Fighting Forgetfulness

Well, good morning again, and a happy 5th of July, happy 4th yesterday. It's good to see you all here. I am honestly impressed that as many of you are here.

I thought we might be even lighter than we are. So it's good to see you here today. If you're joining us on the live stream, welcome to you, and we pray that this service can meaningfully reach your living room or wherever you are, and that you can hear God's Word that I'm about to bring now.

Let me ask you if you would like to join me in the book of Joshua. Our church has been walking through this book for a few weeks now, and we are up to Joshua chapter 4, Joshua chapter 4.

Joshua 4 · chapter mention Joshua 4 · chapter mention

And if you were able to be with us last week, as we come to this chapter, and you'll find this out in a moment if you don't know this already, it might seem a little bit odd that this chapter covers basically the same ground that the last chapter does.

But the emphasis here is different, and it's very clearly on one thing, and that is remembrance. Remembrance. Commemorating this miraculous event of God's deliverance.

And why is memory and commemorance so important, we might wonder? And I would say it's because we're a people who are prone to forget, right?

If we forget things, whether it's ancient people like the Israelites or modern people like you and me, we forget our car keys. We forget where our phone is, and we have to have someone in the family call it.

We forget appointments. We forget to pick up the kids. We forget to pick up that grandkid. We forget things all the time. And I think that's what makes this weekend more unique than usual with our annual 4th of July celebration.

We are remembering the founding of our very country 250 years ago. We are remembering our identity as a nation and what we were founded upon.

And we remember the investment that many people, men and women, have made to have our country, to found our country, to defend our country, and defend our freedoms.

To keep us the democratic, republic, free, one nation under God that we are. We remember that this weekend. Memory is important.

Because what it does is it shapes us by giving us a framework to interpret the present from the perspective of the past. Quite frankly, without memory, we would be doomed to repeat all of our mistakes.

And sometimes we repeat them anyway. Memory is important for not just things like country and founding principles. Did you know that memory is also important to our faith?

And that's what I'm here to talk about this morning. God knows this about us. And so as we come to Joshua, it may not be the 250th anniversary being commemorated here on the banks of the Jordan River.

As a matter of fact, it's actually day one in the Promised Land. But today we're going to watch Joshua, under the Lord's direction, teach the people to remember.

Because this crossing is about more than just entering the Promised Land. It's about a people living in covenant with their God. And while there will be many enemies for them to fight in this conquest,

the Lord knows that enemy number one, the very first enemy they will have to fight, is forgetfulness. So join me as I begin reading in chapter 4, verse 1.

When all the nation had finished passing over the Jordan, the Lord said to Joshua, Take twelve men from the people, from each tribe a man, and command them, saying, Take twelve stones from here out of the midst of the Jordan, from the very place where the priest's feet stood firmly,

and bring them over with you, and lay them down in the place where you lodged tonight. Then Joshua called twelve men from the people of Israel, whom he had appointed, a man from each tribe.

And Joshua said to them, Pass on before the ark of the Lord your God into the midst of the Jordan, and take up each of you a stone upon his shoulder, according to the number of the tribes of the people of Israel, that this may be a sign among you.

When your children ask in time to come, what do those stones mean to you? Then you shall tell them that the waters of the Jordan were cut off before the ark of the covenant of the Lord.

When it passed over the Jordan, the waters of the Jordan were cut off. So these stones shall be to the people of Israel a memorial forever. And the people of Israel did, just as Joshua commanded, and took up twelve stones out of the midst of the Jordan, according to the number of the tribes of the people of Israel,

just as the Lord had told Joshua. And they carried them over with them to the place where they lodged, and laid them down there. And Joshua set up twelve stones in the midst of the Jordan, in the place where the feet of the priests bearing the ark of the covenant had stood, and they are there to this day.

For the priests bearing the ark stood in the midst of the Jordan, until everything was finished that the Lord commanded Joshua to tell the people according to all that Moses had commanded Joshua.

The people passed over in haste, And when all the people had finished passing over, the ark of the Lord and the priests passed over before the people.

The sons of Reuben and the sons of Gad and the half-tribe of Manasseh passed over armed before the people of Israel, as Moses had told them.

About forty thousand ready for war passed over before the Lord for battle to the plains of Jericho. On that day the Lord exalted Joshua in the sight of all Israel, and they stood in awe of him, just as they had stood in awe of Moses all the days of his life.

And the Lord said to Joshua, Command the priest bearing the ark of the testimony to come up out of the Jordan. So Joshua commanded the priests, Come up out of the Jordan.

And when the priest bearing the ark of the covenant of the Lord came up from the midst of the Jordan, and the soles of the priest's feet were lifted up on dry ground, the waters of the Jordan returned to their place and overflowed all its banks as before.

The people came up out of the Jordan on the tenth day of the first month, and they encamped at Gilgal on the east border of Jericho. And those twelve stones which they took out of the Jordan, Joshua set them up at Gilgal.

And he said to the people of Israel, When your children ask their fathers in time to come, what do these stones mean? Then you shall let your children know, Israel passed over this Jordan on dry ground.

For the Lord your God dried up the waters of the Jordan for you until you passed over, as the Lord your God did to the Red Sea, which he dried up for us until we passed over, so that all the peoples of the earth may know that the hand of the Lord is mighty, that you may fear the Lord your God forever.

Would you pray with me once more? Heavenly Father, we pray that you would teach us today from your word. Lord, let it come alive to us, these events so many years ago.

May they become alive for us, and may the principles, the truths that you want us to incorporate into our lives be very apparent. And we pray this in the name of Jesus.

Amen. Now, for starters, let me just say that there's a few grammatical things here in the text that I'm not crazy about in the modern translation that makes it kind of bog down the story a little bit.

One thing is that it says that when, verse 1, when all the nation had finished passing over, and quite simply, a better translation is, when they were finishing passing over, because as you get to the end of the chapter, no doubt you can see that this is still an event that's happening in real time.

And it's here where the Lord speaks to Joshua and commands him. He's to take those 12 men that he's chosen, one man representing each of the 12 tribes, and each guy is to select one stone from the riverbed.

And from what we read later in verse 9, it seems that they are to choose these stones from the very location where the priests are standing.

Now, probably not the rocks they're standing on, but right close enough. They're to pick up one rock for one guy. They are to hoist these big boys up on their shoulders, verse 5, and they're to bring them over and lay them down at the place where they're going to camp for the night.

Now, if we know anything about manly pride and competitiveness, right? You say, no, they didn't have that in the Bible. Nobody had pride. Men weren't competitive.

Yes, they were, just like they are today. I would presume, and this is not in the text, but I would guess that none of our 12 tribal reps wants to be the guy who has the smallest stone.

Right? I would imagine every guy is trying to get his hands around the biggest rock he can possibly carry. It kind of reminds me of my youthful days.

Some would say I might have been a little obsessed with big rocks and stones. If you've been to my house, seen my landscaping, I want you to know that every single one of those rocks I picked up and carried from somewhere else.

Well, maybe there were one or two that were there in the lot. But what I would do is I would go and visit our family. I'd go to Michigan where my parents were.

I would dig up and take a few rocks from the fields of Michigan. I would do the same thing when we traveled out to the farmlands of Iowa. I would go down to the creek beds and ditches and I would search for more rocks.

I mean, it's funny. At one point, my father-in-law back in Iowa was like scouting out his land to tell me where the rocks were, which I thought was great.

And I would put them in, you'd think I had a trailer or a big truck. No, a minivan. With four kids in it and all our stuff. But no matter, no problem at all.

We can fit four, five, six big rocks. And you would just see us across the state of Illinois just driving. I try to equally distribute the weight.

I think one time I put a rock under Terry's feet in the front. But anyway, I was obsessed with rocks. And I remember the biggest thing was, well, the bigger the rock, the better, right?

The only problem was I had to get it out of the creek bed and get it into the van. And so that would sometimes involve all kinds of, you know, physics and measurements and a four-wheeler with a basket and maybe a wheelbarrow.

My rock obsession. So I was thinking about like how big were the rocks that these guys could have carried? And I did a little research by typing in a question on Google, which is really deep research.

And I learned that the average man can probably carry a rock that's about his body weight, which sounds pretty heavy to me. So just try to imagine this pile of rocks in the camp that night.

It's probably pretty significant. I think it's probably pretty noticeable. And God doesn't leave anybody wondering what these rocks are for.

In verse 6, he has Joshua explain it to the people very plainly. He says, these stones are going to be a sign among you. I don't know about you, but I get a kick out of what we hear in the very next verse, in verse 6, verse 7.

When your children ask in time, and that's just one of those moments where I'm sort of fast-forwarded to today and I'm like children then. We're like children now.

They like to ask questions and their favorite question consists of one word. Why? Why? And it's interesting, but we see this kind of similar language in other places in the Old Testament.

Back in Exodus chapter 12, as the people are learning about their Passover tradition and how they're supposed to celebrate it, Moses anticipates that the kids are going to ask, why?

Exodus 12 · chapter mention

Why are we eating it like this, Dad? And then again later in Exodus 13, they're being instructed about this redemption price they have to pay for each of the firstborn Israelite sons.

And again, we read, when your kids ask you why. And then even in Deuteronomy 6, with really all the commands in the law, some of which seem rather strange to people, the Lord rightly anticipates that some of the Israelite, not adults, some of the kids are going to ask why.

And rather than rebuke it, God wants to use it. Verse 6, so when your children ask in time to come, what do these stones mean to you? In other words, why are they here?

Then you shall tell them what happened here. Recount for their little ears the miracle that the Lord your God did for you in cutting off the waters and bringing you safely across this Jordan.

These stones shall be to the people of Israel a memorial forever. A memorial of what God did. A memorial of His power to stop any barrier to get His people across.

And it will also be a memorial that is a testament to their unity. Because if you haven't noticed, it's not three rocks or five rocks or ten rocks, it's twelve rocks precisely.

One rock for each tribe. Twelve tribes, one memorial signifying a unified nation. Again, I was thinking about that this past weekend and, you know, on a weekend like this is, you see a lot of flags flying around town.

You see them in neighborhoods. I think it's great. We fly our flag. One of my neighbors, though, he has flags, not just one. He has, well, this weekend he had a ton of them.

But he usually flies two or three flags. But there is one flag that is a little interesting. It has only 13 stars on it. The flag known as the Betsy Ross flag for the 13 original colonies.

And I know he means well. He's not like anti-patriotic. But I do, the irony doesn't escape me. I think to myself, you know, we live in Indiana.

We're the 19th state. Our state isn't even represented on that flag yet. Well, why don't you just fly the flag that's got all 50 states represented?

The one we've had since 1959 when we added Hawaii. We fly that flag because that flag is a symbol of our national unity. unity. And in much the same way, that is also what this stone memorial is going to be.

It is going to be a symbol of Israel's national unity. Not 10 stones, not 9 1⁄2, 12. So we read on in the next paragraph starting in verse 8 of how the people get busy.

And we're told that they do everything that Joshua commands them. In fact, we hear that explicitly repeated that point in verse 10. how everything gets done just as Joshua commanded that they listen to their new leader just as they listen to Moses.

In fact, down in verse 14, our writer even explicitly tells us of how this whole event not only solidifies the people's unity, it also exalts their leader.

Joshua himself is exalted by the Lord in the sight of all Israel. And we're told that they stood in awe of him just as they had once stood in awe of Moses all the days of his life.

Now one quick thing to clear up. If you've read verse 9 carefully, you might have this impression that there are two piles of stones. Because it looks like in verse 9 that Joshua is setting up the 12 stones in the midst of the Jordan and then he's setting up another memorial in the encampment over at Gilgal.

But let's clear this up. Again, the English translation isn't really helping us as much. It really should read something like he took 12 stones from the midst of the Jordan.

Because every other indication in the text is that there is just the one pile of stones on dry land at the encampment. And the other question of course is to ask ourselves in a muddy river like the Jordan who's going to see a pile of stones once the water returns?

As for the crossing itself, verse 10 shows us that it is not a long drawn out process. We read that it's done in haste and it just sort of reminds us that this is a different kind of crossing than what the people had at the Red Sea where there were two walls of water, one on each side and more of a narrow crossing.

Took some time for the whole nation to get across. Not so here because we know from last week that those waters are heaped up in a pile some 15 miles to the north meaning that this whole river valley is dry and so the people can cross over quickly.

And then in verses 11 and 12 take a look we see another important feature in this crossing and that's the fact that we've got some battle men here, some men armed for battle.

Verse 12 says it's the sons of Reuben, sons of Gad and the half tribe of Manasseh. Do they have their whole families with them? No. They're back across the Jordan east.

Here it's just the 40,000 fighting men all armed and ready for war. If we recall those two and a half tribes liked what they saw when Israel conquered the territory of King Sihon and Og.

This was back in Numbers 32. They took a look around and they said this is some great land. We've got a lot of flocks and herds. Moses, we would like you to let this be our portion.

And after clearing up some misunderstanding Moses at first didn't react very well. He thought they were abandoning the rest of the nation that they weren't going to come across the Jordan and fight for the territory that they still had to take and they made it clear to Moses that they would fulfill their promise.

They would come across when the time was right. And here it is right now. Marching over 40,000 troops ready for war as no doubt an encouragement to the nation and also, mind you, also a discouragement to any of the

local Canaanites who might get an idea about ambushing. Realize that where they cross is only six miles away from Jericho. So then we come to verse 15 and the whole nation is now across and it's an interesting scene because all that's left in the riverbed are these priests holding the Ark of

the Covenant. And now the Lord says to Joshua, verse 16, command the priests bearing the Ark of the Testimony, command them to come up out of the Jordan.

Joshua does. And in verse 18, it's almost like our narrator goes in for the slow-mo shot. It's almost like things slow down. The priests coming up out of the riverbed.

I would imagine, you know, if it was a movie, the camera is going to zoom in. It's going to zero in on the priests' feet and we see the soles of their feet and how they're lifted up onto dry ground.

And it's at that moment that their feet touch the ground that just like that, somewhere up north, somebody hears the sound of rushing water.

And just like that, the waters are back. We're told that the waters of the Jordan return to their place and its flood stage, overflowing all of its banks as before.

Amazing. Verse 19 gives us a time stamp. We're told that it's the tenth day of the first month that they make their camp here at Gilgal. A couple of important things to notice about that date.

First is that this was the exact same date as the 40th anniversary, 40 years before, that the Israelites were commanded to begin making preparations for the Passover.

This was selection day where they would select the lamb for the sacrifice. The other thing to notice is the name given to this place, Gilgal, because if you've read the Old Testament, you know that this name will pop up a lot.

Gilgal, right here, the encampment, will become one of three major religious sites for this nation. In fact, here, right here at Gilgal, in our very next chapter, chapter 5 of Joshua, we're going to see the people celebrate some very important religious rituals, circumcision, Passover.

Gilgal literally means the circle. And we can imagine this large nation encamped in a circular manner, just again, six miles from the walls of Jericho.

And here at Camp Gilgal, inside the promised land now, Joshua, their exalted leader, we read of how he himself takes up those twelve stones, picks them up in his own hands, and he sets up this monument here at the camp.

Verse 21, his instructions repeated again, just to be sure they heard him the first time. When your children ask their fathers in times to come, what do these stones mean?

Then you shall let them know that Israel passed over this Jordan on dry ground. And should anybody have any thoughts that this kind of reminds me of another miracle with a water barrier?

Kind of reminds me of the Red Sea. Joshua removes all doubt about the parallels of the two water crossings. He goes on and he says in verse 23, For the Lord your God dried up the waters of the Jordan for you until you passed over as he did to the Red Sea which he dried up for us until we passed over.

And by we, Joshua means maybe just one or two of them. Him and Caleb. Because all the rest have passed. And here's what it's all about. Here's the meaning of it all told to us in verse 24.

It's so that all the peoples of the earth may know that the hand of the Lord is mighty that you may fear the Lord your God forever. Amen. And so it begins.

Right? The mission before the people of Israel. Because remember they're not here on some vacation. This is not some quick temporary visit. They are not just passing through.

They are here on conquest. And conquest means a fight. And as we said earlier and as the Lord knows full well the first enemy to fight for Israel is forgetfulness.

And so here on the western banks of the Jordan at this place called Gilgal the Lord sees fit to inspire our writer to devote two full chapters to this moment.

A telling and then a retelling of the very same story of the amazing crossing. But of course the focus in this chapter is on that stone memorial.

And I think that tells us something. I think God is telling us something. And that's that his people have a tendency to forget. We all share a common enemy in forgetfulness.

And we need to fight forgetfulness. And the way we do that is with reminders. God's people need memorials or reminders. I think we need continual reminders of his mighty deeds.

Because continual reminders of God's mighty deeds do something for us. And I think our passage shows us some of the things that they do. So in the next few minutes let me offer you four of them.

Here's the first one. It starts with this. Number one. Continual reminders of God's mighty deeds train us to revere God. Continual reminders of God's mighty deeds train us to revere our God.

We notice it's not for our writer here it's not chapter 3 the crossing okay that's over with let's move on to the fun stuff. No. He slows us down here in chapter 4 to retell the story with an emphasis on how they needed to remember.

And I think the fact that God would direct our writer to do this to tell them of how God instructed them to build this memorial I think it is very significant because reflecting on and remembering God's mighty deeds it has the power to train us.

It trains us to revere God. Verse 24 The Lord your God did this mighty deed here so that yes all the peoples of the earth may know that his hand is mighty but also also so that you may fear the Lord your God forever.

Listen the taking of the land was not so important that Israel didn't have time to do this. The conquest was not so important that the inspired writer did not include this moment here in Israel's history to show us that they had to fight again the first enemy

the enemy of forgetfulness by building something that would be a continual reminder. so that every time someone saw this stone memorial it would help them to appropriately revere God to fear the Lord to be in awe of his great power and his mighty hand to know

that he is the true God and there is none like him. This was important for the Red Sea crossing but back then they were given a different way to remember Moses was given a song.

Here it's not a song at the Jordan it's memorialized by a monument and it's important for any significant moment where any of us have seen the Lord move mightily in our lives.

I doubt that he's parted any body of water for you. Certainly hasn't for me. Not yet. I haven't really needed it. We have bridges and boats.

But has God not moved mightily in your life? faith. Think about the first time you professed faith. Did you not memorialize that at some point soon after we hope in baptism?

Think about the health and the care and the provisions God gives you in your life. Are you not thanking him for that at say maybe a meal time when you say grace?

to those bigger decisions that we make in life where he leads us in some significant way maybe in regard to a career path or maybe who to marry or whatever it might be.

Listen, whenever God moves mightily in our lives we are being reminded of how his hand is at work guiding us and directing us and providing for us and it should train us to thankfully revere him.

revere him. He is worthy. He is mighty. He is gracious and powerful. Fear and revere your God, ladies and gentlemen. If it was good for Israel, it's good for us too.

That's one thing that these continual reminders of God's mighty deeds should do for us. Train us to revere God, but there is another thing. Second thing is this, number two.

Continual reminders of God's mighty deeds guard our unity. Guard our unity. I've already drawn attention to this, I won't belabor it, but again, the number of rocks and the number of men.

It's not three, it's not five, it's not ten, it's not nine and a half, it's twelve. Twelve men, twelve rocks to build one stone memorial. And this would be a visual aid to remind everybody of what God had done for them as a nation, together,

one nation under God. So that every time any Israelite family, dad and his son out walking one day, come upon this stone memorial, it's a reminder, son, we're a part of this.

All twelve of our tribes, we were unified in this conquest. You know, the unity of God's people is an important thing even today in the new covenant for the church.

This is why when we come to the New Testament in a letter like 1 Corinthians, it really is painful to hear the apostle Paul talk about the situation in the Corinthian church.

This is what he says in chapter 11 of that letter. 1 Corinthians chapter 11 verse 17, he says, in the following instructions, I do not commend you, because when you come together, it is not for the better, but for the worse.

1 Corinthians 11:17

Can you imagine that? A church gathering faithfully as they should, and an apostle like Paul saying, when you guys do it, it's not for the better, it's for the worse.

What was happening is Paul was dealing with an important part of their worship service, communion, what we're going to celebrate today, the Lord's table.

And what was apparently happening in the church in Corinth was that quote unquote insiders and probably the more prominent people in this church were getting to the table and were eating first, and in some cases, leaving nothing for the rest.

Probably it was a house church meeting in the home, a larger home of a wealthier church member, and rather than treat every member of God's church as an equally important part of the family, some were being excluded from the sacred meal, left outside, literally.

This was not unity. And Paul rightly recognized it was a big problem. continual reminders, which is exactly what the Lord's Supper is even today.

A reminder of our deliverance, yes. A reminder also of our unity in the Lord's name. We should bear witness to our unity as a church every time we celebrate the Lord's Supper.

We should come to it with this priority. We should want to guard and demonstrate our unity as a church. again, continual reminders of God's mighty deeds are intended to guard our unity.

And of course, speaking of the Lord's Supper as we've been, and what it commemorates and reminds us of, that leads us to another point, very naturally.

Number three. Number three. Continual reminders of God's mighty deeds prompt us, prompt us to celebrate the work of His exalted one. To celebrate the work of God's exalted one.

It's no mistake, it's no random occurrence that this part of the chapter emphasizes the exaltation of Joshua. The people's confidence gets a major boost with the miracle in the Jordan, but there's something else that's getting a boost.

Someone else. And that's Joshua and his credibility as their leader. Remember, he is God's chosen leader, designated successor to Moses. This is the man whose very name means God saves.

Verse 14, again, on that day we read, the Lord exalted Joshua in the sight of all Israel, and they stood in awe of him just as they did Moses.

Now honestly, if you step away from the story and you ask yourself, I mean, what all did Joshua actually do? He didn't raise a sword. He didn't give a single military directive.

He didn't even devise the plan that we see unfolding. Really, all Joshua did is he followed. He followed, and he followed to a T, all of the Lord's instructions.

Like a good leader, he passed on every word from the Lord. Lord.

But the Lord Jesus Christ is the better Joshua. Because Jesus, again, the Greek meaning of that, the Greek spelling, God saves, still means the same thing as what the name Joshua does.

Jesus does all of what Joshua did, and so much more. For not only does he faithfully give us God's word, he himself is the word. The word made flesh.

And the work Jesus did, yes, he passed on some instructions, he did faithfully teach, but he was a mediator. And not just by his words, but by his blood shed on a cross as he gave his life as a ransom for many, for all who call on his

name. This stone memorial was a testament and a continual reminder of God's mighty deed here. done through the one he exalted. And really, it's a mirror image of what's happened with our salvation.

Whether it's our own baptism that's our memorial, or our participation in the Lord's table, or any other practice that we do to remember. Listen, they should all prompt us to celebrate the work of God's exalted one, Jesus.

Because that's now who he is. Philippians 2.9, famous passage that talks about the humiliation of Jesus, how he lowered himself. But then we come to verse 9.

Therefore God has highly exalted him and bestowed on him the name that is above every name. Continual reminders of God's mighty deed should prompt us to celebrate the work of his exalted one.

But before we finish today, there is one more point, and it's one we surely can't miss because it's repeated. It's told to us at the beginning of the chapter, and then again, emphasized at the end.

And number four, point number four is this. Continual reminders of God's mighty deeds help us teach the next generation. Next generations. Continual reminders of God's mighty deeds help us teach the next generations.

Verse 6. When your children ask in time to come. Then again down in verse 21. When your children ask their fathers in times to come, what do these stones mean to you?

What is this memorial all about? Why? Why? Why?

Today it might be when your kids ask you, Mom, why do we pray before we eat? Or maybe it's when a child says, Dad, why do we pray before we go to bed at night?

Or Mom and Dad? Or Grandma, Grandpa? Why do we read so many Bible stories? Sometimes as they get a little older, they ask things like, why do we go to church?

Why do we go every Sunday? Who is God? What's He like? And even as they age up and get older, they ask questions like, did the miracles in the Bible really happen?

Are heaven and hell for real? And even for those of us who have maybe reached the point of adulthood, there can still be times where we have questions and struggle with maybe some things about the faith.

Is God a moral monster? Is Jesus in Christianity really the only way to be saved? How can a good God send people to hell? Listen, continual reminders of God and who He is and what He's like and what He's

done, they help us teach the next generations. And they help us let all the peoples of the earth know that the hand of the Lord is mighty and that He is to be revered forever.

Whatever that looks like in your life or in your home, from maybe artwork that you have in your house to notes on the mirror, Bible verses, experiences, maybe you are at a point in life where you're reading those stories to your children about God's mighty deeds.

I hope there are regular times of prayer in your home. From the big events like baptism and coming to the Lord's table, which is one we do more regularly, I pray that these continual reminders of God's mighty deeds, which is what they are, I pray that they

will train you to revere God, and I pray that they will help guard a spirit of unity among all of us, and I pray that they will prompt us all to celebrate Jesus, the Exalted One, and I pray that it will help you teach the next generations.

Today we have an opportunity to celebrate the Lord's table. What a wonderful, how can we walk through Joshua chapter 4 and not celebrate the Lord's table together today?

Joshua 4 · chapter mention

So I'm going to ask those who are going to be serving us, if you would come forward now, and I'm going to ask the worship team if they would join me, and as they come, let me just give you a moment to bow your head and prepare your heart.

Lord, today we celebrate, we commemorate an event that means our greatest deliverance of all, the gift of your Son, Jesus Christ, the sinless one sent from heaven, come to earth, inhabiting

flesh, the God-man who faithfully and obediently carried out your plan. We praise you, we thank you. We are undeserving, and yet out of your great love for us you sent him and enacted the plan to save anyway.

You gave us the forgiveness of sins because of what happened on the cross. You have given us the gift of adoption into your household, so that we now are a part of that holy chosen nation of your people, and so we thank you today.

So Lord, as we come, if there be anything on our minds and hearts that we need to give to you, any burden that we're carrying, let us do so now.

Father, if there's any unconfessed sin, hear us now as we give it to you and confess it in Jesus' name. Help us to examine our hearts, and we pray this in the name of Jesus.

Amen.