What Achan Learned about Sin

After Moses' death, Joshua led the children of Israel. He had just staged a triumphant coup over the well-protected city of Jericho, and "the walls came tumblin' down." Full of their success, a few men went as spies to observe the enemy's strength in the next target city, little Ai. Being assured by the men of an easy victory, Joshua dispatched only about three thousand men to take the city—and they were soundly routed by the enemy.

Joshua, stunned by this unexpected outcome, ripped his clothes as a sign of grief and fell on his face to the ground. "God, why this defeat?" he asked. "Did You bring us here to be run off, after all, by our enemies? When they hear of this, they will laugh at us—and laugh at You because you couldn't deliver your people."

It wasn't God's fault! He had given explicit instructions that everything in the city of Jericho was to be offered up to Him. "Be careful that you don't get greedy and take for yourself something that is set apart for God. That will make trouble for everyone." But a man named Achan couldn't stand to see all those wonderful things go to waste. He saw a fine woven robe, two hundred shekels of silver (worth, by my calculation, about $1000 in our present currency) and a wedge of gold (over a pound = $16,500 in today's market). Seeing them, he desperately wanted them. Surely it wouldn't make that much difference . . . So he took them.

There was a problem, however. If he wore the robe, he would be conspicuous, and it would be obvious to everyone that he had confiscated some of the prohibited loot. Furthermore, he had nowhere to spend the silver without being suspected of some kind of mischief. And how would a wanderer, just in from the desert, come up with a bar of gold anyway? Since there was nothing to do but hide them, Achan buried the beautiful garment, the silver, and the gold in the earth under his tent. Did his crime pay? Not so much. Only the guilty knowledge that he had forbidden goods that he couldn't enjoy.

An act of disobedience was the source of the army's defeat, God explained to Joshua, and He showed him how to identify the guilty party. The leader called out from the twelve tribes the tribe of Judah. From that tribe, he singled out a clan, then a family, and finally an individual—Achan. The punishment was death.

Joshua took Achan and the stolen items, all of Achan's family, all his livestock, his tent—everything connected with him. In the Valley of Achor, the people stoned Achan and his family and burned their bodies and their possessions. They piled a great heap of stones over them that remains, the Scripture says, to the very day the account was written. Ever after, the place was called "the Valley of Trouble. Did Achan's crime pay? Yes, a horrible price, paid not only by Achan but also by all connected with him.

My favorite part of this story is almost hidden in two other portions of Scripture. They give the antidote for the sin and failure represented by the Valley of Trouble. Recorded in the book of Isaiah, many years later, are God's loving words to the very same tribal line of people. "I will bring forth descendants from Jacob, and from Judah those who will possess my mountains; my chosen people will inherit them, and there will my servants live. Sharon will become a pasture for flocks, and the Valley of Achor a resting place for herds, for my people who seek me." (Isaiah 65:9-10) Another prophet contemporary with Isaiah confirms that Trouble Valley's reputation was reversed. Hosea also spoke of the Valley of Achor with a tender message of God's love and pardon for a disobedient nation. There I will give her [Israel] back her vineyards, and will make the Valley of Achor a door of hope. There she will sing as in the days of her youth, as in the day she came up out of Egypt." (Hosea 2:15) A gracious God turned the Valley of Trouble into a place of rest and hope!
Someone reading this may be looking into your own Valley of Trouble at the pile of stones there, marking the place where you encountered defeat. What do you see—

A monument to your inadequacy?
A memorial to your failure?
A symbol of more of the same to come?

You can't disassemble it; it will always just be there. Can you approach your great heap of stones—the memorial of your trouble or failure—and look past it to God? What do you think He sees? Could it be a gateway of hope?

God can transform the most difficult places of our lives into something entirely different, something with meaning and purpose. There is great hope as we look beyond our shortcomings to the great outpouring of God's grace.

MaryMartha

Read or re-read: Failure
Forgive Your Past
Things Mama Taught Me: Be Sure Your Sin Will Find You Out

Scripture taken from the Holy Bible, New International Version®. NIV®. Copyright©1973, 1978, 1984 by International Bible Society. Used by permission of Zondervan. All rights reserved.