Joshua 1:1-9 - Marching Orders

Recast Church Sermon Series Introduction

Join us at Recast Church in Matalon as Don brings us a sermon series entitled Joshua, Land of Promise.

Well, good morning. Everybody doing okay? Everybody's alright? Good. Well, welcome to Recast. I want to just remind all of you, I recognize that there's a couple of you that this is your first time here, you can feel free to get up and get coffee and donuts.

We want to be more of a casual environment, so feel free to do that during the message at any time. Get up in the back and do some stretches or whatever you need to do. Like I said, thank you for that demonstration back there.

I guess some jumping jacks going on. Whatever it takes to keep your focus on the Word. That's kind of the point of this. So if people were to pull out a deck of cards and start playing poker in the back, that would be a little distracting.

I have to confess, that would be a little weird. This morning we're going to jump right into the book of Joshua. Last week we did the introduction, and I know that you weren't all here, but we looked at the life of Joshua starting all the way, and kind of giving the flow of God's redemptive history from Genesis all the way to Deuteronomy with a specific focus on highlighting the events in the life of Joshua and kind of understanding who he is.

Like I said before, by the time we get to Joshua 1 .1, Joshua is already in his 60s, maybe even his 70s. We don't know how old he was exactly, but 40 years have transpired. He was leading battles 40 years ago.

So kind of do the math and figure out how old he would have been in leading armies and things like that. He's probably at least over 55 or 60 years old. So there was some history that was going on back there.

We're going to get a chance to see in our text this morning, in Joshua 1 .1 -9, God ultimately giving Joshua some marching orders, an actual monologue, if you will, from God to Joshua explaining what he wants from him.

So I want you to open your Bibles, please, to Joshua 1 .1 -9. That's page 153 in the Bible in the seat back in front of you, page 153. And one more time, if you don't own a Bible or an English standard version of the Bible, that's what I preach from.

If you don't own one of those, you can take that one with you. It's a free gift from us to you. Follow along as I read Joshua 1 .1 -9. ...that the sole of your foot will tread upon, I have given to you just as I promised to Moses.

From the wilderness and this Lebanon, as far as the great river, the river Euphrates, all the land of the Hittites to the great sea, toward the going down of the sun shall be your territory. No man shall be able to stand before you all the days of your life.

Just as I was with Moses, so I will be with you. I will not leave you or forsake you. Be strong and courageous, for you shall cause this people to inherit the land that I swore to their fathers to give to them.

Only be strong and very courageous, being careful to do according to all the law that Moses my servant commanded you. Do not turn from it to the right hand or to the left, that you may have good success wherever you go.

This book of the law shall not depart from your mouth, but you shall meditate on it day and night, so that you may be careful to do according to all that is written in it. For then you will make your ways prosperous and then you will have good success.

Have I not commanded you? Be strong and courageous. Do not be frightened and do not be dismayed, for the Lord your God is with you wherever you go. Let's pray. Father, this is a text that is full of comforting words and encouragement, but also full of challenge.

And so I recognize that we all come to you and come and sit before you and before your word this morning coming from different angles of life, different places that we are at right now. Some are sitting here in desperate need of challenge.

Challenge to get up and cross over and move out of habits and lifestyles and things that are going on in our lives that we know we ought not to be involved in. And Father, then there are others here who need just an encouraging word, who have had just difficult and dire circumstances in their lives and difficult things that have even hit them this week within the last couple of months, and they need encouragement and I see that here in this text as well.

And Father, ultimately the comfort of recognizing that you are present with us. I ask that we would all walk away from here and that your spirit would change us inside and that our behavior would reflect having come in contact with you this weekend.

That as we wake up tomorrow and Tuesday and Wednesday, that we would be different people just by the very nature of taking in your word, that our minds and our hearts and our lives would be transformed.

We ask this in Jesus' name. Amen. How many of you would love the opportunity to sit down and get a chance to have a face-to-face with God? Would you enjoy that? Now, you raised your hand pretty quick, but let's think about what we're talking about for a second.

I was kind of like, well, I'm not sure how people will answer that. Yes and no, kind of. But how would you feel if you knew the nature of that conversation was going to be that he was going to give you comfort, the comfort of his presence.

That that was going to be the nature of the sit-down meeting, was to comfort your fears. That you were going to receive specific direction about the future and about your life. Does that sound a little bit more appealing?

Maybe more hands would be raised on that one. That he was going to tell you the specifics. But not only that, but he was going to promise his presence with you. And, are you ready for this? He was going to promise success to you.

How many of you are ready to sign up for that meeting now? I think all of us are. We would love that. And I'm going to confess that there are many times over the past year in this process of getting Recast Church up and running, and it's actually been more like a three-year process for me.

We opened our doors about a year ago. There are many times where I would love to have sat down with God and had him tell me what the plans were. How this was going to go. And even now, you guys, as you sit here, you are an answer to a lot of prayers.

Just your presence here. I didn't know if it was going to be me and the band, and I was just going to be preaching to them for the next several months, and that was going to be it. So just the fact that you guys are here is awesome.

I love that. But then, the thing that hit me in that process of thinking through, is I don't know, this is a little bit of a rabbit trail, but what is success for a church? What would God sit down and tell me?

That we're going to be a church of 500 in three years? What is that? Is it numbers? Is that what success? No, success is that people's lives are being changed. And so if something happened and the doors were closed here, I still would call Recast Church a success because lives have been changed here, and I praise God for that.

And success, people will come to me and ask me, So Don, what is your plan for Recast? Where would you like to see Recast in 10 years? And my answer, genuinely, is changing lives. Changing lives and what that looks like.

Maybe our own building, maybe our own property, maybe not. Maybe still meeting right here. But that God is changing lives through his word and is bringing people closer to him in faith. That's what it's all about.

So when it comes to sitting down with God, I would love to have that meeting, but I'd be interested in hearing what success would look like for Recast Church. What we see here is God literally sitting down with Joshua and talking with him.

And now he has recorded this interaction so that we can study it, so that we can know and better understand God's will. That's the purpose of this section of the book of Joshua, is that we can also understand something about these marching orders that God is giving to Joshua.

We hear echoes of him addressing us as we study the text here. We see right away in verse 1 that Joshua records the death of Moses. Well, how many of you would start a piece of history with the death of somebody?

There's a lot of history that's required to understand Moses and all of this stuff. Well, it's very important for the Jews because Genesis, Exodus, Leviticus, Numbers, and Deuteronomy, the first five books of the Bible, also known as the Pentateuch, the five books, were the centerpiece of the law.

Now, all of the rest of the Old Testament is considered Scripture as well, written by God through men, moved by the Holy Spirit. But those first five books are considered the centerpiece. So that Joshua, we're going to see, is the next, is the sixth book.

And he wants to be careful to tie what he's going to say and what he's going to write back to the author, Moses, and say, I'm carrying forward God's word written down through history, and it dovetails.

So we're going to start with the very end of Deuteronomy 34. The very end of Deuteronomy chapter 34 is dedicated to the death of Moses. Joshua 1 starts right away with Moses died. So there's continuity there.

Now, Moses, we see, was very close with God. One of you, kind of from studying the life of Moses, would come to the conclusion that he was kind of close with God. You get that impression? Kind of had a good relationship with him.

He actually was given the title servant of the Lord. Where the word Lord, that we translate Lord there, is four consonants, Y-H-W-H. It is a word that the Jews to this day, a good, devout Jew, will not pronounce.

Yahweh. Many of you have heard Yahweh said before. Yahweh being, in essence, the first name of God, the personal name of God. Not a title, but an actual name. And it is the way that God revealed himself to Moses when Moses saw him in the burning bush, and he had this conversation, and basically the first introduction with Yahweh.

It means, ultimately, I am that I am. And in God's first name is encapsulated to this idea of self-existence. How many of you are dependent beings? You are dependent on something for your survival. We are dependent on oxygen, food, shelter.

Some of us wouldn't have survived the storm last night if we were stuck out in the woods. We are dependent creatures. God is not dependent. He is self-existent. And that's encapsulated in this name, I am.

It implies that he is the one who exists, has always existed, and will always exist in the future. Completely non-contingent on anything external to himself. He exists. In essence, that's a definition of God, and it's encapsulated in his name.

It's kind of an amazing thing for Moses to be called the servant of Yahweh. How many of you would like that title? It's a good, positive title. But we're going to see that Joshua doesn't earn that title, servant of Yahweh, until the very end of this book.

It's not going to be until probably in the fall when we wrap this book up that we're going to see Joshua receive the title servant of God. As a matter of fact, he's given a title here in our text. He is called the assistant to Moses, the helper or the servant of Moses.

In itself, that's not a real shabby title. That would be kind of cool. Be the servant of Yahweh. That's cool too. So that's the way we see Joshua introduced in the text here. The servant, the assistant of Moses.

And so we see that the people of Israel are standing at the brink of entering the land of promise. We see that here in the text. We talked a lot about the land of promise last week, about this territory that was promised to Abraham.

And it was promised down to his descendants, his children and his children and his great-grandchildren. And on down through Moses was promised that as well. And they're standing on the edge of this land of promise.

And let's remember quickly that there was a time in history, according to Scripture, that Joshua, Caleb and Moses all stood on the brink of this land. One previous time. They were ready to enter the land.

We talked about this last week. And what happened to the people of Israel? They rebelled against God. They went in. They sent in spies. And they said, oh, the people are too numerous. They're too strong.

Their cities are fortified.

We're in trouble.

There's no way we can take this land. And God caused them to wander for 40 years around in the wilderness. Right? Those of you who were here last week, do you remember that? So they had to wander around 40 years in the wilderness until an entire generation passed away.

So that's close to Joshua and Caleb and Moses. This is in their mind as they were coming to the promised land back in Numbers 13 and 14. They were close, but the people rebelled. So do you imagine that maybe there's a little bit of trepidation and fear in Joshua?

At this point, they're standing on the brink of entering the land. What happened the last time that he was there and they were on the brink of entering the land? They didn't even get to enter. The people rebelled.

And now, not only that, but their fearless leader Moses is dead. So there's got to be some fear going on in Joshua's heart and in his mind. What about a simple question like, are the people going to follow me?

They didn't even follow Moses at this point. Are they going to follow me? Are we going to be able to pull this off? Are we really going to be able to take the land? What kind of thoughts and questions would be going through your mind?

Your leader has just passed away, and now you're being told to be the leader and take these people in. What about, is God going to remain with me like he was with Moses? Is he going to carry that forward?

But Yahweh enters into a discussion with Joshua in our text and is going to give Joshua three basic marching orders. Now, those of you who would like outlines and like to take notes, the first thing is in verses 2 through 4, God calls Joshua to lead the people into action.

God's call to Joshua. Second, he's going to tell Joshua the attitude he has to have in leading, being strong and courageous, 5 through 6. And then verses 7 and 8, he's going to remind Joshua of the centrality of the written word, the centrality of this covenant that God has made with his people that needs to be upheld.

And then verse 9 is going to summarize that content. God basically coming back and saying, now here's the two main points. So first, we see his commands to Joshua to arise and go over the Jordan River.

They're stationed on the east side, and he's going to say, arise, go over. Direct command from God. And notice that it's not, listen, we know that you've just lost your leader, why don't you take some time to mourn the death of Moses?

That's not what he says. Or how about put together a training program for young soldiers so that you can really get your soldiers in order for this conquest that's coming up. Or how about take some time, settle on this side, you've come far enough, they're there, you've done a good job just getting them this far.

Why not just stay right where you're at? I know he tells him to get up. He says, get up, Joshua, take the people into the land. And everything that we're going to see in our text this morning is going to point towards God comforting the fears of Joshua, giving him confidence.

And even here God reminds Joshua that this is the land that he is giving to the people. And this highlights a theme throughout scripture that is worthy of a brief pause. God is telling Joshua to act, but he's saying, I'm giving the land to you.

So what's actually going on here? Verse 6 even gets to be more pointed, Be strong and very courageous, for you shall cause, God's speaking to Joshua, for you shall cause this people to inherit the land, not just any land, the land that I swore to their fathers to give them.

So God calls people to action in order to accomplish his will. So we have these two things in balance. God wants the land to be theirs, and he's telling them to act on it. In this sense, I think we could call Joshua a tool.

That was supposed to be funny. That was not funny, huh? Apparently that was... sorry. Not... my goodness. Not that kind of tool. Some people might be repulsed at the thought of... Some people might be repulsed by the thought of God wielding people like tools.

Right? By him using people. If we were to be honest, is there some kind of repulsiveness in that? Is that okay for God to use people in that way? But I can say, as one person, I'm excited at the thought of having the higher purpose in my life of being used by God for his furtherance of his glory.

I like that thought. I like the thought that I am a useful thing to God. And that gives me purpose. That gives me a sense of understanding of God's will and coming under that authority. The thing is, he calls us to action in order to accomplish what he wants to have happen.

And I want to ask everyone, when is the last time you experienced that sense of higher calling in your life or that sense of higher living where you realize that what you are doing matters more than just on the level of what you stand to gain?

But you recognize that God is using you, might have put you in a certain circumstance for a purpose. In essence, what I'm asking, when is the last time you felt God's purpose in your life? That he has put me in such and such a person's life for a reason.

And I am here for a purpose. He has given me this job to be able to rub shoulders with these people for a reason. When is the last time you experienced that? When is the last time you thought that through?

That I am a tool in God's hands, useful to him, and he is putting me in circumstances and situations. And I'm not talking about huge things, although sometimes God does call us to do big things. I'm talking about things like showing love to your spouse because you know that a healthy marriage is useful to God.

I'm talking about giving that psycho co-worker a chance to open up their heart to you for the 60th time. Everybody's got one, right? That person who just opens their heart to you every other day and it's just like, oh man, I've got work to do here.

But you recognize that maybe that 60th time is the time that they're actually open to thinking that Jesus might be the remedy to their situation. So you listen and you're a good friend to them. Simple things have a profound impact.

Joshua is going to rally some people. This is what he's called to do. Think about this just from a very literal standpoint. He's going to rally some people and he's going to cross a river. Wow, really?

Is that a big deal? Really, on a human standpoint, on just a material level, is that a big deal? You're going to cross a river. And they're going to celebrate that. Amazing. But when you really dig down to see, it's not an apparently spiritual thing that Joshua is going to do, but his leadership and his faithfulness in following God is going to be one of the defining moments in God's process of redeeming humanity, of setting up a nation that is going to be, from the lineage of that nation, is going to come Jesus Christ, the one who is the blessing to all people and to all nations at all times.

And God called Joshua to be one tool in the process of putting together his kingdom, one cog in the wheel of making this whole thing work. So who causes Israel to inherit the land? In an ultimate sense, I would say God.

Ultimately, God is the one that is causing them to inherit the land, but in an outward sense, Joshua and his faithfulness is the tool that God is using to inherit the land. And verses 3 through 4 serve as greater comfort in explaining to Joshua the scope of the promise.

Every place you step, everywhere your foot falls is the land that I am giving you. God says, in essence, I am passing my promise to Moses, that I gave to Moses, now to you, Joshua. Wherever you set foot will belong to you, from the desert wilderness in the south to Lebanon in the north.

The things that you see there, I think it's in verse 4. Those are designations of geography from the wilderness in the south to Lebanon in the north, as far as the great river in the east, which is the Euphrates River, to the Mediterranean Sea, the great sea on the west where the sun goes down.

I'm giving this all to you. I'm giving the geography that's there. A side note here. Who owns the deed to your property? Consider that for a minute. Some of you are property owners. Some of you have some stuff that you own.

I want you to notice that in verse 3, he says, every place that the sole of your foot will tread upon, I have given to you. It's like it's deeded to them already. They just haven't moved in yet. But that challenges me to think, who owns my deed to my property?

Who owns my car? Who owns my TV? Who owns my stuff? It's interesting to note God is giving an occupied land to Israel. And that kind of ruffles our feathers a little bit in our modern day and age. And we're going to talk through that.

This isn't the text for it, but we're going to have some very direct text about conquering the land here coming up. And we're going to talk through that together. But we can sing songs like you give and take away.

My heart will choose to say, blessed be your name. Do we mean it? I can't help but think that if God decided to give my car to somebody else, that I would struggle with that a little bit. How about your house?

Or even lesser things. I find myself kind of holding on to stuff. It's kind of silly in essence, because it really all belongs to God. We must be challenged to think about God's genuine right and ownership of our stuff.

Like I said, it's been a challenging thought to me this week. But in verse 3 it says, the land is theirs. The deed is in their name, and God is ultimately giving them orders, giving Joshua orders to lead them to move into the land.

So we see the first thing is that God commanded Joshua to arise and to go over the Jordan River. The second thing is that he's going to talk to him about what attitude he needs to have in this process.

He says, Joshua, be strong and courageous, in verses 5 and 6. Now imagine with me, if you will, you and a friend gone for a nice hike up in the UP. Have any of you been to the UP before? Okay, for those of you who haven't, just picture, have you seen woods?

Have you seen trees? Now picture a bazillion of those, and they're really close together. And there might be one road within 120 miles. So you and a friend have gone for a hike up in the UP, but being silly and just crazy, you're there in January.

It's three full days, and you're lost. You're dressed properly, but you're lost. Your trail mix is gone. Your feet are so cold and numb that you can't walk anymore. You collapse to the snow in despair.

Night is beginning to fall. I'm painting a great picture here. The wolves are circling, and the hills are round, and you're hearing them howl your name, and they're hungry. And your friend looks over at you and says, Be strong and courageous.

Does that change your circumstances? Does that make you just, Okay, now we can do this?

No.

Right? Do you guys agree with me that that wouldn't be so comforting to have your friend look over at you and say, Be strong and courageous? Two reasons I give that illustration is that there's a big difference between a friend in the same predicament as you saying, Be strong and courageous, and let's say a rescue worker who shows up on cross-country skis with a rifle and says, Come follow me.

Be strong and courageous. Would that be different? I think so. How many of you would agree that it matters who tells you to be strong and courageous, that that has an impact on what that does for you?

This command to Joshua to be strong and courageous is significant for two primary reasons. Number one, it is God who is telling him to be strong and courageous. It's God who says that to him. And secondly, it is God's presence and support that is given as the reason for the strength and courage.

If you look over at verse five, No man shall be able to stand before you all the days of your life, just as I was with Moses, so I will be with you. God is not just saying, Pluck up your courage against all odds, Joshua.

Yes, the land is plentiful, but there's all these giants in a multitude and armed people and fortified cities.

And all this stuff.

He's saying, I'm with you. He's not saying just generate bravery and courage. It's the very promise and presence of God that is to be the source of his courage. And notice in verse six, we're going to see the first of three times in the text, in the next four verses, that God is going to tell Joshua to be strong and courageous.

Three times in just four verses, he's going to say, be strong and courageous. What is God ultimately driving for in these words, strong and courageous? He's talking about ultimately faith and trust. He says, I'm promising you success.

I'm promising you I'm going to be with you, but you have to trust that. And that trust is what causes the strong and courageous. He's saying, Joshua, I am telling you I'm on your side and you will inherit this land.

I will be with you and I won't leave you. Do you trust me, Joshua? Do you trust me? You will show your trust to me by being strong and courageous. And God is going to ask him to do some things that are going to require some significant trust, like marching around a city seven times, seven days, and kind of things that would be antithetical to a warrior.

Like, well, let's put the battle plan together and conquer this city. And instead, God is like, walk around it a bunch of times.

And the walls will fall down.

Just trust me on this one. That takes more courage for him to obey in that circumstance. So what about you? How is your courage? How is your strength? Are you feeble and frail? When the smallest hurdle of life comes in, do you throw up your hands in fear and dismay?

I find myself, you know, it can be the little things in life. You know, what's it like for you on Monday morning or on Tuesday morning or as the week wears on? Do you find that those little nitpicky things get under your skin and you just get aggravated and you throw your hands up?

I find that oftentimes it's just the smallest things that get in my way that hurt my faith. Listen to what God says in the New Testament about this. In the book of Hebrews 13, 5 through 6, you can jot that reference down, Hebrews 13, 5 through 6.

The writer of Hebrews actually quotes the Old Testament and quotes the book of Joshua, our text, there. He quotes this portion and he says this. I find that it's not just a little ironic that God speaks in the New Testament about trusting Him and recognizing His presence with us in regard to finances.

It's as if He knew that maybe we would have a little anxiety over finances. Like maybe that would be an area of our lives where we would kind of slide into forgetting His presence with us, that He is with us throughout the day and that He is going to provide for us and take care of us.

It's not just a little ironic that that's the context in the book of Hebrews where He talks about His presence with us. But He carries that forward then and talks about the fact that He will never leave us.

He will never forsake us. And He takes what He was speaking to Joshua in the Old Testament and applies it to all of those who are followers of Jesus Christ. Those of us who have given our lives over to Christ recognize that He is with us all the time.

And not with us in that creepy, you better watch what you do. He's up there and He's watching to make sure. Have you ever felt that kind of fear of God where it's like, oh, He's watching everything that I do, right?

There's a different kind of understanding of the presence of God that is for power, for joy throughout your week. It's like, oh yeah, He's with me and He has promised to never leave me or forsake me. He's on my team.

That's kind of comforting, isn't it? It should be a comfort throughout our week. But I'm convinced that one of our greatest issues as humans is forgetfulness. That we forget God's presence with us as we go throughout the week.

You can go a whole day without thinking thoughts about God, without acknowledging His presence with you. I have to confess that even as a pastor, that can happen to me. Where I can go and I can be studying God's Word and not thinking about Him.

It's weird, isn't it?

It can happen.

But God can give us what I would call supernatural courage that defies logic and understanding, even in the midst of our dark valleys. And we go through some dark times, don't we? But even in the midst of that, He is present with us.

He will never leave us or forsake us. My comment to you is that if you are filled with fear, like in verse 1 -9, Joshua 1 -9, He shows the opposite of strength and courage. He says, Do not be frightened and do not be dismayed.

And my question to you is, if you are filled with fear, are you? Do you have fear in your life? Then check your faith. Where is your trust lying? Are you looking to your own strength? Have you forgotten that God is with you?

Take courage because He promises He will never leave us or forsake us. The last thing here in verses 7 -8, God is going to remind Joshua about the covenant that He made with His people, about this written Word that Moses passed on to Joshua.

Part of being strong and courageous is in keeping the law for Joshua, which is the way of life that God had written down in His covenant with His people. Remember, He basically made this vow. He said, If you will follow me in the way and the lifestyle that I have laid out for you as a nation, Israel, then I will be your God, I will be your protector, I will give you this land, I will do all of these things.

I want you to think of it like vows that the Israelites made when they married Yahweh. With my vows, I don't go through a checklist every morning regarding my vows with my wife. Loved her in sickness and in health, check.

Loved her for richer or for poorer, check. Loved her till death do us part, hopefully not today, check. Is that how relationships work? Like checklists? I think often Christians sell the law short because it serves as a case study in our inability.

We recognize our inability, so we automatically assume that it was intended by God to be a checklist and we couldn't check everything off and so now that's the way that Christians often view the law. But because it can be abused doesn't mean that that's the way that it was set up.

Does that make sense? Because it's been abused as a checklist doesn't mean that it was intended to be a checklist. It was meant to be a relationship where the greatest law is love the Lord your God with all your heart, soul, mind, and strength and love your neighbor as yourself.

And all of the other laws, laws like stuff about your ox goring your neighbor. You know, weird things like that. I mean, how many of you know those laws are in there? Okay, or I mean maybe a better thing is like your dog mauling your neighbor because we don't really have a lot of ox around today.

But that concept, you know, it's like all of those laws tie in with this love the Lord your God with all your heart, soul, mind, and strength and love your neighbor as yourself. That there's an actual principle of relationship that is behind the law that we've often missed.

And if we really take law to be that then I think we could all use a little bit more law. If we take it as the way that we relate to God in relationship. But certainly, I take major issue when we interpret the law as checklist.

And our life with God becomes a list of duties, a list of chores that we have to get done before we go on living our lives. And do you see how the Christian life can begin to boil down to that kind of a mentality?

Where I read my Bible because it's what I have to do today. Check. I pray before I eat because that's what Christians do. Check. We just begin to tick off checklists. And it's meant to be so much more than that.