On a fertile plain, stood a city whose walls were towers of strength. Around these walls and inside were palms, heavily laden with fruit, with dates. The Israelites gathered in the wilderness near this city, just on the other side of the Jordan River. Jericho, the City of Palms, promised to be the oasis through which they would enter the land of milk and honey.
The first mention of Jericho in God’s word is in the book of Numbers twenty-two, where after forty years in the Sinai wilderness the Israelites encamp with Joshua on the banks of the Jordan, just across from the fertile plains and palms of Jericho — the proud city whose walls seemed impassable. It’s also at this time when Balak, king of Moab, summons Balaam to call down curses upon the Israelites. But on the way to Balak, Balaam’s donkey three times refuses Balaam’s direction. Balaam beats the donkey and then God speaks through the donkey to Balaam. Balaam’s eyes are opened and then he sees God is speaking to him. He goes on to bless the Israelites, much to Balak’s and Moab’s horror.
Then in the book of Joshua, Joshua sends two spies to look over the land of Canaan and Jericho. The king of Jericho found out these men were held up with the prostitute, Rahab, and he sent word to her to hand them over to him. But she hid the men, because she feared and believed God and what he would do to Canaan through the Israelites. These men vowed to protect her, before returning to Joshua and reporting all that had happened.
As Joshua prepared for battle and neared the walls of Jericho. Strangely he is encountered by a man holding a sword, whom Joshua asked, “Are you for us or for our enemies?” 14 “Neither,” he replied, “but as commander of the army of the Lord I have now come.” Then Joshua fell facedown to the ground in reverence, and asked him, “What message does my Lord have for his servant?” 15 The commander of the Lord’s army replied, “Take off your sandals, for the place where you are standing is holy.” And Joshua did so. (Joshua 5:13-15)
Joshua’s encounter with the commander of the army of the Lord is very similar to that of Moses on Sinai, at the burning bush. Where these men met was holy ground. Our Commander is the Lord Jesus Christ, and here, he was present before Joshua in his pre-incarnate glory, as God the Son from eternity.
It is he who tells Joshua, Jericho will be delivered into his hands when he does what he is commanded to do. For six days, seven priests carried the Ark of the Covenant around Jericho blowing their trumpets, but on the seventh day they carried the Ark around Jericho seven times before Joshua commanded all the people to shout, saying …the Lord has given you the city! (Joshua 6:16) And at their shout and trumpet blasts God levelled the city walls so the Israelites could pass into the city and destroy every living creature, except for the prostitute Rahab and her family. (Joshua 6:15-27)
At that time Joshua pronounced this solemn oath: “Cursed before the Lord is the man who undertakes to rebuild this city, Jericho: “At the cost of his firstborn son will he lay its foundations; at the cost of his youngest will he set up its gates.” (Joshua 6:26)
After this Jericho was a comparative city for all other places the Israelites destroyed; each subsequent city was destroyed in the same way as Jericho. Jericho is also used in the Old Testament to define locations of borders and directions in Israel’s early days of habitation in Canaan. But this City of Palms didn’t have its population and prosperity protected, because of Joshua’s curse on whoever might try to rebuild it.
Israel did evil in the eyes of the Lord and the City of Palms then fell into Moab’s hands for eighteen years under King Eglon. God raised up Ehud who had made a double edged sword, a foot and a half long (about forty-five centimetres). Ehud, Judge of Israel, went and plunged the sword into Eglon, king of Moab, and then led Israel against Moab, in one of these battles ten-thousand men from Moab were struck down.
Then King David uses Jericho as a type of halfway-house after he sent a delegation of men to the Ammonites to pass on Israel’s condolences after their king had died. The Ammonites saw the men coming and humiliated them by cutting off their beards and their tunics from the waist down, so they returned home with bald heads and backsides. Kings David commanded the men stay at Jericho until their beards grew back. (2 Samuel 10:1-19, 1 Chronicles 19:1-19)
Many years later when Israel had become two kingdoms — and Ahab became King of Israel, and Elijah spoke out against him and his wife Jezebel — Hiel of Bethel decided to rebuild Jericho’s foundations and gates. Because of Joshua’s oath and curse, Hiel lost his first born son and his youngest son. (1 Kings 16:34)
This forsaken City of Palms was also the place where King Zedekiah was captured before his family was murdered, and he had his eyes plucked out, at the order of Nebuchadnezzar, king of Babylon. (Jeremiah 52:4-11)
In the New Testament the City of Palms featured in Jesus’ parable of the Good Samaritan. As the players move along the road, the characters travel from Jerusalem down to Jericho. But it was only the Samaritan who picked up the stricken man. Ironically, as Jesus told this parable, he is on his “way” up to Jerusalem to be stricken on the cross. (Luke 10:25-37)
In addition to this, Jesus finds himself in Jericho, healing people and spending time with Israel’s “low-lives” just prior to his entry into Jerusalem. The City of Palms which Joshua had entered so many years beforehand, which had become nothing more than a curse, or, at best, a halfway house for Israel, was now entered by Jesus Christ, our Holy Commander and Saviour. As he came and went he healed blind men on the road into and out of Jericho (Matthew 20:29; Mark 10:46; Luke 18:35).
Then we hear in Luke chapter nineteen: Jesus entered Jericho and was passing through. 2 A man was there by the name of Zacchaeus; he was a chief tax collector and was wealthy. 3 He wanted to see who Jesus was, but being a short man he could not, because of the crowd. 4 So he ran ahead and climbed a sycamore-fig tree to see him, since Jesus was coming that way.
5 When Jesus reached the spot, he looked up and said to him, “Zacchaeus, come down immediately. I must stay at your house today.” 6 So he came down at once and welcomed him gladly. 7 All the people saw this and began to mutter, “He has gone to be the guest of a ‘sinner.’”
8 But Zacchaeus stood up and said to the Lord, “Look, Lord! Here and now I give half of my possessions to the poor, and if I have cheated anybody out of anything, I will pay back four times the amount.” 9 Jesus said to him, “Today salvation has come to this house, because this man, too, is a son of Abraham.
So Jesus ate with the sinner Zacchaeus, whose faith and repentance lead Jesus to declare salvation to him and refer to him as a “son of Abraham”. (Luke 19:1-9)
But, even greater, is the healing he brings to Israel and all humanity when he leaves the humiliated and cursed City of Palms and rides over palms into the City of David, where he is humiliated on the cursed cross for our salvation.
Now the risen Lord has approached us with his double-edged sword, and he, “the Commander of the Lord’s army”, is overthrowing the enemy within us and in all places for all eternity. He calls us to believe he is our friend and not our foe; he is the valiant one who fights for us and has won the battle for us. Jesus, like Joshua who led Israel into Jericho, will lead us, his kingdom, into the eternal City of Palms and Peace. Amen.
