Unless the Lord builds the house, the builders labor in vain—so it says in Psalm 127. Which means only disaster can follow when we try to build what God is not building with us. What a terrifying thing to imagine—God saying “I will not be with you!” But what reason would God ever have to say that?
Perhaps Joshua and the Israelites were wondering the same thing. Spirits were high. Excitement was everywhere. Jericho had just fallen before them by the power of the Lord, and the rest of the promised land lay ahead, ready to be conquered just the same. They felt indestructible. They got comfortable. And then things went wrong. Achan, a man of Judah, had broken the covenant by stealing goods from Jericho that were supposed to be destroyed and dedicated to God. “It’s not all that big of a deal,” he probably convinced himself as he grabbed the gold. But what he saw as no big deal was in fact an utter abandonment of God and his Law. The commandments of God are not to be taken lightly.
Israel tried to charge forward on their own and found themselves defeated, because God was not with them. This should come as no surprise. As long as there was among the Israelites a refusal to honor their part of their covenant with God, why should God honor his part?
God’s blessings and graces abound for his people to an overwhelming degree. But the greatest and most crucial of these blessings is our relationship with him. If we try to sidestep the relationship and settle for smaller enjoyments, not only are we disparaging the Lord, we’re even doing ourselves a disservice! We are not missing out when we obey his commandments; rather, we are partaking in the absolute best that God builds for us, and our labor for it is not in vain.
God is with us, and he lovingly does ample good for us. Let us likewise be eager to lovingly do for him the good that we can do.
