Episode Transcript
[00:00:05] Good morning.
[00:00:06] Hey, good morning. If I have not had the opportunity to meet you, my name is Michael Fueling. I'm the lead pastor here at the church. After the service, I'll be up front and I would just love the opportunity to shake your hand and get to know you. If you have any questions, I'll be up here. And I would love to personally welcome you to week one in our series in the Book of Joshua. If you're new with us, we have already preached through Genesis and Exodus and Leviticus, your favorite sermon series ever, and numbers and Deuteronomy and naturally Joshua. Can you guess what's going to be after Joshua?
[00:00:41] We'll do a New Testament book. No, I'm kidding. Yes, then. And then we'll probably jump into judges. And so our preaching team, we just had a blast teaching through the Torah so far. And excited to get into this next season of God's Word with you. I want to just say up front a couple things about the Book of Joshua.
[00:00:57] Joshua is a book for people who want God to use them.
[00:01:03] Joshua is a book for those who are willing to follow God wherever he leads.
[00:01:11] Joshua is also a book for those who are willing to receive and to respond to strong challenges and sometimes a kick in the rear. All right, so let's jump into our first message. I want to ask your opinion on something, but here's the deal. This is going to be rhetorical. So you get to share your opinion maybe with your family or people at lunch after this.
[00:01:33] Who are the most, in your opinion, evil people alive on planet earth right now? I'll share with you my short list.
[00:01:45] I'm not going to talk about Canadians. Don't worry, we're fine here.
[00:01:48] I'm from Detroit. That's the thing. Okay, but in all seriousness, how about the gangsters who run the human trafficking industry?
[00:01:59] How about extremist Muslims who behead and slaughter Jews and Christians and then chain their children to do the same? How about groups like Boko Haram who right now in Nigeria are murdering Christians and trying to exterminate them literally as we speak?
[00:02:12] How about communist dictators and their power hungry cronies who steal their nation's wealth, live like kings while the rest suffer and then disappear? Entire families who don't comply.
[00:02:21] I have a long list. I just gave you my top three.
[00:02:25] Can we just agree that there is a lot of very dark evil in this world?
[00:02:33] So in the Book of Joshua, it is hard to communicate the weight of what God is asking Joshua and the nation of Israel to do. Essentially God is asking Israel to go into a land filled with the most evil people human history has known since the Flood.
[00:02:53] A kind of evil that is most likely not around today. Or if it is, it is contained and restrained by the Spirit of God. And you might be intrigued and thinking to yourself, okay, Pastor Michael, what exactly are you talking about? And one of my jobs this morning is to help you understand the weight of evil that the Israelites had to walk into and. And face head on. So let's jump right in. I'm going to look at the Book of Joshua. We're in chapter one, verse one. Here's what it says.
[00:03:21] After the death of Moses, the servant of the Lord, the Lord said to Joshua, the son of nun Moses, Assistant Moses, my servant is dead.
[00:03:32] Now, therefore arise, go over this Jordan that would be the Jordan river, you and all this people into the land that I am going to give them to the people of Israel. Now, if you're new, or maybe to the book of Joshua, there's something important you need to know.
[00:03:49] That every single one of what has been called the wilderness generation, this would be the parents and grandparents of the people that Joshua is speaking to.
[00:03:59] Every single one of them died in the wilderness. Remember that God took Israel out of Egypt. They went into the promised land, or they went into the wilderness, and God was like, I'm going to bring you into the Promised land. And then they rebelled against God. And as a consequence, for their sin, they wandered and died for 40 years until every last one of that generation was dead, everyone who was 20 years or older. And now it is time for the children to inherit the promise that their parents and their grandparents forfeited. The promise called the Promised Land, a land flowing with milk and honey. And the only two or three old men from the wilderness generation that were going to be allowed into this promised land was number one, Joshua, who this book is named after, and number two, Caleb. And here's what this practically means, that there is no one over the age of 60 years old, and the vast majority of them are under the age of 40. Like, there is no elderly generation, if you will. And I'm not saying you're elderly if you're 61 or older. But you get what I'm trying to to say.
[00:05:10] Verse 3. God continues to give Joshua directions for the challenge ahead. He says, every place that the sole of your foot will tread upon, I have given to you, just as I promised to Moses, from the wilderness and this Lebanon, as far as the great river, the great river Euphrates, all the Land of the Hittites to the great sea toward the going down of the sun shall be your territory. Now let me give you a visual so you can kind of see what this land looked like. And you're going to see three different pictures next to each other. And if you're wondering how. Pastor Michael how do you use AI? These are moments where I love to put in data and then put it in and have it make me stuff. And then I double check and triple check it and use different AIs to make sure I go back and then check that description and put it back through and then triple check that because I don't trust anything. But here's the picture. You have three different images here. You have one which is modern Israel, which is roughly 8,300 to 8,500 square miles.
[00:06:05] Then you have the land that God promised, which is about 55,000 to 60,000 square miles. And to give you kind of like a context, it's similar to the state of Georgia here in the United States of America. And so now you can kind of understand this is the scope of what God has promised to the nation of Israel. Verse 5. The Lord continues describing the mission to Joshua.
[00:06:30] He says, no man shall be able to stand before you all the days of your life.
[00:06:36] Just as I was with Moses, so I will be with you. I will not leave you or forsake you. I love this phrase. I will not leave you. I will not forsake you. I will be with you. We love this, don't we? Village church. We love the fact that when you trust in Jesus Christ, when you come to him and you say, I am sorry for my sins, I. I believe that you died for my sins and were raised from the dead. Be my God when you come to Christ. God gives you so many benefits, one of which is the Holy Spirit, the presence of God himself. And from the moment you trust in Christ, you have the presence of God with you until not just the day you're dead, for all of eternity. I don't care what you feel. I don't care how bad you are. If you are a real, true Christian, you are stuck in the presence of God for all eternity. In light of that, you should know something about this particular promise.
[00:07:28] Whenever God says, I will be with you, you need to know this.
[00:07:34] He's about to send you into something difficult, dangerous, or scary.
[00:07:40] So let me try to the best of my ability to help you understand what was so scary about this land that they were about to enter into. Now buckle up for a moment because we're have some fun together. You up for that?
[00:07:55] Yep. Some of you are like, no, it's church. We don't do fun. Okay.
[00:07:59] There is an important subplot in the Old Testament that is not hard to find if you know what you're looking for.
[00:08:07] And I truly don't think that you can understand the weight of the book of Joshua, the weight of what God is asking Israel to do, until you understand this subplot. Because it just keeps coming up over and over again. And I don't think I'm being dramatic when I say that this subplot is about a very real evil that a real nation Israel had to address head on. And had Israel not addressed this very real evil, in my opinion, none of us would exist today.
[00:08:39] This subplot has, surprisingly to me, made a recent resurgence in the podcast world. And not just the Christian podcast world, the non Christian podcast world.
[00:08:47] But it's not new at all.
[00:08:50] Some of you might think to yourself after you hear this initially. Really? Pastor Michael? Oh, yeah, really. And just wait till the end of it, because I think there might be a surprise or two.
[00:08:59] So this subplot actually begins in Genesis chapter six, and I want to take a few minutes to indulge ourselves in it. Genesis 6 tells us that God destroyed the earth with a flood because a group called the Nephilim took over the earth and their evil was so pervasive it had to be destroyed so that humanity could have a chance.
[00:09:20] In Genesis chapter 6, verse 4, it says this about the days before the flood. It says the Nephilim were on the earth in those days.
[00:09:29] And I want you to look at this next phrase because it's going to become very important for the book of Joshua.
[00:09:33] And also afterward, after the flood, when the sons of God, these are fallen angels, came into the daughters of man and they bore children to them. These, their offspring, the Nephilim were the mighty men who were of old, the men of renowned. And so here's what you find. The Nephilim were on the earth not just in the days before the flood, but they were also in the earth on the days after the flood.
[00:10:01] Talking about the Nephilim is like talking about the global flood to non Christians.
[00:10:07] At first people are like, wait a minute, that's in the Bible. Okay, yeah, it's in the Bible, but it's in the Bible. So it's not reliable. That didn't actually happen. And then historians discover something interesting about the flood. Every major culture around the world throughout history, completely disconnected, all have Flood stories occurring around the same time, describing similar events.
[00:10:30] And they didn't have any ability to like, collaborate with each other and be like, you're gonna write this in your history books and then I'm gonna write this in my history books and nothing. And then all of a sudden we find this, that secular geologists and sociologists, they finally start to admit something happened. And then you might hear them say something like this.
[00:10:45] Now evidence says that there was clearly a global catastrophe that reset the earth, but very possibly a flood, but definitely not the Bible, not the way it describes it. Got it. So we were right.
[00:10:55] Duly noted.
[00:10:57] So when you talk about the Nephilim, you get actually a really similar reaction. But here's what's interesting.
[00:11:02] The same things happen every major culture all throughout antiquity, around the world are telling the same story in different ways, but the same essential plot line that there's a group of very large people and they're evil and they're powerful and they control things.
[00:11:17] Some call them giants. You can get in your head whatever size you want that to be, but every culture around the world has the same plot line in their own native stories.
[00:11:27] And then we open the Bible and we find. Wait a minute, it was actually already here. Now back to Genesis 6 and I want to show you this.
[00:11:34] The Nephilim's pre flood infiltration was so pervasive genetically and morally that the very next verse, Genesis chapter 6, verse 5, says, the Lord saw that the wickedness of man was great in the earth. And that. And I want you to hear the scope of this. Every intention of the thoughts of his heart was only evil continually. Okay, listen, I have never met a human being who is only evil continually, whose every thought and intention is only constantly evil, with not an ounce of even, like nothing to restrain it or to hold it back. And here's the idea that Genesis 6 wants to get across, that these fallen angels had so devastated humanity that the only option was a restart, but only with those who had not succumbed to their influence. That would be Noah and, and his family.
[00:12:25] And then you should be asking, okay, if the flood destroyed the Nephilim, these giants, these men of renown, these powerful evil people, then why are they there after the flood?
[00:12:37] What's so striking is that the genealogies actually tell us the story. Now it's going to be clear. If they're going to be there after the flood, it's not because they survived a cave in Antarctica. It's because one of the sons of Noah passed on some sort of the lineage and that would be one of his wives. And we know through the genealogies exactly which wife it was. It was the wife of Noah's son, Ham.
[00:12:59] Did you know that the descendants of Ham through this bloodline, did you know that they were the origins of Sodom and Gomorrah?
[00:13:07] Do you know that the most evil people that the Bible describes are all from the son of Ham and his wife? And do you know where all of their descendants are ultimately end up? Landing in and around the Promised Land, by the way.
[00:13:24] Demons and angels and humanity knew that this was going to be a land set apart for God and his people hundreds of years before Israel ever came in. And it's almost as if with full knowledge of this, they're like, we are going to go take control of the land and everything around it to make sure that God's people cannot get in here.
[00:13:44] Okay? So even though this is not talked about in a lot of sermons, I said earlier that it just keeps coming up over and over and over again in the Bible. So I just want to give you a little snapshot of this. They go by different names, and here's just a handful of them. Numbers 13 calls them the Nephilim. Deuteronomy 9 calls them the Anakim. It's a great people, great and tall. The sons of the Anakim. Deuteronomy 2 has a different people called the Rephaim, but still coming from the same origin.
[00:14:12] They're also called in Deuteronomy chapter two, the Emim. In Deuteronomy Chapter two, they're also called the. You've probably never heard the word before, but Zanzuman.
[00:14:20] Then in Deuteronomy 3, there's a description of a person named OG of Bashan, and it says this. His bed was a bed of iron. Nine cubits was its length, and four cubits its breadth, essentially 13ft long and made of iron, because the sheer weight and size of Og of Bashan.
[00:14:37] There is an unnamed warrior from a place called Gath.
[00:14:43] And this is by the way, where who was from Goliath? Good job. Not a trick question. Second Samuel, First Chronicles says, a man of great stature who had six fingers in each hand, six toes in each foot. Another man from Gath, his name was Ishbi Benob. 2 Samuel 21 says this. He was one of the descendants of the giants. Like, I'm not making this up. Like. Like this is just keeps coming up. Then there's Goliath and his brothers, by the way, he had four of them. First Samuel 17, whose height was six cubits and a span, essentially nine feet, nine inches. We get to the Amorites in Amos, chapter two, verse nine says, whose height was like the height of the cedars and who is as strong as the oaks.
[00:15:24] Every time the Bible describes these larger people, they're never good, they are always evil. And they're all from the line of Ham. And now we find them all in the promised land. And this is the group of people that the Israelites have to go through.
[00:15:40] And where do these demon descendants, this race, focus all of their energy consuming, controlling and protecting the promised land? All right, I'm going to bring this all together for you. For Joshua, here is a picture of the promised land with all of the tribes that they will need to conquer. This is a lot of tribes. Think about the state of Georgia. Okay, now I want to show you all of the tribes that the Bible says have giants in them. And those are going to be the ones in red. Just under half of the territory is covered with what we know the Bible says are going to be giants in them. Now I want to talk a little bit more about the evil of these people.
[00:16:23] The land Joshua must lead Israel into is occupied by at least 31 separate kings and sub nations that will need to be defeated, most of whom have armies developed over generations behind massive defenses with literal giant warriors and Israel's parents. It's interesting. I think It's Deuteronomy, chapter 1, verse 28. Moses is retelling to this generation the story of his parents whining and complaining. And he's basically like, they were up all night crying because they were so afraid because. Because they were giants in the land and this is how petrified they were. And he's like, don't be like your parents and grandparents. They were petrified. You're gonna be strong and courageous here. And they wept through the night at the very thought of walking into the land and facing these kinds of evil people.
[00:17:11] I wanna talk a little bit more about the evil spirituality that existed in this land.
[00:17:16] I want you to picture traveling through this land that Moses describes, where everywhere you go, every hillside, every city, they are devoted to demonic religions and to false gods.
[00:17:28] You can find diviners who offer knowledge of the future, mediums who contact the dead, which, by the way, are just demons masquerading as dead people. You can find witch doctors who will use strong drugs and hallucinogens to help you access and experience the spiritual realm.
[00:17:45] And this brings us to their unique cruelty.
[00:17:48] Moses warns this generation that something horrifying among these tribes would be witness. If you walk in there in Deuteronomy 12:31, he says that they burn their sons and their daughters in the fire to their gods.
[00:18:02] And so throughout the land you would encounter large bronze statues to the God Moloch. And he would be heated up until his hands, which were open, were glowing red with heat. And moms and dads would put their children on an altar and listen to them burn alive.
[00:18:17] Why?
[00:18:19] Power, convenience, wealth. Before there was abortion, there was this.
[00:18:26] Let's talk about their sexual immorality.
[00:18:28] Leviticus names gross sexual violations within families, every version of incest, siblings in laws, et cetera. Adultery doesn't stop there. Extensive sexual acts with animals. Not only would they murder their own children, but they would train their leftover children in gross sexual sin.
[00:18:46] Let me illustrate further because I know you want to hear more of that. Centuries earlier, Sodom shows how savage, how savage a community descending from this bloodline could actually be. Two visitors arrive to Sodom. A man named Lot brings them into his house before bedtime. A crowd surrounds it, boys with their fathers supporting them, demanding the visitors be handed over for sexual assault. Lot steps outside, they threaten him, press on the door. Their intentions were to rape and to murder for fun. And the Bible makes it clear it was a family sport.
[00:19:26] And this evil was done hundreds of years before Joshua. And the Bible describes that the evil of this land and its people was only growing from generation to generation.
[00:19:41] If you arrived in these nations and happened to be generally in the category of vulnerable, you might be a sojourner or a traveler, you might be a woman or you might be a child.
[00:19:52] Anything could happen to you. And you were only safe with very strong men. And the stronger and the more violent, the better.
[00:20:02] Because you needed a man who was capable of doing any, anything in order to survive. And by the way, a man who is capable of doing anything in order to survive is a man who's capable of doing anything to you.
[00:20:15] The Bible is telling us these stories, these subplots to help us understand why God does what he does.
[00:20:25] Because wherever you find these bloodlines, you find child sacrifice gross and non consensual sexual sin worse than anything you would find on Internet sites.
[00:20:36] Demon worship and evil unrestrained people get up in arms who don't love God and don't trust the Bible and they accuse God. It's genocide.
[00:20:50] How could you call Israel to go in and wipe out these tribes? If the Old Testament narratives and genealogies are true, maybe the story of Joshua's conquest is not a story of Genocide, maybe. It's a story of God saving humanity from the most evil people on the earth.
[00:21:12] And if you wonder if this comes up in the New Testament, actually it does. In Second Peter and Jude, we find is that the fallen angels who were responsible for this kind of evil were sent into what they call gloomy pits of darkness early, before the final judgment. So you may be wondering, why doesn't this happen anymore? Because the consequences for any fallen angel who does this have been laid out by Jesus. And now Joshua is commissioned by God to lead this generation into this land to war with these evil people, to take hold of the promises that their parents and their grandparents forfeited out of fear.
[00:21:57] And what is going to be required of the Israelites to do this?
[00:22:02] They are going to need to be strong and to be courageous.
[00:22:07] And they're going to have to have an inner resolve that when they go into this dark land, to not let it infect them with evil. And all of this is the context for one of the most important commands in the book of Joshua and one of the most important commands in the Bible. Joshua, chapter one, verse six.
[00:22:26] Be strong and courageous.
[00:22:30] This phrase comes up three times in verses six through nine. And each time there is a command that accompanies it. Which brings us to our three. So what's for the morning? Each following the command to be strong and courageous. So what? Number one, be courageous and take hold of that which God has promised you.
[00:22:52] Look at verse 6.
[00:22:54] Be strong and courageous. For you shall cause this people to inherit the land that I swore to their fathers to give them.
[00:23:05] Many of God's greatest gifts are waiting for those who will do the hard thing to obtain it.
[00:23:14] The distance between what God wants for you and what you want for you.
[00:23:20] It's you. It's no one else. It's you. Unless you think this is some sort of prosperity preaching, let me press into this.
[00:23:29] Does God want you to have the gift, the blessing of a deep knowledge of His Word? I think most of you would say yes.
[00:23:38] This gift is reserved only for people who grab it. I don't know if you're aware of this, that when you trust in Christ, great doctrine is not imported into your brain. When you trust in Christ, your doctrine stinks. I hope you get the gospel down good. But the rest of it, you're gonna have to develop that doctrine. You're gonna have to earn good doctrine because it doesn't happen by osmosis. Good doctrine is earned through listening, through study, and through hard work.
[00:24:08] All right. Does God want you to have the gift of a clean conscience?
[00:24:12] Yeah, like God's. Like one of the promises of God is that you can be cleansed and you get to live with a clean conscience. But guess what? Do you know that this gift is reserved only for those who grab it?
[00:24:24] This gift is reserved for those who make the hard decision to not have secret lives.
[00:24:32] Does God want you to have the gift of having a ministry and a purpose? Yeah, of course.
[00:24:37] Well, this gift is reserved only for those who grab it by doing things, by following what God wants, by sacrificing your time and your talents, your gifts, and serving somebody other than yourselves. One last one. I've got 80, but we'll just give you one more.
[00:24:58] Does God want you to have the gift of a healthy relationship and marriage? Yeah.
[00:25:04] This gift is reserved only for people who do the hard thing, for people who make hard decisions, who have hard conversations, who say no to sin, who choose sacrificial love. All right, so the promise of eternal life after death, that's received by faith alone. Okay, here's how you grab that one. You believe you trust in Christ, but the innumerable promises that God has offered to us before our death are ours to grab.
[00:25:35] Some of you, you have watched your parents and your grandparents forfeit God's blessings.
[00:25:41] Now you have to decide whether or not you are gonna take them for yourself and for your children and your grandchildren.
[00:25:47] And what we learn in this book is that your mom and dad's spiritual compromise is not an extre. Excuse for you to not take hold of what God has for you. I'll say this again. The distance between what God wants for you and what you want for you. It's just you. It's no one else. So be courageous and take hold of that which God has promised you. So, number two.
[00:26:13] Be courageous and obey God's word despite.
[00:26:17] Look at verse 7.
[00:26:19] Only be strong and very courageous. And what does this look like? Being careful to do According to all. Some know all. The law of Moses, my servant, commanded you do not turn from it to the right hand or to the left, that you may have good success wherever you go. Verse 8.
[00:26:37] This book of the law, it shall not depart from your mouth, but you shall meditate on it day and night. What's interesting about the word meditate is it actually means to mumble under your breath.
[00:26:46] It can apply to, like, pondering on something, but it's this idea that you're pondering as you're sort of talking to your breath and you're thinking about it, and it's coming out of your mouth, even if you're just uttering it.
[00:26:55] Meditate on a day and night so that you may be careful to do according to all that is written in it. For then you will make your way prosperous and then you will have good success.
[00:27:07] I have found, and I think most of you would agree with this, that the only way you'll be able to live in a sinful world and to thrive spiritually is if you have a healthy, vibrant relationship with the Son of God, Jesus. Through the Word of God, there is a powerful relationship between the two. If you want to have a dynamic relationship with the Son of God, the living Word Jesus, and you want to ignore the written word in your life, you're going to have a hard time. The two work together because one created the other one is the person, we're in a relationship and the other is what this person has told us he believes and thinks and what is true and what is real. And so we have the living Word, Jesus and the written word, the Bible. And the two are made to synergistically come together and amplify our spiritual maturity. So when you don't know what to do, do what you know the Word says to do. And if you don't know what the Word says to do, find somebody who does know what the Word says and then therefore go do what the Word says to do. Unless you think this is easy, it is not easy to do what what the Word says to do. I want you to think about just the Israelites for a moment doing what the Word says. When you're in a place with no consequences, where no one will know what you do, where you can go sin and then go back home to your husband, to your wife, your mom, your dad, your children. And they would have no category of what you did because there was no Internet and no technology to expose it.
[00:28:34] Growing up in the 80s and 90s and before, I can't speak to the 70s and before cause I wasn't alive then, but 80s and 90s versus now. It's so different in so many ways. But one of the most fascinating differences is that today in the age of complete digital surveillance, nothing is secret.
[00:28:50] Do you guys remember Ashley Madison, bunch of guys. Most of the guys thought they could go do the secret stuff online and somebody hacks their database and releases everything. I don't know if you're aware of this, but like you should be. You know that your IP address, it's like a personal address for your phone. You have a different one for your computer like, they have an address on it, you know, that everybody hate tracks those, like, owns businesses, et cetera.
[00:29:13] AI can aggregate information and infiltrate databases, mine your Internet history. We don't even know. We. We don't even know 1% of what it's going to be capable of in 10 years. And. And I joke with people and I. I just tell them, like, I think you should be really nice to your AI because when it does take over the world, like, like, at least give you a shot. I'm. I'm the good guy. Right? Okay.
[00:29:34] Getting away with anything in this kind of surveillance climate, it actually feels pretty impossible. By the way, this is why your children do not want you to have access to their computers or phones, because it's the last bastion in a surveillance world where they believe they have privacy and the freedom to do things without consequence, which is why we don't let them do it.
[00:29:53] When I was in high school, you could drive by someone's house and egg their house at night, and you know what would happen? Nothing.
[00:29:59] Nothing. Nobody would ever know. And then you could go into, like, a store and you could steal something if you were a little bit intelligent and you could, like, figure out when to do it. Now everything is on camera. And here's the deal.
[00:30:10] In the 80s and 90s and the 70s and before, just because cameras weren't surveilling, you did not mean the eyes of the Lord didn't see everything.
[00:30:21] And so here's what this generation going into the land learned from their parents and grandparents.
[00:30:29] Their parents and grandparents often would live sinful lives because they didn't think anybody cared or noticed. But the Lord saw, and the Lord disciplined them to the tune where they wandered for 40 years in the wilderness. And now these kids have a chance to take for themselves the promises of God that their parents and grandparents forfeited out of fear.
[00:30:53] And it is going to require them obeying God's word despite.
[00:30:58] Finally, number three.
[00:31:00] Be courageous and believe reality over your emotions.
[00:31:05] First verse I ever memorized, Joshua 1:9.
[00:31:09] Have I not commanded you?
[00:31:11] Be strong and courageous. Do not be frightened.
[00:31:17] Do not be dismayed. For the Lord your God is with you wherever you go. Frightened means a fear that makes you tremble, a fear that kind of overtakes you. You've been in the presence of something, you start shaking.
[00:31:31] I have a hunch if I faced an actual giant that I had to fight to the death with, I might have that experience.
[00:31:36] Dismayed is the experience of being mentally discombobulated, overwhelmed, overcome by fear to the point of confusion and wanting to retreat.
[00:31:46] And so, in our cultural moment, because feelings have now taken the place of God in so many people's lives, it takes real courage to not allow your feelings and your emotions to determine what is true and how you live.
[00:32:04] Listen, I've tried. It's really hard to change your emotions, especially on the spot. And there's some emotions I haven't been able to get rid of.
[00:32:12] You can't always control the intrusive thoughts that come into your brain.
[00:32:16] You cannot control your body's and your mind's like visceral reactions to certain places and events. But you can choose to be strong because strong is not an emotion.
[00:32:27] You can choose to be courageous because courageous is a decision.
[00:32:32] It's not an emotion.
[00:32:34] You can choose to follow God despite what your emotions can do. Emotions are good. They are indicators. They are signs. But they're not your authority. They are not your God. And I have found mine to be pretty unreliable in helping me discern reality.
[00:32:50] I have good news for you, though. You have one God.
[00:32:53] His name is Jesus.
[00:32:55] He loves you.
[00:32:56] He made you.
[00:32:58] If you have trusted in Christ, he has saved you. He died for you on the cross and was raised from the dead.
[00:33:05] And as this book unfolds, we're gonna get more clarity as to what this looks like. But our privilege is to take hold of the promises that God is offering to us. Salvation that's yours, that can't be undone, that's in Christ. That's the moment you trust in Christ. But there are so many benefits that God has for the people of God who have trusted in him. And if you have yet to trust in Christ, I also have good news for you. Jesus is still your God, whether you like it or not. He's not like one of many. He is your creator and designer. There aren't others. Those are just demons masquerading. There is one God.
[00:33:38] He made you. He loves you, and he died for you. And I just want to encourage you that that God who loves you and made you, died for you to pay the price for your sins, is offering you forgiveness.
[00:33:50] I love this. I don't know if you're aware, but the name Joshua, you know how it's said in Hebrew, Yeshua? And do you know how Jesus is said in Hebrew, Yeshua? It's the same name. Why the translators did that boggles my mind. It's the exact same name. In the same way that Joshua led the Israelites out of Egypt and into the promised land for salvation. That's an image that's a type that's a metaphor.
[00:34:15] That is an image that points to a greater thing. The true Savior, Jesus, who is leading you and I out of sin. If you will ask for forgiveness, his answer is going to be 100% yes. And I just want to encourage you today.
[00:34:29] The same God who made the world loves you. The same God who delivered Israel can deliver to you. The same God who has good things in store for Israel has even better things in store for you. And what is standing between you and him, but trusting in Christ, apologizing and making him your God. He would love the honor and privilege as your heavenly Father to be reconciled to you. Not because you're good enough, but because you ask him for forgiveness. Am I vill church? Amen. Let's pray. Father, we just thank you for the privilege. We have to read the privilege. We have to read these stories, the failures, the successes, the words that you said.
[00:35:13] And so, God, I thank you that we are not in a position like Joshua and the Israelites. We do not have to go into battle right now. And Lord, our greatest battle, which is sin, you have defeated on the cross.
[00:35:25] Thank you for everything you have done for us. We honor you. We love you. I pray, God, as we teach through the book of Joshua, Lord, that you would awaken us to your goodness and your kindness. You would show us what does it mean to follow you and to be strong and to be courageous. We love you, we thank you and we pray all of this in Jesus name. Amen. Amen.
