Delayed blessings

I finished The Book of Joshua today.  Joshua 24 has a scripture mastery scripture in it--one of the most famous in the Old Testament:  "And if it seem evil unto you to serve the Lord, choose you this day whom ye will serve; whether the gods which your fathers served that were on the other side of the flood, or the gods of the Amorites, in whose land ye dwell: but as for me and my house, we will serve the Lord."

But the part that struck me today was Joshua's recounting of the history of the people of Israel and their Exodus, and the ultimate fulfillment of the Lord's promises to them.  Israel waited a long time for these promises.  They's been promised since Abraham, also promised to Isaac, Jacob, and generations spanning decades, even centuries since he died.

Entering Jericho and the rest of Canaan happened centuries after the Lord's promise to Abraham and his posterity.

The Lord told Israel that one reason for the delay in the fulfillment of their promised land was their own wickedness.  But it's also possible to argue that the withholding of that promise wasn't so much a punishment as it was a withholding of the blessing until Israel was ready to receive it.  It gets back to an earlier post on the timing of the Lord.

Today Joshua confirmed to me the need to be patient and faithful.  The Lord honors his commitments and promises, though He sometimes withholds them for our benefit, even if we can't always understand, with our limited perspective, why.