"...and the LORD turned from the fierceness of His anger. ..." Josh. 7:26 (NASB)What happened prior to this? Achan sinned by taking some items from Jericho under the ban, which God told them not to do. They were consequently defeated at the city of Ai in what should have been an easy, quick battle. Joshua prayed and God told him that their was sin among them. By lot, Achan was shown to be the culprit. What happens next is important.
Achan confessed his sin and "reparation" was made (vv. 19-23). But, even still, "All Israel stoned them with stones; and they burned them with fire after they had stoned them with stones. They raised over him a great heap of stones that stands to this day..."
"and the LORD turned from the fierceness of His anger." (Josh. 7:25b-26a)Wow. Doesn't that seem like overkill? Stone them all and everything they owned? Then burn them?
Confession was made. Some form of repentance or reparation was made (they poured out the banned things before the LORD). But that was not sufficient in this case to turn back the wrath of God, who had commanded Israel repeatedly to purge the evil from their midst. Even though God is "gracious and compassionate, slow to anger and abounding in lovingkindness and truth," (Ex. 34:6), sin still has consequences and God's righteous standards and ways are upheld. The discipline or judgment of God is still meted out and thus people are spared the outpouring of the fullness of His furious wrath. Sometimes God is super-abundantly gracious and turns back not only His wrath, but even His judgmental, temporal discipline when confession and repentance is made.
There is a distinction made in Scripture between the eternal, condemnatory wrathful judgment of God and the temporal, corrective disciplinary judgment of God. Romans 8:1 assures us that "there is therefore now no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus" precisely because the fullness of God's wrath was poured out upon Jesus Christ on Calvary for those who are in Him and have "swapped accounts" (2 Cor. 5:21). Even so, Hebrews 12:5-6, quoting the OT, says that God disciplines those whom He loves and scourges every son whom He receives, going onto say that every legitimate son receives discipline and if you are without it, you are illegitimate children (vv. 7-8).
While through Jesus Christians are spared the eternal condemnatory wrath of God that will come upon the sons of disobedience (Hallelujah! Thanks and praise be to God!), we are not exempt from the temporal corrective disciplinary judgment of God in life. Sometimes God lets the natural consequences of our sin come upon us as discipline; sometimes He actively takes a role in sending discipline; and sometimes He is super-abundantly gracious to spare us entirely in response to our broken contrition and genuine repentance and confession.
Two NT instances can illustrate this very principle.
In 1 Corinthians 5, we learn of gross sexual immorality on the part of one of the Corinthian congregants. In verse five, Paul says, "I have decided to deliver such a one to Satan for the destruction of his flesh, so that his spirit may be saved in the day of the Lord Jesus." Just like in Joshua 7, the experience of the judgment and discipline of God toward Achan and his family turned back the fierce anger of God.
The second is 1 Corinthians 11:29-32 (NASB), which says,
"For he who eats and drinks, eats and drinks judgment to himself if he does not judge the body rightly. For this reason many among you are weak and sick, and a number sleep [= death]. But if we judged ourselves rightly, we would not be judged. But when we are judged, we are disciplined by the Lord so that we will not be condemned along with the world."We should be extremely thankful that there is such a thing as the discipline of God, which is a sign that His full wrath has been turned back from us.
All discipline for the moment seems not to be joyful, but sorrowful; yet to those who have been trained by it, afterwards it yields the peaceful fruit of righteousness. Hebrews 12:11 (NASB)
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