Are You Forgetting God? - A Series in Joshua

Hi Leah.

Hello, Jake.

How are you?

I am doing well.

Thank you.

Good, good.

Thank you for joining us today as we dive into Joshua chapter 22.

Joshua 22 · chapter mention

Really excited to have you with us today.

It's going to be exciting.

Talk to us about what's going on in this chapter today.

Right.

So the Israelites have conquered the land and they have been obedient to what God has called them to do.

And now they are stepping into this inheritance, which is the promised land that had been promised all the way back with Abraham and the Abrahamic covenant.

And what we see is that as the land is allotted, there are these two and a half tribes.

So it's Reuben Gad and the half tribe of Manasseh.

And if we look back in Numbers 32, they had asked Moses if they could settle in the land of Gilead.

So they want to settle east of the Jordan River.

They don't want to cross the Jordan River and go into the land of Canaan because they have a bunch of livestock.

And so they're like, can we just set up camp here?

This is the home that we want.

We want this as our inheritance.

And Moses says, Hey, that is fine.

You can do that, but you have to cross this Jordan River, and at least your men do, and they have to go into battle with their brothers to conquer this land.

So what we see in Joshua 22 is that they have been obedient to Moses' command and they have helped their brothers conquer the land.

And now Joshua is sending them back to their families and their livestock.

And so they take off, they head to cross the Jordan River and receive their inheritance.

But on the way, they stop and they build this altar, the Bible says, of imposing size, right?

So they leave Shiloh, they don't cross the Jordan yet.

And back in Shiloh, it says that the other tribes of Israel gathered and they are upset about this.

And they decide that they want to go to war.

They want this civil war because they do not like this altar that has been set up.

And so Eliezer, the priest, is like, hold up, hold up, let's go talk to them about it first, which is like wisdom, right?

We love that, like taking our time and seeing what's actually going on.

So he sends his son Phineas and men from the other tribes to go, you know, confront them on this altar of imposing size that they have built.

And the reason why they're doing this is because if we look back at Moses' commands for inheriting the promised land, in Deuteronomy 13, he tells the people this he says, When you enter this land, if there are any worthless fellows among you who set up a city and decide that they're going to worship a false god and built an altar to this false god, you are to make war against them.

We are not going to allow any um worship of false gods in our inheritance.

And when you're like, oh, that sounds really harsh, if you actually study the Old Testament and what went along with worshiping some of these false gods, it wasn't just like some tribal chance around a fire and sacrificing some animals.

It it was there was a lot of brutality.

Yeah.

And so God's just like, we're not gonna let that um, you know, take root in this inheritance.

And so this the Western tribes are quick to confront um the eastern tribes on this altar that they have set up.

They're they're obeying, you know, exactly what they're being able to do.

They're in obedience.

So they confront them, and Ruben Gad, the half tribe of Manasseh, explain themselves.

And what they explain is that they have actually built a stone memorial.

And they have done this not to offer sacrifices apart from the tabernacle and apart from Shiloh, which is where God had made his presence known and where the Israelites were supposed to make sacrifices and offerings through the Levitical priests.

Um, they had not set up something separate from worshiping God, but they have just built this as a memorial.

Um they called it, they named it a witness.

And it was so that the children on the western side of the Jordan River and the children on the eastern side of the river could look at it and say, We are indeed brothers.

They didn't want them to think that they were not part of the inheritance, too.

They were just separated by a river.

And so the Western tribes take this as truth.

They say, This is this is fine, this is great, now we don't need to go to war.

And the chapter ends with peace and a civil war averted.

Yeah.

Which is which is always like that didn't need to happen.

Um, and I think that this is one of those rare moments um in the Old Testament with the children of Israel where we have like a win-win.

Um, we can take something from really both sides of this situation and and really learn from it.

So, you know, one thing we can take away is those Eastern tribes, they understood their past.

They understood that they were coming from a stiff-necked people, people who immediately forgot that God had crossed the Red Sea.

And their their parents who had to wander in the wilderness for 40 years and complaining because they were so forgetful.

So they wanted to set something up so that their children would remember the faithfulness of God.

And actually, there are seven stone memorials that are set up in the book of Joshua.

And I think that's really cool coming from a generation whose parents would have been wandering for 40 years.

They're like, we don't want to make the mistakes of our parents.

We are going to set up these memorials as a sign for our children, as a witness for our children of the faithfulness of our God.

And I think we can learn, learn from that and and really think about our families.

Are we setting things up for our children to help them remember like the goodness and the faithfulness of God?

And I just think of one one way we do that is we bring our children to church every Sunday.

And our children often ask, and we go back and we talk about the Sabbath day, they're like, if the Sabbath was Saturday, why do we go to church on Sunday?

And I was like, we go to church on Sunday.

Every Sunday, we remember what happened on the best Sunday ever when Jesus conquered death and he rose from the grave.

And that is why, I mean, like we we will hardly miss church because we are going to remember on a weekly basis um the beauty of that morning and him rising from the dead.

So I think it's it's setting up those moments in your children's life to help them remember.

Yeah, the faithfulness of God.

But we can also learn from these Western tribes who were vigilant.

I mean, they were so vigilant, they had just driven out this idol worship from the land of Canaan, and then they think, you know, they they don't um perceive what's going on correctly, but they think that what's happening is that some of their brothers are then going to get into this idolatry and and make sacrifices to false gods, and they are so vigilant to um to stand up against it and to say we will not allow this to take root in our inheritance.

And I think, you know, as believers, sometimes we're not vigilant in our community um to look for sin that's taking root.

Maybe we don't want to be judgmental towards other people in our community.

Um we might not be vigilant even, you know, within our own homes.

But I think if if you really want to make a personal application, as as followers of Jesus, we have received the best inheritance ever.

We have been given the gift of the Holy Spirit, and we have, you know, this promise of perfect eternity with Christ.

And you know, God says He will dwell in us.

That is the best inheritance.

And are we going to allow any kind of sin to take root um in that inheritance, or are we gonna be vigilant to fight against it?

And I know I mean, it was just like, I mean, this is fresh, this is really fresh, but it was even like a week ago where I just totally gave in to coveting.

And I made this like intentional decision.

I was in a really bad mood.

It would have been like things piling up all week long of just I'm unhappy about this, I'm unhappy about this, I'm unhappy about this, and I was just like letting it all fester, right?

I was letting it all fester and God's like, oh, you're coveting right now.

That is the 10th commandment.

Um and and just really the spirit of just being so ungrateful.

And I knew what I was doing, and I was like, I don't care.

This is how I feel, and this is how this is where I'm gonna let my thoughts go.

This is where I'm gonna let my heart go.

And it's incredible um how quickly, I mean, I was almost physically sick over it and just completely incapacitated um to just do fruitful personal ministry in my own home because I had let this take root.

And even with this passage on my in mind at the time, I was just like, no, vigilance, like you cannot stifle the Holy Spirit by letting any kind of sin take root in the inheritance um that you've been given.

So I think from this we can just take away the the importance of being quick to to recognize sin and take action against it.

Yeah, I think both both camps, both sides of it, that with both of those takeaways can almost be summarized in just remembering God.

You know, because the eastern side, they they want to remember him, they want to build this thing for him, you know.

They want they want to set up this memorial so that people after them can remember.

But the western side is like, we remember what we what our ancestors were told to do, you know.

And I do think it again, it can all kind of be summarized in just remembering God.

Fortunately, God holds our salvation securely, you know.

That that He is the one that has given us salvation, He is the one that has given us Jesus, He is the one that holds that together, and it He is who saved us.

We don't save ourselves.

However, this is a relationship with a living being being a follower of Jesus.

It is a relationship with a living God.

And all of this makes me just think about like every relationship that we have, whether it's a friendship, uh a relationship with your child, a marriage, a boyfriend or a girlfriend, an uncle, a coworker, all of it.

All of it is based off of remembering and serving that other person so that you can show them how good God actually is.

Both sides of the side of Israel, both the Eastern and Western, wanted their relationship with God to be secure and wanted it to be good and fruitful and to live fully in the inheritance that God has given them.

They wanted to protect it for generations to come.

I feel like if we if we want to do the same thing, if we want to have a fruitful, meaningful relationship with God that can last for generations, that can pass on to our children, that can pass on to the people that we have relationships with, our relationship with God has to be what we remember first and what he who being who he calls us to be and doing what he calls us to do.

And so whether it's by setting up a quote unquote altar or stone pillars or whatever it was that to remember him, that can look like behaviors, that can look like habits, that can look like literally for for Monica and I, we actually have a jar full of rocks.

Yeah, you say that before that every single one of those rocks represents a way that God has provided for us in the past.

And that's this the the story of Joshua is where we get that idea.

Um, but like even like showing that to our children, like we are gonna remember what God has done, showing that to the the rest of the world of like like that.

That's the power of our testimony is remembering what God has done in our lives and sharing it with other people so it doesn't, so that so that story with him doesn't die and it can be reproduced.

And then on the other end of it, doing everything we can to protect it, thinking about what is good, thinking about what is true, dwelling in his word, obeying him, even even if it feels like it's gonna be difficult, even if it feels like we maybe we need to challenge our brothers and sisters, even if it like we have to be obedient to what he calls us to do.

Both of those things, both remembering who God is and and that we have a relationship with him and wanting to pass that on and protecting it like it's precious, even to the point of being willing to battle for it.

Both of those things is pure love for God.

The importance of you know being surrounded by by good community, um, even talking about you know my own sin and like what I was going through, my husband's just kind of like, Hey, what's what's going on with you?

Like, what's up?

And I just told him, I'm like, I am dealing with this like coveting issue and this, you know, discontentment.

And he calls me to remember.

I mean, that's how that's how what he did.

He was like, Leah, I want you to remember what you've been called to.

Like, I want you to remember how faithful God has always been to us.

And so surrounding yourself with with community who is going to help you remember.

I mean, that's what that's what your kid is.

Yeah.

Awesome.

Good stuff.

Thank you so much for today, Leah.

Yeah, thank you.