Holy Roller

Good morning. Good morning to you. How is everybody? Good? All right. We awake? Are we ready to hear the Word? But before we get to that, before we get to that, there's another slide I have to show.

Where is it, Miriam? Thank you. My baby girl, not the one with the blue hat, the one in the green gown had a baby. His name is Max.

So we are super excited. Thanks for letting me indulge myself. This is actually to save a lot of conversations. So the baby's here. He's healthy. Mother's doing well. I think they go home today. So we're super blessed and excited.

Thank you. Let's go on. Book of Joshua is why we're here. Book of Joshua. And as you're turning to chapter 5, I think it was the mid-1980s.

I was about 12 years old. And what I'm about to describe to you became a regular feature of our hot Nebraska summers. Hot Nebraska summer. Yeah, they were hot.

We were living in Weeping Water, Nebraska, where my dad was the pastor at the local missionary church in town. And the distinction, you have to understand, about Weeping Water at the time, not anymore, but at the time, is that the regional camp was right in town.

Not out in the cornfields like Prairie Camp is, where a bunch of our teens came back yesterday. They had a great time. Think about it. Right in the middle of a town of about 1,100 people, give or take a few cats and dogs.

Right in the center of town, well, not in the center, but within a few block radius of a convenience store, and a five and dime, and a fire station, and a bar, and all those things, was the camp.

And when I say the camp was in town, I mean the city streets went right past the tabernacle. In fact, there was one city street that went right through the center of the camp, right by the dorms and the dining halls.

And so you can imagine what it must have been like when during an evening camp meeting service, some monster truck would rev its engines and screech its tires and lay on the horn, and some ne'er-do-well would lay on that horn and scream out at the top of their lungs,

Holy Rollers. Holy Rollers. Now, usually there would be another adjective in front of the word holy, and it's an unholy word that I won't repeat.

Holy Rollers. That's what we were to the townsfolks, and I remember the first time my 12-year-old ears heard that, I wondered, what in the world does that mean?

I mean, even at the local town swimming pool where we would spend most of our summer, the kids would walk by me and my siblings on the deck of the pool, and they would whisper, Holy Rollers!

Well, there's a technical definition to the word holy roller. It actually comes out of a little bit of American church history, the 19th century Pentecostal camp meeting scene, where people would feel a moving of the spirit, and it would make them shake or fall down, and in some cases roll around on the ground.

The first, the original holy rollers. But as often happens over time, words and phrases kind of evolve in their meaning. And we didn't do that at the Wheaton Water camp.

We didn't roll around on the ground. But what they were doing when they were screeching their tires and screaming out holy rollers, is they meant, you guys think you're so holy.

You guys, the way you live, how you act, I guess you could say the way you roll in life, is so weird, so different. I mean, who spends a hot summer night in a non-air-conditioned tabernacle with sawdust on the floor, wood chips?

Which we did. We were the holy rollers. Well, it came to mind this week, forgive me if I don't see just kind of a little parallel to Joshua chapter 5.

Joshua 5 · chapter mention

I would submit to you that God is doing some rolling here today. Because God is about to reveal Himself as the ultimate holy roller, who will, in some cases, literally roll some things away.

Our chapter here, it comes to us in four different scenes. And so we're going to take it that way. Four quick snapshots where God essentially rolls away things that prevent His people from living in a relationship with Him.

from removing the power and courage of the enemy to rolling away His people's shame and punishment. Even the distance created by their very unholy conduct and He Himself.

God rolls that away too. Yes, Joshua 5 is all about the business of a holy God rolling these things away and thereby clearing the way for His people to be able to faithfully depend on Him for what's coming next.

So go ahead and join me in Joshua chapter 5. Again, we're going to divide it up paragraph by paragraph and we're going to focus in on each scene at a time.

Joshua 5 · chapter mention

So I'm going to read verse 1. Scene 1 begins and ends in verse 1. And you can follow along with me as I read that for us. We're calling scene 1 inside the enemy's heart.

Verse 1. As soon as all the Canaanites, all the kings of the Amorites who were beyond the Jordan to the west and all the kings of the Canaanites who were by the sea heard that the Lord had dried up the waters of the Jordan for the people of Israel until they had crossed over, their hearts melted

and there was no longer any spirit in them because of the people of Israel. Well, the news has spread. This news that we've been looking at for two chapters, apparently the news spread very fast.

Who knows? Maybe there were some spies from Jericho that were watching this whole thing go down at the Jordan River. But news of the amazing river crossing has reached the ears of all the kings of the Canaanites and the Amorites.

And it's not just the news that a large nation of people have been able to ford the Jordan at an unlikely place right by Jericho, but also how it was done.

Miraculously at flood stage, a crossing en masse of a whole nation that, remember, wasn't like the Red Sea, like two walls of water, like the aisle right in front of me where all the people walked through with walls of water.

This was a drying up, a heaping up of the waters of Jordan 15 miles away, meaning that this entire river valley was dry and everybody could just cross en masse and quickly, which they did.

And what were these Canaanites and Amorites thinking? Well, they attributed things like this, feats like this to the nation's God. And so they're thinking, oh boy, Israel's God can do something like this?

He must be top dude in the divine food chain. And their reaction, well, it's interesting, but Moses, some 40 years earlier, actually prophetically sang about their reaction.

Here's what we read in Exodus chapter 15. This is just after the Red Sea crossing. Exodus 15 verses 14 through 16. The peoples have heard, they tremble.

Exodus 15 · chapter mention Exodus 15:14–16

Pangs have seized the inhabitants of Philistia. Now are the chiefs of Edom dismayed. Trembling seizes the leaders of Moab. And all the inhabitants of Canaan have melted away.

That's right. Melted away. That's how our narrator puts it right here. He says that their hearts melted. That there was no longer any spirit in them.

No more fight. No more courage. I don't know if you've been watching any of the World Cup games this last month. It's coming to a close here.

But, you know, as you watch any of these games, this is true in really any sport. If I've learned one thing, it's this. This is a really, a very real phenomenon.

It's that when you're in a fight, in this case, it's not a fight for your life. They're just trying to win a cup. It's a soccer game. But there is the psychological battle, isn't there?

And sometimes the psychological battle is bigger than just what's happening on the pitch. If you're down three goals and it's the 75th minute, unless you're messy, it's over, right?

Game over. It's done. And you can, even from a TV screen, you could just watch as the hearts of the opposing team that's down or the team that's down in the scores, you can just watch the energy leave their chest.

They don't run as hard. They don't scrap as much. It's like their courage, their heart is melted, even as the opponent is getting more and more energized as the seconds tick by.

That is exactly the feeling that the Canaanites are dealing with here. And doubly so. Because let's remember that even before the Jordan dried up, there was that prostitute Rahab inside the city of Jericho that they're about to go take, who said this back in chapter 2 when she met the spies.

She told this to the Israelite spies. As soon as we heard it, she says, and she's talking about the crossing of the Red Sea 40 years earlier.

As soon as we heard about that, our hearts melted and there was no spirit left in any man. I mean, they're all ready. And then now this? Water miracle 40 years ago at the Red Sea melts their hearts and now it's happened again like yesterday.

Another water miracle. And another complete heart meltdown. It's like we're done. And so really I think to summarize what's happening here, we're going to have some points.

I'm going to give you one point for each scene. I think we could summarize it this way. We'll make this our first point this morning. Point number one, God rolls away His enemy's power.

God rolls away His enemy's power. He rolled back a river and in doing so, He rolled back a whole lot more, didn't He? Because when your heart and your courage have completely melted, melted like butter, you're not going to have any power.

Your power has been rolled back. God has rolled away the enemy's power. Let's go on to our next scene. This one begins in verse 2. So back to the scripture, verse 2.

We're going to read through verse 9. Scene 2 I'm calling Inside Israelite Tents. Verse 2. At that time the Lord said to Joshua, Make flint knives and circumcise the sons of Israel a second time.

So Joshua made flint knives and circumcised the sons of Israel at Gibeath-Heraloth. And this is the reason why Joshua circumcised them. All the males of the people who came up out of Egypt, all the men of war, had died in the wilderness on the way after they came up out of Egypt.

Though all the people who came out had been circumcised, yet all the people who were born on the way in the wilderness after they had come out of Egypt had not been circumcised.

For the people of Israel walked 40 years in the wilderness until all the nation, the men of war who came up out of Egypt, perished because they did not obey the voice of the Lord.

The Lord swore to them that he would not let them see the land that the Lord had sworn to their fathers to give us, a land flowing with milk and honey.

So it was their children whom he raised up in their place that Joshua circumcised. For they were uncircumcised because they had not been circumcised on the way.

When the circumcising of the whole nation was finished, they remained in their places in the camp until they were healed. And the Lord said to Joshua, Today I have rolled away the reproach of Egypt from you.

And so the name of that place is called Gilgal to this day. You think about what's happening here. Hearts melted. What better time for Israel to do what?

Lord, spring the attack. Let's go. I mean, these Canaanites are cowering. They are afraid. They have no courage whatsoever. No spirit to fight.

Let's pounce. And let's do it now. And yet, what does the Lord say to do instead? It's, hey Joshua, make some flint knives. You've got some business to attend to, Joshua.

And those flint knives that you're going to make are not for battle. They're for a little surgical operation. You're going to take those flint knives inside each Israelite's tent.

Now, obviously Joshua didn't do it himself. He had help. The tent of every Israelite male who is not circumcised. Now, without getting too graphic, and the irony is not lost on me because my grandson is getting circumcised like right now.

But, you know, I am aware that circumcision is a process that is, without getting too graphic, well, let's just say it involves rolling away and removing something, right?

The foreskin. And, wildly enough, that's a very intentional wordplay in Scripture. Down in verse 9. When you hear the Lord say what He says in verse 9, Today I have rolled away the reproach of Egypt from you.

That's an intentional pun. Now, why would so many of our Israelite men need circumcised? Well, we say that because, you know, the Israelites were supposed to be doing this all along.

Way back as far as their forefather Abraham. That was the command given to him. That was the practice that the Israelites had. To circumcise the male children.

The problem came, as we read in the passage, when they came up out of Egypt and across the Red Sea and went all the way through the wilderness, they got to the doorstep of the promised land.

And the problem was, in Numbers chapter 13, they refused to go in. Numbers chapters 13 and 14 tell us the story. Twelve spies were sent out by Moses.

Numbers 13 · chapter mention Numbers 13 · chapter mention

Ten of those spies returned with what we'll call the majority report. And the majority report was, we cannot do this. They're like giants in our eyes and we're like grasshoppers.

We will get slaughtered. We cannot do this. And their unbelief carried and sadly ruined the day. Only Joshua and one other guy named Caleb. Two spies came back with a minority report that said, no matter, with God's help we can do it.

Let's go. And so as a punishment for their unbelief and disobedience, God sentenced them to 40 years of wandering around the wilderness. 40 years for this adult generation to basically die off.

You will not go in, God said, but your children will. Let me read it to you in Numbers 14, verses 30 to 33. Not one of you shall come into the land where I swore that I would make you dwell, except for Caleb the son of Jephunneh and Joshua the son of Nun.

Numbers 14:30–33

But your little ones, who you said would become prey, I will bring in, and they shall know the land that you have rejected. But as for you, your dead bodies shall fall in this wilderness, and your children shall be shepherds in the wilderness for 40 years,

and shall suffer for your unfaithfulness until the last of your dead bodies lies in the wilderness. I mean, even the Apostle Paul later in the New Testament gets pretty graphic when he talks about this in 1 Corinthians chapter 10.

1 Corinthians 10 · chapter mention

Here's what he says. This is the NIV, 1 Corinthians 10, 5. Nevertheless, God was not pleased with most of them. Their bodies were scattered in the wilderness.

And apparently, that older generation was so faithless that they also stopped circumcising their sons. The mark of the covenant, circumcision.

Apparently, nobody was circumcising any of the newborn baby boys. And this is why they will now have to do it. Verse 5. All those who were born on the way in the wilderness after they had come up out of Egypt.

The babies, yes. The children, yes. The grown men, 40-year-old grown men, yes. And listen, don't think this didn't take a little bit of faith on the Israelites' part.

It did. Here they are, following Joshua's orders, even as your target is ripe, even as your enemy, they got those melted hearts. Not only are you missing your opportunity, though, to hit a soft target, to hit them now when their courage is weak,

momentum is on your side. Now, if you're Israel, think about this. You are essentially hamstringing your entire fighting force. Think about it.

Every male, from the babies to the full-grown men, right here at this vulnerable camp, Gilgal, on the banks of the Jordan, no less than six miles from Jericho, your hope of any self-defense is now null and void.

Again, I was looking at circumcision, did a little research this week. How long is the typical recovery period for an adult male? Why do I look these things up?

I don't know. I just do. Basically, for the first 24 to 48 hours, let's just say, you don't do anything. You don't move. And then they say, really, you should take the full week off work.

And if you're in a labor-intensive job, you should take three weeks, because you're not supposed to do anything strenuous, no heavy lifting for a minimum of three weeks, and really, they like it to be six.

So yeah, being obedient to this directive from the Lord here is going to leave this entire camp compromised and very vulnerable. And if you don't believe me, let me send you to Genesis chapter 34.

Genesis 34 · chapter mention

There's a story back in Genesis, you can read about it, how just two guys, two sons, went in together, Simeon and Levi, and they were able to wipe out an entire town of fighting men after there was an offense done to their sister.

They were able to wipe out all the men of the town, just two of them, because they had been just circumcised. So, honestly, in terms of military strategy, this move makes no sense at all.

No sense. The men will be completely immobilized, temporarily crippled, and unable to walk, much less fight. But, in obedience, they do it. This is a different generation.

They do it. Every uncircumcised male gets circumcised. And we read in verse 8 that when the circumcising of the whole nation was finished, they remained in their places in the camp until they were healed.

Yes, probably weeks. Here in this place, back up in verse 3, named Gibeath-Heraloth, a name that literally translates, you'll like this, hill of the foreskins.

Doesn't that sound pleasant? The Lord says here, in this place, what have I done? I have rolled away, pardon the pun, I have rolled away the reproach of Egypt.

Now that's interesting too, isn't it? What's this reproach of Egypt? What's God talking about? Well, we think He's talking about the very thing that Moses feared.

This is 40 years earlier. This is back when the nation, boy, they were a bunch of rascals. And about every time you turned around, the Lord Yahweh was saying to Moses, I'm going to abandon these people.

Or in some instances, I'm going to kill them all. I'm going to destroy them. They're wicked. And Moses would plead with the Lord, and he effectively changed the Lord's mind.

But you know what he would say? Part of his spiel to the Lord, he would say, but what about the Egyptians? If you do that, Lord, the Egyptians are all going to hear about it.

And they're going to think that this people's God was not strong enough to get them where they said they were going to go.

And honestly, in point of fact, they had something to taunt Israel with for the past 40 years. Because once that first generation of Israelites disobeyed God and ended up sentenced to walk around the wilderness for 40 years, you think Egypt didn't know about it?

You think there weren't any Egyptian scouts or merchants or travelers that came through and were like, what's this humongous nation doing out here?

It looks like they don't know where they're going. They were here two weeks ago. That dumb nation of slaves has no idea what they're doing or where they're going.

Scouts would come back. They're still out there wandering. Rehaling the taunts of Egypt, the reproach of Egypt, leaving this nation living in shame day after day.

Shame. But now, by their circumcision, by this ceremonial preparatory act of covenant renewal, which is what circumcision is, God is making a point.

And that point is this. It's our second point this morning. Point number two. God rolls away His people's shame. God rolls away His people's shame.

See, that's what the Israelites' failure to circumcise was. It was tantamount to breaking the covenant. And this is, this is again what the Lord had directed Abraham, their forefather, back in Genesis.

Genesis 17, this is what he says. He says, the Lord says, any uncircumcised male in your extended family as you grow into a nation who is not circumcised in the flesh of his foreskin shall be cut off from his people.

He has broken my covenant. So, the very physicality of these men is a testament to their covenant breaking. By their sheer physicality, they were living shamefully in broken covenant.

But now, God says, I have rolled that back. By rolling back and removing the very symbol of your father's broken faith, your foreskins. So that now, with that shame and reproach all rolled away, now the covenant can be renewed.

And this is exactly what happens next as we move from scenes, twos, inside the tent, and now we come back outside for what happens next. Pick up our reading in verse 10.

Verse 10. Scene 3, I'm calling outside on the ground. Outside on the ground. Verse 10. While the people of Israel were encamped at Gilgal, they kept the Passover on the 14th day of the month in the evening on the plains of Jericho.

And the day after the Passover, on that very day, they ate of the produce of the land, unleavened cakes and parched grain. And the manna ceased the day after they ate the produce of the land.

And there was no longer manna for the people of Israel, but they ate of the fruit of the land of Canaan that year.

It's the Passover. This is what the rite of circumcision was to prepare them for. We now understand the urgency and the timing of the mass circumcision.

It's because the people are at the anniversary date when they should be celebrating the Passover. And if you think that that's coincidence, well, you don't know God very well.

Not a coincidence. And they know, and God knows, that any uncircumcised male cannot celebrate the Passover in that condition. Exodus was very clear about that.

And so here they are. It's the 14th day of the month. And what that means is that our debilitated Israelite men and boys, they've had a whole three, maybe four days to heal.

But they're not going to have to be in fighting shape because they just need to be able to celebrate a feast. And we presume they can manage that.

Unless we think that this is somehow something that Israel's been doing consistently every year like they should have on this date, no, they haven't.

Because again, due to that monumental act of disobedience, I cannot emphasize this enough. Numbers 14, that act of disobedience, the refusal of the parental generation to go into the promised land, because of that disobedience, they have been living 40 years in a state

of broken covenant. I mean, they stopped circumcising their children. They stopped celebrating the Passover. So yeah, this is the first Passover Israel has celebrated in 40 years.

40 years to the day. And what that means is that for a very good portion of this nation, this is the first Passover they've ever celebrated.

And there's something else very significant about this day that our narrator very carefully draws our attention to, and it's what greeted them outside their tents the next morning.

Something is missing. Verse 12, And the manna ceased the day after they ate the produce to the land. And there was no longer manna provided for the people of Israel.

Now it's hard to slow down and try to appreciate what this must have been like. Can you imagine if you're a 39 year old, 40 year old adult, your entire life, every morning you wake up, you go outside and you collect the manna.

You get the food. It was this heavenly food that was like dew in the morning and they would collect it. It was white and sweet to taste and they would make their cakes and they survived off this in the wilderness.

But the day, the next morning after the Passover they go out like normal expecting the same thing. I mean this is how we eat, same provision from God, same food, the manna, and it's gone.

It's been removed. You might say it's been rolled away. But they don't need it now. Because as verse 11 tells us, they have something else to eat.

They have the produce of the land, unleavened cakes and parched grain. They are now, remember, inside the promised land, in the land flowing with milk and honey.

They're now able, end of verse 12, to eat of the fruit of the land of Canaan. That's all the orchards and vineyards. Imagine now going over the hills and finding fields planted with crops that you can now just take and eat.

Imagine going to the orchards that you didn't plant and God talks about this in the law. He says, I'm giving you a land inhabited by very wicked people that we're driving out.

And you're going to have everything that they have. You see, their previous food was the food of punishment. It is food of punishment that is now no longer needed because their punishment has been rolled away.

Symbolized by the fact that the food of their punishment is now rolled away. And that's going to be our third point this morning. Point number three, God rolls away his people's punishment.

His people's punishment. Again, manna was wilderness food. Remember, it was not the plan to feed them manna for very long. The plan was never 40 years of wandering.

It was supposed to be temporary food. Yes, God's provision. But in the act of their disobedience, what happened was their temporary provision of food became their permanent food and in that sense became their food for the period of punishment.

Their punishment food, manna. But now, with the nation back in covenant, symbolized by both their nationwide circumcision, and now symbolized by the Passover that they have just celebrated, a remembrance the Passover was,

of what God had done in the past and now it was taking on new meaning. It was now a celebration, a proclamation of what God was about to do for them.

They were able to reflect on what God was giving them and so manna is no longer needed. The manna has ceased. It's rolled away because they're no longer wandering in judgment.

They are no longer eating the food of punishment. They are now faithfully in the land eating the food of promise.

Well, our story would be done, but it's not. There's still one more scene. Check it out. This one starts in verse 13. We'll finish the chapter.

I'm calling scene four, the ground by Jericho. The ground by Jericho. Verse 13. When Joshua was by Jericho, he lifted up his eyes and looked and behold, a man was standing before him with his drawn sword in his hand.

And Joshua went to him and said, are you for us or for our adversaries? And he said, no. But I am the commander of the army of the Lord. Now I have come.

And Joshua fell on his face to the earth and worshiped him and said to him, what does my Lord say to his servant? And the commander of the Lord's army said to Joshua, take off your sandals from your feet for the place where you are standing is holy.

And Joshua did so.

Verse 13 says, it's when Joshua was by Jericho. You know, you read something like this, don't you think, like, what's Joshua doing out here all by himself?

Because he appears to be all by himself. I guess old habits die hard, you might say. I mean, he was a scout before, earlier in life. Once a scout, always a scout, maybe that's it.

But let's just remember that the whole camp's been circumcised. So unless he wants to bring a bunch of ladies with him, there's not any men to go with him.

Everybody else who's in fighting stage of life is back at the camp recovering. So what's a man like Joshua to do? Just wait around for the men to heal?

No. He's got to go out and scout. That's what he's doing. He's scouting out the situation. Only as he does so, we're told that he looks up. It's like, behold!

That's the ancient way of saying, check this out! Behold! There's a man standing there, and he's got, he's very clearly a warrior, he's got his sword, not his hand on his sword, he has his sword drawn.

He goes down here, up here, like this. I don't know about you, but I'm smart enough to know that, you know, number one, this man is clearly a warrior.

Number two, it looks like he's on duty. And number three, he means business, and Joshua, you might be in trouble. Is this really the time to talk?

Are you for us or for our adversaries? It's a very fair question. Essentially, Joshua is asking for this man's identity. And by the way, given that angels are, number one, quite dazzling in scripture when they appear, I don't think it's an angel besides the

fact that the being enables or allows Joshua to worship him.

So who is this mighty heavenly warrior here? Well, based on how the narrator flows right into the next chapter, chapter six, by the time we come to verse two, this individual is just simply called the Lord.

A lot of folks believe this is a manifestation of the Lord himself, what we would call a theophany, an appearance of God. Much like when back in Genesis with Abraham, three men appeared to him at his tent one day.

And if you know the story, two of them went on to the town of Sodom and one stayed behind. And it's revealed to us that the one is the Lord.

Others have speculated that, you know, this might actually be a Christophany, an appearance of Christ, pre-incarnate. I guess an incarnate, pre-incarnate Christ.

After all, the second person of the Trinity manifesting himself as a warrior, well, we do see it in Revelation where John saw it. So is it God?

Is it Jesus? We can't say for sure. I lean toward God. But in answer to Joshua's question, the mysterious figure does, he does what my wife often does when I ask her an either-or question.

She'll say, yes. And here the individual says, no. Neither. But I am the commander of the army of the Lord. And then what he says next is interesting.

Now I have come. Why would he say that? Well, there's another way to put this. You could translate it, here I am now. Listen, this is significant because what's happening after what the Lord's telling, and what the Lord is telling Joshua, what's happening is

that God is here again with his people. With the covenant renewed, the Lord is showing Joshua that not only has the enemy's courage been rolled away and melted, not only has the people's shame and punishment been rolled

away, something else has been rolled away too, and that would be distance. Distance or separation has been rolled away. The separation brought about by the people sinfully breaking covenant.

God, realized, had been somewhat distant from his people for these past 40 years. And yet, now what does he say? Now he says, now I have come.

Here I am now. And again, when Joshua does the natural thing that anyone should do in the presence of the Lord, falls down and worships him and commits himself as a servant.

What's your will? What do I do? This commander of the Lord's army receives the worship. And then now he says this. Verse 15. Take off your sandals from your feet.

For the place where you are standing is holy. Holy ground.

Is this because the ground near Jericho is somehow intrinsically holy? No. It's because God's here. It's because the Lord has now come. much in the same way as he had to Moses in the wilderness of Midian at the burning bush where

Moses was told to do the same thing. Take off your sandals. It's holy ground because I'm here.

I am here. The distance has been rolled away. That's going to be our fourth point this morning. Number four is this. God rolls away his people's distance.

God is now present with his people in a way that makes even the ground under Joshua's feet holy. And when God says take off your shoes. Roll off those sandals from your feet.

He's telling Joshua this is what's happened. The distance put between these two covenant parties myself and you my people. It's been healed.

It's been bridged. You are now back in covenant with me. God rolls away his people's distance. We want to take a minute and turn our attention to our day and our time.

So we're going to fast forward to right now. And maybe you're sitting here this morning wondering what does this truth from each of these scenes, these four points of truth, how does that apply or extend to my life?

Let me take a quick glance at our points and put them all up on the screen here. Point number one, God rolls away his enemies' power. Point number two, God rolls away his people's shame.

Number three, God rolls away his people's punishment. And number four, God rolls away even his people's distance.

Church, understand that this is what God has done for us at the cross. cross. This is an illustration of what God has done not just for one ethnic people a few thousand years ago.

This is something he has done now and it's available for all people for whosoever may come. Because at the cross of Jesus, at his cross, each of these things has happened for each and every one of us who come

to him and become his people. Each and every one, number one, at the cross, God rolls away our enemy's power. Our enemy, of course, is Satan.

The devil. The accuser. Tempter of our souls. The great deceiver. Do you realize that the cross breaks his power? Do you realize that Satan does not hold power over you or me as believers?

It's true. The cross is the victory. And also, number two, at the cross, God rolls away our shame. Removed. Taken away. He rolls away the reproach of our sins and our failures as a people.

And they are many. Because when sins are forgiven, which is what happened at the cross, shame is rolled away. Meaning that if you've come to Christ and you've confessed your sins to him, they're covered.

You do not need to have shame for them. Number three, God rolls away our punishment too. He did that by rolling our punishment away from us and onto his own son, didn't he?

Jesus. He put it completely upon his son in our place. God rolled away our punishment. And finally, at the cross, number four, God rolls away our distance.

That symbolism of that event that happened in the temple with the curtain separating the most holy place from the rest of the temple. It was what?

When Jesus died, the moment he died, it was torn in two. No more separation. God rolls away the distance. Separation is gone. And so what should our response be to these truths?

What should your response be to God? I think the Israelites today show us. They listened. That's the first thing they did. They listened to the word given to them through Joshua.

And you and I, we must listen to the word given to us through the new and better Joshua, Jesus. Jesus. And the Israelites also obeyed action.

They removed what needed removing to be back in that covenant. Sure, it was a symbol. It was an ancient symbol for a time, an old covenant. Today, we know that losing a foreskin doesn't mean a blasted thing.

But in our day, we do have a different kind of circumcision. The Bible talks about it as a circumcision of the heart, a spiritual circumcision, where the Lord rolls away and removes the sinful stain from our hearts, where He's able to wash them and make them clean.

So let me ask you, are you, as you sit here this morning or as you listen, wherever you are, are you feeling under the enemy's power? Do you sometimes think that Satan still has you?

He does not. God rolled away that power at the cross. Satan's heart has melted. He knows he loses. And he can level no meaningful accusation at you.

He levels accusations all the time. They just don't stick anywhere it counts, except if you let them.

Are you feeling under shame? I talk to a lot of people as a pastor. People tell pastors sometimes more than they tell even their friends or spouses.

And I know many of us, I know many of you feel shame for things in the past. Shame for failures. Don't feel that. Hear me today when I say, Christ has rolled away the shame.

And of course, He's rolled away the punishment too. And yet a lot of us still feel we have things happen to us in life and we think God's punishing us.

I'm talking about you if you're a believer. And I would simply say to you, stop eating that bread. Stop eating the bread of punishment. That's no longer for you.

That's not outside your tent when you get up. When you cross over and you follow the better Joshua, you don't have to eat the bread of punishment, the manna.

You now have an abundance in His promises. Yes, God may train you. He may even discipline those He loves. In fact, He will. Hebrews tells us that.

He disciplines those He loves. But that is not punishment.

It's not the bread of punishment anymore. That went to someone else, capital S, to Jesus. And lastly, I would ask you, do you go through seasons where you feel distant from God?

It's true. Sometimes we do. Sometimes it's because of a spiritual dryness in our lives. It's because of a period of life that we're in. It's because of inordinate suffering, perhaps.

And we feel distant from the Lord. Sometimes we stop praying. We stop feeding on His Word. We feel distant from God. But I want you to know that you are not separated from Him when you come to Jesus.

There is now no more condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus, Romans says. No more separation. Jesus bridged the chasm. He has broken down the barrier so that He is there.

He has not left you, and He never will. So we can commune with Him, and He with us. And we can do it, not eating the bread of punishment, not fearing that there is still shame, not thinking that God is still distant from His people.

We can do it up close and fill ourselves with the food and fruit of His promises. His promises. I'm going to ask the worship team if they would come right now.

And as they do, let me ask you if you would just join me in standing, and I want to pray for us. Heavenly Father, please let these truths sink deeply into our hearts.

For, Lord, the person that is struggling with something in the past, that believes a lie from the enemy that they can't be forgiven, or maybe you were forgiven, but you still have to be punished for it, or you still wear the shame for it.

No, Lord, that is not true. You have rolled those things away. Lord, Lord, for those of us that are in a hard spot, maybe even right now, who feel like you are so distant from us, and when it's really us being distant from you, you are always there.

Remind us, Lord, at any time, at any point, we can open up our hearts and our mouths and speak to you. We can come right before the throne of grace.

There is access. We are not barred. We are not kept back because of the way paved for us through the blood of your Son. Jesus, we thank you for that.

And so, Lord, encourage us this morning, those of us who have put our faith and hope in you, remind us of these promises. We are in the promised place now because of Jesus Christ, the better Joshua.

And Lord, if there be anyone here this morning that's saying, I have not crossed over that river, I am not in that territory and I need to be and I feel His calling.

I pray that they would not wait and that you would draw them even today. And we pray these things in the name of the better Joshua, in Jesus' name.

Amen. Let's sing.