The record of the taking of Jericho teaches a lesson that ought to be studied by everyone who is in danger of being led to accept the theories of "Anglo-Israelites," and to expect the return of all Jews to Palestine before the coming of the Lord.
Character of the Inheritance
That victory at the very door of the land of Canaan, showed how alone the land which God has promised could really be possessed, and consequently the character of the inheritance. "By faith the walls of Jericho fell down," (Hebrews 11:30) even as the children of Israel had crossed the Red Sea, and the Jordan by faith. The land which they were to inherit, in fulfillment of the promise of God, was one that could be inherited only by faith-by a people full of faith, and living and moving only by faith. But faith means righteousness. "The just shall live by his faith." (Habakkuk 2:4)
We are made righteous by faith. Therefore the inheritance was to be one in which only righteous people can dwell; and for that we, according to God's promise, still look, "for new heavens and a new earth, wherein dwells righteousness." (2 Peter 3:13)
This was in the promise from the beginning. When God appeared to Abraham in Mesopotamia, and said, "Get you out of your country, and from your kindred, and from your father's house, unto a land that I will show you, ... I will bless you, and make your name great, and you shall be a blessing, ... and in you shall all families of the earth be blessed." (Genesis 12:1-3)
Blessing means the removal of the curse; so the blessing upon all the families of the earth means the removal of the curse from all the earth. The blessing promised to Abraham is forgiveness of sins, the turning away from iniquities; (Acts 3:25-26; Romans 4:6-9) it is also "life for evermore." (Psalm 133:3)
Now the curse came upon the earth because of man's sin, and therefore it follows that when all families of the earth are delivered from sin, the curse will be removed from it. Thus we have it that Abraham and his faithful descendants gladly confessed that they were strangers and pilgrims on the earth, (Hebrews 11:13) even as King David at the height of his power did, (1 Chronicles 29:15) desiring "a better country, that is, a heavenly." (Hebrews 11:16)
And for this reason, "God is not ashamed to be called their God; for He has prepared for them a city." (Hebrews 11:16)
Heirs of God
The promise of God to the seed of Abraham, extending even to us, was, "I will be their God. ... I will establish my covenant between me and you and your seed after you in their generations for an everlasting covenant, to be a God unto you, and to your seed after you." (Genesis 17:8,7)
Compare with: "For this is the covenant that I will make with the house of Israel after those days, says the Lord; I will put my laws into their mind, and write them in their hearts: and I will be to them a God, and they shall be to me a people." (Hebrews 8:10)
The possession of God himself--"heirs of God" (Romans 8:17)--is the essential part of the promise, the sum and substance of it. "I am ... your exceeding great reward." (Genesis 15:1)
Having God, we have all things; "having no hope and without God in the world, [we are] aliens from the commonwealth of Israel, and strangers from the covenants of promise." (Ephesians 2:12)
The Israelites crossed the Jordan, and captured Jericho, by faith--the faith of Jesus--the faith that means the receiving of God, the Divine Word. Their abiding in God was their surety of the possession of the land; without Him, their being in the land, even as rulers, was as though they were in Egypt.
In Him we also obtain the same inheritance, and the Holy Spirit is the pledge of it. His abiding presence causes us to look with confidence and hope for the coming of Christ from heaven, at the time of the "restoration of all things, whereof God spoke by the mouth of His holy prophets which have been since the world began." (Acts 3:21,RV)--Present Truth, October 9, 1902.