Joshua 1 explained: Joshua Takes Over from Moses

A new leader steps in (vv. 1-2)

With Moses dead, the LORD speaks directly to Joshua, who had spent years as Moses' assistant. The work goes on: the people camped east of the Jordan River must now cross into Canaan.

The land and a promise (vv. 3-6)

The LORD sketches wide borders, from the southern desert to Lebanon and from the Euphrates River to the Mediterranean, an ideal outline larger than the land Israel held through most of its history. The LORD promises to be with Joshua just as he was with Moses, but this land was already home to other peoples, so the promise is also a call to war.

Courage tied to the law (vv. 7-9)

The text links Joshua's success to keeping all the teaching Moses left, speaking it and thinking it over day and night without drifting from it in any direction. The command to be strong and unafraid comes three times, resting on the promise that God goes with him.

Three days to get ready (vv. 10-11)

Joshua has his officers tell everyone to prepare food, because in three days they will cross. Christians have long read this entry into a promised home as a picture of what Jesus brings, noting that his name is the same as Joshua's in Hebrew.

The eastern tribes reminded (vv. 12-15)

Reuben, Gad and half of Manasseh had already settled land east of the Jordan after promising Moses they would still help the other tribes. Joshua holds them to it: families stay behind while their fighters go first, until everyone has rest, meaning a settled home free from war.

The people's pledge (vv. 16-18)

They promise to obey Joshua as they obeyed Moses, add a prayer that the LORD will be with him as he was with Moses, and declare that anyone who rebels against his orders will be put to death. They close by repeating God's own words to him: be strong and courageous.

Key verse: Joshua 1:9

Where Christians differ

Christians differ on how to understand a God who gives a land already lived in by other peoples, some reading it as real divine judgment on those nations and others as a national story told in the war language of its time.

Something to think about

When someone you relied on is gone, what helps you step into what they left behind?