#2 – A Misunderstood Witness
A “witness” was defined in our last study as
“…one who has a personal knowledge of God, one who strengthens and confirms God’s testimony of Himself, who draws attention to the Lord.”
This definition is equally applicable to inanimate objects and helps us learn something more about a silent witness.
The Old Testament is replete with examples of inanimate objects intended to be silent witnesses to a truth. God used objects to represent or symbolize something that pointed to Himself or some intrinsic truth.
One example was a large stone to remind the people of Israel about God’s Word. After the tribes of Israel occupied the land of Canaan, Joshua rehearsed the Law of Moses by reading it aloud before them. He then used a large rock as an object lesson in the event people ever forgot the Law or someday denied that it was God’s Word. The large rock was meant to be an unchangeable silent witness to the truth; it would endure as a never-changing reminder even if the people changed. (Joshua 24:27)
Four times the tabernacle in the wilderness, which was designed by God and constructed by Israel for worship, (Exodus 25:9) is called the “tabernacle of witness.” (Numbers 17:7, 8; 18:2; 2 Chronicles 24:6) Its presence as the dwelling place of Jehovah God (Exodus 29:45-46) and place of God-ordained worship was a silent witness to Israel and the surrounding nations that Jehovah had chosen to dwell in the midst of a peculiar people.
Another example of a silent witness in the Old Testament is the stone altar described in Joshua chapter 22. When the tribes of Reuben, Gad and the half-tribe of Manasseh chose land on the eastern side of the Jordan River for their inheritance, they promised Joshua and the other tribes that they would leave their families and land to fight side-by-side with their brethren and claim the Promised Land on the western side. They swore to fight as long as it took to subdue the inhabitants of the land. (Joshua 1:12-18) When the war was over and Joshua granted the nation rest they were honorably released from their promise and sent back to their families. (Joshua 22:1-9) When they reached the western shore of the Jordan River they built a large stone altar as a monument before they crossed over the river. (Joshua 22:10) Shortly thereafter, the other tribes in Israel heard that Reuben, Gad, and the half-tribe of Manasseh had built an altar on the edge of the Jordan and, thinking they had broken their promise to worship only Jehovah and had defected to pagan worship, the other tribes amassed an army to go to war with the two and a half tribes. (Joshua 22:11-20) Before civil war ensued the two and a half tribes explained their reasoning for the stone altar and assured their brethren they had not forsaken the Law of Moses. They repeated their dedication to the God of Israel and their unity with the other tribes. With the purpose of the stone altar finally made clear, a catastrophic civil war was averted, and everyone parted in peace. (Joshua 22:21-34)
The intended purpose of the stone altar was to be a silent witness to their commitment to the other tribes, their promise to never forsake the Law of Moses, and their bond to Jehovah the God of Israel. But this was not obvious by simply seeing the stone altar itself. Their commendable purpose – “…it shall be a witness between us that the LORD is God” – could not be discerned by seeing the altar of stones alone. An explanation was needed.
Inanimate objects, whether a single large stone, written tablets of stone, a tent, or a pile of stones, can be misunderstood or not understood at all. A lesson for us as we consider what it means to be a silent witness is that a silent witness, whether a person or an inanimate object, can only make a partial or incomplete statement. A silent witness may be intended to point to God but it might be misinterpreted as something entirely different. Our best intentions and purest motives may need further elaboration before they can point the observer to truth about God.
Rather than discourage us from being silent witnesses, this should motivate us more to pray for an opportunity to explain why we do what we do (1 Peter 3:15) and how those who see our silent witness can come to know the One who is “…the Way, the Truth, and the Life.”
To be continued…
