The Comeback Kid | Joshua 8:1-29 | Gabriel Guzman

And man, what a great generosity moment that was. I

don't know who that guy was.

In the beginning, but he sucked at pickleball.

Well, have you guys been enjoying our Joshua series that

we've been going through. I'm gonna go through chapter eight

with you guys tonight. But if you haven't met me before,

my name is Gabriel. I'm the associate director of Family

Ministries here at Patriot Church. And if you serve in

Patriot Kids or Patriot Youth, can you raise your hand

first really quick so we.

Can just love on you really quick.

We just thank you for all of your service, how

you do for all the families here at Patriot Church.

I also just want to honor Pastor Adam and Pastor Ashley.

I don't count it for granted that they asked me

to come up here and speak. I always count it

in honor and so I always love that they do

that for me. But if you have your journals for

Joshua chapter eight, I have five journals up here, as

promised by Pastor Herron last week. If you do not

have a journal, you can run up and grab one

right now. It's a journal of don't run too fast.

Don't take two. Okay, here she goes, here, she goes. Wow,

she just went in for it. One, two to three

he laughed. So I had to give him one. I

don't know why he laughed as he grabbed one. So

I said, all right, you get one ute.

You laughed, you laughed. H Well, family, today.

We're gonna be in Joshua chapter eight, verses one through

twenty nine. Now, we're not gonna read it all right

now when we stand up, We're only going to do

two verses for you. So don't freak out when we

stand up right now. But you can turn to Joshua

chapter eight in your journal or your Bible, go on

your phone, or if you simply want to listen, if

you do me a favor, We're all gonna stand together

for the reading of God's word right now. Joshua Chapter eight,

verse one and.

Two is how we will start.

It says this, and the Lord said to Joshua, do

not fear, and do not be dismayed. Take all the

fight men with you, and arise go up to eye.

See.

I have given it into your hand, the King of

I and his people, his city and his land. And

you shall do to I, and it's king, as you

did to Jericho and its king. Only it's spoil and

it's livestock. You shall take as plunder for yourselves, lay

an ambush against the city behind it. Let's pray, Lord,

we come before you right now, and we thank you

for your word. God, We thank you for everything we

can learn from it. People did not come to hear

from a man tonight. They came to hear from you, Lord,

and I pray that as your word goes forth, it

is powerful, and it penetrates the hearts and the spirits

and the minds of those who hear it. In your name,

we pray, Amen, you can all be seated. Thank you

so much so. Today's sermon is titled the Comeback Kid.

It's called the Comeback Kid. You know, last week and

the weeks before, in chapter seven, we talked about how

the Israelites got defeated. They went to a battle and

they lost, and there was some sin involved and all

of that kind of stuff. But in this chapter they win,

they're victorious, and we're gonna see that they had a comeback.

They were comeback kids. And I don't know I for you,

but I like a good comeback kid.

Story.

Some of the most popular movies are comeback kid stories.

I'm thinking of movies like Rocky. Does anybody know the

movie Rocky? Some of you? Okay? Great?

The Karate Kid, The Karate Kid Okay, Yes, there's a

lot of Karate Kid movies. They're still making. There's one

coming out next month. They keep making them. Why they

keep making them because it's a comeback story. Everybody likes

a comeback story. The Pursuit of Happiness super popular movie.

A story of a father trying to overcome his own

situation and on circumstance, not only to provide for himself,

but to provide for his son, and he ultimately overcomes

those struggles and he has a comeback. The most popular movie,

the highest grossing movie of all time, Avengers Endgame. Now

that's a superhero. Big fan of Avengers Endgame. I would

assume that there's some in here because it's the highest

grossing movie of all time.

You see, that's a movie about superheroes.

And in the last movie, the movie before, they lost,

they got defeated, and then in the Avengers Endgame they win,

they have a comeback, they defeat the enemy, and so

the Israelites our story. This story in chapter eight is

a story of a comeback kid, and I want to

encourage you that that's your story too. You're a comeback kid.

You're having a comeback. Maybe you got defeated before, maybe

you got defeated today. But your story doesn't end with failure.

Your story doesn't end with defeat. Your story doesn't end

with sorrow. It doesn't end with grief. It ends with victory.

And that's what we're gonna learn today in Joshua chapter eight.

We're gonna learn about some three rs that we can

apply in our lives on how to have victory. But

before we get into that, let's read this quote really

quick from Robert Hes.

He says, for the.

Christian, the story of Eye illustrates God's forgiveness toward a

repentant people and the manner in which continued obedience is

rewarded with victory over the struggles and temptations of life.

I don't want anybody in here to feel like they

can't apply something in the Old Testament to their life

because it doesn't talk about Christians, it doesn't talk about Jesus.

I don't want you to feel like you can't apply

something in the Old Testament specifically, maybe and even in

this chapter, because it's talking about a battle, it's talking

about a warfare. And I don't know if you knew this,

but Joshua chapter eight is the most detailed battle in

the whole book. It's the most detailed battle in the

entire book. And we'll talk about some reasons on maybe

why that is. But maybe you're thinking to yourself.

I'm not in a war.

I don't have a sword strapped to me, I don't

have a gun at my waist ready to go, and

I'm not in a warfare. So I don't know how

this could apply to me. But I want to let

you know, Oh, if you didn't know that, that's not

how the Bible describes the life of a Christian. The

Bible describes the life of a Christian as a life

of war. There's a lot of scriptures we can turn

to for this, but I'm only going to share three.

You can just listen to them if you'd like to,

you know, need to turn there. Tewod Corinthians, chapter ten,

verse three and four says, for though we walk in

the flesh, we are not waging war according to the flesh.

For the weapons of our warfare are not of the flesh,

but have divine power to destroy strongholds one Timothy six twelve.

Fight the good fight of the faith, Roman seven twenty three.

But I see in my members another law waging war

against the law of my mind and making me captive

to the law of sin that dwells in my members.

You see, the Bible describes the life of a Christian

as a life in warfare, as a life in battle.

And I don't know if there's anybody in here that's

felt like that in their life, like they've been in

a battle, that they've been fighting for their lives sometimes

in this life as a believer in Christ. And so

we're in a war. We're in a battle, and there

are enemies in this battle. And notice its enemies plural,

because we're very familiar with one enemy, which is the devil, right,

we're very familiar with it. But there's more than just

the devil. The Bible describes three enemies. Three enemies. I

have a reference for you guys. You guys could take

a picture of you want. You guys can read them.

We're not gonna read them together. But the Bible describes

three enemies. That's the flesh that's gonna be yourself, your

own desires.

The world, the world system, how the.

World operates, and the devil, who are very familiar with.

And so those are the enemies.

And I don't know if you felt like you've gotten

defeated by one of these enemies before.

Maybe you got defeated by one of these enemies tonight

before you got here.

But we're gonna see in Joshua chapter eight, how we

can have victory in our lives, how we can come

back from our defeat from any of these enemies. There's

three rs that we're going to go through. It's going

to be renewal, readiness, and retaliation. Renewal, readiness and retaliation. Now,

before we get into the chapter itself, just want to

give a quick recap to where we're at and how

we come here in Joshua chapter eight. There's twenty four

chapters in the book, and so we're almost halfway there

through the book. But there's not a lot that's happened

so far. But the story of Joshua is following the

Israelites which have come out of Egypt with Moses, and

that old generation dies and there's a new generation now

and they come to a land that God promised them,

and now in the Book of Joshua, it's their job

to capture the land, to defeat the people that are

living in that land, because it's theirs. God promised it

to them, and so that's what this book is about.

And so the first battle they have is the Battle

of Jericho, and it's funny that it's even just does

a battle, because that's the battle where they walk around

the walls and the walls crumble and the Lord gives

them victory. And so they weren't supposed to take anything

from Jericho. Everything was supposed to belong to the Lord.

But there was this guy Achin and he saw something

that we learned last week.

He saw something and he took it for himself, and

he took it in secret, and so nobody knew about it.

And so then they after Jericho's done, everybody's happy that

they won and everything's going well, and then they go

to the next battle I, and so they go and

they try to attack I, and you know, it's even

a little cocky. They only send a little bit of people.

We did it so good last time. We just need

a little bit of people. It's a small it's a

small city. We're good to go, no need to worry.

And they lose. This is the first time Israelites die

in a battle in this new generation. They're defeated, and

it's because of the sin of Achin. And so last

week I encourage you to listen to that sermon from

Pastor Herron.

He did a great job talking about it.

But last week we talked about how they uncovered the

sin of Achin and what they did about it. They

destroyed a can, they destroyed his family, They destroyed any

kind of remnants of that sin so that they can

ultimately have victory.

And so they atoned for it. They prayed to God.

God revealed that sin. And so now we're here in chapter.

Eight, after that sin was exposed, after that sin was absolved,

and so.

Now what do they do.

The first point here renewal on how to have a comeback,

how to have a victory in your life. It's going

to be recommissioned after recommitment.

First verse, and the.

Lord said to Joshua, do not fear and do not

be dismayed. Now we're going to stop there in.

The first verse.

These first two verses are really important to the whole

chapter of the book, and we're not necessarily going to

go verse by verse, but these first few verses we

are going to stop on. And this first part of

this verse is important because this commissioning by the Lord.

The Lord said to Joshua, wasn't there when they first

went to attack I. The Lord never told Joshua anything

about I. They just went and they did it. And

why did that happen? Because there was sin involved from

Jericho and so the Lord didn't commission him.

So he is commissioning him now.

And you notice the phraseology he says, do not fear

and do not be dismayed. That's some similar language that

we've already kind of heard in the Book of Joshua,

specifically Joshua won nine, where the Lord tells them do

not fear and be courageous. We're very familiar with that

kind of language, and that's from Joshua nine. The Lord

also speaks like this in Deuteronomy one, twenty one and seven,

eighteen and thirty one eight. It's very familiar language, and

it's almost like the Lord is now recommissioning the goal,

recommissioning what he had the Israelite to do, which was

to conquer the Promised Land.

Hey, I know that sin happened.

We brought that sin before me, we dealt with it,

and now you're back on your mission. I'm ready to

send you out again. Now I'm ready to give you victory.

And that's almost like a pretext some homework that we

have to do before we have victory in our own lives,

and that's to get rid of some sin that we have,

some secret stuff that's going on with us. And again

I can't recommend it enough to listen to that sermon

last week on how to do that and what does

that look like and how can we overcome that sin?

Because you need to do that before you have victory.

You need to do that before the Lord is able

to recommission you. You need to do that before the

Lord's able to recommit you on what he has to

do in your life. We can't have sin and we

can't have victory together. You have to pick one, and

it's up to you which one you want, because sometimes.

The sin feels good, it looks good.

You want it sometimes because one of those enemies is

our flesh.

But we have to pick do we want victory or

do we want sin? First?

John one to nine says, if we confess our sins,

he is faithful and just to forgive us our sins

and to cleanse us for all unrighteousness. I really like

this from First John, chapter two, verse one. He says,

my little children.

I am writing these things to you so that you

may not sin.

But if anyone does sin, like John's admitting that the

life of a Christian won't be perfect, the life of

a Christian isn't just sinless all the time. There might

be a moment where you sin as a Christian. He

goes on, if anyone does sin, we have an advocate

with the Father Christ, Jesus the Righteous, And so we

need to choose is it our sin that we want

or is it victory? And if we pick victory, okay,

we're gonna have to recommit ourselves to the Lord, and

we're going to get recommissioned. The verse goes on, Joshua,

chapter eight, verse one, take all.

The fighting men with you and arise, go up to eye.

And so this is different. Already, this is different.

Then before you see they decide on their own.

They're only gonna take maybe three thousand people to go

take eye. It's a small it's a small people, it's

a small, small, little camp.

We can take it with a little bit of people.

Now we're gonna take everybody. Now we're gonna take it everybody.

Now he goes on.

See, I have given into your hand the King of

I and his people, his city and his land. And

so that's some emphasis there, the King of I and

his people, his city, and his land. You see, these

are gonna be the achievements of the Israelites in the

reverse order. So they're first going to enter the land,

then they're gonna siege the city, then they're gonna destroy

the people, and then they're gonna hang the king. And

so it's outlining what's gonna happen in this battle. And

we'll be able to track it too. We'll be able

to track it as we go through. Verse two says,

and you shall do to I and it's king, as

you did to Jericho and its king. Only it's spoil

and it's livestock. You shall take as plunder for yourselves.

This is the first time Israel gets to take some

of the plunder from the battle. This is the first

time they get some of the spoils from the war.

And why is that why do they get it now?

When Jericho was all dedicated to the Lord who one

maybe they got forgiven from the sin of Achin and

they absolved that. But to the Israelites have almost been

treated like a baby by God. While they're going through

the wilderness, they get treated like a baby because.

They act like babies.

They say, God, I'm hungry, God, I'm thirsty, and so

God gives them food and then God gives them some water,

and so he's literally almost holding their hand leading them

through the wilderness. And now that they're in the Promised Land,

it's like a baby needing to walk, a baby needing

to feed themselves now, and that's what's kind of happening here.

If you notice that earlier in Joshua, we read that

the Lord stopped giving them manna, and so.

Now they're gonna need some of this plunder.

They're gonna need some of this to live on their

own and to succeed on their own.

This is really important.

Next, what the Lord says, he says, lay in ambush

in verse two against the city behind it. This is

the main tactic that the Lord gives Joshua by which

they're going to defeat I and they're gonna win this battle.

The tactic is ambush. That's how they do it.

And this is a smart tactic in battle. It's a

cunning tactic. And it reminds me of this verse in

Matthew ten sixteen. Behold, I am sending you out as

sheep in the midst of wolves. So be wise as

serpents and innocent as doves. Maybe your Bible says as

cunning as serpents. THESV says wise as serpents, And so

Jesus gives this directive to his disciples as they're going

out and preaching the gospel.

But that's a directive for us.

If we want victory in our lives, we need to

be cunning. We don't just need to know that we

have a struggle or know that we have a battle.

We need to be smart enough and creative enough to

know how do we overcome it? How do we overcome

our own flesh, how do we overcome the world? Overcome

the devil? How do you do these things? Well, we

need to be cunning, We need to be smart. Okay,

so there's a renewal. You get recommissioned after a recommitment

to the Lord. Number two step two in having a comeback,

having victory. That's readiness, readiness preparation with precision, preparation with precision.

Verse three.

So Joshua and all the fighting men arose to go

up to eye, and Joshua chose thirty thousand mighty men

of valor and sent them out by night, and he

commanded them be, you shall lie in ambush against the

city behind it. And so it's really important how he

says that lie in ambush against the city behind it,

because he perfectly recaps, perfectly restates what the Lord told him.

Joshua didn't leave it up to his own interpretation of

what the Lord said.

He didn't leave it up to his own imagination of

what the Lord said. Well, God says matters.

How he says it matters, and the Bible tells us.

And that's our word, right, the word of God, that's

what we call this. He tells us what we should

do a lot of times. He tells us what not

to do a lot of times.

And it's not up to us to try to interpret

what does God mean by that? What God says not

to sin? What does he mean though?

When God, when God says that I shouldn't I shouldn't

get get drunk a lot. What does that mean? Maybe

he means no. Now we're starting to do our own interpretation.

We're starting to give our own imagination. God means what

he said, He means what he said, and so Joshua

perfectly tells the people what God said. And he's going

to go on to describe the plan that they have.

He goes on, do not go very far from the city.

But all of you remain ready, everybody say ready, verse five,

And I and all the people who are with me

will approach the city. And when they come out against us,

just as before, we shall flee before them. And they

will come out after us until we have drawn them

away from the city. For they will say they are

fleeing from us, just as before, so we will flee

before them. Joshua is counting on the people of Eye

to be cocky. He's counting on the people of I

to be predictable. He doesn't we know for sure that

they're gonna do that potentially, but it's pretty predictable. Why

because that's what happened last time they went.

Into the battle.

They saw that they were losing, so they were treated

and as they were treated the people ran after them.

They said, all right, they're going, let's go after them.

And that's how some of the Israelites died. And so

it's very predictable. And so how we have victory in

our lives, we have to know that there's a lot

of predictability. We have to know ourselves. You know you

better than anyone. I don't know you.

Better than you. You know you better than you. You

know what can.

Get you going, you know what can cause you to sin.

You act pretty predictably.

And so if you.

Want to have victory in your life, plan for the predictability,

plan for the predictabilities in your life.

You can do that.

You can know that if you go out with that girl,

maybe that'll happen.

Maybe this will happen.

Right, if you're gonna take one sip, you know what's

gonna happen. If you're gonna stay up late, was your computer,

you know what's gonna happen.

You have to plan for the predictability. Verse seven.

Then you shall rise up from the ambush and seize

the city.

You see.

Now we're gonna start to refer to it as the

city in the Bible, And that's what the Lord said, right,

He's gonna.

Give you the city.

Seize the city, for the Lord your God will give

it into your hand. And as soon as you have

taken the city, you shall set the city on fire.

You shall do according to the word of the Lord.

See I have commanded you. So Joshua sent them out

verse nine, and they went to the place of Ambush

and lay between Bethel and I to the west of Iy.

But Joshua spent that night among the people.

You see, Joshua tells them the plan. Here is the plan.

Let's go on.

In verse ten, Joshua arose early in the morning and

mustered the people and went up. He and the eld

years of Israel before the people verse eleven, and all

fighting men who are with him went up and drew

near before the city and encamped on the north side

of Eye, with a ravine between them. He took about

five thousand men and sent them in ambush between Bethel

and I. You see, Joshua planned, He had it down

to a t There was there was precision in his plan.

There was detail in his plan. Yes, the Lord gives

him the main tactic. And now he says that to

the entire people of Israel, and that's how we have

to be. Matthew twenty six forty one says, watch and

pray that you may not enter into temptation. The spirit,

indeed is willing, but the flesh is weak. Sometimes we

think we're pretty strong, but the Bible says you're not.

The Bible says we're not that strong. I can feel

really strong sometimes, but as soon as these chain of

events have been, as soon as this leads to this,

lead to this. Okay, now I'm really weak. Now I'm

really weak. Don't be unaware. Prepare with precision the last

r here retaliation, retaliation.

Now that we have a renewal, and now that we

are ready.

We have to retaliate. We have to fight back. We

have to fearlessly fight, fearlessly fight. And so I'm going

to do a little transition here actually, because we're gonna

do this. Do we have any visual Ooh, I went home, Hobby,

I did the wrong thing. Uh Oh, I went I

did as wrong as I could have done it. I

went home instead of the next app Canva, let's just

go here?

Is it up? Nope? I opened a new app. There

it is here, we go. I did it. I got

back somehow I did it.

We have any visual learners in the house, Jane, if

you're a visual learner, I need to visually see how

many visual learners we have in here.

Okay, perfect.

So we have a map here so that we can

take a look at the battle. Okay, I'm going to

summarize these next few versus. We're not gonna be reading

them all. But we have right here. This is gonna

be the people of I. And just so we can

kind of see it here, let's go here right here.

Oh yeah, I moved that. I moved it right here.

So this is gonna be I. That's gonna be IE.

And so we have them right and now we need

now we need the Israelites. So we have one base

that's gonna be right here. Okay, So this group is

the main group that's gonna be seen. This is the

main group. This is the ambush group. Right here, that's

the ambush group. And so what happens is they see

right here, they see Joshua, and the king sees Joshua.

And the king only sees what Joshua wants him to see.

He only sees what the Lord wants him to see.

So he's over here just looking this way. He's just

worried about what's happening there. And so they go over here,

but this ambush is waiting to they're ready to go.

They're ready to go, and so these they're really just

here to distract.

They're really just here to distract.

And that's kind of what these verses do right at

the beginning.

But there's something important here, and I'm gonna go back

really quick. I'm gonna go back.

Something really important here in verse eighteen, super important. Verse

eighteen says, Then the Lord said to Joshua, everybody's in

their place. Everybody's ready to go. Then the Lord said

to Joshua, stretch out your javelin that is in your

hand toward I, for I have given it into your hand.

That phrase, stretch out the javelin that is in your

hand is huge. It's huge, and maybe we didn't notice it,

but that's why I'm here to tell you.

It's huge.

The Lord gives Joshua another command in the middle of

this battle. He gave him one. This is how you're

gonna win. This is what I want you to do.

And now he's in the middle of it and he goes, hey,

also stretch out your hand. Now that you're in the

middle of it, and so it's up to Joshua to

obey that command.

Joshua needs to.

Obey in the middle of the fight, in the middle

of this thing happening, and that's important for us.

We still need to obey. When we're in the fight.

We can prepare, We've renewed, we're preparing, and now that

we're in the fight, hey, we're ready to go. Well,

now it's still up to us to obey. We still

have to obey to get there. You see Joshua doing

this guarantees victory. But it's also reminiscent of another command

in the past, two commands, maybe both of them in Exodus.

Exodus seventeen. That's the battle of the Amalekites. I don't

know if you remember the story of Moses having to

keep his hands up and they win the battle. And

more importantly, the parting of the Red Sea. Why is

the parting of the Red Sea important because of the

phrase this is what it says next is fourteen sixteen

lift up your staff and stretch out your hand over

the sea and divide it that the people of Israel

mago through.

The sea on dry ground.

You see, that phrase is what led to a miracle happening.

Stretching out Moses' staff and the Red Sea parts.

You see, this is a theme that's.

Been going on in the Book of Joshua, the theme

of the old generation had a God that did all

these things. The new generation has the same God who

does the same things. Okay, And so that phrase is

now saying, hey, just like the Red Sea was a miracle,

you winning this battle is going to be a miracle.

You know, you having victory in your life is a

miraculous act of God. It's miraculous, and it's just as

miraculous as anything you'll read in the Bible. He's right

there with you, and it's miraculous because it's hard to

do it on our own. But the stretching out of

the hand, and we'll talk about it a little bit later,

but that's also showing God's presence is there. It's not

just them in the fight. God is with them in

the fight. And you're not alone in this fight. God

is with you.

He gives you the strength to do it. You can

do it because he's with you. He's the one that's

gonna help you do it.

And then it says this continuing in Joshua chapter eight,

and Joshua stretched out the javelin that was in his

hand toward the city. He was obedient. He was obedient.

The Lord told him to do something right in the

middle of it, and that's what he did.

And that's what he did.

And so what ultimately happens is I'm just gonna summarize

it for us for the sake of time. But the

people are drawn out, the people of I are drawn out,

and they see that Israel's there, and then they.

Start to reach.

The Bible says, they pretend to lose, and they run away,

and then Joshua stretches out his hand, and then the

ambush happens because the city's empty. They left the city empty.

The ambush goes in. They set the city on fire.

The smoke rises up, and then the people turn around.

The people of I turn around, and they go, oh, no,

what has happened to us? They get so they don't

it's to the Bible says, they don't know this way

or that, they don't know where to go this way

or that way. They don't know what to do. And

so then the ambush comes out. And now they're getting squeezed.

They get squeezed because they have Israelites on both sides,

and ultimately they win the battle. They win the battle

verse twenty three. But the King of I they took

alive and brought him near to Joshua. So they did

the land, they did the city, and now it's the king.

Now it's the king, because they already did the people too.

They destroyed all the people.

Now those are the three RS. But there's a bonus

R that I tell you guys about. There's four for ours,

for ours. You see you do all these things. There's

you renew yourself. You are ready, you make a plan

with precision, you retaliate, You fearlessly fight in this fight,

and it can be hard.

There's a reward. That's the last R. Reward Verse twenty four.

Verse twenty four. You have a reward.

When Israel had finished killing all the inhabitants of I

in the open wilderness where they pursued them, and all

of them to the very last had fallen by the

edge of the sword, all Israel returned to eye and

struck it down with the edge of the sword verse

twenty five. And all who fell that day, both men

and women were twelve thousand all.

The people of I.

You see, I was completely destroyed, completely destroyed by Israel,

and Joshua.

Obeyed verse twenty six.

But Joshua did not draw back his hand with which

he stretched out the javelin until he had devoted all

the inhabitants of Ied to destruction. See, Joshua could have

stopped with the javelin when he saw that they were winning.

He could have stopped because he was getting tired of it.

He could have stopped and stepped into the battle to

help them. But it seems like from the text he

had his hand stretched out with the javelin, and that's

what he was doing.

Why because that's what.

The Lord told him to do, And because of that

he had total victory. One of your rewards for doing

all these things for victory is having victory. You do

these things, you will have victory in your life. You

will have victory over your struggles. You'll have victory over

the pains and points in your life. But that's not all.

That's not all you're gonna have verse twenty eight. We'll

skip to verse twenty eight here. So Joshua eye and

made it forever a heap of ruins as it is

to this day. And he hanged the King of I

on a tree until evening, and at sunset Joshua commanded

that they took his body down from the tree and

threw it at the entrance to the gate of the city,

and raised over it a great heap of stones, which

stands there to this day. Now, that happens a lot

in the Book of Joshua, where there's something there to

this day. We talked about that before, especially with these

monuments that the Israelites make. But their victory resulted in permanence.

Their victory resulted in a permanence, and a reminder to

the generation that's reading the Book of Joshua, because they're

reading this book and it says it's there to this day,

which means they can go over there and look at it.

You know.

Let's read this by John chrysossom Here, an early church father.

He said, the path to the kingdom is not easy,

but the reward is beyond compare. It's not easy, it's

not easy, and the reward is heaven. The reward is

being with Jesus. But the reward is even greater too

with us today because we can have victory today, and

we have a testimony. That's that permanence that the people

of Israel had when they say to this day, that's

your testimony. That's something for you. You're leaving something for

the next generation. You're leaving something for your kids, You're

leaving something for those around you. With your victory, they

see you have victory over that, you overcame that. Wow,

I feel like I can overcome some stuff now. I

feel like I can fight my battles now that I've

seen you do that. You have a testimony and you

have victory. That is your reward for being obedient. That

is your reward. This detailed battle shows Israel that by

their obedience, the Lord will defeat all their enemies and

give them the Promised Land. That's one of the reasons

this book, this chapter is so detailed. The Lord takes

obedience seriously, and he takes repentance seriously. The victory of

Eye is not just a story of what God has

done in the past, but it's a reminder of what

He can do for us right now. You want to

see a miraculous event in your life? Does anybody want

to see that? A miraculous event? Where's a miracle. I

can see experience the victory that the Lord can give

you over your own struggles, over your own temptations, especially

if you've been defeated by them in the past. That

is a miraculous event on the level of any other

miracle in the Bible, because the Lord is behind it.

The Lord is behind it. You're not by yourself. God

is not done with you because of your past failures.

But he is ready and able to give you the

greatest victory you've ever seen in your life.

He's ready for it.

He's ready for it, and that victory will be a

testimony to those around you, to your children and to

their children. It's a testimony that you'll have. That's the

reward you're gonna have. And I don't know if there's

anybody in here that hasn't experienced the greatest reward you

could ever have. It's the reward that Jesus Christ paid

for on the cross. You know, we talked about that

preamble that we need to do, that little homework we

have to do, which is getting rid of that sin.

That's what Jesus did on the cross. You see, we're

all born with this thing called sin, and that's the

thing that stops us from spending forever with Jesus. Because

we are eternal beings, we will live forever and ever

and ever. And you either live forever with Jesus or

you live forever without Jesus.

Those are the two options.

Living forever with Jesus is in his presence and eternal

happiness and glory. Living without Jesus, the Bible describes it differently.

That's what we would know as hell. That's what we

know as the gnashing of teeth. And there's a question

right outside this building that says, where will you spend eternity?

Because you're going to spend it one of two places.

And because of this thing called sin that we have,

we're not able to spend it with Jesus because sin

simply means missing.

The mark of falling short.

And God wants us to be with him, and so

that requires a payment, and so he sends his own

son to this world to die on a cross as

a payment for our sins. And that's how we're able

to spend and forever. Would you suspend eternity with Jesus?

How do you do it?

This is what we tell the kids, and pat your kids,

We say, it's as easy as abc. You accept him

as your Lord and savior. You believe that he died

on the cross and rose again for your sins.

And see you confess your sins to him.

You confess that you've done something's wrong, that you've fallen

short of a standard, you fallen short of the mark,

and he is.

Faithful to forgive you of your sins.

If you're in this place right now and you've never

done that before, you think to yourself, Yeah, you know what,

this is making sense Right now. We're going to say

a prayer together. And this prayer isn't what saves you.

This is like a confirmation prayer. It's a confirmation of

something that's already going on in your heart. And so

we're gonna say it together right now. Everybody bow your

heads and close your eyes and repeat after me, say,

Dear Lord Jesus, I accept.

You as my Lord and savior. I believe that you

died on the cross for my sins.

I thank you God for forgiving me, and I thank

you for being with me for the rest of my life.

In Jesus' name, I pray Amen. Amen.

If you said that prayer, family, and you meant it

from your heart. You're now a part of the patriot

of God, the Family of God. And we have some

next steps for you. If you said that prayer, what

do you do now that you're a believer? What do

you do now that you're saved, that you believe in Jesus.

You're gonna visit this website that's gonna be a grow

dot faith and you're gonna download a free book by

our founding pastor, Pastor Diego, and he tells you how

do you walk out this life as a Christian?

What do you do now? How do you achieve.

Victory as a Christian? Because it's not gonna be perfect.

It's not gonna be perfect.

Amen.

Family, All right, Well, I hope you guys enjoyed service today.

We're all gonna leave together right now. I'm gonna pray

for us and we'll be on our way. If you're

in need of any additional prayer, We're gonna have our

prayer team here after service, right here at the altar.

We want to believe God with you. We want to

pray with you for any pains that you have in

your life, any struggles you need to overcome. Please to

share that with our team, and we'll be ready to

pray with you after service.

God, we come before you right now, and we thank

you for your word. Lord. We thank you for everything

we can learn from the God.

We pray that it would penetrate our hearts and our minds,

and we would carry it with us for not only today, Lord,

but for the rest of our lives.

We thank you. Lord.

I pray for traveling mercies for everyone as they're leaving

this place, God, that they would get to their destination safely. Lord,

in Jesus' name, we pray, Amen, Amen. Hope to see

you guys on Sunday.