In today’s episode of the Weekday podcast, Bobby shares a powerful lesson from the book of Joshua, chapter 8, where Joshua faces an unexpected defeat at the town of Ai. After the high of conquering Jericho, Joshua assumed the next battle would be easy—but it wasn’t. However, God had a new plan. He instructed Joshua to return to the place of failure and try again, this time following His guidance. Bobby unpacks the key takeaway for all of us: sometimes, our setbacks are opportunities to try again, but this time, with God's direction. By doing things God's way, Joshua found victory, and we too can experience breakthrough when we align our actions with His wisdom. This episode serves as a reminder to trust God's plan, even after failure, and to keep moving forward with faith.
Well, hey, friends, welcome to another edition of the Weekday Podcast. This is Bobby. We are always glad that you're here, Chuck and I count it a privilege to be able to journey with thousands of you every single weekday. And if there's ever a topic that's just burning within you that you want us to talk about, please drop me a note@bobbyugarhillchurch.com. bobbyugarhillchurch.com dot. It'd be so fun to be able to tailor the content for your specific request. Well, speaking of requests, today, I want to pass along just a devotional that I read recently that I thought was super helpful. I thought, man, this is a good lesson for all of us. And it's based out of Joshua chapter eight, verse one, where Joshua and the nation of Israel has really been conquering the land. And sometimes it went well, and in this case, sometimes it doesn't go well. And in the midst of that, God speaks to them and listen to what God says. In Joshua eight one, he says, arise. Go up to AI. See, I have given into your hand the king of AI, his people, his city and his land. Now, if you don't know the background of this, this is just a few miles north of Jericho. And Joshua had circled the name of the city on his wall map, basically saying, this is where we're going to attack. And so they'd had this great victory in Jericho. If you know the story, marching around seven times on the 7th day. And I think Joshua assumed that this next town was going to be easy. I think he thought, man, we've conquered all this great stuff. Now, this next little town is not going to be hard. But if you know the story, Joshua was in for a surprise. The town was full of what I'd call pit bulls. The people of AI bit back, and Joshua's division race home, licking their wounds. And Joshua, quite frankly, was undone.
He didn't know what to do. He was stunned by this massive failure.
Joshua may have been undone, but God wasn't. God told Joshua to revisit that place of failure. In essence, what God told Joshua is, let's do it again, but this time, do it my way. And I don't think Joshua needed to be told twice. He and his men made an early morning march to Aihdenkhdev, the king of AI probably was still strutting around the City because of his victory. And he marched toward Joshua. He left the Town unprotected. And so what ends up happening is the SEAL team, basically that Joshua had charged in. They set fire to the city. Joshua reversed his course. He caught the army of AI in the middle, and the victory was complete. Think about that. Think about how different that was from the first attack. In the first attack, Joshua listened to the voice of spies. In the second, he listened to the voice of God. In the first, he stayed home. In the second, he led the way. In the first, it involved a small unit of people, and his second involved many more men. The first attack involved no tactics. His second attack was strategic and it was sophisticated. So when I read this devotional, I asked the question, well, what's the point? Here's the point. God gave Joshua a brand new plan. He said, try it again. Do it my way. And when Joshua followed God's strategy, guess what? Victory happened. And so today, that's what I think is a good lesson for all of us today. Let's go back and let's do it God's way. Have a great day. We'll see you back here soon.
