Then Joshua commanded the officers of the people, saying, “Pass through the camp and command the people, saying, ‘Prepare provisions for yourselves, for within three days you will cross over this Jordan, to go in to possess the land which the Lord your God is giving you to possess.’” – Joshua 1: 10-11

The Lord led Israel around the land of the Philistines because that land was not the land of Promise. There was no reason why they should fight and die for a land that had not been promised to them. However, now under the leadership of Joshua, after Israel had spent 40 years in the wilderness, she was poised to cross the Jordan River into the Promised Land. The only problem was that the land which had been promised to them was already occupied. Therefore, in order to live in that land, they would have to fight to take possession of it.

This reminds us that not everything worth having will be handed to us. Some things, indeed, the best things, will have to be worked for and fought for. God fought with them as they fought, but the fact is, they too had to fight to possess the land.

Furthermore, it is also true that possessing often requires dispossessing. That is, in order for us to move into our place of promise, something else which is already there may have to be driven out. It might be a spirit in the place. It might be an attitude within the inhabitants of the place. It might be junk left in the place. It might be people who control the place. We may be able to move in, but we will never be able to stay in until the ungodly things there are removed. And, by the way, they will not be moved without a fight.

This history of Israel also reveals that it takes a certain breed of people to possess the land. The crowd which left Egypt with Moses wandered and died in the wilderness. Of them, only Joshua and Caleb entered into the Promised Land. This new generation did not carry the baggage of slavery nor the self-doubt which went along with it. Although they had been conceived in the desert, they were convinced that they could possess the land, and they did. The conclusion is that: “It is not enough to have the promises of God. There comes a point when we must be willing to take possession of them.”