The Mission of God (15)
Notes
Transcript
The Mission of God
CHOOSE THIS DAY WHOM YOU WILL SERVE!
Introduction
Joshua 24 is all about commitment: commitment to one’s family, commitment to truth and to moral virtue, and above all else, commitment to God.
Life today is not about commitment instead it is all about choices and the opportunity to set my course at my own pace in a way that makes me feel good and satisfies my most basic needs.
My best life now is a Life that is all about the unfettered freedom to turn on a dime and go in the opposite direction this month from the direction I was heading last month. Keep your options open. Don’t lock yourself into anything or anyone. Your’re free to go and do as you please.
This is one reason fewer and fewer husbands are committed for life to their wives. It’s why wives are less and less committed for life to their husbands. Commitment is ok so long as it’s convenient. Commitment works so long as it’s comfortable.
In Joshua 24, we find Joshua’s final words to Israel just before his death at 110.
It takes place at Shechem (v. 1), where years before one of the most remarkable scenes of covenant renewal took place (see 8:30-35). The entire nation and all its leaders were present as Joshua reminded them of what God had done in the past (vv. 2-13) and what commitment on their part for the future entailed (vv. 14-28).
Joshua Recounts God’s Faithfulness to Israel
Joshua’s summary of Israel’s history served one dominating purpose: to showcase from Israel’s history the sovereignty of God that brought them to their destiny!
Joshua uses the first-person singular pronoun I for God as he explains Israel’s past deliverance and present placement:
• “I took your father Abraham from the region beyond the Euphrates” (v. 3).
• “To Isaac I gave Jacob and Esau” (v. 4).
• “I gave the hill country of Seir to Esau as a possession” (v. 4).
• “I sent Moses and Aaron” (v. 5).
• “I defeated Egypt by what Idid within it” (v. 5).
• “Afterward I brought you out” (v. 5).
• “When I brought your ancestors out of Egypt” (v. 6).
• “Your own eyes saw what I did to Egypt” (v. 7).
• “I brought you to the land of the Amorites” (v. 8).
• “I handed them over to you” (v. 8).
• “I annihilated them before you” (v. 8).
• “I would not listen to Balaam” (v. 10).
• “I rescued you from him” (v. 10).
• “I handed them over to you” (v. 11).
• “I sent hornets ahead of you” (v. 12).
I gave you a land on which you had not labored and cities that you had not built, and you dwell in them. You eat the fruit of vineyards and olive orchards that you did not plant.’
It’s the only and ultimate reason why Israel now stands in possession of the land of Canaan. It’s also the only and ultimate reason why you are here today, in possession of eternal life and forgiveness of sin. It’s also the only and ultimate reason why there is Grace Covenant Church.
Do you think of your life in these terms?
Do you see that all you are and have and now can reasonably hope for in the future and into eternity is all because of the singular gracious commitment of God to you in Christ Jesus?
Get Rid of the Idols
Joshua 24:14 (ESV)
14 “Now therefore fear the Lord and serve him in sincerity and in faithfulness. Put away the gods that your fathers served beyond the River and in Egypt, and serve the Lord.
In the light of all God had done in Israel’s history to get them to their present destiny, their idolatry was a slap in the face of the sovereign One.[2]
This is not the third generation after Abraham.
There had been scores of generations by this time. Moreover, the years that had passed had been years of the greatest blessing and of tremendous demonstrations of the power of the true God over all the other “gods.”
Even here, at one of the most significant peaks in all Israel’s long history, Joshua needed to urge the destruction of these idols.
Are we better? Those who know their hearts know that the sins of the past cling closely to us and are a danger at every turn.
It is always necessary to reject the false and choose (and continue always to choose) to worship and serve the true God. [3]
Consider Your Response
“But as for me and my house, we will serve the Lord.”
Joshua 24:15 (ESV)
15 And if it is evil in your eyes to serve the Lord, choose this day whom you will serve, whether the gods your fathers served in the region beyond the River, or the gods of the Amorites in whose land you dwell. “But as for me and my house, we will serve the Lord.”
1. You must choose! Straddling the fence and wavering between options is impossible. There is no such thing as neutrality regarding your relationship with God. Indecision is a decision!
It’s all or nothing. These words from Joshua were a call for undivided loyalty and complete commitment. You must choose for yourself! No one can make this choice for you. Joshua couldn’t make it on behalf of the Israelites. I can’t make it for you.
Joshua: An Expositional Commentary (Choose This Day)
the tense he used implied more than a once-for-all choosing, as if one can make a choice and be done with it thereafter. The tense involves what grammarians call continuous action. That is, it involves the past, but it also involves the present and the future.
It is as if Joshua had said, “I have chosen to serve the Lord; I am choosing that same path of service now; and I will go on choosing to serve God until the very end.”
Schaeffer writes, “This was the character of Joshua. He chose, and he chose, and he chose, and he kept right on choosing. He understood the dynamics of choice—once-for-all choice and existential choice as well. Thus his word to the people was not an affirmation puffed up on the spur of the moment. It was deeply imbedded in Joshua’s comprehension of what is required of a person made in the image of God, one called upon not to obey God like a machine or an animal, but to obey God by choice
2. Joshua’s remarkable Example
at the end of verse 15. Whatever the people decide to do, even if they decide to go back to the gods of Egypt or back to the gods that Abraham worshiped before he came to know the Lord on the other side of the River Euphrates, Joshua says, “As for me and my house, we will serve the Lord.”
3. Notice his commitment there is not for himself alone but for his household also.
“and my house”
Dads and moms, there is no use
We must be saying by our choices that we want our children and all those who are behind us to follow Jesus.
if you are half-hearted and lukewarm in it yourself. You cannot say you are resolved to give your heart exclusively to Christ while college football and the condo at the beach and the house in the country and almost every other chance you get to abandon the worship of God for your own entertainment takes priority in your life.
We are always discipling our children and those who are watching us. , always.
You are always catechizing them. What are you teaching them, not only by your words but by your example?
What are you catechizing your children really to believe? You can be a Christian just fine while giving Jesus the dregs of our time and attention. That the Lord will never really call you to sacrifice your comfort or your money or your time or your priorities?
although everyone eventually reaches the age when he or she must choose for oneself,
Joshua took responsibility for more than himself. He acknowledges the obligation he has as the leader of his entire family.
Israel’s Response
Joshua 24:16–19 (ESV)
16 Then the people answered, “Far be it from us that we should forsake the Lord to serve other gods, 17 for it is the Lord our God who brought us and our fathers up from the land of Egypt, out of the house of slavery, and who did those great signs in our sight and preserved us in all the way that we went, and among all the peoples through whom we passed. 18 And the Lord drove out before us all the peoples, the Amorites who lived in the land. Therefore we also will serve the Lord, for he is our God.” 19 But Joshua said to the people,
“You are not able to serve the Lord, for he is a holy God. He is a jealous God; he will not forgive your transgressions or your sins.
After Joshua challenges the people to a renewed commitment, in verses 16 through 18 they respond in a way that any evangelist worth his salt would dream about their hearers responding like this.
Do you see how they respond?
Joshua issues the call, and they all come streaming down the aisle. They sign the card. They pray the prayer, don’t they? “We’re all in, Joshua! No holds barred! Me too! Sign me up!” That’s what they say. And I suppose, were we in Joshua’s position, we might leap for joy at the response and immediately admit them to membership in the church and move right along.
But look at verse 19. Joshua apparently needs some lessons on how to do evangelism.
Verse 19 – he doesn’t say to them, “Well now you’ve prayed and signed the card. You’re all set!” What does he say?
“You are not able to serve the Lord. He is a jealous God. He will not forgive your transgressions or your sins. If you forsake the Lord and serve foreign gods, He will turn and do you harm and consume you after doing you good.”
That’s no way to make converts, Joshua!
We find Jesus doing very similar things in His evangelism.
, don’t we?
“Go and sell all you have and then follow Me,” He told the rich young ruler.
“If anyone would come after Me, let him deny himself and take up his cross daily and follow Me.
For whoever would save his life will lose it, and whoever loses his life for My sake will save it. For what does it profit a man if he gains the whole world and yet forfeits himself?”
Joshua said, “You’re not able to serve the Lord. You’re not counting the cost. You’re rushing into this. You’ve underestimated the persistent wickedness of your rebel hearts and the power of your remaining sin.”
How we need to beware of playing at religion, of keeping our idols while paying lip service to the Lord, of saying one thing but doing another.
The root cause for a lack of commitment is Idolatry
Their inability to keep their commitment to their God is because of the other gods that they serve.
Joshua 24:20–24 (ESV)
20 If you forsake the Lord and serve foreign gods, then he will turn and do you harm and consume you, after having done you good.” 21 And the people said to Joshua, “No, but we will serve the Lord.”
22 Then Joshua said to the people, “You are witnesses against yourselves that you have chosen the Lord, to serve him.” And they said, “We are witnesses.” 23 He said, “Then put away the foreign gods that are among you, and incline your heart to the Lord, the God of Israel.” 24 And the people said to Joshua, “The Lord our God we will serve, and his voice we will obey.”
Do you hear what Joshua is saying?
He is telling the Israelites in no uncertain terms that the root cause of lack of commitment is idolatry!
The underlying explanation for why we are reluctant or ultimately refuse to commit ourselves wholly to God is that we are idolaters!
But how can you say that to us in the 21st century, given the fact that we don’t typically turn from God and run off to the closest pagan shrine and literally bow down in front of a lifeless statue of marble or granite?
None of us have never worshiped a wooden idol or are in the least inclined to burn incense to a golden calf or swear allegiance to a false god.
Let me give you one example to help explain how this applies to us.
Colossians 3:5 (ESV)
5 Put to death therefore what is earthly in you: sexual immorality, impurity, passion, evil desire, and covetousness, which is idolatry.
If covetousness is idolatry, then idolatry need not entail a statue of Buddha or genuflecting in a pagan temple.
Idolatry is any tendency in the human heart to dethrone God for the sake of something else. whether that be money, sex, ambition, power, pride, or something as seemingly innocuous as respectability. To the extent that we give our affections to anything other than God on the assumption that it can do for our souls what he can’t, we are guilty of idolatry.
We are idolators when we begin to lose our contentment in Christ when we say that Christ isn’t altogether adequate, we start to long for other things to satisfy our souls.
We begin to say, “I must have something more than God to make me complete, an experience, event, or possession that I can’t trust God to provide.” In effect, we elevate something above God in our esteem. We put our confidence in the promise of “things” and “stuff” and whatever money can purchase, believing the lie that there is a depth of joy and quality of life in it/them that can’t be found in God.
Anytime our pursuit of more stuff is driven or energized by the belief that it can fulfill the longing of our souls in ways that God cannot, we are guilty of idolatry.
Granting any object or possession such a powerful place in our hearts or elevating it to a position of the highest value, deserving of our utmost effort and attention is to deify it. We in effect are “bowing the knee to another master.” Our hearts are captive to a different “lord.” We have, quite simply, violated the first commandment: “You shall have no other gods before me” (Exodus 20:3).
Some of you won’t commit to a local church to serve and give and sacrifice for others for the glory of God because you worship your own personal comfort and convenience. You have elevated above God your own individual freedom and the pleasure of using your time and money and energy to satisfy your soul’s desire.
We don’t commit to loving God only and living for God only and serving God only because we love, live for, and serve ourselves! That’s idolatry!
Joshua said it as clearly as he could. Paul said it as clearly as he could. And now I’m saying it as clearly as I can: the alternative to commitment is idolatry!
in the very next book of the Bible, in the second chapter where this very verse is repeated, we are told, “After that whole generation had been gathered to their fathers, another generation grew up, who knew neither the Lord nor what he had done for Israel. Then the Israelites did evil in the eyes of the Lord and served the Baals. They forsook the Lord, the God of their fathers, who had brought them out of Egypt. They followed and worshiped various gods of the peoples around them” (Judg. 2:10–12).[6]
“God will not be mocked,” Joshua is saying, and even if you can convince everyone else around you, He knows your heart. He knows, and so be warned. Count the cost of discipleship carefully. Do not presume upon God.
The people are undeterred, and so he makes a covenant with them in verse 25. Verse 27, he erects a stone to be a witness against them should they ever break the covenant and then he sends them all away.
Joshua 24:25 (ESV)
25 So Joshua made a covenant with the people that day, and put in place statutes and rules for them at Shechem.
Joshua 24:27 (ESV)
27 And Joshua said to all the people, “Behold, this stone shall be a witness against us, for it has heard all the words of the Lord that he spoke to us. Therefore it shall be a witness against you, lest you deal falsely with your God.”
God is a God of long-suffering, mercy, and second chances. Israel’s history has proven this. Throughout their history, Israel has been the beneficiary of God’s benevolence, forgiveness, and restoration.
But Joshua tells them they will not be able to serve the Lord! He even tells them God will not forgive their sins and transgressions, though God has forgiven them for past generations. Hadn’t he just told the story?[4]
He was talking about the nature of God and the nature of this people.
God would not tolerate unholiness and insincerity because he is a holy and jealous God. Holiness is the essence of who God is. God is wholly other, righteous and just. He is wholly other, merciful and mighty. He is wholly other, forgiving and punishing. God is set apart from everything unholy, because he cannot tolerate sin.
Joshua aims to prevent Israel from making an emotionally charged decision. Joshua knows how fickle Israel has been through the years. He is telling their story, his story, as a crucial part of his-story, and their past failure to obey and their failure to rid themselves of idols do not bode well for their future obedience.[5]
One day
We will worship with all saints because Jesus the greater Joshua calls believers to a renewal of worship and service to God through the power of the Holy Spirit.
Faithful servants will hear, “Well done!” Well done for persevering through the rain. Well done for running on through the rain. Well done for learning and recounting the history of the ancestors of our faith.
Well done for studying the Word made understandable through the Spirit.
Well done for teaching others the way to the cross!
Well done, good and faithful servants, well done!
The pronouncement will be made in the Land of No More—no more sorrow, no more pain, no more suffering, no more tears.
All God’s children will hear, “The kingdom of the world has become the kingdom of our Lord and of his Christ, and he will reign forever and ever” (Rev 11:15). [7]
[1]Smith, R., Jr. (2023). Exalting Jesus in Joshua (D. Platt, D. L. Akin, & T. Merida, Eds.; pp. 239–240). Holman Reference.
[2]Smith, R., Jr. (2023). Exalting Jesus in Joshua (D. Platt, D. L. Akin, & T. Merida, Eds.; pp. 240–241). Holman Reference.
[3]Boice, J. M. (2005). Joshua (p. 134). Baker Books.
[4]Smith, R., Jr. (2023). Exalting Jesus in Joshua (D. Platt, D. L. Akin, & T. Merida, Eds.; p. 242). Holman Reference.
[5]Smith, R., Jr. (2023). Exalting Jesus in Joshua (D. Platt, D. L. Akin, & T. Merida, Eds.; p. 242). Holman Reference.
[6]Boice, J. M. (2005). Joshua (p. 136). Baker Books.
[7]Smith, R., Jr. (2023). Exalting Jesus in Joshua (D. Platt, D. L. Akin, & T. Merida, Eds.; p. 246). Holman Reference.