Please turn in your Bibles to Joshua chapter 15. This is a text that's got a lot of hard-to-pronounce names, but hopefully you will see that there is a lot in here that we can be edified by. Joshua 15, beginning at verse 1. So this was the lot of the tribe of the children of Judah according to their families. The border of Edom at the wilderness of Zin, southward, was the extreme southern boundary, and their southern border began at the shore of the Salt Sea from the bay that faces southward. Then it went out to the southern side of the ascent of Akrabim, passed along to Zin, ascended on the south side of Kadesh Barnea, passed along to Hezron, went on to Adar, and went around to Karka'ah. From there, it passed toward Asman and went out to the brook of Egypt, and the border ended at the sea. This shall be your southern border. The east border was the Salt Sea, as far as the mouth of the Jordan, And the border on the northern quarter began at the bay of the sea at the mouth of the Jordan. The border went up to Beth-Hoglah and passed north of Beth-Arabah. And the border went up to the stone of Bohan, the son of Reuben. Then the border went up toward Debir from the valley of Vechor, and it turned northward toward Gilgal, which is before the ascent of Adumim, which is on the south side of the valley. The border continued toward the waters of En Shemesh and ended at En Rogel. And the border went up by the Valley of the Son of Hinnom to the southern slope of the Jebusite city, which is Jerusalem. The border went up to the top of the mountain that lies before the Valley of Hinnom, westward, which is at the end of the Valley of Rephaim, northward. Then the border went around from the top of the hill to the fountain of the water of Nephthawa and extended to the cities of Mount Ephron. And the border went around to Ba'alah, which is Kirjath-Jirim. Then the border turned westward from Ba'allah to Mount Seir, passed along to the side of Mount Jerim on the north, which is Chesilon, went down to Beth Shemesh and passed on to Timnah. And the border went out to the side of Ekron northward. Then the border went around to Shikron, passed along to Mount Baalah, and extended to Jabneel, and the border ended at the sea. The west border was the coastline of the Great Sea. This is the boundary of the children of Judah all around, according to their families. Father, we thank you for this portion of your word, and I pray that you would bless this, your people, and build them up in the most holy faith. In Jesus' name, amen. Well, even if you are not super interested in Judah's borders, I will assure you that there is a lot in this passage that directly relates to your lives. And I want to begin, before we dig into the passage, by reminding you of two things that we at least in brief touched upon in the past and I think helps us to explain this passage. The first one is that our God is a promise-keeping God. Now, granted, the promise that is fulfilled here was made more than 400 years earlier to Abraham, but even back then, when God made the promise, He told Abraham it wasn't going to be fulfilled right away. It was going to be fulfilled after 400 years, and it was fulfilled exactly the way and exactly at the time that God had said it would be. God is always on time for each of us. He is a promise-keeping God. Second, though God also had quite a few short-term promises that he gave to Abraham that he immediately blessed him with, this long-term promise helped Abraham to develop a long-term perspective. And that was so important for the development of Abraham's faith. Well, in the same way, God daily blesses us. He says He daily loads us with benefits, doesn't He? He daily blesses us with the fulfillment of His promises, and yet He still gives us promises we're never going to see in our lifetime probably. They are long-range promises, and these promises test our faith in the same way that they tested Abraham's faith. I believe the things that you and I are doing are contributing to the long-term goals that God is moving planet Earth toward if we are doing these things in faith. It's a future world that is going to be completely converted, where all of God's blueprints are going to be applied to all of life. Isaiah 11, 9 says, the earth shall be full of the knowledge of the Lord as the waters cover the sea. Now, it takes faith to believe that post-millennial promise, where there's going to be a converted world, and everything's going to be lived out according to God's Word. It takes faith to believe that. And Abraham, his long-term faith in what God was promising in the future motivated him to plant seeds in the present, just like you and I can be planting seeds for our future. Just as one example, People have wondered, why on earth, Phil, are you writing a book on biblical civics? Because nobody's going to implement it. And I'm saying, oh, ye of little faith. I write it for two reasons. One is to rebuke civil magistrates for not living up to God's word. But the other is, I believe in the future there is going to be an application of these blueprints. Why not write it now? Who knows? God could convert some civil magistrates just like he did, you know, in Babylon and in And so what we are doing now will contribute to the future. And so there is this long-term faith or short-term faith as well. But having spelled that out, let's dive into the text and look at a few more lessons. Verse one begins by saying, so this was the lot of the tribe of the children of Judah. Now, lots were sort of like dice. They were thrown sometimes in games. And the world thinks of dice and lots as representing chance. But Proverbs 16, verse 33 says, In other words, it's saying, even the things that the world considers to be random chance are 100% controlled by God. Matthew 10.29 says, not one sparrow can fall to the ground apart from the Father's will. And the very next verse says, every hair on your head is numbered. Not one hair can fall off your head without it being God's will. You can't breathe a particle of dust into your nose without God having already predestined it. That may seem hard to believe, but there are many scriptures that describe that. Westminster Confession words it this way. God from all eternity did, by the most wise and holy counsel of His own will, freely and unchangeably ordain whatsoever comes to pass. And so the question comes up, well if that's the case, Should we just regularly use dice to determine what God's will is for our lives? You know, it's a legitimate question. Some people say, yeah, maybe that's what we should do. But Reformed people down through history have rightly said, no, no, no, don't move there too quickly. This was only for unique situations. Normally, God does not want us to use dice. or lots. And I say normally because there are unique situations where this would be appropriate. This particular case here was a unique situation that was commanded by God in Numbers 26, 55 through 65. He says, use the lot to divide the land. And the reason God wanted them to do this is if any human had decided who gets which portions of land, some of which were way better than other portions of land, there would have been endless arguments among the tribes. But since it was settled by lot, nobody could argue with it. And there are similar situations that come up today where I think it is appropriate to flip a coin to make a decision. You know, when people cannot come to agreement on what should be done, but either decision is ethically an appropriate decision, or maybe there's three or four ethical possibilities that you could choose, then throwing a dice or flipping a coin can be an appropriate way to do that. Proverbs 18.18 says, casting lots causes contentions to cease and keeps the mighty apart. But let me just give you a caution when it comes to this whole issue of casting dice, because I think some people use this way, way too frequently. Wherever the general principles of the Word can settle an issue, we need to make the decision based on the Word of God. And I know it takes hard work, but this is what God normally expects us to do. And if we're lazy, we're not going to even know that God's Word applies. This is one of the reasons I try to train the men that I meet with on how to get better and better at applying, making applications of every verse of Scripture. You know, there's one meaning, but there's many times different applications that can come from the text. That means we have to We have to understand God's Word. We have to dig into God's Word to be able to do that. This past Monday, there was a question that was brought up, you know, is it appropriate to adopt frozen embryos? They're sometimes called snowflake babies because you know, with this wretched system where they do artificial insemination. Well, they fertilize a whole bunch of eggs and they only use one. What do they do? Sometimes they discard them, sometimes they save them. Some of those embryos are 25 years old and older. So anyway, the question was, we need to rescue these babies from limbo and adopt them into a womb. Well, even though that is appropriate sometimes, the question came up, you know, there's really no ethical prohibition of this. There's no ethical question that we need to consider. And I brought up five ethical issues that absolutely need to be considered before you make that decision, because it's not appropriate for everyone. And the Bible does address this, and I mentioned I hadn't even studied this adequately, but there may be more issues that the Bible addresses. But the point is, we need to dig into the Scriptures a lot more than we do, and not just resort to dice or flipping a coin. Main point, though, here, is that we can have confidence that God is sovereign over everything, including so-called chance events. I think it was last week that Gary said in his sermon on Thanksgiving, that for us to be able to be thankful for all things, God has to be sovereign over all things, and that is absolutely right, including the difficult things that you face. So the lot speaks to God's sovereignty. Now let's look at the borders, and I'm gonna spend most of my time just on this point here, because it's almost never talked about, and yet it is so relevant to what's going on in America today. Now, it's very clear to me in these and subsequent chapters that the borders are all laid out for three civil entities. Israel as a whole, the tribes, and the entity that the new King James mistranslates as families, at least I believe it's a mistranslation. The Hebrew word is Mishpachah, and you do not have to read in the literature and the commentaries very far to realize that there is huge debate on how in the world to translate this word Mishpachah. What is it referred to? There's still debate. It's not been a settled issue. And the word clan might be a little bit closer to the meaning of this word, especially if you think of the Scottish clans like the McLeods and the McGregors and McDonald's, where you could identify with the clan even if you weren't necessarily genetically related or you couldn't prove your lineage. But however you translate the term, it is clear that each mishpachah had its own army, had its own court system, and had all of the other civil functions that a state normally has. It wasn't just a family as we think of families. In fact, there are places in the Bible where members from outside of that family, the clan, were a part of the mishpachah. They weren't even related. No kinship with each other. So that by itself rules out the translation of families. And that's why many scholars point out that a mishpachah, though it could often represent one clan, was technically not simply a clan. It was a legal subdivision of a tribe. And every word there is important. It was a legal subdivision of a tribe. that had civil functions, had an army, had all of the things you would normally consider to be a part of a civil entity. If you want an analogy, and it's not a perfect analogy, but in many ways, the Mishpachah functions similarly to our modern counties. And thus, several authors point out that Israel was a confederation of tribes, or a confederation of states, and each state was a confederation of counties with checks and balances built into each other. And nations, tribes, and counties all had borders that limited their jurisdiction. That's the whole point of giving the borders, was to limit their jurisdictions. They didn't own land like individual families owned land. No, the borders were to limit their jurisdiction. And this is so important to understand if we are to oppose some of the federal and state tyranny that we have been seeing in the last few decades. And because of the mistranslation here, I need to dig into this a little bit more to prove my point. Notice that verse one says, so this was the lot of the tribe of the children of Judah, according to their mishpacha. Verse 12 ends this section by saying, this is the boundary of the children of Judah all around, according to their mishpacha. So the nation of Israel had a border. Each tribe had a border, except for Levi. And each mishpacha had its own border. These borders were very useful for the tribes, which were equivalent to our states. And each mishpaka was, the borders were useful for the mishpaka, which is equivalent to our counties. It's not just our national borders that are important, so are the borders of each state and each county. So these are, these spell out their jurisdictions. Let me just use it as an example. A sheriff of a county does not have authority to function in a neighboring county because that's not his jurisdiction. And in the same way, the Avenger of Blood in the Old Testament did not have authority to function anywhere in Israel that he wanted to function, nor does the Nebraska legislature have the right to dictate what Iowa should do. And those of you who live in Iowa are very grateful for that, I'm sure. So Israel was not to interfere with Edom or Moab the way that San Francisco City Council has been seeking to dictate what Israel should do, you know? We can't do these. These borders show where our jurisdictions are. Well, throughout this passage, God lays down the exact locations of each border of Judah according to its Mishpachah and the borders of neighboring nations. Verse one goes on to say, the border of Edom at the wilderness of Zin, southward, was the extreme southern border, or boundary, same word. And the word border occurs in every verse in our section except for verse three, where the word it also refers to the border. Now here's where it's significant in comparing to America. The Hebrew word for border, geboula, when it's used for a corporate entity like Edom, Moab, Israel, Judah, Simeon, et cetera, is defined by the dictionary this way. quote, the geographical area under the jurisdiction of a sovereign state, the general area where the territory of two or more nations or people groups meet. So let's see if there are state-like functions for both tribe as well as for the Mishpaka. There are many passages that indicate that each of the 11 tribes that were given borders had their own armies, their own generals, governors, court system, etc. In many ways they acted as a sovereign state. And thus numerous authors demonstrate that Israel was a confederation of states much like America is supposed to be, a confederation of states. Likewise, the Hastings Dictionary of the Bible demonstrates that there were these subdivisions within Israel called Mishpachahs that had many of the functions of America's early county structures, and that those Mishpachahs could quickly mount a fighting force under a leader equivalent to our sheriff, Judges 18.11 is one example. It says, 600 men of A. Mishpachah of the Danites went out from there, from Zorah and Ashtael, armed with weapons of war. Hiller speaks of the troops raised from each Mishpachah for military purposes. So each of these Mishpachahs had a military force under its own leaders, and it was not dissolved. When the whole nation went to fight, they would call these people. They could just decide, hey, our county is not going to be involved in this war. It's an unjust war. And when they went, they fought under their own leaders like happened in early America. They were not dissolved into a massive army where there's only loyalty to one one general. Even our modern military needs to be completely revamped and decentralized like it was for many, many years in early America. Another fact that helps to give definition to the Mishpachahs is that they had the authority to investigate a case of murder, to judge it, and to inflict the death penalty for that murder even during the time of the monarchy. Okay, this is not just during the time of Joshua and during the time of Judges. It was true even during the time of the monarchy. Now in 2 Samuel 14.7, which was during the latter part of David's reign, the new King James mistranslates Mishpacha once again as the family trying to execute the murderer. Well, families didn't have the authority to execute anybody, but mishpakahs did, okay? They were the smallest governmental unit with civil powers of that sort. So however you want to translate the Hebrew word, see that word that is translated here as families as being the smallest governmental unit with full civil powers. That's the key point. And that's why Jeremiah 1.5 speaks of every mishpachah as having a throne. The Hebrew word is kisei. Well, it's a civil function, okay? So I think I've given enough to prove my point. These mishpachahs had their borders and their jurisdictions that were honored. And the book of Judges especially shows the relationships between different mishpachahs and the mishpachah to a tribe. and tribes to each other in such a way that it illustrates four principles. And I'm going to end this point with these four applications. First, God intended there to be decentralization and distribution of civil powers. America has gone in the exact opposite direction. It has become more and more centralized, and the states and counties have relinquished more and more of their powers to the federal government. That needs to be reversed. Now, at the abolitionist movement meeting, Which has been postponed to the what is the 25th or something like that? Jared was going to be sharing how Butler County has some fabulous Platforms to reverse this process in America and it's more and more counties imitate what they're doing I think we're gonna make some major good forward progress. I So we need to encourage counties and states to take back what was originally intended to be in their jurisdiction and to give up powers that should not belong to any jurisdiction. We need to think about these things, not just assume that whatever happens has always happened. Early America was much closer to the biblical ideal than most people realize. By the way, R.J. Rushtuni, I think, has done some great stuff on this. Second, the Mishpika slash county, however you want to word that or clan, in the Bible could interpose itself against its own tribe or even against a neighboring country or a neighboring tribe if those entities invaded or intruded themselves into its jurisdictions. The invasion could be resisted and should be resisted. Now, later in the Bible, these very borders will be the justification for interposition. In America, just as one illustration, the South had every right to secede in order to avoid some of the tyrannies under Abraham Lincoln. Now, they had their own tyrannical problems. I'm not justifying what the South did themselves, but here's the point. The right to secession is built right into the way America was founded and certainly was built into the right of the way Israel was set up. Now, this is not the passage I'm going to use to get into those various forms of interposition and which ones are good, which ones are better. But the borders and the relationships within these borders speak to limited jurisdictions that need to be carefully guarded. That's the key point. And as we influence politicians, we need to be thinking about these things. America's founding fathers certainly did. Just read their writings. They certainly did. Third, interposition can go both directions. It can go up, it can go sideways, because tyranny can arise in any civil jurisdiction. Now, just one example of tyranny in a lower court, in 2 Samuel 14, 7, A woman appeals to King David to interpose downward against an unjust sentence that her mishpachah had rendered against the sole surviving member of her family, who had accidentally killed his brother. Now, it was actually a false setup by Joab. But in terms of theory, it still is a point that is valid. David promised to investigate and intervene. He knew that Mishpachahs could potentially engage in injustice, and it was helpful to appeal to a higher jurisdiction. I think it was a wonderful thing when the Supreme Court reversed Roe v. Wade in a 6-3 decision. It was wonderful that this appeal went to them because now the states can begin to roll forward in a much faster way anti-abortion legislation. And so interposition, they can go in all directions when jurisdictions are overstepped. Fourth, this is one of hundreds of passages that helps to define free travel, immigration, and citizenship. Earlier in the book, we already saw that there were numerous strangers that had covenanted with God, and were enjoying the liberties of Israel. But they were not Jews, and they were not citizens of Israel. When you study all of the border passages of the Bible, you discover that individuals and families, like Elimelech, and Naomi, and Ruth, and many others, were allowed to travel freely over county borders, over state borders, and over national borders. But just because they entered a nation did not mean they're automatically a citizen of that nation. Same is true of tribes. Same is true of mishpachahs. Strangers could live in all three civil jurisdictions, but in order to have a vote and in order to own land, they had to embrace the faith, get circumcised to become Jews. There was a commitment to a biblical worldview required. And we have seen that Gentiles, by the way, could become Jews. Caleb was one example. We're going to see him inheriting land in the next section. But he was at least his family was formerly Gentile. He himself probably wasn't. But anyway, there was free travel. But citizenship had its restrictions. And even those who traveled in the country had to be willing to abide by its laws. And by the way, you're going to see that the prophets anticipate a time when the world is converted where this is going to continue to be the case. This is not just for us in sick world. This is for a converted world. And it was true in the Old Testament. It'll be true in the future. Even unbelievers could be within a country so long as they abided by the laws of that country. And so the Bible gave none of the language and ethnic restrictions that Christian nationalists insist upon. In fact, I'll have you turn with me to Isaiah 19. I'm going to read one of the prophecies that describes a time that's still in our future. This has never been fulfilled yet. and begin reading at verse 18. This is a great passage to oppose Wolf's racist Christian nationalism, or others who want to put high walls around our nation to keep people out. Hey, they don't just keep people out, they imprison people within the nation as well. Let's start reading at verse 18, Isaiah 19, verse 18. In that day, five cities in the land of Egypt will speak the language of Canaan and swear by the Lord of hosts, one will be called the city of destruction. Notice that these Egyptian cities will speak Hebrew and be Christian. Speaking a non-Egyptian language does not mean they cease to be an Egyptian nation. Breaking down language barriers, that's not an unbiblical thing. But at this stage in history, it's not completely converted. It's a five to one ratio, verse 19. In that day, there will be an altar to the Lord in the midst of the land of Egypt and a pillar to the Lord at its border. And it will be for a sign and for a witness to the Lord of hosts in the land of Egypt, for they will cry to the Lord because of the oppressors. And he will send them a savior and a mighty one, and he will deliver them. Then the Lord will be known to Egypt, and the Egyptians will know the Lord in that day and will make sacrifice and offering. Yes, they will make a vow to the Lord and perform it. And the Lord will strike Egypt. He will strike and heal. They will return to the Lord, and He will be entreated by them and heal them." Now get this, this is verse 23, "...in that day there will be a highway from Egypt to Assyria, and the Assyrian will come into Egypt, and the Egyptian into Assyria, and the Egyptians will serve with the Assyrians." In that day, Israel will be one of three, with Egypt and Assyria, a blessing in the midst of the land, whom the Lord of hosts shall bless, saying, Blessed is Egypt, my people, and Assyria, the work of my hands, and Israel, my inheritance." So there are going to be three Christian nations in the Middle East, Egypt, Assyria, and Israel. They will all speak the same language while maintaining their borders, but there will be a highway between them, free travel despite those borders. In other words, borders limit the political jurisdiction, but it was not designed to keep other ethnicities out of the nation like Christian nationalists want to do. Even though Egyptians will be in Israel, and in Assyrian, vice versa, that will not destroy their national identities. Why? Because God insisted on a much higher standard for citizenship. And I'm not going to get into some of the other ways that this passage overthrows Wolf's Christian nationalism, but there's quite a few good essays out there. Brian Mattson's written one. Martin Selbretty has written one. There's a few out there that are really good on this point. OK, so enough on that. But let me give you some general observations without getting into all of the specifics of towns, villages, rivers, and seas. First, I would encourage you when reading scriptures like this to try to get into the thinking of the original audience. If you don't, these passages will be ultra boring. They'll bore you to tears. Let me use an analogy. when one of you purchases a house, you are super interested in the page after page of specifications for that property, the kind of insulation, what kind, how old is the roof and what kind of roof is on there? What's the plumbing like? I mean, you're, you're just very interested in all this. Why? Because you're going to own this property. You want to make sure it's exactly what you want. And because we love you, we're very interested in that as well. It was such a delight for Gary and me to be at, um, Grace and Lyle's house, boy, I almost didn't get the names there, this past week to dedicate it. I mean, it is such a delight to see people inheriting these things, and we have an interest in those kinds of things, right? But to a person who's just a stranger, they're not gonna be interested in reading all of those details, not at all. Well, in the same way, the tribe of Judah considered this text a precious text since it spelled out their inheritance, jurisdiction, and authority. And once you understand why they would have rejoiced in it, then you can start applying it to our current situations like we have been doing already. Now, I'm not going to get into why the mention of each town helps us to interpret later passages. I think it would be too tedious. But just know that every word of every passage in the Bible was intended for edification. It's needed for some purpose. So don't skip over passages like this. Ask questions about the original audience, and the Lord might open up further applications for you. Another thing that I notice in this text is that Judah got its allotment first, even though Judah was the fourthborn, was not even born of the first wife, Rachel, was born of Leah. And other tribes might have wondered, why on earth is Judah getting its portion first? It's not the firstborn. He was not the firstborn. Well, if they knew their Bible, they might have guessed. In Genesis 49, Jacob blessed each of his sons, and Judah received a special blessing stating that he would rule over his brothers and that the Messiah, the Messianic King, and other kings would come from Judah. Okay, that's Genesis 49, 8 through 12. So making Judah receive his portion by law at first may have been a hint at this. Likewise, giving Judah the biggest and best portion of the land may also be a hint, hey, there's something special that's going to be happening in Judah. David Dickman in his commentary says, commentators from Calvin onward have indicated that Judah comes first in the order primarily because of the special blessings conferred on it by Jacob, Genesis 49, 8 through 12. As the Old Testament story develops, Judah assumes increasing importance among the Twelve, not least because King David and his descendants come from Judah, as does great David's greater son, the Lord Jesus Christ, Matthew 1.1. After the division of the kingdom, it is Judah by which the southern kingdom is known, with its capital in Jerusalem and the Lord's temple there, so that in every way this tribe has the supremacy among the brothers. In chapter 15, 1 through 12, its boundaries are carefully and clearly set out with regard to all four points of the compass. Now let me just apply this a little bit further than he does in his commentary. When you actually see how nice a slice of the pie that Judah gets, it does not seem fair at all. But this is actually, I think, a perfect picture of how God sovereignly distributes His gifts to His elect all down through history. He never distributes His gifts equally, never. And that should not bother us. None of us deserve anything. And rather than envying other people who have more than what you have, we should rejoice in what God has given to them. God is the Lord, and He has the right to give uneven distribution of gifts and finances and talents, period. And your heart is evil if you have envy. You need to repent of that. That envy will actually spoil you in being effective with what God has already entrusted to you. Interestingly, in Matthew 18, Jesus applies this to even how many times we need to forgive our brother. Some people are very easy to deal with and others not so easy. Peter said, Lord, how often shall my brother sin against me and I forgive him? Up to seven times. Jesus said to him, I do not say to you up to seven times, but up to 70 times seven. And it just doesn't seem fair. that, you know, with some people we only have to forgive them a few times, and other people, the earth's expecting us to forgive them 490 times? Really? How is that fair? But here's the point. All of us should rejoice that God has given us any grace, any finances, any mercies whatsoever. He is the Lord, and He has the right to distribute as He wills. Okay, let me at least outline the borders. I'm not going to spell the borders out in great detail. Now, if I were addressing scholars, there are other things that I would draw out of this passage, because there's cartographic, archaeological, there's other significant things that actually disprove liberals later on. Really good stuff in here. But let me just summarize it briefly. Verses 2 through 4 give the southern border. Verses 3-4, the western. First part of verse 5 gives the eastern border. And verses 5-11, the northern border. The passage goes from south to west to east to north. And so the Sea of Galilee is the northern border. The river that comes down, Jordan River, that's another border. And on the west is the Mediterranean. And just as God expected the other tribes to rejoice in God's distributions, God expects us to rejoice in what each person in our church and other churches have received. Envy should be banished from our heart. God has his purposes and his distributions, and we can trust him for that. May it be so. Amen. Father, I thank you for your word. And I thank you for the challenges that it gives to our hearts. I pray that you would forgive us for any envy that we may have had over what other people have been given. Help us to use it to, first of all, value the talents, the finances, the gifts that you have given to us individually and to use them to our best. ability for the extension of your kingdom. And as we are faithful with little, may you entrust us with more. Bless this, your congregation, we pray in Jesus' name. Amen.