Latest / Lamp and Light Bible Reading Plan / September 1, 2026 - Joshua 22 & Proverbs 13:13-16

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September 1, 2026 - Joshua 22 & Proverbs 13:13-16 · Lamp and Light Bible Reading Plan

• 0:01
  SPEAKER_00: Welcome to the Lamp and Light Bywording Plan, where we are seeking to love the Lord our God with all of our heart, soul, mind, and strength, with God's word letting the way.
• 0:09
  SPEAKER_00: I'm Josiah Smith, Lead Pastor of Combus South Valley.
• 0:12
  SPEAKER_00: Today is Tuesday, September 1st, 2026.
• 0:26
  SPEAKER_00: Listen intently to God's written word.
• 0:28
  SPEAKER_00: Joshua 22.
• 0:30
  SPEAKER_00: At that time Joshua summoned the Rumenites and the Gadites and the half tribe of Manasseh, and said to them, You have kept all that Moses, the servant of the Lord, commanded you, and have obeyed my voice in all that I have commanded you.
• 0:43
  SPEAKER_00: You have not forsaken your brothers these many days, down to this day, but have been careful to keep the charge of the Lord your God.
• 0:51
  SPEAKER_00: And now the Lord your God has given rest to your brothers, as he promised them.
• 0:56
  SPEAKER_00: Therefore, turn and go to your tents in the land where your possession lies, which Moses, the servant of the Lord, gave you on the other side of the Jordan.
• 1:05
  SPEAKER_00: Only be very careful to observe the commandment and the law that Moses, the servant of the Lord, commanded you, to love the Lord your God, and to walk in all his ways, and to keep his commandments, and to cling to him, and to serve him with all your heart and with all your soul.
• 1:22
  SPEAKER_00: So Joshua blessed them and sent them away, and they went to their tents.
• 1:26
  SPEAKER_00: Now to the one half of the tribe of Manasseh, Moses had given a possession in Bashan, but to the other half Joshua had given a possession besides their brothers in the land west of the Jordan.
• 1:37
  SPEAKER_00: And when Joshua sent them away to their homes and blessed them, he said to them, Go back to your tents with much wealth, and with very much livestock, with silver, gold, bronze, and iron, and with much clothing, divide the spoil of your enemies with your brothers.
• 1:53
  SPEAKER_00: So the people of Reuben and the people of Gad and the half tribe of Manasseh returned home, parting from the people of Israel at Shiloh, which is in the land of Canaan, to go to the land of Gilead, their own land of which they had possessed themselves by command of the Lord through Moses.
• 2:09
  SPEAKER_00: And when they came to the region of the Jordan that is in the land of Canaan, the people of Reuben and the people of Gad and the half tribe of Manasseh built there an altar by the Jordan, an altar of imposing size.
• 2:22
  SPEAKER_00: And the people of Israel heard it, said, Behold, the people of Reuben and the people of Gad and the half tribe of Manasseh have built the altar at the frontier of the land of Canaan, in the region about the Jordan, on the side that belongs to the people of Israel.
• 2:37
  SPEAKER_00: And when the people of Israel heard of it, the whole assembly of the people of Israel gathered at Shiloh to make war against them.
• 2:44
  SPEAKER_00: Then the people of Israel sent to the people of Reuben and the people of Gad and the half tribe of Manasseh and the land of Gilead, Phineas, the son of Eliezer, the priest, and with him ten chiefs, one from each of the tribal families of Israel, every one of them the head of a family among the clans of Israel.
• 3:03
  SPEAKER_00: And they came to the people of Reuben, the people of Gad and the half tribe of Manasseh in the land of Gilead, and they said to them, Thus says the whole congregation of the Lord, What is this breach of faith that you have committed against the God of Israel, in turning away this day from following the Lord, by building yourselves an altar this day in rebellion against the Lord?
• 3:26
  SPEAKER_00: Have we not had enough of the sin at Peor from which even yet we have not cleansed ourselves, and for which there came a plague among the congregation of the Lord, that you too must turn away this day from following the Lord?
• 3:40
  SPEAKER_00: And if you too rebel against the Lord today, then tomorrow he will be angry with the whole congregation of Israel.
• 3:48
  SPEAKER_00: But now, if the land of your possession is unclean, pass over into the Lord's land where the Lord's tabernacle stands, and take for yourselves a possession among us.
• 3:58
  SPEAKER_00: Only do not rebel against the Lord or make us as rebels by building for yourselves an altar other than the altar of the Lord our God.
• 4:08
  SPEAKER_00: Did not Achan, the son of Zarah, break faith in the matter of the devoted things, and wrath fell upon all the congregation of Israel, and he did not perish alone for his iniquity.
• 4:19
  SPEAKER_00: Then the people of Reuben, the people of Gad and the half tribe of Manasseh, said in answer to the heads of the families of Israel, The mighty one, God the Lord, the mighty one, God the Lord, he knows, and let Israel itself know.
• 4:32
  SPEAKER_00: If it was in rebellion or in breach of faith against the Lord, do not spare us today for building an altar to turn away from following the Lord.
• 4:41
  SPEAKER_00: Or if we did so to offer burnt offerings or grain offerings or peace offerings on it, may the Lord Himself take vengeance.
• 4:49
  SPEAKER_00: No, but we did it from fear that in time to come your children might say to our children, What have you to do with the Lord, the God of Israel?
• 4:59
  SPEAKER_00: For the Lord has made the Jordan a boundary between us and you.
• 5:03
  SPEAKER_00: You people of Reuben and people of Gad, you have no portion in the Lord, so your children might make our children cease to worship the Lord.
• 5:12
  SPEAKER_00: Therefore we said, Let us now build an altar, not for burnt offerings, not for sacrifice, but to be a witness between us and you, and between our generations after us, that we do perform the services of the Lord in his presence, with our burnt offerings and sacrifices and peace offerings, so your children will not say to our children in time to come, You have no portion in the Lord.
• 5:35
  SPEAKER_00: And we thought, if this should be said to us or to our descendants in time to come, we should say, Behold, the copy of the altar of the Lord, which our fathers made, not for burnt offerings, not for sacrifice, but to be a witness between us and you.
• 5:51
  SPEAKER_00: Far be it from us that we should rebel against the Lord and turn away this day from following the Lord by building an altar for burnt offering, grain offering, or sacrifice, other than the altar of the Lord our God that stands before his tabernacle.
• 6:07
  SPEAKER_00: When Phinehas the priest and the chiefs of the congregations, the heads of the families of Israel who were with him, heard the words that the people of Reuben and the people of Gad and the people of Manasseh spoke, it was good in their eyes.
• 6:19
  SPEAKER_00: And Phineas the son of Eleazar, the priest, said to the people of Reuben, and the people of Gad and the people of Manasseh, Today we know that the Lord is in our midst, because you have not committed this breach of faith against the Lord.
• 6:32
  SPEAKER_00: Now you have delivered the people of Israel from the hand of the Lord.
• 6:36
  SPEAKER_00: Then Phinehas, the son of Eleazar, the priest, and the chiefs, returned from the people of Reuben, and the people of Gad in the land of Gilead to the land of Canaan, to the people of Israel, and brought back word to them.
• 6:48
  SPEAKER_00: And the report was good in the eyes of the people of Israel.
• 6:52
  SPEAKER_00: And the people of Israel blessed God, and spoke no more of making war against them to destroy the land where the people of Reuben and the people of Gad were settled.
• 7:02
  SPEAKER_00: The people of Reuben and the people of Gad called the altar witness, for they said, It is a witness between us that the Lord is God.
• 7:11
  SPEAKER_00: Proverbs thirteen, thirteen through sixteen.
• 7:14
  SPEAKER_00: Whoever despises the word brings destruction on himself, but he who reveres the commandment will be rewarded.
• 7:22
  SPEAKER_00: The teaching of the wise is a fountain of life, that one may turn away from the snares of death.
• 7:28
  SPEAKER_00: Good sense wins favor, but the way of the treacherous is their ruin.
• 7:34
  SPEAKER_00: Every prudent man acts with knowledge, but a fool flaunts his folly.
• 7:39
  SPEAKER_00: Now we are continuing to wind down to the great book of Joshua.
• 7:44
  SPEAKER_00: And here in Joshua 22, we see some things that were established earlier before Israel entered into the Promised Land by crossing over the Jordan, specifically with the Reubenites, the Gadites, and the half-tribe of Manasseh.
• 8:00
  SPEAKER_00: Now, if you remember, those three tribes they went to Moses and they asked if they could have the land as their possession so that their livestock and all of their possessions could be held within that land.
• 8:14
  SPEAKER_00: And if you remember back in the book of Numbers, there is this request that is made because it they they basically feel like this is really good land, this is fruitful land for us and our family and for all of our livestock.
• 8:27
  SPEAKER_00: Now, ultimately, the Lord grants that request through Moses.
• 8:30
  SPEAKER_00: But if you remember, Moses says specifically, you will enter into the promised land with the rest of your brothers, and you will fight.
• 8:39
  SPEAKER_00: You will fight until the victory is secure, and then you may return to this land on the other side of the Jordan.
• 8:48
  SPEAKER_00: And so here we see in Joshua 22 that promise being upheld.
• 8:52
  SPEAKER_00: They kept their end of the bargain, they fought until the victory was won by the Lord, and now they are being sent home.
• 9:01
  SPEAKER_00: So this is the detail of them being sent back to the other side east of the Jordan River.
• 9:08
  SPEAKER_00: But there is immediately a level of conflict here in Joshua 22 because they construct this altar.
• 9:17
  SPEAKER_00: The text says an imposing altar.
• 9:19
  SPEAKER_00: You can imagine it's very obvious, it's hard to miss, and intentionally so as we read this chapter, they made it sort of grand so that it wouldn't be witnessed, and so that future generations would look at it and would remember.
• 9:34
  SPEAKER_00: And that's why they called it witness.
• 9:37
  SPEAKER_00: Now, the nation of Israel as a whole on the west side of the Jordan, the rest of the clans, they hear about this altar and they kind of go into a frenzy.
• 9:47
  SPEAKER_00: In fact, they are planning to make war.
• 9:50
  SPEAKER_00: Now, if you don't quite understand what's going on here, uh it is very explicit in the law of Moses, in the book of Leviticus, that there is to be essentially one office that is authorized by God Himself to offer sacrifices, and that is the office of the priest.
• 10:10
  SPEAKER_00: And so that there is no priest.
• 10:13
  SPEAKER_00: The tribe of Levi is spread all across.
• 10:16
  SPEAKER_00: We we just read about those cities, those ten cities on the west side of the Jordan.
• 10:22
  SPEAKER_00: They are not on the east side, they are not with these clans, and so they have no priest, they have no tabernacle.
• 10:30
  SPEAKER_00: The tabernacle is in Shiloh, where they depart from.
• 10:33
  SPEAKER_00: And so this would be a grave violation of the commandments of the Lord.
• 10:40
  SPEAKER_00: And so while it may feel like, what's the big deal?
• 10:42
  SPEAKER_00: They just created an altar, uh, this would be if their intention was to disobey, if their intention was essentially to start their own priestly order and to offer their own burnt offerings and sacrifices, that would be rebellion.
• 10:58
  SPEAKER_00: That would be breaking the covenant, which is why when uh the representatives, the the ten heads of the clans and the son of Eliezer, the high priest, is sent over there to kind of ask questions and see what's going on.
• 11:14
  SPEAKER_00: This is why they point to some history, uh, not so distant history in the life of Israel.
• 11:21
  SPEAKER_00: In fact, in verse 17, they're asking, remember that they're they're at this point they're on the defensive, and they said, Have we not had enough of the sin at Payor from which even yet we have not cleansed ourselves?
• 11:33
  SPEAKER_00: So this is a call back to Numbers 25, where it says, Israel lived in Shidam at the time, and the people began to whore with the daughters of Moab.
• 11:44
  SPEAKER_00: And these invited the people to the sacrifices of their gods, and the people ate and bowed down to their gods.
• 11:52
  SPEAKER_00: So Israel yoked himself to Baal of Peor, and the anger of the Lord was kindled against Israel.
• 12:00
  SPEAKER_00: And so this is what they are concerned about.
• 12:02
  SPEAKER_00: Hey, are you are you constructing another altar?
• 12:05
  SPEAKER_00: Are are you uh offering sacrifices to other gods?
• 12:08
  SPEAKER_00: Have we not had enough?
• 12:10
  SPEAKER_00: They said of the sin.
• 12:11
  SPEAKER_00: Have you not learned uh your lesson?
• 12:14
  SPEAKER_00: In fact, it even reiterates the consequences that happened in Numbers 25 as a result of Israel's rebellion.
• 12:21
  SPEAKER_00: It says, Have we not had enough?
• 12:23
  SPEAKER_00: And for which uh this sin of whoring with the daughters of Moab and offering sacrifices to their false gods and adopting them.
• 12:31
  SPEAKER_00: It says, There came a plague upon the congregation of the Lord.
• 12:36
  SPEAKER_00: And even they they also cite in verse 20 the sin of Achan.
• 12:40
  SPEAKER_00: Did not Achan, the son of Zarah, break faith in the matter of the devoted things?
• 12:44
  SPEAKER_00: This is not the altar of the Lord.
• 12:46
  SPEAKER_00: You do not have the priest of the Aaronic priesthood that God established to offer sacrifices, they're the only authorized individuals.
• 12:55
  SPEAKER_00: Did not Achan, the son of Zarah, break faith in the matter of devoted things?
• 13:00
  SPEAKER_00: And wrath fell upon the congregation of Israel, and he did not perish alone for his iniquities.
• 13:07
  SPEAKER_00: So they're raising the alarm.
• 13:09
  SPEAKER_00: And ultimately, of course, if you read the story, uh the tension and the conflict quickly subsides because they realize no, no, no, they're not trying to offer sacrifices, they're not establishing their own priestly order, they're not offering sacrifices to false gods.
• 13:24
  SPEAKER_00: They've simply built an altar to be a witness, which is what they call the altar.
• 13:29
  SPEAKER_00: We we want this to be a witness, it's a memorial of sorts that reminds us, no, that there's one God.
• 13:36
  SPEAKER_00: We serve the God of Israel.
• 13:38
  SPEAKER_00: So it's just a great reminder of the great detail.
• 13:42
  SPEAKER_00: And even at this point in Israel's history, their great concern for obeying every command of God.
• 13:50
  SPEAKER_00: And they wanted to be obedient, they wanted to love the Lord their God with all their heart, soul, mind, and strength.
• 13:56
  SPEAKER_00: And so that's why there was this conflict, this brewing conflict, because it seemed like these tribes that went to the east side of the Jordan were just right back to the sin of Peor or the sin of Achan, and so Israel was having none of it.
• 14:10
  SPEAKER_00: Hey, have we not have enough?
• 14:12
  SPEAKER_00: Have we not seen the consequences that come from disobeying the word of the Lord?
• 14:18
  SPEAKER_00: And really that gets us to our Proverbs today.
• 14:20
  SPEAKER_00: In Proverbs 13, verse 13, it says, Whoever despises the word brings destruction on himself.
• 14:28
  SPEAKER_00: Whoever despises the instructions of the Lord, and really this whole chapter is kind of focusing on instructions, teaching, listening, hearing uh commandments ultimately of the Lord.
• 14:42
  SPEAKER_00: And so it says, Whoever despises the word brings destruction on himself, but he who reveres the commandment will be rewarded.
• 14:51
  SPEAKER_00: So we see that wisdom actually lived out in Joshua chapter 22, because they're thinking to themselves, the the ten um representatives from the clans and and the the son of Eliezer, that the priest Phineas, that they're thinking they're despising the word, they're breaking the commandment.
• 15:07
  SPEAKER_00: What are they doing?
• 15:09
  SPEAKER_00: But in fact, we see no no no, everyone is on the same page here, they're not despising the word, they are revering the commandment, and as a result, at this point, the nation is rewarded, the conflict subsides, and of course, this is stapled into the wisdom of Israel because it's it's wisdom from the Lord.
• 15:27
  SPEAKER_00: So whoever despises the word.
• 15:29
  SPEAKER_00: So in our context, despising the word would be ignoring the commandments of God, ignoring what his word says, living our lives how we see fit, building our own altars, uh, erecting our own tabernacles, worshiping our own gods.
• 15:45
  SPEAKER_00: And the Bible says, no, no, no, no, no.
• 15:48
  SPEAKER_00: That brings destruction.
• 15:50
  SPEAKER_00: We need to be the people that revere the commandments of the Lord that are kept and preserved for us in his word.
• 15:56
  SPEAKER_00: And we need to trust that he who reveres the commandment will be rewarded.
• 16:01
  SPEAKER_00: It goes on in verse 14 and says, The teaching of the wise is a fountain of life, that one may turn away from the snares of death.
• 16:12
  SPEAKER_00: The teaching of the wise.
• 16:13
  SPEAKER_00: And who is wise, but the one who fears the Lord and keeps his commandments.
• 16:18
  SPEAKER_00: And even as proof of that, verse 15, good sense wins favor.
• 16:23
  SPEAKER_00: Good sense that's rooted in wisdom, the teaching of the wise, uh, wins favor.
• 16:29
  SPEAKER_00: But the way of the treacherous is their ruin.
• 16:33
  SPEAKER_00: And it concludes in verse 16: every prudent man acts with knowledge, but a fool flaunts his folly.
• 16:40
  SPEAKER_00: Every person that is seeking to be wise is prudent, is making decisions in a kind of measured way, acts with knowledge.
• 16:48
  SPEAKER_00: But a fool, of course, they're gonna flaunt their folly.
• 16:51
  SPEAKER_00: They're gonna run headfirst without considering their steps, without consulting the Lord.
• 16:57
  SPEAKER_00: They're gonna make some of the same mistakes that Israel has made in uh Joshua, where they don't ask, they they just do, and they get into some tricky situations.
• 17:05
  SPEAKER_00: They sign contracts with nations that they shouldn't, and they are deceived by the Gibeonites as an example.
• 17:11
  SPEAKER_00: And uh we see that that's how a fool operates.
• 17:14
  SPEAKER_00: But a prudent man acts with knowledge.
• 17:17
  SPEAKER_00: So in Joshua 22 and in Proverbs 13, 13, we see uh that the Bible's very clear that we ought to be people of the word.
• 17:25
  SPEAKER_00: We ought to revere the commandments of the Lord.
• 17:29
  SPEAKER_00: And I think it's an appropriate response that uh Phinehas and those ten uh clans representatives uh that they have.
• 17:36
  SPEAKER_00: They're concerned.
• 17:37
  SPEAKER_00: Are they just despising the the covenant?
• 17:40
  SPEAKER_00: Are they despising the commands of the Lord?
• 17:43
  SPEAKER_00: Are they despising the word?
• 17:44
  SPEAKER_00: And of course, in a very positive way, we find out no, they're not doing that, but they're the concern is good.
• 17:50
  SPEAKER_00: That's a concern that we ought to share.
• 17:52
  SPEAKER_00: We want to be those who revere the commands of the Lord.
• 17:55
  SPEAKER_00: We we want to be trusting that we will be rewarded.
• 17:59
  SPEAKER_00: I think of even Psalm 19: those who keep the commandments, uh, in keeping them there is great reward.
• 18:05
  SPEAKER_00: So we see that reiterated here in Proverbs 13.
• 18:09
  SPEAKER_00: So let's be people of the book.
• 18:11
  SPEAKER_00: Let's be people who are concerned with the commandments of the Lord, who don't despise it by rejecting it, but in fact, who are the wise and who are the prudent that act according to the knowledge that's uh grounded in the fear of the Lord that's grown through the word of the Lord.
• 18:29
  SPEAKER_00: Well, thank you so much for joining us today on a lamp and light Bible reading podcast.
• 18:32
  SPEAKER_00: For more information about Compass Bible Church South Valley, visit compass bible sv.org.
• 18:37
  SPEAKER_00: Keep reading, keep growing.
• 18:40
  SPEAKER_00: God's word is a lamp to your feet and a light to your path.