Faith With Follow-Through / God’s Commission To Joshua (Joshua Chapter 1)

The book of Joshua, so turn to Joshua chapter 1. So we're going to continue with our chapter-by-chapter study of the Old Testament. Joshua picks up where the book of Numbers left off. I know you're thinking, no, it's Deuteronomy.

No, it's really Numbers because Numbers ended with Moses and the children of Israel. They're in the plains of Moab by the Jordan River across from Jericho. That's where Numbers ends. Yeah, we did a one-part study on Deuteronomy, but Deuteronomy really doesn't advance the narrative at all.

The only thing in Deuteronomy that advances the story is what? The death of Moses. Deuteronomy is basically God's law restated. So Moses dies in Deuteronomy and this is where we are picking up. They're in the plains of Moab and they're about ready to enter the promised land.

So Joshua, the book of Joshua, we now see instead of Moses as a type of Christ, we're seeing Joshua as a type of Christ. And Joshua will lead the children of Israel into the promised land, something that Moses, who represents the law, cannot do.

So these events are happening, as you can see on the screen, somewhere in the 14th century BC. Joshua is believed to be the author of this book. Joshua is the first of 12 historical books in the Old Testament.

And the theme of Joshua is the conquest of the land of Canaan. So let's follow along in chapter one.

Joshua's Commission and the Call to Courage

After the death of Moses, the servant of the Lord, it came to pass that the Lord spoke to Joshua, the son of Nun, Moses' assistant.

Moses, my servant, is dead. Now therefore arise. Go over this Jordan, you and all this people, to the land which I am giving to them, the children of Israel. Every place that the sole of your foot will tread upon, I have given you as I said to.

Moses.

From the wilderness and this Lebanon, as far as the great river, the river Euphrates, all the land of the Hittites, and 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, as I was with Moses, so I will be with you.

I will not leave you, nor forsake you. Be strong and of good courage, for to this people you shall divide as an inheritance the land which I swore to their fathers to give them. Only be strong and very courageous, that you may observe to do according to all the law which Moses, my servant, commanded you.

Do not turn from it to the right hand or to the left, that you may prosper wherever you.

Go.

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

Have I not commanded you? Be strong and of good courage. Do not be afraid, nor be dismayed, for the Lord your God is with you wherever you go.

Then Joshua commanded the officers of the people, Pass through the camp and command.

The people, saying, Prepare provisions for yourselves, for within three days you will cross over this Jordan, to go in to possess the land which the Lord your God is giving you to possess.

And to the Reubenites, the Gadites, and half the tribe of Manasseh, Joshua spoke, Remember.

The word which Moses, the servant of the Lord, commanded you, saying, The Lord your God is giving you rest, and is giving you this land. Your wives, your little ones, and your livestock shall remain in the land which Moses gave you on this side of the Jordan.

But you shall pass before your brethren armed, all your mighty men of valor, and help them until the Lord has given your brethren rest, as he gave you. And they also have taken possession of the land which the Lord your God is giving them.

Then you shall return to the land of your possession, and enjoy it, which Moses, the Lord's servant, gave you on this side of the Jordan, toward the sunrise.

So they answered Joshua, All that you command us we will do, and wherever you send us we will go, just as we heeded Moses in all things, so we will heed you. Only the Lord your God be with you, as he was with Moses.

Whoever rebels against your command and does not heed your words, in all that you command him shall be put to death. Only be strong and of good courage.

When you think of the book of Joshua, what do you think of?

The battle of Jericho.

Yeah, battles, you know, warfare, you mentioned the battle of Jericho, that's probably one of the most famous, if not the most famous of all Old Testament battles. But that's what you think of going through the book, warfare.

So the application for us is that while Israel in the Old Testament was fighting physical battles, we the church in the New Testament, we fight what?

Spiritual battles.

We fight spiritual battles. In both cases, faith is what is required for there to be success. And here's the thing that we don't want to miss. Part of having a real, authentic faith is actually doing what you say that you believe.

So the Israelites, and we've seen this before in the book of Numbers, the Israelites could say, hey, we believe in God. We believe in the Lord. We trust in the Lord. But if they refuse to enter into the promised land, what does that tell you?

They don't really believe in the Lord or they have some faith, but not enough faith. So that's been the problem up until now, 40 years earlier, they went through this. They wouldn't enter into the land.

Thankfully, things have changed. So let's take a closer look. Joshua 1, verses 1 through 3. And after the death of Moses, the servant of the Lord, it came to pass that the Lord spoke to Joshua, the son of Nun, that's N-U-N, not the son of N-O-N-E, the son of Nun, Moses' assistant, saying, Moses, my servant is dead.

Now, therefore, arise, go over this Jordan, you and all this people to the land which I am giving to them, the children of Israel. Every place that the sole of your foot will tread upon, I have given to you as I said to Moses.

So Joshua is now, what we like to say, Joshua is God's man. It was Moses, now Joshua has been charged with the leadership of this nation. And in leading the people, he not only must have faith, he must have a bold or a strong and courageous faith.

Look at verse 6. It says, Be strong and of good courage, for to this people you shall divide as an inheritance the land which I swore to their fathers to give them. Only be strong and very courageous that you may observe to do according to all the law which Moses, my servant, commanded you.

Do not turn from it to the right hand or to the left, that you may prosper wherever you.

Go.

Now what does that mean? Put that in your own words. Do not turn to the right hand or to the left. How would you describe that in your own words?

God is encouraging him to be a strong leader. And not to be afraid, as long as he is obedient to what God's direction is.

Okay.

So if he departed to the left or to the right, what would that mean? What would that look like?

Don't get off track.

Don't get off track. Because in the process of all this, he might have his own ideas. Yeah, I know the Lord said this, but I really think it would work better if I did it this way. Do people do that today?

They kind of know what the scripture says. Technically they know the right thing to do, but somehow they convince themselves that this other way is better. So don't do that. Don't go to the left. Don't go to the right.

Stay on track. Verse 8, this book of the law shall not depart from your mouth, but you shall meditate in it day and night that you may observe to do according to all that is written in it. For then you shall make your way prosperous and then you will have good success.

And we know this by now, this is part of the law that if you obey the covenant, you'll be blessed. If you disobey, you will be cursed. So being prosperous, anytime you hear today, kind of the prosperity message that's out there that we talk about from time to time.

Anytime you hear a preacher usually talking about this prosperity message, they have to go back and quote Old Testament books about the law of God, because that was part of the old covenant that if you obey, you'll be blessed.

Now, is that still true though, that you will be blessed if you obey God? Right. But it's not a one-to-one thing monetarily where if you do this, you'll get so much money in return. That's where a lot of people go wrong.

But the path to God's blessed, to be blessed by God, yeah, you have to obey him. That's still true.

All right.

The Two and a Half Tribes and Their Duty to Fight

So starting in verse 12, Joshua reminds the two and a half tribes that settled east of the Jordan of their obligation to fight alongside of their brother. Do you remember the two tribes without looking?

I know you could look and find the answer real easy, and we heard it a minute ago, but two and a half tribes that decided, hey, we don't want to go into the land. We're happy right here where we are. What tribes were they?

Without looking.

Okay.

Half tribe of Manasseh. What are the other two?

Yeah. Yeah.

Reuben and Gad. So you'll remember this, uh, hopefully from our study of the book of numbers, these two and a half tribes, they were just content with the land that they were in and they wanted to stay here.

They settled for good enough. Now God's best was in the promised land, but that was pretty good where they were. So they were, they were settling. That's the way I see it. And they knew what God said there.

You need to enter the land, but no, we don't want to. So what did they do? They went to Moses and had Moses ask God on their behalf, is this okay if we just stay.

Here?

And did God agree to that? He did agree on one condition that when it comes time to fight the battle, the conquest of Canaan, you better be there to fight alongside the other tribes. Because if, if you're not there to fight with them, then what?

Yeah.

Then comes the cursing, right? If you disobey, uh, you'll be cursed. Uh, just one, one comment on this in way of a spiritual application. Uh, there are, I think Christians today sometimes that are kind of content where they're at.

Uh, maybe they're not exactly the most motive motivated people to do the harder things, uh, in the Christian walk. When it comes to accomplishing great things for God, they're not really interest. They just kind of want to do what they do and be where they're at and kind of leave the harder stuff to others.

Um, you know, okay. There's some people like that. And I think that's the way Reuben Gad and Manasseh were. But when it comes to just staying home and staying out of the battle and leaving your brothers and sisters high and dry, that is not an option.

So when Joshua leads the army towards Jericho, if Reuben Gad and Manasseh decide to stay home and not help in their time of need, the Lord warned them that they would be held accountable. And I think that comes out very clearly in the end of this chapter is basically seen as treason.

If they're not there for their brothers and sisters, that that's, that's treasonous basically. So the, the thing we learned from this, the lesson is we need to support each other. Christians, especially in the day and age we live in, we need to back each other up.

We need to be there when a fellow believer is in need, when they're facing trial, whether it's personal things, whether it's health things, whether it's persecution, when you see a fellow brother or sister in need to say, Hey, that's their problem.

I'm just going to, or just to sort of drop out of the fight altogether. That is, that is not an option. It's treasonous against Christ and the body of Christ. So we need to be there for one another.

It's scriptural.

Right.

It says bear one another's burdens, bear one another's burdens, love your neighbor as yourself. How much more your brother in Christ. Okay. Any questions so far?

All right.

The word you use, the word settled and that's used rest in the King James where you use twice in this first chapter. And what it means is to settle. You give them the rest. But after they conquer the land, right?

So when they were in the land, once they've conquered the land, then they would have rest.

Right.

And when we think of rest, what do we think of sitting down and relaxing, right? Well, spiritually speaking, the ultimate rest in Christ, right?

Heaven. Good. Good.

So the mission for Israel in verse two is arise, go over this Jordan, you and all this people to the land, which I, this is the Lord speaking, which I am giving to them.

Okay.

The land, which I am giving to them. So where did this promise originate? When was this promise first given that I will give to this people, this, this land, where's.

That all start to Abraham.

Okay, good. So let's turn to Genesis chapter 12 for a moment. You remember, hopefully from a few weeks ago, did a sermon from Genesis chapter 12, where we talked a little bit about the Abrahamic covenant.

So this is the first promise to Abraham and his descendants that he would make of Abraham, a great nation, obviously land and people are involved in that. It said that God made a conditional promise to Abraham, right?

Good.

God made to Abraham and unconditional promise. So because it's unconditional, it's going to happen. Even if there are unfaithful people along the line, which there were, and there are, it must come to pass.

And for those watching online, Marcus is holding up a, something to do with Israel, a symbol of Israel.

Yeah.

God keeps his promises. Yeah. But they're unfaithful. They don't believe in Jesus. Well, no kidding. God is still faithful though.

All right.

Genesis chapter 12. I mean, they were unfaithful in the wilderness all throughout the book of numbers, right? Genesis 12, starting in verse one of the Lord had said to Abram, get out of your country from your family and from your father's house to a land that I will show you.

And I will make you a great nation and I will bless you and make your name great. And you shall be a blessing. And I will bless those who bless you. And I will curse him who curses you. And in you, all the families of the earth shall be blessed.

So Abram departed as the Lord had spoken to him. So while the promise or the covenant was unconditional, here's the thing. Abraham still had to do something, right? What did he have to do?

Get out of his country.

Get the land.

Right.

Kind of believe, but belief required believing.

He said, Lord, I believe, but I'm going to stay right here. Actually, if you look at Genesis chapter 11 and chapter 12, it does look like Abraham didn't go right away, but that's a whole other story. But yeah, Abraham did have to do something.

He had to leave his father's house and he had to go. He had to arise. He had to go to the land that God showed him. And in Joshua, the Israelites, they're going to receive a promise. God promised the land.

It's unconditional. But guess what? They still have to do something. They still had to enter the land. They still had to fight the battles. The point is people always have to do something. Now salvation is by grace alone, faith alone.

We still have to do something, don't we? What are some things that we have to do?

Repent.

You have to believe. You have to repent.

Receive.

Yeah.

You have to receive the free gift. That's still something you have to do. You have to call upon the name of the Lord, right? Whoever calls upon the name of the Lord shall be saved. So there's always something that men have to do.

Obey.

Well, yeah. I mean, obedience is part of repentance that, you know, at the moment you're saved, you're not fully obedient. And I mean, God has to, there's the sanctification that comes afterwards, but there's always something to do.

Yes, Marcus.

Believe in your heart, but confess with your mouth.

Confess with your mouth.

You have to use the mouth a little bit.

Now the covenant of the law, on the other hand, was conditional. You know, those things that God promised to Israel, those things would only come to pass if they upheld their end, which they did. God said in the law, if you do this, if you obey, I'll bless you.

If you disobey, I'll curse you. So the law ultimately brought a curse because men are unfaithful. But with this promise to Abraham, it must come to pass because God is faithful. So God promises to make Abraham a great nation.

You're still in Genesis 12, okay? In verse five, Abraham and his wife, or Abram and his wife Sarai, at this moment, those are their names. They come to the land of Canaan, look at verse seven, it says, then the Lord appeared to Abram and said to your descendants, I will give this land.

And there he built an altar to the Lord who had appeared to him. So this is all background information. The book of Joshua really doesn't make any sense with these promises unless you first understand this stuff.

So let's go back to Joshua one. But as far as the conquest of the land of Canaan goes, pastors and commentators have kind of gone back and forth as to the symbolic meaning of the promised land. What is the promised land represent?

We know what the promised land is. It's the land of Canaan or the modern day state of Israel. People call it Palestine.

I don't know.

Is the word Palestine in the Bible? I don't think it's in the Bible. I don't call it Palestine because in the scripture, it's not, I don't see that word, but we know what the promised land is literally, but what does it point to symbolically.

There's, yeah, there's two main views. Either it refers to heaven, like you said, or it can refer to God's best or God's blessing. To enter into Canaan is like entering into God's, the fullness of his blessing for your.

Life.

And any of you heard any messages or teaching on that that you can think of as the Palestinian.

Covenant and just the word covenant would indicate that it's God's best.

Okay.

All right.

I think it can represent both. I don't see a problem with that. In Romans chapter four, the apostle Paul ties in God's covenant promise to the gospel and salvation and if there's anything we know about the gospel and salvation as evangelical Christians, it's by faith alone.

However, one common misconception is that salvation, while it is by faith and not by works, that gives some people the idea that, again, you don't have to do anything, but you do have to do something.

You have to believe, call on the name of the Lord as we talked about.

Yes.

Question on Palestine. It was my understanding that that term or that name, you know, it was only, only occurred, you know, several centuries ago and that was, it was assigned to this land by, as an insulting term from some other nation.

I'm not sure the origin of it, but again, it's, it's not biblical or I don't see it as part of God's plan other than, you know, they had become enemies of the nation of Israel.

Right.

I, I'm not even sure where the term Palestine originates. I think it was used around World War II, after World War II, when they were dividing up the.

Land.

It didn't get called Israel until the nation formed and they were choosing, okay, what are we going to call it? And they decided Israel, but, but it was referred to as Palestine, I think, before World War.

II.

But again, that's not in the Bible. So I'm going to use the biblical term.

Recent terminology given by other people.

I would, I would always recommend to use biblical terminology whenever you can, because there's a lot of conversations about a lot of things and new terms are always being made up. And if we stick to biblical terms, then we can find a biblical definition.

So that's, I think, always the way to go, but back to what I'm talking about here with the gospel. Yeah, it's by faith, but just like Abraham was called to do something, Joshua is called to do something, you know, have faith, be courageous.

But he still had to do something. So faith is more than just mental ascent, right? We've talked about this before. James chapter two, 19 and 20 says, you believe there is one God you do well, but what?

But even the demons believe and tremble. But do you want to know, oh, foolish man, that faith without works is dead. And again, Israel could say they believed in the Lord, but if they didn't actually take the land, then they didn't believe enough at the very least.

Okay.

Turn to Hebrews chapter 11. I'm going to expand on this point a little more. So yeah, we're saved by faith. We're saved by believing in the gospel, but that can never be divorced from what we do. I'll use the illustration again, right?

Who remembers this? Here's the chair. Do I believe that this chair can hold my weight? Yeah, I do believe that. Now what do you tell me?

I'm not sitting in that chair.

What does that tell you? Yeah, I don't really have faith in the chair. I can say I do, but talk is cheap. I don't really have faith in the chair until I sit in the chair.

Now I'm at rest.

I might just finish the rest of the message like this. I can pull this up and be more comfortable, but we get it. You can't really separate faith from what we do. Look at Hebrews 11 verse eight. This really comes out clearly.

By faith, Abraham what? Is that a new thought for anyone? By faith, Abraham obeyed when he was called to go out to the place which he would receive as an inheritance. And he went out not knowing where he was going.

Yeah, Abraham, by faith, he obeyed. Abraham was far from perfect. And there's all sorts of things you could talk about with Abraham's life. He did things wrong, but his faith was evident in that he believed God.

And that was backed up with his actions, which is what James talks about with the sacrificing of Isaac. Right now we're talking about Joshua, right? Look at Hebrews 11 verse 30. By what? By faith, the walls of Jericho fell down after they were encircled for seven days.

All right, let's turn to Joshua chapter six, because this is probably the most well-known story from Joshua. The battle or the destruction of Jericho. And the walls came tumbling down. So the walls came down, not by works, but by faith.

The Israelites did not tear down the walls. Them blowing the trumpet. It's not that the reverberation from the trumpet and them yelling really loud. I was watching one of these history channel specials where the experts like, well, you know, if they yelled at this pitch and there's the sound, it could have sent shockwaves.

And there could have been a fracture in the wall. That could have really been why the wall came down. That's a bunch of baloney.

Okay.

They did not tear down the walls. God tore down the walls. But he did it in cooperation with their faith. So they, by faith, the walls of Jericho fell down. But the Israelites, they did have to do something.

Okay.

And what was it?

March around the city, blow the trumpet, shout, all the rest.

Okay.

Joshua chapter six, verses one through five. We'll cover this more in depth, you know, five weeks from now. It says, now Jericho was securely shut up because the children of Israel, none went out and none came in.

And the Lord said to Joshua, see, I have given Jericho into your hand. It's king and the mighty men of valor. You shall march around the city. All you men of war. And you shall go all around the city once.

This you shall do six days. And seven priests shall bear seven trumpets of ram's horns before the ark. But the seventh day you shall march around the city seven times. And the priests shall blow the trumpets.

And it shall come to pass when they make a long blast with the ram's horn. And when you hear the sound of the trumpet, all the people shall shout with a great shout. Then they could, they could hear this and think, what's the point of doing that?

This isn't going to work. That would be the normal response that anyone would have. Well, this is pointless, but they had faith. They believed God's word because they believed God's word.

What does he say?

Then the wall of the city will fall down flat and the people shall go up every man straight before him. So Joshua and the children of Israel had faith in the power of God. And because they had faith, they did what the Lord asked of them.

So let me pose this question to you. Given that, do we have that same kind of faith that we do what the Lord asks of us? There are many things we can learn from these Old Testament stories. But first, what are some things the Lord asks of us?

Let's try to put a little meat on the bones here.

Love the Lord, dear God, and fill your heart, soul, mind, and strength. And love your neighbor.

So love God. Love your neighbor. Be holy, you said. Well, that's a command repeated in both Old and New Testaments. Be holy, for I am holy. What does that mean to be holy?

Cleansed of unrighteousness.

I think we all know, to some degree, we know what it means to be unholy.

Right?

That isn't too hard. So these are things that the Lord asks of his people. And if we say, well, I believe in God. I believe. We have faith. Well, amen. But are we willing to do what God asks us to do?

So all sorts of things we can learn. As Christians, we use another principle. We're almost done. But we use the New Testament to interpret the Old Testament. If you take notes, write this down. The best commentary on the Old Testament is not John MacArthur's commentary series on the Old Testament.

The greatest commentary on the Old Testament isn't the Bible knowledge commentary from Dallas Theological. Who has that one?

Yeah.

I mean, these are some good commentaries. The best commentary isn't Calvin's Institutes. The best commentary on the Old Testament is what?

Right.

It's the New Testament. This is what we often say. We compare Scripture with Scripture. So we interpret these Old Testament passages based on what Jesus and his apostles said about them. As we were doing in Hebrews.

Jesus said about the Old Testament Scriptures. He said they were about him. Remember John 539. He said, these are they which testify of me. So that means the book of Joshua. The book of Joshua is about Jesus.

According to Jesus, Joshua is about him. So then the question for us is how? How is it about Jesus? So the theme of Joshua is what the conquering Canaan or the conquest of the land of Canaan. Of course, Joshua and Jesus, same name.

The Hebrew or the Old Testament name is Joshua. The New Testament equivalent is Jesus, meaning Jehovah saves. So here it is. I understand this is from studying. This is what I've concluded. I understand Joshua and the conquest of the land of Canaan to be an allegory.

That doesn't mean it didn't happen. Okay, all these events actually happened. But I understand it to be an allegory of Jesus leading his people through many spiritual battles. He leads us into his blessing, into his rest.

His blessing starts in this life, but ultimately culminates in the greatest blessing of all. Being accepted into his heavenly rest in the kingdom, in the kingdom of God. So God's blessing starts in this life.

The path to God's blessing is obedience. We have faith and a true faith is one where you actually put into practice the things you say you believe. That's the path to God's blessing. It starts now, but we don't receive that full and ultimate rest until we are received into heaven.

So Joshua leading the children of Israel into the promised land is a picture of Jesus leading us into heaven. But there's a lot of battles along the way.