Purity in the Community of God’s People

Ol’ Gene sat through some Scripture teaching this morning that triggered several thoughts for ponder.  One of the Scriptures was in Joshua 7 where a Judahite named Achan held back a portion of war spoil that was to be given over to Jehovah.  And Scripture says “the LORD’s anger burned against Israel.”  In the end, Achan was stoned and burned along with his entire family, his animals, and even his tent.  And then Scripture says “then the LORD turned from his fierce anger.”  

Wow!  One man sinned, and the Lord got angry with everyone!  Now that conflicts with our contemporary way of looking at individuals and groups, and what we consider to be “fairness.”  But with God’s people, in this case, the group is definitely punished for the act of one person.  In fact, we find examples of this throughout the Bible, the many suffering for the sinfulness of the few.

What does this mean?  Well, this Scripture, as well as many others, says to me that God has high expectations for His people--expectations to maintain purity within the community--expectations for them to be a holy people.  He expects them to be intolerate of willful sin.  And if His people tolerate it, that is, if they corrupt the community by allowing sin in the group, God will not go with them as proved by Israel’s defeats at the hands of its enemies.

This can be brought forward and applied to the new covenant church.  God still expects purity within the community of His people.  Those who think He doesn’t ought to ask Ananias and Sapphira (Acts 5).  He killed them to keep impurity from creeping into the infant church.  Later God gave His people instructions by way of Paul’s letters on how to handle corruption among themselves.  And if His people ignore those instructions, they will suffer spiritual defeat.  God will depart from their midst and remove His lamp stand.  Satan will defeat them. 

At least this is the way Ol’ Gene Pool puts together the totality of Scripture.  God is the same today as He was yesterday.  So don’t discard those harsh stories in the Bible as being old fashioned, unloving, and not applying to us in this day in age.  If you do, well….check the Scripture for yourself to see what it says on the matter. 

Blessings in the Lord Jesus Christ.

Gene Pool