Tricked!

TODAY’S SPECIAL: Joshua 9:1-21

TO CHEW ON: "The Israelites sampled their provisions but did not inquire of the Lord." Joshua 9:14

Have you ever been tricked? Maybe you were tricked for a good thing, like having someone throw a surprise party for you. Or maybe it was for a bad thing, like falling when someone pulled a chair away. The Israelites had a trick played on them the day some raggedy strangers rode into camp.

“Who are you and what do you want?” Joshua asked them.

“We’re people from a far country,” they told him. “We’ve heard about how God has helped you and we’re scared of you. We want to sign a peace treaty with you.”

“How do I know that you’re not from close by?” Joshua asked.

“Here’s proof,” the men said. They showed Joshua dry, moldy bread, cracked wineskins, torn faded clothes and worn out sandals. “These things were all new when we started on this trip,” they told Joshua. “We’ve been traveling so long the bread got moldy, the wineskins cracked and our clothes wore out.”

Joshua and the people tried the bread. It was very old. They examined the wineskins and the clothes. They certainly were worn out. “Yes, we’ll sign a treaty with you,” Joshua told the travelers. But he had missed doing one thing. What was it?__________ (Joshua 9:14)

Just three days later Joshua found out the truth. The men, who said they came from far away, were from Gibeon which was nearby. They had tricked Joshua and the Israelites with old bread, cracked wineskins and dress-up clothes.

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Tags: trust trickery prayer God’s help consequences