Day Seventeen - Settling into the Land and Life

Joshua 15:1 to Judges 3:27

The bulk of the heavy fighting is over, the people who were in Canaan have been mostly "cleansed" from the land, and the process begins of assigning the allotments of territory to the tribes of Israel.  The time has come for them to truly dwell in the land that the LORD first promised to Abraham as an inheritance.  Seven of the tribes drag their feet in settling on the land so Joshua has seven areas marked out for them and then cast lots (kind of like rolling dice) to determine where each tribe would live.  

After a little dust up between the tribes on either side of the Jordan over the building of an altar away from the tabernacle, the Israelites settle in as Joshua gives them his farewell address.  He also leads them in a renewal of the covenant after first saying to everyone assembled, "choose for yourselves this day whom you will serve . . . but as for me and my household, we will serve the LORD." [Joshua 24:15]

Settling down in life is not the same thing as choosing what is holy and right.  Now, as then, the people whom God has brought to this moment in life are faced with a choice: will we be diligent in keeping the ways of the LORD or as time goes by give our lives over to something else?