Name = Character: Joshua
“Have not I commanded thee? Be strong and of a good courage; be not afraid, neither be thou dismayed: for the LORD thy God is with thee whithersoever thou goest.” - Joshua 1 v9
Joshua’s name is his whole story: “The LORD Saves.”
He was born a slave in Egypt and originally named Hoshea, meaning “salvation.” Moses later changed it to Yehoshua (Numbers 13 v16), putting the name of God at the front. The change says it all: the salvation Joshua would bring was never his own.
He learned to follow before he learned to lead.
Joshua was Moses’ assistant for decades. He led Israel’s first battle against Amalek (Exodus 17), and when Moses left the tent where God met with him, Joshua stayed behind. Scripture says he “departed not out of the tabernacle” (Exodus 33 v11). The man who would command armies began as a servant who stayed close to the presence of God.
Then he was tested: one of two who believed.
Moses sent twelve spies to scout the Promised Land. Ten came back terrified of its giants and fortified cities. Only Joshua and Caleb said, “the LORD is with us: fear them not” (Numbers 14 v9). Israel believed the ten, refused to enter, and wandered the wilderness for forty years. Joshua and Caleb were the only two from that generation who lived to enter the land.
Forty years later, he was handed the impossible job.
Moses was dead. Israel was camped on the east bank of the Jordan River, swollen at flood stage, with the Promised Land on the other side and a hostile country waiting in it. God’s first word to Joshua wasn’t a battle plan. It was a command to be strong and courageous, repeated three times. The courage wasn’t self-generated. It rested on one promise: “as I was with Moses, so I will be with thee: I will not fail thee, nor forsake thee” (Joshua 1 v5).
Then God proved it. The priests carrying the ark of the covenant stepped into the river, and the waters stopped flowing. An entire nation crossed on dry ground (Joshua 3).
His victories were never about military genius.
At Jericho, the first city in their path, there was no siege. Israel marched around the walls in silence for seven days, then blew trumpets and shouted, and the walls fell (Joshua 6). Joshua 10 v42 gives the credit plainly: “the LORD God of Israel fought for Israel.”
And he finished as he started.
At the end of his life, with the land at rest, Joshua gathered the tribes and gave them a choice: “But as for me and my house, we will serve the LORD” (Joshua 24 v15). A leader with nothing left to prove still chose to point past himself.
The lesson for us:
Courage isn’t the absence of fear. It’s obedience that keeps walking because the One who sent you goes with you. Joshua’s name told Israel who would win every battle before it began.
The LORD saves. The LORD leads. The LORD fights for his people.
Heroes of the Constitution: James Madison
“If men were angels, no government would be necessary.”
James Madison didn’t trust power. That’s why the Constitution works.
He’s called the Father of the Constitution, a title he brushed off, saying the document was the work of many hands. But no one worked harder to build it, defend it, or improve it.
He started from a sober view of human nature.
That line from Federalist No. 51 is where most people stop reading. The next line is the point: government has to be strong enough to control the governed, and then be forced to control itself. His answer was structure: separated powers, checks and balances, and ambition set against ambition, so no person or faction could take everything.
He built a republic of limited, enumerated powers.
Madison believed government gets only the powers the people give it. Everything else stays with the people and the states. That idea is the backbone of the Constitution, and it’s the first thing to check any time someone says government should be able to do “whatever it takes.”
He defended it in public.
With Hamilton and Jay, he helped write the Federalist Papers, making the case to ordinary Americans, line by line, for why this system deserved ratification. He didn’t assume people would trust it. He argued for it.
Then he did something harder: he admitted it wasn’t finished.
Madison first doubted a bill of rights was necessary. But many Americans wouldn’t support ratification without one, and he kept his word to them. In 1789 he introduced the amendments in Congress and pushed them through. Those amendments became the Bill of Rights, protecting speech, conscience, the press, and the right to worship freely.
His belief in religious liberty ran deep. In his 1785 Memorial and Remonstrance, he argued that religion belongs to the conviction and conscience of every person, not to the state. Faith that’s forced isn’t faith, and a government that can command your conscience can command anything.
The lesson for us:
Freedom isn’t preserved by hoping the right people stay in charge. It’s preserved by rules that bind everyone in charge, and by citizens who know those rules well enough to defend them.
Madison gave us the framework. Keeping it is our job.
@EricLDaugh Let's be real. If any one of us weren't doing our job, what would happen? Thune needs to tell them to put up or shut up. And if they continue on this path of nothing, kick em out at the polls!
@EricLDaugh Meanwhile, gas and diesel prices are killing American budgets, food prices are high, and we're killing the American cattle farmers with foreign beef that won't lower any prices if the processors don't do anything different. Long term vision seems questionable at best right now.
@News4SA He can want in one hand and crap in the other. The Supremacy clause guarantees that a state level leader cannot stop federal level law enforcement.
Never thought I'd see the day when people actually condoned crime. Make no mistake, crossing the border illegally is a crime.
@RepMTG That all depends on what your definition of freedom of speech is. If you say “I don’t like the government funding Israel’s war with Palestine”, you should absolutely not be criminally prosecuted. Making incendiary comments that ultimately leads to harm should be prosecuted.
@BRun13@RealKevinNash@Lions Those statistics are suspect anyways. In the past it took into account that people who were no longer looking for work as unemployed. You can make the numbers look like anything you want them to in order to sway public opinion. The real test is watching the economy.