes this chapter and conscripts it to be a lesson against gossip among church members and the need for unity within the church. Of course, the church that needs to be unified is the Adventist organization. As we have previously stated, the assumption that Adventism can be written into the Biblical accounts is a false assumption.
Adventism is not Christian; it holds to a false gospel, and it clams to be the modern “spiritual Israel” because the original Israel failed in its mission and rejected the Messiah. Adventism, of course, claims to be the true inheritor of the law God gave Moses, self-proclaiming to be the only “church” that keeps the seventh-day Sabbath and that proclaims the truth about the second coming of Christ.
Adventism is wrong, of course. It is NOT part of the Christian church. Furthermore, no group, Christian or not, can write itself into the biblical accounts of Israel and claim to find itself or God’s commands for it within the stories of Israel.
Thursday’s lesson addresses “Conflict Resolution” and summarizes Joshua 22 as giving “several principles of communication that can apply to everyday human relationships in the family, church, and community.” The last paragraph states:
Had the East Jordan tribes apostatized, the people of Israel would have applied the requirements of the covenant. Unity can never be an argument to water down truth or give up on biblical principles. However, church discipline should always be the last (and not the first) resort, after attempts at reconciliation and pastoral assistance based on God’s Word have failed. How different would our churches look if these simple principles were consistently applied!
This chapter is not advice about exercising church disciplines and not gossiping! It is an account of the trials that occurred among the twelve tribes as they settled the land prior to Joshua’s death. The first years of Israel’s life in the land were tumultuous; yet the Lord has left us the account of His own faithfulness and of the constant threat of apostasy. The issue here wasn’t gossip or a false accusation—although that idea can be a “downstream” application—but the issue was the need for trust based on the worship of God as He revealed it should be done. The nine tribes’ doubt about the eastern tribes was not illogical. They had reason to doubt! They did not attack the three tribes, though without talking to them first. They allowed them to explain. The lesson simply misrepresents the story for the purpose of mandating that Adventists stay “unified” around ADVENTISM. The organization uses the Bible as a tool of moral shaming to keep people fearing the consequences if they don’t stay loyal to the denomination.
Appropriating Joshua’s Commands
The Teachers Comments, as so often happens, reveals the underlying belief that gives shape to the lesson’s persistent reminders to be united and not to gossip. Here we find the way the author uses part of Joshua’s final counsel to the eastern tribes before they crossed the Jordan to their territories on the east of Canaan. On page 146 we read this:
Before their departure, he [Joshua] summarized the core of the Torah (law) and explained the path to complete commitment in five infinitive phrases, progressing logically from love to service:
Before we look further at how the Teachers Comments develop this idea, lets firs read the passage the author uses to develop his thesis:
“And now Yahweh your God has given rest to your brothers, as He spoke to them; so now turn and go to your tents, to the land of your possession, which Moses the servant of Yahweh gave you beyond the Jordan. “Only keep yourselves very carefully to do the commandment and the law which Moses the servant of Yahweh commanded you, to love Yahweh your God and walk in all His ways and keep His commandments and cling to Him and serve Him with all your heart and with all your soul.”—Joshua 22:3–5 LSB
Joshua was reminding the tribes of Reuben, Gad, and the half-tribe of Manasseh to live by the terms of the Mosaic covenant. He acknowledges that they have kept their promise to help the other nine tribes conquer the cities into which they moved. He also affirms their taking possession of the land area east of the Jordan—as Moses had agreed prior to his death. Finally, in this passage Joshua reminds these brothers of the terms of the covenant which they have agreed to keep as part of the nation of Israel. Finally, he reminds them to honor the Lord with all their hearts and souls.
Joshua is not shaming them nor doubting them. He is not acting like a severe parent, reminding them there will be fearful punishment if they disobey. On the contrary, their leader is affirming and supportive, reminding them that they are part of the covenant people and that Yahweh will bless them if they honor the covenant. Verse six even says Joshua blessed them and sent them away.
The author leads with the sequence of commands at the end of verse 5:
First, “to love Yahweh, your God” (Josh. 22:5, NKJV). Love is the foundation of God’s character, and everything starts with it. Service without love is legalism.…There is no contradiction between the Old and New Testaments’ revelation of God: He created human beings to have a relationship with Him based on love, not fear.…The object of our love is balanced between the divine transcendence of the Creator (Elohim) and the immanence of our Lord (Yahweh), who dwells with His people.
First, in the ancient Near East, “love” was a political term that indicated truehearted loyalty to one’s king. Yahweh was Israel’s King, and the nation had made a covenant with Him, agreeing to obey Him, and He would bless them. Yet the lesson doesn’t deal with the context of Joshua’s parting commands to the three tribes. Instead, it takes his words that they should love their God, Yahweh, and twists that command into reminding the Adventist readers that—according to the Adventist worldview—they were created to have a relationship of love with God, not of fear.
The Bible never explains God’s creation of man this way. The entire history of mankind hangs on God’s word to Adam that, if he ate of the tree, he would die. He ate—and he died spiritually the same day. This spiritual death is Adam’s legacy to the entire human race. Adam’s sin condemned all humanity to spiritual death—but God provided a way to redeem doomed humanity.
The biblical account of the Lord Jesus coming as a man and becoming sin for us as He hung on a cross, enduring God’s wrath for our sin, and then dying, being buried, and rising on the third day, shattering the curse of death that condemned all humanity apart from Jesus—this reality is never taught in Adventism.
Instead, Adventists are taught to think of God as wanting a relationship with them. All they have to do is to recognize His love and desire for them, and in loving response, keep His law. This, they are taught, will fulfill God’s expectations for them. They are never taught that, apart from trusting the completed atonement of the Lord Jesus on the cross, they SHOULD fear God. He is just, and He will not excuse sin apart from our trusting His provision for us. In fact, Jesus Himself said that people’s fear should never be of men but of God, the only one with the authority to command justice:
“But I say to you, My friends, do not fear those who kill the body and after that have no more that they can do. But I will show you whom to fear: fear the One who, after He has killed, has authority to cast into hell; yes, I tell you, fear Him!”—Luke 12:4, 5 LSB
Unbelievers absolutely should fear God. He did not create us because He desired someone to love; the Trinity was complete within Itself before God ever created. We were created for God’s glory, not to fulfill a sentimental desire in His heart.
Commandments: Not the Law
The second and third infinitives the author conscripts from Joshua 22:5 are “to walk in all His ways” and “to keep His commandments”. Here is where the author twists the text to describe the Adventist worldview:
Keeping the law as an expression of God’s will is the natural outcome of a thankful heart that comprehends what God has done. In this sequence, there is a progression from love as the starting point, the first spark, to a trusting relationship, which results in obedience. That is why John says that “His commandments are not burdensome” (1 John 5:3, NKJV). It’s clear that true obedience stems from love, as evident in Jesus’ words to the disciples: “‘If you love me, you will keep my commandments’ ” (John 14:15, ESV).
These Adventist proof-texts would not get even a second glance of concern. Yet these texts from 1 John and from the gospel of John are not referring to the Ten Commandments as Adventist always says they are! Adventists always insist that wherever the word “commandments” appears in the English translations of the Bible, the reader is to understand that to mean the Ten Commandments.
Yet John was completely consistent: the Greek word underlying the word “commandments” in every one of John’s five New Testament books, including Revelation, is “entole” or “entolas”. This word does NOT mean “law”. It means teaching, instructions, sayings, commands—buy NEVER does it mean LAW.
In every instance when John referred to the Law, including the commands within the Decalogue, he always used a different Greek word: “nomos”. This word means “law”. The Ten Commandments fall under the word NOMOS, not ENTOLE.
Yet Adventists use those texts from John to remind Adventists that they must keep the Ten Commandments, especially the fourth. “His commandments are not burdensome”, they intone—but John wasn’t referring to the Decalogue at all! The Sabbath is never in view within these instructions from John.
What were Jesus’ commands, if they weren’t the Ten Commandments?
“A new commandment I give to you, that you love one another, even as I have loved you, that you also love one another.”—John 13:34 LSB
“This I command you, that you love one another.”—Luke 15:17 LSB
I rejoiced greatly to find [some] of your children walking in truth, just as we received commandment from the Father. Now I ask you, lady, not as though [I were] writing to you a new commandment, but the one which we have had from the beginning, that we love one another.—2 John 1:4–6 LSB
If Jesus’ commandment was that we love one another as He loved us—sacrificially to the point of giving His life to grant us redemption from death—then what should we do about the law? How do we know it doesn’t apply to us any longer? Paul explains in Galatians:
And what I am saying is this: the Law, which came 430 years later, does not invalidate a covenant previously ratified by God, so as to abolish the promise. For if the inheritance is by law, it is no longer by promise, but God has granted it to Abraham through promise. Why the Law then? It was added because of trespasses, having been ordained through angels by the hand of a mediator, until the seed would come to whom the promise had been made.—Galatians 3:17–19 LSB
Notice that the law is not eternal; it was first given 430 years AFTER God covenanted with Abraham to give him seed, land, and blessing (see Genesis 15). It had a temporary authority; it lasted only until the SEED came! When Jesus came, the Law became obsolete!
Now we live under the authority of the Lord Jesus. When we trust Him, we are transferred from the domain of darkness into the kingdom of the beloved Son (Colossians 1:13). We are saved and protected and made alive by the eternal blood of the covenant which Jesus shed on the cross!
The teachers comments finish by quoting the last of Joshua 5:22: “to hold fast to Him” and “to serve Him with all your heart and with all your soul”. Yet these commands are not to be understood according to the context of Joshua but according to the context of Adventism’s great controversy worldview.
The reader has already been reminded that they must keep the commandments—and every Adventist will understand that is a reminder to observe the seventh-day Sabbath, that peculiar mark that sets Adventists apart and silently separates them from Christian worship where they could have the chance to hear the real gospel preached. By misinterpreting the words of Scripture and by applying the lens of Ellen White’s warnings and commentaries to every passage of the Bible, Adventism succeeds in diminish the impact of God’s revelation of His faithfulness int the world.
Once again, the Sabbath School lesson has taken one of the timeless accounts of God’s people entering the land He gave to them and has twisted it into a moral lesson reminding the Adventist readers to keep the law and to submit their personal questions and ideas to the common good by staying unified with the organization.
Yet the story of these tribes and their near-misunderstanding is not a moral lesson and a warning to be good and obey the law. Rather is reveals a God who keeps His covenant promises. He does what He says He will do. And that faithfulness of God includes His faithfulness to honor those who honor the Son and to deny those who deny the Son (Luke 12:8,9) Adventism does not honor the Son. They deny His full atonement for sin on the cross. They say He was fallible and that He lacked the attributes of God, giving up His omniscience and omnipresence when He took a body. They say He is still carrying on the atonement in heaven in a supposed investigative judgment after which Satan will cleanse heaven by carrying away the sins of the saved.
The Adventist blasphemy against the Lord Jesus is couched in scholarly words and pious phrases, but they deny the finished work of Jesus.
I appeal to you, dear Adventist, to ask the Lord to teach you what is true. Ask Him to show you from His word what you need to know. Get a notebook, and begin copying the book of Galatians. Then move to Colossians, then Hebrews, then the book of John. Ask the Father to reveal Jesus to you!
When you see who He is and what He has already done, you will never be the same. Trust Him. Believe that He fully propitiated for your sin. Believe that He died your death and was buried, and believe that His resurrection on the third day is the very source of your own spiritual new birth when you believe. When you believe, you will pass out of death into life, and you will never come into condemnation!
Entrust your Adventism to the Lord, and allow Him to give you a new Father and a new identity: child of God. Trust Jesus; believe Him—and pass today from death to life! †
This weekly feature is dedicated to Adventists who are looking for biblical insights into the topics discussed in the Sabbath School lesson quarterly. We post articles which address each lesson as presented in the Sabbath School Bible Study Guide, including biblical commentary on them. We hope you find this material helpful and that you will come to know Jesus and His revelation of Himself in His word in profound biblical ways.
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