Israel Commanded to Destroy the Wicked

Student Choice #1 : Israel Commanded to Destroy the Wicked

1. The different nations that the Lord identified are: Hittites, Amorites, Canaanites, Perizzites, Hivites, Jebusites. 
     Israel was commanded to "utterly destroy" them and all things related to them.  They destroyed their places of worship, their idols, etc.  Israel was commanded to do this because of the wickedness of the Canaanite people and the disobedience and sin that they were involved in.  If just their idols were destroyed then they might have tried to rebuild elsewhere and pick up their practices again.  I like how God makes it clear that he doesn't senselessly destroy nations of people.  Everyone is given the chance to choose to be obedient to His commands so the Canaanites also could have chosen differently and saved themselves.

2. These nations were destroyed because of the wicked practices they were involved in like worshipping idols and intermarriage, prostitution and homosexuality.  The manual stated that it was so bad the things they were doing were "kinds of evil...so infectious".  When I read that I thought of the flu bug and how it can literally take over a house and everyone gets sick just because they are near to the first sick person.  Not because they too were sick but simply by proximity.  Israel was commanded to give justice in the way that the Lord wanted it done.  The people had to know that their disobedience violated the law and that they could and should have chosen differently.

3.  I think that many of the sins that the Canaanites were involved in doing are sins that we can sometimes find ourselves close to or exposed to on a daily basis and it is our responsibility to keep our spirits clean and pure by staying as far away from those sins as possible.  Like I already related, sometimes just being close to them makes it easier for us to pick them up.  We need to keep our standards high and  focus on the Lord and on His teachings...align our will and our desires to match His and that sort of focus can help us to stay where we need to be.