Achan's Death??

[Jephte21]

I'm not questioning the authority of the Lord God in this matter. But why did God did not show mercy unto Achan and his family after he admit that he have sin against the Lord?Joshua 7:20 And Achan answered Joshua, and said, Indeed I have sinned against the Lord God of Israel, and thus and thus have I done: did he end up in hell after what he had done, even though it seems like he repent. It certainly shows to me how seriously The Lord God take sin and why we should ask for the fear of the Lord everyday, so we do not break his commandments.

[creationliberty]

And ye, in any wise keep yourselves from the accursed thing, lest ye make yourselves accursed, when ye take of the accursed thing, and make the camp of Israel a curse, and trouble it. But all the silver, and gold, and vessels of brass and iron, are consecrated unto the LORD: they shall come into the treasury of the LORD.
-Jos 6:18-19

Who's to say God didn't show him mercy? For example, a murderer can be forgiven of his crime before God through repentance, but still have to pay for the crime on earth.
Verily I say unto thee, Thou shalt by no means come out thence, till thou hast paid the uttermost farthing.
-Matthew 5:26

At the same time, he stole from God Himself. The confusion may be that it wasn't the mercy that you personally thought he should have been given, and though you may not have thought you questioned God's authority, the phrasing of your question actually did question God's authority because you said, "why did God not show mercy unto Achan," which is based on an assumption that there was no mercy involved, instead of asking, "How did God show Achan mercy for his confession?" or even more concerning, "Did Achan come to repentance for his crime?" (It doesn't say he repented, only confessed.) It is not up to us to decide what mercy is given to whom:
What shall we say then? Is there unrighteousness with God? God forbid. For he saith to Moses, I will have mercy on whom I will have mercy, and I will have compassion on whom I will have compassion. So then it is not of him that willeth, nor of him that runneth, but of God that sheweth mercy.
-Rom 9:14-16

God sees the heart, and makes pure and righteous judgments that, in reality, we don't even have the right to question. God's judgment is good, no matter how we might perceive it, and therefore, we should judge ourselves first; just as Achan should have judged himself, so he wouldn't have stolen from God in the first place.
For if we would judge ourselves, we should not be judged. But when we are judged, we are chastened of the Lord, that we should not be condemned with the world.
-1Co 11:31-32

[Jeanne]

Keep in mind, too, that Achan didn't confess until the Lord pinpointed him.

Joshua 7:13 Up, sanctify the people, and say, Sanctify yourselves against to morrow: for thus saith the Lord God of Israel, There is an accursed thing in the midst of thee, O Israel: thou canst not stand before thine enemies, until ye take away the accursed thing from among you. 14 In the morning therefore ye shall be brought according to your tribes: and it shall be, that the tribe which the Lord taketh shall come according to the families thereof; and the family which the Lord shall take shall come by households; and the household which the Lord shall take shall come man by man. 15 And it shall be, that he that is taken with the accursed thing shall be burnt with fire, he and all that he hath: because he hath transgressed the covenant of the Lord, and because he hath wrought folly in Israel.

16 So Joshua rose up early in the morning, and brought Israel by their tribes; and the tribe of Judah was taken: 17 and he brought the family of Judah; and he took the family of the Zarhites: and he brought the family of the Zarhites man by man; and Zabdi was taken: 18 and he brought his household man by man; and Achan, the son of Carmi, the son of Zabdi, the son of Zerah, of the tribe of Judah, was taken. 19 And Joshua said unto Achan, My son, give, I pray thee, glory to the Lord God of Israel, and make confession unto him; and tell me now what thou hast done; hide it not from me.

It's not like he came forward willingly and confessed his sin. He only did it when Joshua confronted him.

[ThomasHGW]

I also thought it was interesting that Joshua said to give God glory, and make confession unto him; AND tell me what you did, but from what I see, Achan only confessed to Joshua, I'm not even sure he confessed to God, or repented... but as stated earlier we are not to judge Gods judgment, we can only read what we see
Joshua 7:19-20 And Joshua said unto Achan, My son, give, I pray thee, glory to the LORD God of Israel, and make confession unto him; and tell me now what thou hast done; hide it not from me. And Achan answered Joshua, and said, Indeed I have sinned against the LORD God of Israel, and thus and thus have I done: When I saw among the spoils a goodly Babylonish garment, and two hundred shekels of silver, and a wedge of gold of fifty shekels weight, then I coveted them, and took them; and, behold, they are hid in the earth in the midst of my tent, and the silver under it.


Joshua 6:18 And ye, in any wise keep yourselves from the accursed thing, lest ye make yourselves accursed, when ye take of the accursed thing, and make the camp of Israel a curse, and trouble it.
Joshua 6:24 And they burnt the city with fire, and all that was therein: only the silver, and the gold, and the vessels of brass and of iron, they put into the treasury of the house of the LORD.
Joshua 7:1 But the children of Israel committed a trespass in the accursed thing: for Achan, the son of Carmi, the son of Zabdi, the son of Zerah, of the tribe of Judah, took of the accursed thing: and the anger of the LORD was kindled against the children of Israel.
Also note that the LORD  made a covenant with Israel, and it seems as though Achan was the only one who stole of the accursed thing in chapters 6-7.
So when one person broke the covenant with the LORD it says the children of Israel committed a trespass in the accursed thing.

[creationliberty]

Perhaps I should have added the point, in additions to the good points that Jeanne and Thomas made, that the commandment was to destroy every man, woman, child, and beast who owned those materials. Once Achan took possession of them, he was now one of them.

[anvilhauler]

It is a shame that the last forum was lost as we covered this also in one of the discussions on contradictions.

Deuteronomy 24 Authorized (King James) Version (AKJV)
16 The fathers shall not be put to death for the children, neither shall the children be put to death for the fathers: every man shall be put to death for his own sin.

Joshua 7 Authorized (King James) Version (AKJV)
24 And Joshua, and all Israel with him, took Achan the son of Zerah, and the silver, and the garment, and the wedge of gold, and his sons, and his daughters, and his oxen, and his asses, and his sheep, and his tent, and all that he had: and they brought them unto the valley of Achor. 25 And Joshua said, Why hast thou troubled us? the Lord shall trouble thee this day. And all Israel stoned him with stones, and burned them with fire, after they had stoned them with stones.

It would seem that they too were then transgressors of the Law in that they punished the innocent children for the sin of their father.  Unless the children were old enough to also be involved and knew what they were doing.

[creationliberty]

It is often implied in conversation in our Bible studies that others are not as well-versed in Scripture as I may be. The difference is not because I have some sort of special powers that no one else has, but rather, because, over the years in teaching, I've been forced to repeat many doctrines over and over, and repeat the answer to the same question over and over, and that's what keeps me sharp. Having a convenient place to refer back to can be helpful, but it may also be good that we don't always have that, simply so we can answer the question again, refresh our memories, and be sharper in the Word.

Pointing out "them" was good to bring up as well. The man cursed his own family, or at least, it appears that way. We don't know all the details; perhaps the man's wife and children helped him steal from God.

[Jeanne]

In Deuteronomy 24, God is telling the people how THEY should judge. The priests (judges) were not to punish anyone other than the guilty party for their transgressions. GOD, on the other hand, has His own rules for how He judges sin:

Exodus 20:5 thou shalt not bow down thyself to them, nor serve them: for I the Lord thy God am a jealous God, visiting the iniquity of the fathers upon the children unto the third and fourth generation of them that hate me;

Exodus 34:6 And the Lord passed by before him, and proclaimed, The Lord, The Lord God, merciful and gracious, longsuffering, and abundant in goodness and truth, 7 keeping mercy for thousands, forgiving iniquity and transgression and sin, and that will by no means clear the guilty; visiting the iniquity of the fathers upon the children, and upon the children's children, unto the third and to the fourth generation.

Numbers 14:18 The Lord is longsuffering, and of great mercy, forgiving iniquity and transgression, and by no means clearing the guilty, visiting the iniquity of the fathers upon the children unto the third and fourth generation.

Deuteronomy 5:9 thou shalt not bow down thyself unto them, nor serve them: for I the Lord thy God am a jealous God, visiting the iniquity of the fathers upon the children unto the third and fourth generation of them that hate me,

In the case of Achan, God was the one who pronounced judgement but He had the people carry it out.

[anvilhauler]

Thanks for the replies.  I went to bed last night and then had the horrible thought that I had changed the course of the discussion and was debating with myself if I should get up and get back on the computer and delete my posting. 

Yes it is good to go over the same materials repeatedly and with this whole topic I found myself standing back again and trying to get a grasp of the overall picture of the events that were happening.

My apologies for bringing in a side issue that were not on topic with the main discussion.  Of the situation with Achan, God also knew that thousands of years later we would be reading the account of these happenings and they would be as instruction for us.  Although I use humour too often to comment about the absurd things that are happening all the time I certainly take the message on board that there is a certain way that God requires us to be within His new camp of those who are redeemed.

[Jephte21]

Thank you guys for pointing out to me my false accusation to the Lord God that he didn't show mercy unto Achan. I just couldn't figure it out reading the scripture. Now I'm going to be more careful with what comes out of my mouth so I do not offend The Lord God with my saying.

May God bless you all !!