Daily Devotional · Joshua 13:1
The Portions That Remain
Reflection
Joshua was old and well advanced in years. The main battles had been won. The land had been broadly conquered. But God came to him with a sobering reality: "There is still very much land to be taken." The book of Joshua then proceeds to describe portions of the land that remained unconquered — Philistia, parts of Lebanon, territories that had not yet been driven out. Not every promised territory was claimed in Joshua's lifetime. Not every tribe fully took possession of its allotment. This was not failure. It was process. The conquest was real but not yet complete. The promises were valid but the possession was progressive. God had said to Israel: "I will drive them out before you little by little... until you have increased enough to take possession of the land" (Exodus 23:30). The remaining land was not evidence that God had not kept His word. It was an invitation to continued faithfulness. The inheritance required claiming — territory by territory, generation by generation. In the Christian life, this pattern holds. We are positionally in Christ — fully justified, fully loved, fully heirs. But experientially, many dimensions of that inheritance remain unclaimed: peace we have not yet possessed, forgiveness not yet fully received, gifts not yet developed, relationships not yet reconciled. There is still much land to take.
Background
The book of Judges picks up where Joshua leaves off and documents the failure of successive generations to claim their inheritance — leading to the cyclical decline described in Judges 2. The land God promised was fully given; the failure was in Israel's willingness to press the claim. This becomes a recurring theological theme in the prophets as well.
Truth
There is always more inheritance to claim. Growing older in faith does not mean the work is finished — it means the territory is familiar and the battles are different. God's word to aging Joshua was not retirement: it was a map of what remained to be claimed.
Application
What portion of your inheritance in Christ remains unclaimed — a character quality, a relationship, a spiritual gift, a dimension of freedom? Name it as your "land to be taken." Ask God for His strategy and one concrete step this week toward claiming it.