and the territory of the Canaanites stretched from Sidon towards Gerar and all the way to Gaza, then towards Sodom, Gomorrah, Admah, and Zeboiim, all the way to Lasha.
I will give you and your descendants the whole country of Canaan—where you've been living as a foreigner—as land to own forever, and I will be their God.”
I will fix your borders from the Red Sea to the Sea of the Philistines, and from the desert to the Euphrates River. I will hand the inhabitants of the land over to you, and you will drive them out.
I said to myself, I really want you to be my children, and to give you the best country, the most beautiful place of any nation. I hoped you would call me “Father,” and never give up following me.
This is what the Lord God says: “These are the boundaries you are to use when allocating ownership of the land to the twelve tribes of Israel (Joseph is to receive two allocations.)
You are to allocate the land to them equally. I held up my hand and made a solemn promise to give it to your forefathers, so this land will come to you to own and to pass on as an inheritance.
to open their eyes so they can turn from darkness to light, from the power of Satan to God, and so they can receive forgiveness for their sins and a place with those who are set right as they trust in me.’
So Joshua took the entire land in accordance with what the Lord had instructed Moses, giving it to Israel to own as it was divided up among the tribes. Then the land was at peace.
Many years had passed by, and Joshua had grown old. The Lord spoke to him, saying, “You're now an old man, but there's still a great deal of land still to be taken.