(The view expressed in this blog are my own and should not be taken as inspired in any way.)
Joshua 7:10–15, “And the LORD said unto Joshua, Get thee up; wherefore liest thou thus upon thy face? Israel hath sinned, and they have also transgressed my covenant which I commanded them: for they have even taken of the accursed thing, and have also stolen, and dissembled also, and they have put it even among their own stuff. Therefore the children of Israel could not stand before their enemies, but turned their backs before their enemies, because they were accursed: neither will I be with you any more, except ye destroy the accursed from among you. Up, sanctify the people, and say, Sanctify yourselves against to morrow: for thus saith the LORD God of Israel, There is an accursed thing in the midst of thee, O Israel: thou canst not stand before thine enemies, until ye take away the accursed thing from among you. In the morning therefore ye shall be brought according to your tribes: and it shall be, that the tribe which the LORD taketh shall come according to the families thereof; and the family which the LORD shall take shall come by households; and the household which the LORD shall take shall come man by man. And it shall be, that he that is taken with the accursed thing shall be burnt with fire, he and all that he hath: because he hath transgressed the covenant of the LORD, and because he hath wrought folly in Israel.”
Sometimes it is important to pray but at other times it is important to act. The Lord commanded Joshua to tell Israel not to take any booty from Jericho but the Lord also promised Israel that if they obeyed Him they would be able to conquer their enemies and take possession of the Promised Land. They experienced and unlikely defeat so Joshua had to do something about the problem rather than just pray about it. There are many times when praying is important and these times must never be ignored but there are also times when we can be proactive and deal with situations. In this case Israel had sinned and no amount of prayer would solve the problem of sin, it had to be dealt with. We can’t always assume that trauma in our own lives or in the lives of others is a consequence of some individual action we have done. However, a time of prayer can lead us to understand the issue. Joshua had to deal with the sin before the campaign could continue. Every body in the camp had to make sure that they were ceremonially pure and then deal with the specific issue that had caused this disaster. The priests had a way of determining the Lord’s will by using the stones called Urim and Thummim (see Num 27:18–21, “And the LORD said unto Moses, Take thee Joshua the son of Nun, a man in whom is the spirit, and lay thine hand upon him; And set him before Eleazar the priest, and before all the congregation; and give him a charge in their sight. And thou shalt put some of thine honour upon him, that all the congregation of the children of Israel may be obedient. And he shall stand before Eleazar the priest, who shall ask counsel for him after the judgment of Urim before the LORD: at his word shall they go out, and at his word they shall come in, both he, and all the children of Israel with him, even all the congregation.”) The Lord told Joshua to take the tribes, one by one, and see which tribe was responsible, then he was to take the clans and the families and finally determine which individual was responsible for the sin in Israel.
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