Deuteronomy 31:8

Israel is camped on the plains of Moab (Numbers 22:1), east of the Jordan, with Canaan in sight across the river. The forty years in the wilderness are over, the generation that rebelled has died, and their children are about to go in. Moses has just led them through the renewal of the covenant, setting before them blessing and curse, life and death (Deuteronomy 27–30). Chapter 31 turns from that long farewell teaching to the practical matters of his death and the handing on of leadership to Joshua.

Verse 1 says that “Moses went and spake these words unto all Israel.” The word for went, yâlak, is the ordinary verb for walking, used both literally and figuratively, and spake is dâbar, to speak or tell. At the end of his life Moses goes to the people and speaks to them in person. “These words” uses dâbâr, which means a word or speech and, in a separate sense, a matter or thing. The phrase gathers up the instruction God has given through Moses, which he now hands on to the generation that will live by it in the land.

His hearers are “all Israel.” In chapter 29 the whole nation stood before the LORD, from the captains and elders to the little ones, the wives and the stranger in the camp (Deuteronomy 29:10–15), and the same whole people hear Moses now. The covenant belonged to every one of them, so every one heard its last charge. In Israel the final words of a leader carried great weight, as Jacob’s last words to his sons did and as David’s charge to Solomon would.

“The LORD thy God, he will go over before thee.” The verb ʻâbar means to cross over or pass through, and it is the word for crossing the Jordan. Moses has just said that he will not go over, and his next words are that the LORD will. The same verb is then used of Joshua: “and Joshua, he shall go over before thee.” God goes first and Joshua follows as his chosen servant, so the one promise carries both God’s power and the leader he has given. This is the God who went before Israel out of Egypt in the pillar of cloud and of fire (Exodus 13:21).

Canaan was held by strong peoples, the Amorites, Hittites, Canaanites, Perizzites, Hivites and Jebusites, many with walled cities and seasoned armies, nations greater and mightier than Israel (Deuteronomy 9:1). Moses says the LORD “will destroy these nations from before thee.” The verb shâmad is the plain word for destroying, and it is often used of God’s judgment. “And thou shalt possess them” points back to the promise of the land first given to Abraham (Genesis 12:7). A psalm later looks back on this and says, “they got not the land in possession by their own sword, neither did their own arm save them” (Psalm 44:3).

“As the LORD hath said” refers to Joshua’s appointment. Earlier, at the LORD’s command, Moses set Joshua before Eleazar the priest and all the congregation and gave him a share of his authority (Numbers 27:18–23). Joshua leads because God chose him, and the people can follow him with confidence.

Verse 4 gives the people a reason to believe this that they had seen for themselves. “The LORD shall do unto them as he did to Sihon and to Og, kings of the Amorites.” Sihon, king of Heshbon, and Og, king of Bashan, were powerful kings east of the Jordan, and Israel had defeated both only a short while before and was living in their land (Numbers 21:21–35). The crossing of the Red Sea belonged to the older generation’s memory. These victories were fresh, and this generation had seen them.

The verb ʻâsâh, “do”, is one of the broadest in Hebrew, covering doing and making of every kind. Here the comparison “shall do … as he did” turns a past victory into a pledge for the future. The God who acted against Sihon and Og will act the same way against the kings of Canaan, because he is the same God. “Whom he destroyed” uses shâmad again. Elsewhere Moses tells Israel that the LORD goes with them to fight for them against their enemies (Deuteronomy 20:4), and that when he delivers the nations of Canaan to them they are to destroy them utterly (Deuteronomy 7:1–2).

Remembering what God has done is one of the ways faith grows strong for what is still ahead. The psalmist says the same in a time of trouble: “I will remember the works of the LORD: surely I will remember thy wonders of old” (Psalm 77:11).

“And the LORD shall give them up before your face.” The verb nâthan means to give, and it is used with great freedom for putting, setting, handing over and delivering up. The victory is God’s gift to Israel. “Before your face” uses pânîym, a word plural in form and always used as a singular, meaning the face and so the front or presence of someone. Israel will see their enemies handed over in front of their own eyes, and they will know who did it.

God’s giving has a purpose: “that ye may do unto them according unto all the commandments which I have commanded you.” The word for commandments, mitsvâh, means a command or precept, and in Deuteronomy it often stands for the whole body of the law. Here it points especially to the commands about the nations of Canaan, to drive them out, make no covenant with them and break down their altars (Deuteronomy 7), and to the laws of war for the cities of the land (Deuteronomy 20:16–18). All of it rests on God’s covenant with Abraham (Genesis 15:18). God gives the victory, and Israel is to carry it out his way. Paul joins the same two things when he tells believers to work out their own salvation, “for it is God which worketh in you both to will and to do of his good pleasure” (Philippians 2:12–13).

With the promise in place, Moses gives the command: “Be strong and of a good courage, fear not, nor be afraid of them.” He says it first to the whole people, and in the next verse to Joshua. Châzaq means to fasten upon or seize, and so to be strong or firm, and it is used of courage. ʼâmats means to be alert, steady and courageous, and the KJV elsewhere renders it “stedfastly minded.” Put together, the two words make one strong charge to hold firm in heart and in action.

“Fear not, nor be afraid of them” names the danger. “Them” are the nations across the river. This generation knew what fear had cost their parents, who refused to go up into the land at Kadesh and died in the wilderness (Numbers 14). Moses now calls their children to the courage their fathers lacked, and he gives the reason at once.

“For the LORD thy God, he it is that doth go with thee.” The verb hâlak is the broad word for walking and going, and here the LORD walks with his people into the land. Their courage rests on his company, so it is courage that anyone among them could have, the weak as well as the strong. A psalm puts it the same way: “The LORD is my light and my salvation; whom shall I fear?” (Psalm 27:1). The LORD repeats this charge to Joshua himself after Moses has died (Joshua 1:1–9).

“And Moses called unto Joshua, and said unto him in the sight of all Israel.” The charge is public. Every tribe sees Moses hand the leadership on, so Joshua’s authority is clear to all, no rival can claim it, and the people see that God’s plan carries on past the death of the man who had led them for forty years.

Moses gives Joshua the same words he gave the people: “Be strong and of a good courage.” The reason follows: “for thou must go with this people unto the land which the LORD hath sworn unto their fathers to give them.” The land rests on God’s oath to Abraham, Isaac and Jacob (Genesis 12:7), and Joshua is the one through whom that old promise will come true for this generation. “And thou shalt cause them to inherit it” sets out his task. He will lead them in taking possession, through the campaigns of the conquest and the dividing of the land among the tribes.

These words became the watchword of Joshua’s life. The LORD says them to him again, three times over, when he takes up the work (Joshua 1:6–9), and adds, “for the LORD thy God is with thee whithersoever thou goest.” David uses the same charge when he hands the building of the temple to Solomon: “be strong, and of good courage; dread not, nor be dismayed” (1 Chronicles 22:13). And the psalmist says, “Wait on the LORD: be of good courage, and he shall strengthen thine heart” (Psalm 27:14).

Verse 8 completes what Moses says to Joshua, and it gathers up the whole passage. “And the LORD, he it is that doth go before thee” uses hâlak again, the LORD going ahead to lead the way. “He will be with thee” adds his company alongside. God made the same promise to Moses: “My presence shall go with thee, and I will give thee rest” (Exodus 33:14). Then come the two verbs of verse 6, râphâh and ʻâzab, “he will not fail thee, neither forsake thee.” The verse moves from God’s leading, to his presence, to his faithfulness, and only then to the command, “fear not, neither be dismayed.”

The word for dismayed, châthath, means to be broken down, by force or by confusion and fear, and its most common sense is to be afraid or discouraged. Before every battle Israel’s priest was to say much the same to the army: let not your hearts faint, for the LORD your God goes with you to fight for you (Deuteronomy 20:1–4). The promise is spoken to Joshua, and it carries the whole nation with him, since the God who leads their leader leads them too. The LORD repeats it to Joshua in nearly the same words (Joshua 1:5).

Moses himself told Israel that God would raise up a prophet like him (Deuteronomy 18:15), and the New Testament shows Jesus as that prophet and greater than Moses. Moses was faithful as a servant in God’s house, and Christ as a Son over his own house (Hebrews 3:1–6). He is the mediator of a better covenant (Hebrews 8:6). “For the law was given by Moses, but grace and truth came by Jesus Christ” (John 1:17), and Jesus came to fulfil the law (Matthew 5:17).

Moses could bring Israel to the Jordan and no further. In that he points to the need for another who can bring God’s people all the way in. Joshua’s name in Hebrew, Yehoshua, means “the LORD saves”, and it is the same name as Jesus. Hebrews notes that Joshua’s rest in Canaan was a foretaste, and that a rest remains for the people of God (Hebrews 4:8–10). Jesus is the way, the truth and the life (John 14:6), he goes to prepare a place for his people (John 14:2–3), and by one offering he has perfected for ever them that are sanctified (Hebrews 10:14). In him believers have obtained an inheritance, sealed by the Holy Spirit (Ephesians 1:11–14).

What the LORD promises in verses 3 to 5, Christ does in a far greater battle. He is the captain of our salvation, made perfect through suffering (Hebrews 2:10), and the author and finisher of our faith (Hebrews 12:2). On the cross he spoiled principalities and powers and made a show of them openly (Colossians 2:15). Through death he destroyed him that had the power of death, the devil, and set free those who all their lifetime were in bondage through fear of death (Hebrews 2:14–15). God has delivered us from the power of darkness and moved us into the kingdom of his dear Son (Colossians 1:13), and “we are more than conquerors through him that loved us” (Romans 8:37).

The promise “he will be with thee” comes to its fullest in Jesus. Isaiah foretold a child called Immanuel (Isaiah 7:14), and Matthew tells us the name means “God with us” (Matthew 1:23). At the close of Matthew’s Gospel the risen Jesus, with all power given to him in heaven and in earth, sends his disciples to teach all nations, as Moses sent Joshua, and promises, “lo, I am with you alway, even unto the end of the world” (Matthew 28:18–20). He promised the Comforter and said he would not leave his disciples comfortless (John 14:16–18). He has overcome the world (John 16:33), and “all the promises of God in him are yea, and in him Amen” (2 Corinthians 1:20).

This passage stands at the end of the greatest leader Israel had known, and its strongest words are about God. Moses would die on the far side of the Jordan, and the LORD would cross it ahead of his people. Joshua would lead, and the LORD would go before Joshua. Every generation of God’s people sees its leaders come to their last day, and here the people are given what outlasts them all: a God who goes before, who goes with, and who will not fail or forsake.

The passage also shows how faith is handed on. Moses gave the people the words of God and charged them to teach those words to their children (Deuteronomy 6:6–7). Joshua was told to keep the book of the law in his mouth and meditate on it day and night (Joshua 1:7–8), and Paul told Timothy to commit what he had heard to faithful men who would teach others also (2 Timothy 2:2). The courage God asks of his people rests on what he has already done and on the promise he has already made, so it is open to anyone who hears his word, at the Jordan or anywhere else.