Joshua 7:14 In the morning therefore ye shall be brought according to your tribes: and it shall be, that the tribe which the Lord taketh shall come according to the families thereof; and the family which the Lord shall take shall come by households; and the household which the Lord shall take shall come man by man.
[Patriarchs & Prophets pp 494>495] The lot was to be employed for the detection of the guilty. The sinner was not directly pointed out, the matter being left in doubt for a time, that the people might feel their responsibility for the sins existing among them, and thus be led to searching of heart and humiliation before God. Early in the morning, Joshua gathered the people together by their tribes, and the solemn and impressive ceremony began.
Step by step the investigation went on. Closer and still closer came the fearful test. First the tribe, then the family, then the household, then the man was taken, and Achan the son of Carmi, of the tribe of Judah, was pointed out by the finger of God as the troubler of Israel. To establish his guilt beyond all question, leaving no ground for the charge that he had been unjustly condemned, Joshua solemnly adjured Achan to acknowledge the truth.
The wretched man made full confession of his crime: “Indeed I have sinned against the Lord God of Israel.... When I saw among the spoils a goodly Babylonish garment, and two hundred shekels of silver, and a wedge of gold of fifty shekel's weight, then I coveted them, and took them; and, behold, they are hid in the earth in the midst of my tent.” Messengers were immediately dispatched to the tent, where they removed the earth at the place specified, and “behold, it was hid in his tent, and the silver under it.
Matthew 10:26 For there is nothing covered, that shall not be revealed; and hid, that shall not be known.
May The Lord add His blessing to the study of His word. God bless!