FRONT-PORCH GOSPEL: Echoes from the Valley of Shechem

Welcome again, friends, to the “front porch.”

Shechem, a city (and a valley) in Samaria, is about thirty-five miles north of Jerusalem, and the site of some of the greatest events in both the Old and New Testaments. Put on your hiking shoes today, and we’ll take a little trip up to this valley and get a glimpse of some of those great events, one in particular.

As we walk into the valley, we look up at two prodigious mountains – Mount Ebal and Mount Girizim – towering a thousand feet over the city, twin towers separated by a valley a mile to a mile-and-a-half wide. Looking out over the valley, we see an abundance of fountains of water flowing down the mountains and through the valley, as many as seventy-five in all. Some of the fountains originate up on Mount Girizim and watershed down eastward all the way to the Jordan. The fountains in the city and those that flow down Mount Ebal proceed westward and empty into the Mediterranean. As these scores of fountains flow through the valley, they nurture a deep, plush forest of fruit trees that grow all around.

But the valley’s beautiful situation is not the greatest part of it, as great as it is. In the narratives of biblical history, we read of many tremendous events that occur here at Shechem. Abraham – as he finally leaves Haran and moves southward into Canaan – makes his first camp and builds his first altar right here in this valley with these two mountains towering over. Having not known the true God very long, the mountains must have reminded him that a greater God than he had ever imagined looks over him now, a God unlike the pagan gods that he left behind in Babylon.

Two generations later his grandson Jacob comes to Shechem after his amiable reunion with Esau. With the fears of the past gone, he buries the hatchet and looks to the God of heaven with renewed thanksgiving. But Jacob’s commitment to the Lord, much like our own, comes in stages. He has not completely loosened himself from the idols that he and his family had gathered through the years in a foreign land. So, here in the valley of Shechem, he gathers his family; and they bury all the idols of the past under an oak tree. The beautiful valley of Shechem has become a valley of virtue and commitment – and it would continue as such for years to come.

Around 1367 B.C., one of the Lord’s greatest warriors comes to this lush valley late in his life. Long before he had led the people across the Jordan to the Promised Land. But now years having passed, he has fought his final battle in the conquest of that land. He is walking the very last mile of the way. He gathers his people together for a ‘Valedictorian’ speech down in the valley of Shechem, the theme of his speech being God’s great mercy and care for them through all the years. “Through many dangers, toils, and strife, we have already come, ‘Tis grace has brought us safe thus far, and grace will lead us home.” Indeed, the great hymn tells the life story of God’s servant Joshua as well as any hymn could.

As Joshua comes to the climax of his final speech, he leaves them with these notable words: “Choose you this day whom you will serve,” he tells them all, “But as for me and my house, we will serve the Lord.” The exclamation of those words echoes off of these two mountains hovering high above. Not one soul in all of Israel could have missed these words, for they all sat to hear – some on the side of Mount Ebal, and others on the side of Gerizim. A man can stand down in that valley – we are told – and speak in a loud voice; and the valley, laid out as in a vacuum, sends the words a mile or more across the valley and up the sides of those the mountains looking down over them.

Can you imagine, today, Joshua’s words echoing through that fountain-filled valley!

“As for me and my house we will serve the Lord!”

It is a resolution for the ages. I am very glad its poignant message still rings out to us today, filling every heart that is open down deep in this valley of Shechem, echoing majestically from mountainside to mountainside.

Coach Steven Bowen, a long-time Red Oak teacher and coach, now enjoys his time as a full-time writer and preacher of the gospel. In addition to his evangelistic travels, he works and writes for the Church of Christ of Red Oak at Uhl Road and Ovilla. Their worship times are 10 a.m. Sundays and 7:30 pm. Wednesdays. Email coachbowen1984@gmail.com or call or text 972-824-5197.