When a Small Sin Becomes a Big Defeat — Joshua 7:1-12 (Session 9)

In this verse-by-verse study of Joshua 7, Reasoning Through the Bible examines Israel’s unexpected defeat at Ai after the great victory at Jericho. One man, Achan, secretly took what God had placed under the ban, and that hidden sin affected the entire nation. The chapter reminds believers that God sees what people try to hide and that secret sin can rob God’s people of spiritual power.

This session explores Achan’s sin, Israel’s defeat, Joshua’s desperate prayer, God’s response, and the sobering reality of God’s wrath against sin. The study also explains why the defeat at Ai was not caused by a lack of confidence. Israel expected an easy victory, but hidden sin had weakened them before the battle ever began.

A major theme in this episode is that God does not overlook sin among His people. Hidden sin may seem small, but it does not stay small. Like leaven, it spreads and brings damage. Joshua 7 becomes a warning to believers and churches today: if God’s people want His power against the world and the flesh, they must deal honestly and radically with sin.

Topics in this episode include:

• Joshua 7 study
• Achan’s sin
• Israel’s defeat at Ai
• hidden sin in the camp
• God’s wrath against sin
• secret sin and spiritual power
• why Israel lost after Jericho
• confession and repentance
• the danger of small sins
• the church’s power against the world and flesh

Reasoning Through the Bible is a verse-by-verse Bible teaching ministry committed to careful exposition, biblical context, and faithful application.

Questions in this session:

• How do we reconcile God’s wrath and His love? 
• How much does God know? 
• Is the modern church empowered? Why or why not?
• How does God react to our disobedience? 
• What happens to people in God’s will when they sin?  

Transcript

Recapping Jericho's Defeat

Speaker 1 0:18

Welcome back to Reasoning Through the Bible podcast , and we are picking up with chapter 7 today as a little bit of a recap . We finished on chapter 6 , where Jericho was defeated . Joshua has completely destroyed it . And then he also put a curse at the very end of chapter 6 . If anybody tries to rebuild the foundation of Jericho , that there would be a curse on their family . And then verse 27 of chapter 6 finishes up . So the Lord Yahweh was with Joshua and his fame was in all the land . So today we pick up talking about chapter 7 and we continue the journey and the conquest of the land of Canaan .

Achan's Secret Sin Revealed

Speaker 2 1:02

Joshua , chapter 7 , verse 1 , says this but the son of Israel acted unfaithfully in regard to the things under the ban , for Achan , the son of Carmi , the son of Zabdi , the son of Zerah , from the tribe of Judah took some of the things under the ban . Therefore , the anger of the Lord burned against the sons of Israel . Here's the first question Does God know what we hide in secret ?

Speaker 1 1:26

Yes , he does obviously .

Speaker 2 1:27

So this guy , achan , was not supposed to take the things that they found in Jericho , but he did . Nobody knew , as we're going to find out here later in the chapter , he takes them and hides them in his tent . Does God know about this ?

Speaker 1 1:41

Yeah , absolutely .

Speaker 2 1:42

Even the things that I've hid .

Speaker 1 1:44

Yes .

Speaker 2 1:44

Somehow God always knows , and the other thing here is that he knows exactly who it is . He gives the person's name and what tribe they're from and who their father and grandfather were . God knows all these things . If God already knows , why do I go and try to hide my sin ? Why am I trying to hide things from God when he already knows ?

Speaker 1 2:09

anyway , because you know that they're sinful , you know that they're things that are not approved of God , and so the natural man thing to do , mankind thing to do , is to hide . That's what we do amongst ourselves , because we can successfully , most of the time , hide things from other people , but with God you can never hide .

Speaker 2 2:31

What did Adam and Eve do in the garden when they first sinned ?

Speaker 1 2:34

They hid .

Speaker 2 2:35

Yeah , can you hide from God ?

Speaker 1 2:37

No , and that's a good point too , because prior to that , god walked with them and they talked with God every day . Here they are . After they had done sin , they'd missed the mark . That's what sin means is missing the mark . Immediate reaction is to hide from God . They didn't want to talk to him .

Speaker 2 2:54

The end of verse one says the anger of the Lord burned against the sons of Israel . Do we ever think of God as being angry ? Do you ever think of God as being wrathful ? Do we ever talk about that in our churches today ?

Speaker 1 3:07

We don't talk about it enough . I think that there could be . There's some churches that's . All they talk about is how God's wrath is upon mankind . So I think you can have two ends of the pendulum . But there's many , many churches that don't talk about God's wrath . They just talk about his love .

Speaker 2 3:23

Especially in our day . I know , steve , you and I we've been Christians for a pretty good while and we've heard a fair number of sermons in a fair number of churches . You hear a stereotype about fire and brimstone preachers , but I can tell you it's a rare day that I've ever actually heard one . I've heard a whole lot of sermons on how to live your life and how to keep your families together , and all those are valuable . Rare day that you hear a sermon on God's wrath . I believe there was a famous sermon two or three hundred years ago called Sinners in the Hand of an Angry God . If you ever read this , it has this language in there about we are sinners and we're held by a thread and God's holding us over the burning flames of hell and at his whim he would let us go . That sermon caused a revival and was one of the great revivals in history . Here we are today .

Speaker 2 4:22

It's a rare day we ever hear anything about God's wrath , but it's actually a major thing . God is wrathful against sin . He is always wrathful against sin and he's always loving towards repentance . We have here a description of God being wrathful and we have to point out a little bit teensy bit of theology here . God is always wrathful against sin and he's always loving towards repentance . And our actions don't change God in the sense that God's not going to learn something about our sin or our repentance that he didn't know yesterday . He doesn't get up in the morning and read the news to figure out what happened . He knows in advance . So he is always wrathful towards sin and he's always loving towards repentance . When we experience a change of God's wrath towards God's love , who changed it was us .

Speaker 2 5:21

We changed from a place of fighting against God to a place of repenting and having God's love . Here we have at the end of Joshua 7 , 1, . God's wrath shows up because of the sin of this man , achan . We're going to read the next few verses and , steve , if you could read Joshua , chapter 7 , verses 2 and go through

Israel's Devastating Defeat at Ai

Speaker 2 5:41

verse 12 .

Speaker 1 5:41

Joshua sent men from Jericho to Ai , which is near Beth-Avon , east of Bethel , and said to them go up and spy out the land . And the men went up and spied out Ai . And they returned to Joshua and said to him do not have all the people go up , but let about two or 3,000 men go up and attack Ai . Do not make the whole people toil up there , for they are few , so about 3,000 there from the people . And they fled before the men of Ai and the men of Ai killed about thirty-six of their men and chased them before the gate as far as Shebarim and struck them in the descent and the hearts of the people melted and became as water . Then Joshua tore his clothes and fell to the earth on his face before the ark of the Lord . Until the evening he had the elders of Israel and they put dust on their heads and Joshua said Alas , o Lord , god , why have you brought this people over the Jordan at all ? To give us into the hands of the Amorites to destroy us ? Would that we had been content to dwell beyond the Jordan .

Speaker 1 6:57

O Lord , what can I say when Israel has turned their backs before their enemies , for the Canaanites and all the inhabitants of the land will hear of it and will surround us and cut off our name from the earth . And what will you do for your great name ? The Lord said to Joshua Get up . Why have you fallen on your face ? Israel has sinned . They have transgressed my covenant that I commanded them . They have taken some of the devoted things . They have stolen and lied and put them among their own belongings . Therefore , the people of Israel cannot stand before their enemies . They turn their backs before their enemies because they have become devoted for destruction . I will be with you no more , unless you destroy the devoted things from among you .

Speaker 2 7:48

So we have here a situation where Israel has just , in the previous chapter , defeated mighty Jericho , walled city , big city , and God defeated Jericho . Now , in chapter 7 , joshua sends a couple of people over and they come back and they say this is just a little place , just little AI , no big deal , shouldn't be a problem , just send a few people over there and they'll take care of it . What actually happened when they got over there ?

Speaker 1 8:20

They got thoroughly whipped whipped so bad that they were pursued down the hill by the people of AI . And keep in mind , remember , when they first crossed over , they had just 40,000 warriors just from the three tribes on the eastern side of the Jordan . So there was obviously a lot more warriors that Israel had , and they're only sending up 3,000 to attack this city .

Speaker 2 8:48

In verse 5 , Israel hears about this . What happens at the end of verse 5 ? What happens to the people of Israel when they hear about the defeated AI ?

Speaker 1 8:58

They end up being in the same situation that we saw . Rahab described the people at Jericho their hearts had melted , they were distressed , the pendulum had swung all the way to the other side . They just had given up altogether and were just scared to death in regards to what was going to happen to them .

Speaker 2 9:20

Think of what might be going through Joshua's mind at this point . God's been with him . Joshua had faith . Joshua saw the victory at Jericho , and now they get thoroughly defeated . And they're in this land . The Jordan River's closed behind them , there's no real escape , and now they've gotten to their first big defeat . What do you think's going through Joshua's mind ?

Speaker 1 9:42

Well , he's distressed . I mean , we see it a little bit later in his description of his question to God you know , why have you brought us over here ? Just to have us defeated . So he's distressed as well . He's worried and can't understand why God has done this .

Speaker 2 9:58

As we've learned . What is the cause of this defeat ?

Speaker 1 10:02

It's people that had gone in and taken some of the things that God had told them not to take . There were certain items that they were to leave alone and not take , and they were to consecrate them , not take . And they were to consecrate them because those were going to be used by God . But there's a person , achan , who had taken these things and hid them , and that's the reason behind it . Obviously , joshua doesn't know that , but God knows it To your point earlier . This was the decision that God made in regards to those people taking the items that they weren't supposed to .

Speaker 2 10:38

Well , there's this hidden sin in their midst and of course , god knows it . And because of that Israel lost its power . They were hiding this sin instead of dealing with it . So that's why the nation lost their power . In verse 3 , we see here that when they went in they had all the confidence in the world . They had just seen the victory at Jericho

Joshua's Desperate Prayer

Speaker 2 11:01

. They said this is a small city . They had faith . So it wasn't a lack of faith that caused the defeat . That's very critical . They had all the confidence in the world . They had all the faith in the world that they could defeat Ai , but they didn't . So , even though they had the faith , they were still powerless because of this hidden sin . When we make an effort to confess sin and eliminate it , god always blesses and empowers us . But what always happens when we try to hide sin in our life ?

Speaker 1 11:31

It's going to be found out at some point , and usually there's some sort of disastrous results of it .

Speaker 2 11:39

So this was little AI and it was just this one guy that had this one little sin that had hidden , that caused a problem and a loss of God's power . Is it okay to hide just a little sin ? No , come on , steve , I just want to hide just a little sin . No , come on , steve , I just want to hide just a little bit of sin .

Speaker 1 12:00

That's the human aspect that we've talked about in other podcasts and we continue to see it . The human aspect is oh , a little bit will be okay , I can hide a little bit over here , I can do this a little bit . I don't have to do everything that God says to do , and that's the problem is that we don't know the reasons in regards to everything that God knows . So God , through this , is teaching us and others you have to trust what I'm saying , you have to believe what I'm saying and you don't deviate from it . A little bit is still a problem .

Speaker 2 12:40

Over in the New Testament , jesus uses leaven yeast as an example of sin and he said what happens if we hide a little bit of leaven in the loaf ?

Speaker 1 12:49

The whole loaf balloons , because that's what yeast does to the bread .

Speaker 2 12:53

What happens if I hide just a little bit of sin in my life ? It's going to balloon . It's not going to stay little right , it tends to grow and take over . And things like that Little bit of sin that we hide even a little bit , we think , oh , this is a small thing . We think it's small because we're comparing ourselves to the guy down the street . But when we compare ourselves to a holy God , then all sins are major sins and they always end up causing us problems . So in verse 6 , what does Joshua do in verse 6 when he learns of this defeat ?

Speaker 1 13:26

He does something that was typical in that day that showed great , great remorse and distress . He tore his clothes and fell to the earth and his face before the ark of the Lord throughout the day , into the evening of the day , both him and the elders of Israel , so the leaders , and they threw dust on their heads . These were all acts to show that they are trying to get as low as possible and show how low they are in regards to God and that they're so remorseful and so distressed that these are actions that were done in the culture of the time of that period .

Speaker 2 14:11

In our day , we tend to have this view of God as buddy-buddy . God gets beside me and he's just a friend and he helps me along the way , and that's true in a sense . But it's also true that God is immense . God is massive , god is greater than us in the sense that we really don't have ground to stand on , and if we were to truly realize His is immensity in our smallness , we would prostrate ourselves before a holy God . This is why we kneel when we pray things like this . So they prayed for how long , you said ?

Speaker 1 14:47

Into the evening , so all day into the evening .

Speaker 2 14:50

I'm not going to ask how often I've done that or how long you've done that , but I can confess there's been times where I probably should have stayed in prayer because of a problem this long , and I can say that I've been guilty of not praying enough . What ends up happening when Joshua does this ? God shows up and answers .

Speaker 1 15:08

Yes , and he says that here's the reason why that this happens . So Joshua is asking him why have you done all this to us ? And then he also has the audacity to say what are the other people going to do in regards to thinking about you , almighty God , whenever the reality is that God hasn't left them . It's because there's sin in the camp that they've disobeyed . And so , again , it's not God that's moved , it's Joshua and the people of Israel that's moved .

Speaker 2 15:39

The sin that

God's Response to Hidden Sin

Speaker 2 15:41

we find out here in a little bit was a fleshly sin . It was a coveting of these valuable items . If we look at the big picture here , in Joshua , israel goes into the promised land and they come up against Jericho and we said in our previous study , jericho represents the world , it's got a stronghold and we go up against the world with the word of God and the blood of Christ . But here , with Ai , ai represents the flesh . Ai represents the sin that's in us , the false desires and the sinful desires that are in us . Achan was tempted by covetousness and greed . How hard is it for us to overcome the flesh .

Speaker 1 16:22

It's a constant struggle that we have because it's the flesh that's connected to this world , the five senses that we have and the connection that we have to this world . It's a struggle to be completely disconnected from it in a good way . So the church today .

Speaker 2 16:41

Do you see it as being up against Jericho the world , or AI the flesh ?

Speaker 1 16:46

I think that it's both , a little bit of both , but it's filled with human beings that are in this world and fleshly in this world .

Speaker 2 16:54

God responds to Joshua . Joshua spends the afternoon and into the evening prostrate in prayer and praying to God . Why did this happen ? Why verse 10, ? Why is it that you have done this ? God responds verses 10 , 11 , and 12 , and he tells them there's a sin . What does God do here ? Consider the big picture Israel is God's chosen people , his elect . Israel is in the promised land , which we said represents salvation . One of the things they do when they first get into the land is they're circumcised and we could make the analogy to baptism and they've been blessed . At Jericho , they defeated the world , but now they've sinned and they've been blessed . At Jericho , they defeated the world , but now they've sinned . What does God do ? Does he kick them out of the land ?

Speaker 1 17:39

No , and in verse 10 , the way that it's worded . There he says get up to Joshua . He says why have you fallen on your face ? So there's a little bit of an inference there of Joshua before pleading and saying why have you done this , god ? Why have you forsaken us ? Why have you done this to where we have turned in the face of the enemies and been cowards , basically ? And God's response is get up , why are you even asking that question ? Why are you being so remorseful to the point of throwing ashes and tearing your clothes ? There's a little bit of inference there for Joshua to know . Maybe he doesn't know specifically what's happened , but his first reaction should have been there's a problem somewhere , or else God would not have caused this to happen . We get that out of verse 10 in that God is saying why have you fallen on your face ? And then he goes into verse 11 , talking about the specifics .

Speaker 2 18:41

Verse 11, . Israel has sinned and they've transgressed my covenant . Israel is God's chosen people . Do they lose the relationship with God when they or they stop being God's chosen people here ? Does God destroy Israel because they sinned ? Does he kick them out of the land ? No , he doesn't do any of them . What do they lose ? They lose their power against AI . That's what they've lost . They've lost God's power in their lives because of the sin .

Speaker 2 19:09

So if we take that to our day , if we look at the church today , the church as a whole , is the modern church empowered ? Do we have power against the world , against the flesh today in our churches ? Do we see local churches that have power over the world and the flesh ? How about the church as a whole , the international church

The Church's Power Against Sin

Speaker 2 19:30

? Would we consider that the international church or the global church powerful against the world ? And I submit to you that there's pockets of it . I've seen churches that were powerful enough , that had an impact , that people were living holy lives , but those are few and I've seen a whole lot of them that don't have power over the world , don't have power over the flesh , don't have power over the flesh , and some of them have just given up and accepted the world and accepted the fleshly things because they don't have power over them .

Speaker 2 20:03

So I would submit that if we were to examine ourselves and again not pointing fingers at anybody else , all of us examine ourselves If we were to honestly repent before God and eliminate the small sins in our lives , we would have God's power again .

Speaker 1 20:21

You know and Glenn , this goes back to the beginning of starting out , of discussing and teaching about the wrathful side of God . It's a good balance to have . Yes , god is a loving God , but there's also a wrathful side , and if the churches today , if all they teach and preach is the loving part of God and not the wrathful side of it , then the people that are members of those churches are not learning that when you hide sin , no matter how small it is , there's a wrathful part of God that's going to find you out and something is going to happen . And it doesn't make you effective or that church necessarily effective against the world , because that sin is there .

Speaker 2 21:12

God doesn't wink at sin . He takes all sin very seriously . What does Jesus over in the New Testament say about sin ? What does he say to do if our eye causes us to sin ?

Speaker 1 21:24

Pluck it out . What does he ?

Speaker 2 21:25

say to do if our hand causes us to sin .

Speaker 1 21:28

Cut it off .

Speaker 2 21:29

I hope there's not a whole lot of people running around with one eye and no hand , but the message is clear . What he's saying is deal with sin in a radical manner . If there's something in your life that's close to you that's causing you to sin , don't just live with it . Cut it out of your life , get it away from you .

Speaker 1 21:48

That's the message . It's how serious that sin is . We might not tend to think that it's it's not that serious , but it is . And that's the hyperbole that he uses there to give the impression yes , this is something serious and you need to get it out .

Speaker 2 22:03

We are so immersed in weak human flesh that we tend to wank at sin and we tend to live with it . But God is holy and pure and each of us needs to ask ourselves whether I have any sin in my life and deal with it radically . Yes , we're saved by faith in God's promise . But we all have to ask ourselves have I lost God's power in my life because of some small sin that I'm hiding ? And I have to note here , steve , that the opposite of this can be true too .

Speaker 2 22:35

Just because there's a problem in my life or somebody else's life doesn't mean God's blaming me for some sin . Just because somebody got sick or some loved one died , lost my job , my house burned down or something like that doesn't mean God's punishing me because of some hidden sin that I God . Why would you be punished ? No , sometimes bad things happen and we don't know why . God doesn't always take us into his counsel . But it is true , and the message here in AI is really clear . But it is true and the message here in AI is really clear If we hide sin in our lives , we lose God's power over the strongholds of the flesh in the world , and God doesn't wank at sin . So that's probably a good spot to wrap up . We'll stop there for today , and next time we'll pick up in the second half of Joshua , chapter seven .