Working Class
Joshua 19:49-50
When they had finished distributing the several territories of the land as inheritances, the people of Israel gave an inheritance among them to Joshua the son of Nun. By command of the LORD they gave him the city that he asked, Timnath-serah in the hill country of Ephraim. And he rebuilt the city and settled in it.
If you ran into Joshua at your local grocer, do you think he’d be surrounded by an entourage of chauffeurs or would you find him all by himself, reaching for a jug of milk with dirt still caked to his working boots? Think about that for a moment. If he came to your church as a visitor this Sunday, would he arrive by motorcade and make a scene coming in, or would he slip into the back row, shake hands with the deacons, and then slip back out as covertly as he’d arrived?
To me, Joshua 19:49-50 is an exclamation point to the character of this leader we’ve been watching all along the way. Notice that while he’s the most highly regarded man in the entire commonwealth, he’s also the last man to receive an inheritance. He’s like the mom who prepares a hot meal for her family and then lets them eat while she feeds the baby, having to microwave her own dinner later on. “The last shall be first,” said our Lord. “He who is greatest of all must be servant to all.” And that’s the sort of shepherd Joshua is. First to serve and last to eat.
Notice also that Joshua is industrious. He hasn’t gone to the Gibeonite lumberjacks and said, “Hey, why don’t y’all build me a house while I go rest in this hammock?!” Oh no—victory and glory haven’t suddenly turned him into Pharaoh. Even in his old age, he’s still rolling up his sleeves, bending his neck and back under heavy loads, and getting his hands calloused. See, we tend to think of Joshua as the sort of CEO who just delegated responsibility to everyone else. But the truth is earthier than that. Joshua is a working man, as all goldy men are, with the heart of a king but the hands of a shepherd.
And don’t miss the paradox here, friend, that a land marked by rest is one where godly men are hard at work.