expression in prayer. It was therefore, after all, a contest of faith, and faith is "the victory over the world."

Strange, that amidst this universal agitation, one should have remained unmoved, who, all the time, knew

that he was the cause of Israel's disaster and of the mourning around. Yet his conscience must have told him

that, so long as it remained, the curse of his sin would fo llow his brethren, and smite them with impotence. It

is this hardness of impenitence - itself the consequence of sin - which, when properly considered,

vindicates, or rather demonstrates, the rightness of the Divine sentence afterwards executed upon Achan.83

His sin was of no ordinary character. It had not only been a violation of God's express command, but daring

sacrilege and profanation. And this under circumstances of the most aggravated character. Besides, Joshua

had, just before the fall of Jericho, warned the people of the danger to themselves and to all Israel of taking

"of the accursed thing" (Joshua 6:18). So emphatic had been the ban pronounced upon the doomed city,

that it was extended to all time, and even over the whole family of any who should presume to restore

Jericho as a fortress (6:26).84

And, in face of all this, Achan had allowed himself to be tempted! He had yielded to the lowest passion. One

of those Babylonish garments, curiously woven with figures and pictures (such as classical writers

describe), a massive golden ornament, in the shape of a tongue, and a sum of silver, amounting to about 25l

in a city the walls of which had just miraculously fallen before the Lord, had induced him to commit this

daring sin! More than that, when it had come true, as Joshua predicted (6:18), that such theft would "make

the camp of Israel a curse, and trouble it," Achan had still persisted in his sin.

It will be remembered that, forty years before, at the brink of the Red Sea, "the Lord said unto Moses:

Wherefore criest thou unto Me? speak unto the children of Israel, that they go forward!" (Exodus 14:15). As

then, so now, when Joshua and the elders of Israel lay on their faces before the Lord, not prayer, but action

was required. In the one case it was not exercise of faith to pray where obedience was called for; nor yet, in

the other, had prayer any meaning, nor could it expect an answer, while sin remained unremoved. And so it

ever is. The cause of Israel's disaster lay, not in want of faithfulness on the part of the Lord, but on that of

Israel. Their sin must now be searched out, and "the accursed" be "destroyed from among them." For,

although the sin of Achan was that of an individual, it involved all Israel in its guilt. The sinner was of Israel,

and his sin was in Israel's camp. It is needless here to discuss the question, how one guilty of sin should

involve in its consequences those connected with him, whether by family or social ties. It is simply a fact,

admitting no discussion, and is equally witnessed when God's law in nature, and when His moral law is set

at defiance. The deepest reason of it lies, indeed, in this, that the God of nature and of grace is also the

founder of society; for, the family and society are not of man's devising, but of God's institution, and form

part of His general plan. Accordingly, God deals with us not merely as individuals, but also as families and

as nations. To question the rightness of this would be to question alike the administration, the fundamental

principles, and the plan of God's universe. But there is reason for devout thankfulness, that we can, and do

recognize the presence of God in both nature and in history. The highest instance of the application of this

law, is that which has rendered our salvation possible. For just as we had sinned and destroyed ourselves

through our connection with the first Adam, so are we saved through the second Adam - the Lord from

heaven, Who has become our Substitute, that in Him we might receive the adoption of children.

The tidings, that the sin of one of their number had involved Israel in judgment, must have rapidly spread

through the camp of Israel. But even this knowledge and the summons to sanctify themselves, that on the

morrow the transgressor might be designated by the Lord, did not move Achan to repentance and

confession. And now all Israel were gathered before the Lord. First approached the princes of the twelve

tribes. Each name of a tribe had been written separately,85 when "the lot" that "came up," or was drawn,

bore the name of Judah.

Thus singled out, the heads of the various clans of Judah next presented themselves, when the lot

designated that of Zarhi. And still the solemn trial went on, with increasing solemnity, as the circle

narrowed, when successively the families of Zabdi, and finally, among them, the household of Achan was

singled out by the hand of God. All this time had Achan kept silence. And now he stood alone before God