The Power of God in Our Journey: Reflections on Joshua 4

And so we're going to continue our study here in the Book of Joshua.

If you have your Bibles, turn with me to Joshua, chapter four.

We're going to pick up where we left off last time.

And we've seen something building here in the Book of Joshua.

It started with a promise.

And the promise is that God would allow the nation of Israel,

led by Joshua, to go into the promised land and reclaim the land

that was rightfully theirs.

And through that, God said, okay, Joshua, I promise that this

is going to happen.

But he also promises that he would be with them through it.

He says, okay, my presence is going to be with you.

All the way back in Joshua, chapter one, verse nine, he says,

don't be afraid, neither be thou dismayed, for the Lord thy God

is with thee whithersoever thou goest.

And so he says, when my promise comes to you, so does my

presence, and so does my power.

And so he promises Joshua, and by extension, Israel, that God is

going to be with them in this battle, in this fight, that they

have to take back the land that is theirs, that God had promised

them.

And in so doing, we see that they go into Jericho, and we have

that story with Rahab and an amazing story of God planning it

and actually seeing that the people are already in fear of the

power of God.

And then we looked at Joshua, chapter three, where Joshua is challenged

by God to prepare to cross the River Jordan.

And anytime that God has a promise for us, we know that there's

going to be at some point, obstacles along the way.

And for them, it was the obstacle of the Jordan River.

They were promised by God that they would have the land across the

river.

But the Jordan river was a huge obstacle to get their people

across.

They didn't have barges back then.

They didn't have a big bridge that they could cross the river with.

They had to cross the river with a bunch of people.

A bunch.

A bunch of people and a bunch of animals and a bunch of possessions.

And so this river seemed like a roadblock.

It seemed like an obstacle.

But God says, I'm going to get you through that.

And he promises that he's going to part the waters and take

them across.

And last week we see that God speaks to Joshua and he says, joshua,

I'm about to do this amazing thing.

I'm about to work this miracle.

And what I want you to do is make a memorial of this miracle.

And I want you to remember as a people, and we want you to pass

that memory on to the next generation.

And that's what we saw last week.

And we ended in verse nine and it says, and Joshua set up 12 stones

in the midst of Jordan in the place where the feet of the priest

which bear the ark of the covenant stood.

And there they are there unto this day.

And so now verse 10, we're going to see actually Israel passing

through.

Last week we just saw the build up to that, the promise of

that, the preparation to that, and the idea of building those memorial

stones.

But now we're going to see in verse 10, through the end of the

chapter, really, God taking the people and moving them and keeping

his word all the way to the end.

And so in verse number 10, it says, for the priest which bare the

ark stood in the midst of Jordan until everything was finished,

that the Lord commanded Joshua to speak unto the people according

to all that Moses commanded Joshua, and the people hasted and

passed over.

And there's so much in that verse that we could look at there,

but really what we see is that the priests are in the middle of

the river bearing the ark of the covenant.

And we know that that was at that time a picture, a visual picture

of the presence and the power of God in the midst of the nation

of Israel.

And so at the centerpiece to this miracle is the presence and

the power of God.

And that's where their eyes were fixed on.

And for all of us in the middle of the miracle, in the midst

of this great thing that God is doing for us, we have to keep

our eyes on him.

And that's when we can have obedience.

And that's when we can see the hand of God working.

And that's when we can see the will of God working in our life.

And so it says the priests are holding the ark there in the middle

of the Jordan River.

And it says there until everything was finished that the

Lord commanded.

That's an amazing thing that they saw to the end.

They saw the promise come to pass.

And sometimes God's promises are revealed step by step.

And the truth is, is that we as Christians have to stay faithful

all the way through, because God is going to stay faithful all

the way through.

It says that God stayed faithful to the people according

to all that Moses commanded Joshua.

And the people hasted and passed over.

And so the priest stood with the ark of the covenant for the entire

time it took for the whole nation to cross over.

And by the way, the Nation isn't just 50, 60 people.

That could happen in a few minutes.

We're talking probably millions of people crossing over

this is going to take a long time.

And so the priests stood there, the leaders stood there in

the middle of the Jordan river the whole time.

And I believe that this is a visible symbol of the presence of

God that had to remain in the river through the entire crossing.

And I think we as a church have to keep our eyes on.

On the Lord throughout all of our dealings, no matter what it might

be, because that's how we're going to see victory.

That's how we're going to see God doing an amazing work in our

life if we keep our eyes fixed on him.

So verse number 11, it says, and it came to pass when all the

people were clean passed over, that the ark of the Lord passed over.

So it wasn't until all the people crossed over that the ark

passes over.

And the priest, in the presence of the people, then it says

this.

This is an amazing thing.

It says, verse 12.

And the children of Reuben and the children of Gad and half of the

tribe of Manasseh passed over armed before the children of Israel

as Moses spake unto them.

Now, if you just read that verse and you didn't understand the

context, you would say, so what's the big deal?

Well, the big deal is this.

If you remember, there were three tribes that had land on this

side of the Jordan.

They didn't need to cross the Jordan and fight.

God had already promised them their land there.

But they said, you know what?

Because we're unified and because we're together and because

my brother still has a battle to fight, we're going with you.

And so we see men from Reuben and Gad and half of the tribe of

Manasseh come across and say, even though we already have God's

promise in our life, we're going to stay the course with you

as you are continuing to see God's hand working in your life.

And what's that a picture of?

That's a picture of us maybe in our life, that maybe God has blessed

us in certain capacities.

But there's still other people that need God's blessing.

And we want to be there with them through it.

We want to help them through it.

And so the people that were settling on the east side of the

Jordan river, they could have stayed on that side, but no, they

sent their armies over to fight on behalf of the rest of the

nation, just as they had promised all the way back in Joshua

chapter one.

Now, I think, again, this is a picture, an example of how we don't

just get to a place in our life where we get comfortable and,

and content with just the blessings that God has for us, but

that we want to turn and help others and bless others with the

blessings that God has given us.

And I, Pastor Carlos, already mentioned, and Brother Allen, we

are so blessed in this nation.

We were sitting around in our Bible study this morning, kind of

joking around about how none of us had enough money.

And I looked around and I was kind of convicted.

And I said, you know what?

Statistically speaking, we're probably in the 1% of this whole

world and how much we have, I mean, we've got food on the table,

we've got a car to drive.

All, all of you have a house to live in.

The truth is, is that we are so, so blessed materially.

And I believe that God wants us to use those materials that God

has blessed us with for other people around us that maybe don't

have the same things that we have.

But two, I believe also that God has blessed us so much spiritually.

Think about just this, that many of you have with a Bible in

your lap, or some of you have a phone that can pull up versions

in different languages and all that kind of stuff and cross reference.

You know, there's people that are willing to risk their lives to

have one of these in front of them.

There's people that are willing to smuggle Bibles into countries

that aren't allowed to have Bibles because this is so viable.

We're so spiritually best that we have the revealed word of God

before us.

We're so blessed that we're able to come here.

You know, there's some places in the world that you can't come

like this and talk about Jesus publicly.

There's persecution.

And look at countries like Nigeria right now.

There's.

There's people that are getting slaughtered for being Christian.

And we're so blessed here.

And you know, many times we're thankful maybe by what we say, by

the freedoms that we have.

But you know what, what we should do is use the freedoms that

we do have and the time that we have to redeem the time and say,

you know what?

We need to be busy with these things that God has blessed us with.

So we have those blessings already.

But who can we help with the freedoms that we have?

Who can we help with the blessings that we have?

And so I want you to think about that here.

And then it goes on a little bit further and it says this verse

number 13, about 40,000 prepared for war, passed over before

the Lord unto battle to the plains of Jericho.

So they're preparing themselves for battle.

We know that there's God's timing and God's way that's happening,

but they're following him.

And so ultimately, we know that crossing the Jordan was just

one miracle, but there's going to be multiple miracles of God's

power and provision as they go into battle, specifically here in

Jericho coming up.

And so we know that God is going to be with them through all

of this.

And so verse 14.

On that day, the Lord magnified Joshua in the sight of

all of Israel.

And they feared him as they feared Moses all the days of his

life.

And so this is a testament to Joshua's obedience, not that he was

to be worshiped.

The Bible says that the Lord magnified him.

The Lord lifted him up as a leader here in this case, so that

the people could follow Joshua as Joshua was following God.

It's the same principle that we see in the New Testament with

Paul.

He says, follow me as I follow Christ.

He doesn't say, follow me and end it there, but he says, follow

me as I follow Christ.

It's a picture of exhortation.

Exhortation is, let me challenge you to follow Christ, and

I'm there with you through this.

We're going to do this together.

And so Joshua was magnified in the sight of all of Israel, just

as Moses was.

And the Bible says here that they feared him.

Not in a fear of he's going to condemn them, but fear and respect.

They're revering him, so to speak.

And it says that Joshua had this type of testimony.

Now, how could Joshua have this type of testimony?

It's not necessarily because he was a powerful man.

It's not because he wielded a sword.

It's because God was on his side.

And if we want to be respected, if we want to be influencing

people, if we want people to be changed by our testimony, the

Bible says that, that we need to be walking just as Joshua walked

in obedience to the Lord's will in our life.

It's not about how loud we speak, it's not about how strong

we are, but it's about how strong God is in our life, how much

we're willing to submit to him completely.

And so that's why Joshua is exalted here, not because of his

power, but because of God's power.

Then we look at verse 15.

This is all, the waters are going to flow again.

The water of Jordan is going to flow again.

And says, and the Lord spake unto Joshua saying, command the priests

that bear the ark of the testimony that they come up out of

Jordan.

Joshua therefore commanded the priest saying, come ye up out of

Jordan.

And it came to pass when the priests that bear the ark of the

covenant of the Lord were come up out of the midst of Jordan.

And the soles of the priests feet were lifted up unto dry land,

that the waters of Jordan returned unto their place and flowed

over all of his banks.

And they did as they did before.

And so the idea here is this, that God restores the Jordan river

back to how it was.

But he says, hey, look, I'm going to make sure all of you get

out.

And so there's going to be struggles in life and seasons of

life are going to change.

But ultimately we see God's provision and protection through

this.

And so the Jordan river returned to its natural flow to show

that this was a supernatural event.

It wasn't like they went up the river and built these, you know,

blocking aids.

And you know, this is how it's always been.

No, they, this was a miraculous work of God.

And I've heard a lot of people try to, you know, with, with science

try to prove why or how this happened.

And maybe God did use some weather event.

But I just take it as this is a miracle of God, right?

We don't need to question that God can use anything.

And so God uses his power to allow them to cross over.

And no doubt in my mind that these Israelites knew that this was

a work of God.

They weren't like, oh wow, maybe the Amorites stopped the water

up there.

No, they knew that this was a work of God.

And when we're in the midst of a miracle, it's so evident that God

is working.

I know that probably most of us in our life can point to times

and instances where we say, that's only by God.

There is no way that I could have done that.

It's no way that this is just by happenstance.

This is a miracle of God.

And so in that moment when they're crossing over that river,

they're not doubting God, they're not questioning God because

God is so real to them.

But we're going to see here in a few moments that God challenges

them and commands them to make a mark in which they can remember

the power of God.

Why?

Because even those that walked across the dry ground in the Jordan

river were going to be tempted to question God.

Why?

Because they were going to forget about the miracle of God.

Verse 19 and the people came up out of the Jordan on the 10th

day of the first month and encamped in Gilgal in the east border

of Jericho.

And those 12 stones which they took out of Jordan, did Joshua pitch

in Gilgal?

Now why did they do that in Gilgal?

Well, Gilgal will would at this point in time become the base

of operations for their whole conquest in the promised land.

So this is basically like their capital there for that point

in time.

And so it would be appropriate that this would be where they would

set up their memorial for what God had done for them to get across

Jordan and to remind them in all of the battles that they were

going to be facing that God was with them and that God would

be continuing with them.

And so they're encamped there in Gilgal on the eastern border of

Jericho.

And verse 20, it says, and those 12 stones which they took out

of the Jordan, did Joshua pitch in Gilgal?

And so that's an awesome picture of them setting up camp and

showing the Lord that they were obedient.

Verse 21.

And he spake unto the children of Israel, saying, and this is really

the main point I wanted to get across here this evening.

He says, when your children shall ask their fathers in time to

come, saying, what mean these stones?

Says there's going to be a time when you might be forgetting.

There's definitely going to be a time when your children will forget

and maybe even your children's children will forget the power of

God.

He says, so what will you say when people ask, what are these stones

all about?

Verse 22 he says, then ye shall let your children know, saying,

israel came over this Jordan on dry land.

He says, remind the next generation of the miracles of God.

Remind the next generation of the salvation of the Lord.

Remind the next generation that God is with us.

Verse 23.

For the Lord your God dried up the waters of Jordan from before

you until you were passed over.

So he says, detail, details, explain the details of what happened

as the Lord your God did to the Red Sea, which he dried up before

us until we were gone over.

And so he says, hey, it's for you to remember what God has done

so that you can pass it on to the next generation.

But there's even more here.

There's even more here.

He says, verse 24, that all the people of the earth, not just

their children, not just the people of Israel, but that all of

the people of the earth might know the hand of the Lord, that it

is mighty, that ye might fear the Lord your God forever.

And so there's a purpose to these stones.

It's actually multifaceted There was an obvious purpose of the

memorial stones.

To remind the people of Israel themselves of the power of God.

Why?

Because it's so easy for us to forget how God is powerful and how

God is good and God might work a miracle in our life.

And it's so easy for us to doubt that later on.

It's so easy for us to forget.

I can tell you time after time in my life, I mentioned last week

our car accident that we had a little over two years ago.

I mean, in that moment it was so evident that God preserved us.

And we got home and we sat our kids around the floor there and we

told them, guys, we just experienced a miracle, that we're

okay.

But later on I can tell you that the night that Silas was born

and everything that happened with that and God's provision, there

was no doubt in my mind that God's hand was in it.

But I'm going to tell you that two years later, sometimes I'm tempted

to doubt God's miraculous work.

Why?

Because the mundane day to day stuff that we deal with.

And so he says, hey, be reminded yourself because it's so

easy to forget about the great miracles of God.

And so we don't remember the past works of God so that we can

live in the past.

Paul says, I don't look behind me because sometimes that's what

we do.

Sometimes we look at God's work in the past and that's all we

can.

Oh, that was the glory days.

That was when God was really working.

And we almost want to live back in those days.

And I understand the good old days, but the idea would be this,

not just to look back and live in dreamland of the past, but to

say this, you know what I'm thinking of what God is going to

do in the next struggle that we have in our life that we face.

And so we remember the object of our faith.

Sometimes we look at the gift, which is the miracle, and that's

what we worship.

You know, we get our kids gifts for Christmas and they take

the gift and they think the gift, that would be kind of weird,

right?

We're, they should be thinking the gift giver, not the gift itself.

And so often we as Christians worship that miracle.

And that's what we get excited about.

Instead we should be getting excited about the one who gave us

that miracle because we still have him as our heavenly Father.

And that miracle might wear out over time, but the miracle of

God being our Savior never wears out.

Our salvation never wears out.

So that's what we tap into not the miracle, but the object of faith

that we have put our trust in and that greater works are coming

in the future.

But then it's this, okay, so remind yourself.

But then remind your children.

Remind your grandchildren.

Remind the next generations.

So there was an important purpose to this next step so that

the next generation, who might be tempted to forget or might not

even be here in this case, would remember that God's work was

not done with them.

And we talked all about this last week about this importance of

passing the torch on to the next generation.

How do we do that?

Well, we don't pass down our tradition, even though traditions

are a good thing.

I like tradition.

But if we just say, well, hey, you know what?

We go to church and we do this and we do that, and then we don't

necessarily get to the why behind what we're doing.

You know what?

Like, if I just tell my kids, well, you gotta always go to church.

Just go to.

Just.

You gotta be in church.

Like, that's great.

I think we should say that.

But I think that even deeper we should explain why we're going

to church.

Because this is our church family, as God has called us, to

not forsake the assembling of ourselves together.

I need the exhortation.

I need to be exhorting.

I need the edification.

I need to be edifying.

There's so much more to what we're doing.

And so if we just walk by these stones and.

And the children, hey, hey, what are these stones?

And, oh, yeah, God opened up the Jordan River.

It was just whatever.

No, he says, here, be detailed.

Explain what God did.

And so he says, pass this on to the next generation so that they

can know God.

Not so that they can know the fact of the science behind the Jordan

river splitting, but that they could know God, the one who split

the Jordan River.

But then he says more here.

He says in verse 24, that all the people of the earth might know

the hand of the Lord.

And so there was also another purpose to making these memorial

stones, and that was for the purpose of the world, so that the

world can know that there is a God who is all powerful, who can

work miracles, who can save them, a God that all should seek

after.

It says that right there.

It says that all the people of the earth might know the hand of

the Lord, that it is mighty, that ye might fear the Lord your

God forever.

So really, that's the message that we have and the work that God

has done in our life, number one, to remember the work that God

has done for us in salvation and all those blessings to follow.

But then number two, to pass that on, we all have a responsibility

to pass on the gospel and the truth of his word to the next generation.

If it's your children, that's your responsibility.

If you've had children and grandchildren, your grandchildren

are your responsibility.

Maybe you don't have any children within the church, and maybe

you don't have that opportunity, but we as a church have

the opportunity to pass it on to the next generation.

I want to take you to a passage of scripture that I think

mirrors this in the New Testament.

It's a passage of Scripture that we see in second Timothy, chapter

two.

Second Timothy, chapter two.

I think all of us have the responsibility to some capacity to

tell other people about how good God is and how much they need

to trust in him so that they can see his powerful hand.

And so that they might, as it says there in Joshua, fear him or

respect him and seek them, seek him with all of their heart.

So in second Timothy chapter two, we know in that context it's

Paul talking to Timothy.

And he's talking to Timothy, a young pastor, about what he should

do within the church, how he should lead his church.

And it says there in verse number one of two, Timothy chapter

two, thou, therefore, my son, be strong in the grace that is in

Christ Jesus.

He says, be strong, stand in the truth of who Jesus Christ is.

But then he says, this is what you're supposed to do.

And the things that thou has heard of me among many witnesses.

So Paul says, what you've heard me teaching, what you've seen

me doing the same, commit thou to faithful men.

Meaning this.

You are to take what you've been taught and what you have experienced

and what you are resting in and pass that on to other people.

And then it says something amazing.

Who shall be able to teach others also?

Meaning Paul teaches Timothy, Timothy teaches other people, other

people teach other people.

And that goes on and on and on until the Lord returns.

And so the Bible tells us that that's our goal.

That started all the way back in the book of Joshua and even before

that.

God does a miracle in their life.

God saves them.

And he says, pass that on.

And think about how that has happened over century, over centuries,

over thousands of years.

God's hand has worked through the lives of people and people have

taught other people.

And if all of us are in this room are honest, I there has been

somebody who has taught us what they have been taught by somebody

else.

There is Someone who has shared with us something that was

shared with them.

There is someone that has explained to us their testimony that

has impacted our lives.

And so the Bible tells us something very similar in the New

Testament that we see in the Old Testament.

Pass on what you have, share with other people the blessing that

God is to you.

Give a testimony of a miracle.

And then the challenge for us as the recipients of that is to be

excited when other people tell us the miracles of God.

Not be judgmental, not be, oh, they're just bragging about how God

is in their life.

No, we should be joyful when other people are joyful.

We should learn from other people's teaching and testimony.

And so what we can see here in this case is that God tells us to

pass it on to the next generation.

It's not an option.

We see all the way back in the book of Deuteronomy, if you look

with me in the book of Deuteronomy, we see that there is

this challenge to all of us from the very beginning, and that

is to know God and to love God and share that lifestyle and share

that faith with other people.

All the way back in the book of Deuteronomy, Deuteronomy chapter

Deuteronomy 6 · chapter mention

6, we see God stating to his people what it means to know him

and to share that faith with other people around them.

And so in verse number one of Deuteronomy, chapter six, it says,

now these are the commandments, the statutes and the

judgments which the Lord your God commanded to teach you that ye

might do them in the land, whether you go to possess it.

Now think about this.

This is Deuteronomy before Joshua.

And so this is already something that has been taught to

the people of Israel.

But they've already been tempted not to pass on the blessings

of God that they have experienced.

So remember, this is prior to this.

And this is them being taught that they need to be hearing all

of these things.

And so it says, that thou mightest fear the Lord thy God to

keep all the statutes and his commandments which I command thee,

thou and thy Son, and thy Son's son, all the days of thy life,

and that thy days may be prolonged.

Hear therefore, O Israel, and observe to do it that it may be well

with thee, and that ye may increase mightily as the Lord God

of thy fathers hath promised thee, and the land that floweth with

milk and honey.

So this is talking about going to the promised land.

And this is something that God has promised, and this is something

that God is blessing.

And he says in Verse four.

Hear, O Israel, the Lord our God is one Lord, and thou shalt love

the Lord thy God with all thine heart and with all thy soul

and with all thy might.

Now that might sound familiar to you, that might be something that

you've seen in the New Testament, right?

That's just a restating of what God has already said in the

Old from the very beginning.

God wants our heart.

God wants us individually to seek after him with everything that

we have.

The early Jewish folks would have called this the Shema.

This was like what they state all the time.

This is their focus.

And in going forward he says this and thou shall love the Lord

thy God.

He says everything.

Verse 6.

And these words which I command thee to this day shall be

in thine heart.

So he says it starts with a personal relationship with you and,

and the Lord.

It's where your heart is.

You can't help other people around you if your heart is not in

the right place.

I can't come in and be a testimony for the Lord if my heart

is not where it needs to be.

I can't come in and exhort people properly, edify people properly,

show love on people properly if I'm not where I need to be before

the Lord.

The Bible tells us that we need to prepare our hearts to, to

be used by Him.

And preparing our hearts to be used by him simply means that we're

given over to Him.

But then he says next in verse seven, so, so be that way in your

personal life.

Be, be that way with your relationship with God.

But then it says, and thou shalt teach them diligently, teach

the law of God, teach the word of God and the ways of God diligently

unto thy children, and shall talk of them when thou sittest in

thine house, and when thou walkest by the way, and when thou

liest down, and when thou risest up, which means this.

Talk about God all the time, talk about his works all the time.

Not just in church, not just in Sunday school, but when you're

walking, when you're working, he says, when you're out on your

way walking, when you lie down, when you rise up, and thou

shalt bind them for a sign upon thy hand, and they shall be

as frontlets between thine eyes.

Now there are some people that have taken that literally and say,

well, I've got to wear the word of God.

They actually take a scroll from Deuteronomy chapter 6 and they

Deuteronomy 6 · chapter mention

roll it up and they put it in a box and they strap it to their

Forehead.

And they wear it on their forehead.

And then they wrap up the verses on their arms.

This isn't God saying, literally, you got to wear a box

on your forehead.

He's talking about keeping this in your mind and in your heart,

keeping it before you in everything that you do.

And he says, and thou shalt write them upon the post of thy house

and on thy gates.

And it's the simple idea of having it surrounding us.

It's not just what we do on Sundays.

For them, it would have been Saturdays.

But it's not just what we do one day a week.

It's who we are in every element of our lives.

So we're not like, hey, don't do that while you're at church.

I've been tempted to be like that as a dad and as a pastor and

as just a human being because my kids are acting up.

Hey, you can't be doing that at church.

We.

Well, maybe they shouldn't be doing that anytime, right?

Because the reality is, is that if we try to present to be one

way here and another way here, we're missing the boat.

The whole idea for us as Christians is that this is our life.

So the way that we do this is Deuteronomy tells us this.

Joshua tells us this.

In the New Testament, we see that we're to raise, in Ephesians,

Ephesians 6:4

chapter 6, verse 4, to raise our children in the nurture and admonition

of the Lord.

The way that the next generation sees what it means to

follow Christ is not through giving them a list of rules and saying,

follow this.

The way that the next generation can follow Christ and

know what it means to follow Christ is to see authentic Christians

living the truth in every capacity of their life, not perfection.

Nobody is going to be perfect.

And I think that we can understand that.

But when we do mess up, to be authentically before our children,

before our grandchildren, admitting that, hey, you know what?

I've made a mistake.

You know, I've had to apologize to my kids, to swallow

my ego and say, dad wasn't right in that.

I've had to do that.

I've had to apologize to my wife for the things that I've said

or the things I have not done.

And so I could just push forward and say, well, I'm the dad

and I'm the pastor, and this is how it goes.

Or we admit where we fall, and our children and our grandchildren

and the next generation can see that we're not trying to be perfect.

All we're trying to do is follow Christ to the best of our

ability.

As Deuteronomy chapter 6 says, to love God with all of our hearts,

Deuteronomy 6 · chapter mention

with all of our soul, with all of our might.

That's what we are supposed to teach the love.

And so again, it's going to be connected to obedience.

We don't just tell our next generation, well, do whatever you

want.

Worship God however you want to worship him, just as long as you

love him.

No, Deuteronomy 6 is all about following God's word.

But the right way to follow God's word is with our hearts and

not with just our actions.

Because we can do things on, like, you know, some of you know

this.

Maybe even you remember this.

When you were a child, your parents asked you to do something

and you did it, but there was no heart in it.

You were in the heart of rebellion as you were doing the work.

Clean your room.

Okay, I'm cleaning my room, but the whole time I'm just thinking

about how I want to mess up this room.

And one day, when I'm an adult, I remember one time my parents

told me I wanted a dog so bad.

We already had a dog, but I wanted another dog.

I wanted a bunch of dogs.

I wanted, like, 20 dogs.

My parents like, well, you can't have a dog.

And I was so mad, I said, I want another dog.

And I said, I remember saying this out loud to them, when I'm an

adult, I'm gonna have a whole house just full of dogs.

And I have one dog.

But we're ready.

Maybe even like, she's like, Alicia's like, you know, no more.

So in the point of time, in my rebellion, I thought I knew what

was best for me.

And my parents understood that.

There's this and there's this, and if you have a bunch of dogs,

no offense to you, but not everyone's cut out for that, right?

And the idea would be this.

Sometimes we think we know what's best.

Sometimes our children think we know what's best.

And all we have to do is we have to go back and say, look, you

might have your opinions, you might have your thoughts, but this

is the standard.

It's not Dad's opinion, it's not Mom's opinion, it's not the church's

opinion, it's not your opinion.

We have a standard of righteousness, a standard of holiness

that's laid out for us.

And the only way that we can take that in is through Scripture.

And so, so often, we're willing to compromise in many different

areas.

And so what we say is this.

We're basically boiled down to this.

We're ruled by the word of God.

We're ruled by the direction of the Holy Spirit.

The Word of God is our guide.

And so, you know what's going to happen is that some of you have

already experienced this, and I'd love for you to tell me your

testimony of what you did with your children in this process.

But you're gonna have your children come home and say, hey,

this is what I learned at school today, and fill in the blank.

And it's not what the Bible says, or, this is what I experienced

out in public today.

Now, there's a lot of different ways that we can respond

to that.

We can respond to that with just ignoring.

Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah, whatever.

Just.

Let's just change the subject.

Or we can address it with a biblical worldview, or we can address

it with a worldly, fleshly worldview.

And what I would challenge all of us with at any capacity is to

always deal with every situation, every question, every

doubt, every.

Every opinion with the word of God.

What does the Bible have to say about this?

And so we get to this in Joshua, and we see that there's this

miracle of God.

We see that there's this challenge to pass it on to the next

generation, to show the children and the grandchildren and

the great grandchildren the power of God.

And we see within the church, it is our job to pass on the truth

of God to other people, to the unsaved people.

They need to hear the word of God.

It's not a matter of how they're going to respond to it.

Because sometimes I've justified not sharing the truth with

someone because I'm like, maybe they're just not going to believe.

Maybe.

Maybe they just.

That's not for them.

It's not our job to try to figure out who wants to receive it

and who doesn't want to receive it.

We are the vessels of explaining and demonstrating to people

what God has done for us.

Now, we're going to look at a passage of Scripture in.

We're in Joshua, chapter four right now.

But I want you to see a passage of Scripture in First Peter

because it's going to tie together with our next verse that

we're going to look at.

So look at First Peter with me.

And I want you to see what the Bible says is really, in this case,

our cornerstone within the church and what we are to profess

to the world what we are to profess to our children.

Because if I just get up and say well, it's all about the law

of God.

Well, it's not about the law of God anymore.

I don't need to teach my children all 613 commandments that

are laid out in the Old Testament.

So what do I point my children to?

Well, it's very clear what we point our children to.

It's very clear what we point the world to.

It's very clear what we point to Christians.

We point to non Christians.

It says it right here in First Peter, chapter two.

It says, to whom coming?

And this is verse four.

To whom coming as unto a living stone, disallowed indeed of

men, but chosen of God and precious.

Meaning this.

He's talking about Jesus here.

He says Jesus came as a living stone.

Now he's giving a picture of a building.

Back then they would build buildings by stones, right?

So he says, there's this one living stone.

He's going to talk about it here in a moment.

Who he is the chief cornerstone.

He's the foundation.

And we as Christians are living stones that are added to the

top of the foundation.

So he says in verse 5, ye also are living stones, like lively stones.

You are built up a spiritual house, a holy priesthood to offer

up spiritual sacrifices acceptable to God by Christ Jesus.

Meaning we are to be built upon something.

What we are built upon is the truth of Jesus Christ, verse 6.

Wherefore also it is contained in the Scripture.

Behold, I lay in Zion a chief cornerstone, elect, precious.

And he that believeth on him shall not be confounded.

The Bible says here that we are built on top of the chief cornerstone,

Jesus Christ.

It was prophesied before, all the way back in the book of Psalms,

that Jesus would be that chief cornerstone.

He would be the elect.

He would be the one who is precious.

All those that believe in him will never be defeated.

All of those will never be taken away.

And then he goes on to say something amazing here.

Verse 7.

Unto you therefore, which believe.

So to those who believe in Jesus, who is he?

Well, he is precious.

So when I talk to somebody about Jesus and they go, well, that's

an amazing thing.

That's a. I get excited about that.

That's someone who understands who Jesus is and his power.

But believe it or not, the Bible says that not everybody is

going to take Jesus as being precious.

It says here another thing.

It says in verse number seven, Unto you, therefore, which believe

he is precious, but unto them which be disobedient to the ones

who are in rejection of him.

The stone which the builders disallowed the same is made the head

of the corner and a stone of stumbling and a rock of offense even

to them which stumble at the word being disobedient.

Whereunto also they were appointed meaning this.

What we teach is Jesus.

To some people, that's going to be precious.

To some people, that's going to be their hope.

The other side of people that are in disobedience, that's going

to be a stumbling block.

Jesus is always the most polarizing figure.

Why?

Because he is the one that either for the believers is going

to be precious or for those who are in rebellion, they're going

to hate that.

I can get out into the corner and preach about church all day.

Everyone should be in church and they're going to say, okay, yeah,

you should have a God, you should believe in a God, something,

and everyone's going to be okay with that.

But the moment we insert Jesus as the way, the truth and the life,

that is where there's division, that is where there's offense.

So we have to be okay in certain instances where we preach

Jesus and people are going to be offensed, the next generation

might recoil at that.

Why?

Because if they're in rebellion, that's going to be different.

And so what's going to happen is, is that we have to preach Jesus

nonetheless.

And it's the truth of Jesus Christ and the power of the Holy

Spirit that will turn the hearts of man to the truth.

We can't just preach church to our kids.

We can't just preach being moral to our children.

We can't just preach, hey, be religious to our children.

We have to preach Jesus to our children.

All those morality, the church, the way that we deal with

other people that comes in line with a relationship with Jesus.

Now as they're young and some of you know this by way of example,

a one year old needs to understand this is right, this is

wrong.

But as they get older, there needs to be a reason why behind this

being right and this being wrong.

It's not that you're pleasing me even though they please me.

They're ultimately pleasing the Lord at that age.

But guess what?

There's going to be a time in a place where my son, my daughter,

don't fear me anymore.

And there's going to be, they're going to 18, 19, 20 years

old and they're going to say, well, dad isn't in charge of me anymore,

so I can do what I want to do.

So I don't want to be the ultimate one in charge of them.

I want to Pass them off to their heavenly father so that one

day they'll realize that I go to church.

I serve God because I serve my heavenly Father.

And so it's a relationship with Jesus that we teach them along

with all these other things in Scripture.

But sometimes what happens is that we try to raise our children

in the rules of the book without teaching them the author

of the book.

And we have to get deeper into that.

And are we going to fail?

Of course.

Are our children going to have anger?

Our.

Are our children going to be rebellious?

Sure, in many cases there will be that.

But what we have to do is come alongside of them and preach Jesus.

And so I think about that because.

Let's go back.

And this is where we're going to end here this evening.

Joshua, chapter five, verse one.

This is.

We're going to leave off and you're going to say, why did you

go into that whole rock of offense and rock of being precious

since chief cornerstone?

You're about to see why.

Verse 1.

The people in the area around the Jordan river hear what just happened.

They hear that God just did this miracle.

And we're going to see their response.

Instead of turning their hearts to God, they cower in fear.

They're in rebellion.

And so it says.

And it came to pass when all the kings of the Amorites, which

were on the side of Jordan westward, and all the kings of the

Canaanites which were by the sea, heard that the Lord had dried

up the waters of Jordan from before the children of Israel until

we were passed over, that their heart melted.

Now, this is not a heart melting with belief and humility.

This is their heart melting.

Fear, knowing the judgment of God is coming.

And folks, when we preach the truth of God, there's either two

camps.

Either the camp that we find hope and peace because we're on the

right side, or fear, rebellion, confusion, and ultimately

condemnation to those that are in rebellion.

So the Canaanites and the Amorites could have turned to God.

There was a process in which Gentiles could turn to the Lord and

convert.

We know that.

Why do we know that?

Go back to Joshua, chapter two.

Rahab, right?

We know that there was an extension of grace to those who are

not the children of Israel.

These people could have said, this is the true God.

Our God's not real.

Our God can't do this.

This is the true God.

They could have had a proper response to the power of God.

But no.

What do they do?

They melt in fear.

Neither was their spirit in them anymore because of the children

of Israel.

So instead of submitting to God, they fear Israel and know that

judgment is coming.

And now we're going to see here later on how God enacts this.

And we're going to see a story.

Most of you know it in the book of Jericho, or not the book

of Jericho, the city of Jericho, in the book of Joshua, what

God does there.

But here in chapter five, we see a preparation of the siege of

Jericho.

And we're going to come back to that next week, and we're going

to look how Joshua prepares for the battle and how they prepare

themselves spiritually and physically for the siege of Jericho.

So I think I want to leave it with that, that when we see the power

of God, our proper response should not be to cower in fear, right?

Because there's no more condemnation to us in Jesus Christ,

but we are to respect him and to love him and to celebrate his

miracles and his victories.

And so what we need to do is preach the word of God to the world.

No matter what the response is.

For some people, it's going to be a response of anger.

Why?

Because the chief cornerstone is in the fence.

It's a stumbling block to many people because to submit to Jesus

means to give up our way.

To submit to Jesus as the way means I'm wrong, I'm a sinner.

You know what?

People are really nice until you call them a sinner, right?

And.

And we don't start with that.

Like, I don't, you know, personally, my way of witnessing

to someone isn't just walking up to someone at the store and go,

do you know you're just a filthy, rotten sinner?

Well, what.

Excuse me, like, I might get in a fight, right?

But so we preach.

We preach who Jesus is, and we preach a need for our Savior.

If I tell everybody, Jesus is just going to make your life better.

Like, well, maybe my life is okay.

Like, you know, But Jesus doesn't just come to make our lives

better.

He comes to save us from a sickness that's called sin that leads

to death.

And so we do need to portray to people that there is a need for

a savior and that will offend some, but we do it in love.

But we cannot leave that out.

We cannot leave out the message of judgment.

I wish I could just tell everybody, hey, you know what?

God will understand if you're a good person.

But the truth is that, what's the Bible say?

There's none good.

No, not one.

There's nothing that I can do good that can outweigh my Bad.

So what do I do?

We, as a church, we.

We preach the cornerstone.

And however they respond is how they respond.

That's not our job to make them respond.

Our job is to present the chief cornerstone as what they should

build their life on.

And that's what we do with our children.

I've heard a lot of people that say, well, you know what?

I just don't know.

I'm fearful.

Are my children gonna follow God?

Are they gonna do this?

Are they gonna do that?

Folks, it's not like a magic potion.

We raise our children in the nurture and admonition of the Lord.

We point them to Jesus.

We live it authentically.

And it's like any other gospel situation, any other evangelistic

situation.

We trust in the Lord that God is going to do his work.

I want my children to be serving the Lord.

I want my children to be in church forever.

It's yet to be seen that that's going to happen.

But my goal is to make it so much so that this is our life, that

that is something that they want to have one day.

And many people have seen, many people have seen people that

have gone to church for decades and decades and decades,

and then people walk away sometimes.

We don't always have those answers of why that happens.

I don't have the answers to why that happens.

But all I know is as a dad and as a husband, what I need to do is

I need to do my role, my part.

God's going to do his part, and we have to just trust in Him.

And who's to say if someone's gotten away that they won't come

back?

We never give up on people.

We never stop praying for people because the power of God is

so much bigger than any heart of rebellion.

And so we know that God's love is never, never running dry.

And so we can just keep calling out to Him.

And Lord willing, we will see these young people come back to Christ.

So next week, we'll come back.

Joshua, chapter five.

I hope that you'll come back and study this along with us and

hope that it's a blessing.

Thank you again for listening to the Middletown Baptist Church

podcast.

I hope that this sermon has been a blessing for you.

If you would like to find out more information about our church

or this sermon, you can find us at middletownbaptistchurch.org

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You can also email me directly at Josh [email protected]

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Thank you so much.

God bless.

Have a wonderful day.