Joshua 16:10

Drove not out. An indictment is brought against the Ephraimites for not driving out the Canaanites from Gezer. Instead they put them under tribute. The real motive was probably covetousness, so that the Ephraimites might be profited by their services. The city and its inhabitants were not destroyed until Solomon’s time, when Pharaoh, king of Egypt, took Gezer and gave it to his daughter, Solomon’s wife (1 Kings 9:16).

By allowing these foreigners to stay in their midst, the Ephraimites were endangering themselves spiritually. The future history of this tribe shows them lapsing completely into idolatry until God was forced to declare through His prophet, “Ephraim is joined to idols: let him alone” (Hosea 4:17). The fate of Ephraim and the associated tribes should serve as a warning to us, not to yoke ourselves together with unbelievers (2 Cor. 6:14). Such an association is almost always detrimental.

To profess fellowship with those who love the Lord, without resolutely setting about to drive out from the life those habits that bind one to this world, is to be in danger of succumbing to the evil these habits are certain to produce in the life. A Christian cannot expect to retain the friendship of the world, to continue his association with worldly-minded persons as before conversion without being influenced by them. Our only safety is to drive out from the life all that tends to evil (see on ch. 17:18).