The Day the Sun Stood Still

A battlefield in the hills. The enemy is running, but the light is fading fast. And one man lifts his face to the sky and says something no one had ever said before. “Sun, stand still.”

To understand this day, you have to know about a trick. A little earlier, the people of Gibeon had heard what happened to Jericho and Ai. They were afraid. So they dressed in worn-out clothes and cracked sandals, packed dry, mouldy bread, and came to Joshua pretending to be from a faraway country. “Make a peace treaty with us,” they said. And Israel did, without asking God first. Three days later they found out the truth. Gibeon was just up the road. But a promise made in God's name is a promise. Israel kept it.

Now the king of Jerusalem, Adoni-zedek, is alarmed. Gibeon is a great city, bigger than Ai, with strong fighting men, and it has just gone over to Israel. So he sends word to four other kings, of Hebron, Jarmuth, Lachish and Eglon. “Come and help me. Let's attack Gibeon.” Five armies march. They surround the city and settle in for the kill. And from behind the walls, the Gibeonites send a desperate message to Joshua's camp at Gilgal. “Don't abandon your servants! Come quickly and save us! All the kings of the hill country have joined against us.”

Joshua could have shrugged. These are the people who fooled him. But he gathers his army, and the Lord speaks to him. “Don't be afraid of them. I have given them into your hand. Not one of them will stand against you.” So Joshua marches all night, uphill from the Jordan valley, through the dark. At dawn, his army appears out of nowhere. The five armies are caught completely by surprise. They panic, and they run, west along the steep road that climbs and then drops down from Beth-horon.

And then the sky joins the battle. As the enemy flees down the slope, the Lord throws huge hailstones down on them, all the way to Azekah. The Bible says more of them died from the hail than from the swords of Israel. And still the day is not done. Joshua stands before all Israel, and speaks to the Lord, and then to the sky itself.

“Sun, stand still over Gibeon. And you, moon, in the valley of Aijalon.”

And the sun stood still, and the moon stopped, until the nation had defeated its enemies. The sun stayed in the middle of the sky and did not hurry to go down for about a whole day. The writer can hardly believe it himself. “There was no day like that before it or after it, when the Lord listened to the voice of a man. For the Lord fought for Israel.” Then Joshua and all Israel went back to the camp at Gilgal. The people who had tricked them were safe, because Israel had kept its word, and because God had kept his.

Here's a detail that's easy to miss. Right after Joshua's words, the Bible says, “Is not this written in the book of Jasher?” Jasher means the Upright. It seems to have been an old collection of poems and songs about Israel's heroes. Second Samuel quotes it again, for David's lament over Saul and Jonathan. The book itself is lost. Because Joshua's words come from a poem, readers have understood this day in different ways. Many take it as a miraculous lengthening of daylight. Others suggest the light was held in some other way, or that the poem celebrates the victory in vivid language. All agree on the point the writer makes: the Lord fought for Israel.

The Day the Sun Stood Still. You'll find it in Joshua chapter 10, verses 1 to 15. It began with a promise that Joshua might have wished he'd never made, and he kept it anyway. So here's the question to carry with you. Is there a promise you've made that's become hard to keep, and what would it look like to keep it?