Joshua and Judges: Crossing the Jordan - Obeying God's delegated authority, part 17. Jos 1:16-18; Heb.

Title: Joshua and Judges: Crossing the Jordan - Obeying God's delegated authority, part 17. JOS 1:16-18; Heb.   

 

Announcementsopening prayer:

 

 

Peter exhorts believers who are undergoing persecutions, that in view of the fact that these are allowed to come by God and are designed to purify their lives, they have every reason to trust Him to take care of them through all of their sufferings.

 

But in order to do this the believer must have honor in his soul.

 

Believers without honor are unable to handle such pressure and they compromise and their voices become silent, and by so doing, they lend approval to the malignant power.

 

If something like this ever occurred in our nation, in our lifetime, I don't think any of us would like to be standing in heaven before our Lord at His Bema Seat and have to declare that we were too afraid to stand up for the truth when we were called to, even though that decision made life a bit easier and more comfortable.

 

MAT 10:32-33

"Everyone therefore who shall confess Me before men, I will also confess him before My Father who is in heaven. "But whoever shall deny Me before men, I will also deny him before My Father who is in heaven.

 

The context of this passage is not confessing Him in church were everyone agrees with you.

 

MAT 10:24 "A disciple is not above his teacher, nor a slave above his master.

 

MAT 10:25 "It is enough for the disciple that he become as his teacher, and the slave as his master. If they have called the head of the house Beelzebul [the devil], how much more the members of his household!

 

MAT 10:26 "Therefore do not fear them, for there is nothing covered that will not be revealed, and hidden that will not be known.

 

MAT 10:27 "What I tell you in the darkness, speak in the light; and what you hear whispered in your ear, proclaim upon the housetops.

 

MAT 10:28 "And do not fear those who kill the body, but are unable to kill the soul; but rather fear Him who is able to destroy both soul and body in hell.

 

In other words, who are you really accountable to? And that One will deliver you, even in martyrdom, and Christ gives the example of innocent sparrows that are cared for by the Father.

 

MAT 10:29 "Are not two sparrows sold for a cent? And yet not one of them will fall to the ground apart from your Father.

 

MAT 10:30 "But the very hairs of your head are all numbered.

 

MAT 10:31 "Therefore do not fear; you are of more value than many sparrows.

 

MAT 10:32 "Everyone therefore who shall confess Me before men, I will also confess him before My Father who is in heaven.

 

If a believer truly believed this, as it will occur in heaven when the overcomer is announced to the Father and His angels under his new title, wouldn't this be far more important to him than the approval of men?

 

MAT 10:33 "But whoever shall deny Me before men, I will also deny him before My Father who is in heaven.

 

The Christians who compromise truth and fail as ambassadors for Christ when under persecution will be denied announcement to the Father and His angels.

 

MAT 10:34 "Do not think that I came to bring peace on the earth; I did not come to bring peace, but a sword.

 

There will be suffering for the believer but it is not to be the type of deserved suffering that all mankind are partakers of.

 

MAT 10:35 "For I came to set a man against his father, and a daughter against her mother, and a daughter-in-law against her mother-in-law; 

 

MAT 10:36 and a man's enemies will be the members of his household. 

 

MAT 10:37 "He who loves father or mother more than Me is not worthy of Me; and he who loves son or daughter more than Me is not worthy of Me.

 

In choosing to compromise truth to keep the peace with family means that you value family more than God. And although family is a good gift from God, usually, they are not worthy to be compared with God.

 

MAT 10:38 "And he who does not take his cross and follow after Me is not worthy of Me.

 

MAT 10:39 "He who has found his life [psuche] shall lose it, and he who has lost his life for My sake shall find it.

 

The found life is the new conscience of the regenerated believer who through the word of God and the filling of the Spirit has evaluated life and the spiritual life from this foundation and has concluded that value is in God alone.

 

So then, his values have changed into conformity with Christ's and so his conscience has changed and so he has honor as well as excellence. He has lost his old conscience and found Christ's. He loves his family but they have their place before God.

 

This new conscience is also cleansed from all guilt and condemnation which the old conscience had in abundance. Losing our lives or conscience for Christ's sake and finding His is one of the greatest blessings for living in time and in the midst of a world that hates Christ.

 

REV 3:5

'He who overcomes shall thus be clothed in white garments; and I will not erase his name from the book of life, and I will confess his name before My Father, and before His angels.

GAL 2:11  But when Cephas came to Antioch, I opposed him to his face, because he stood condemned. 

 

GAL 2:12 For prior to the coming of certain men from James, he used to eat with the Gentiles; but when they came, he began to withdraw and hold himself aloof, fearing the party of the circumcision.   

 

GAL 2:13 The rest of the Jews joined him in hypocrisy, with the result that even Barnabas was carried away by their hypocrisy.   

 

GAL 2:14 But when I saw that they were not straightforward about the truth of the gospel, I said to Cephas in the presence of all, "If you, being a Jew, live like the Gentiles and not like the Jews, how is it that you compel the Gentiles to live like Jews?   

 

GAL 2:15 "We are Jews by nature and not sinners from among the Gentiles;   

 

GAL 2:16 nevertheless knowing that a man is not justified by the works of the Law but through faith in Christ Jesus, even we have believed in Christ Jesus, so that we may be justified by faith in Christ and not by the works of the Law; since by the works of the Law no flesh will be justified.    

 

GAL 2:17 "But if, while seeking to be justified in Christ, we ourselves have also been found sinners, is Christ then a minister of sin? May it never be!   

 

GAL 2:18 "For if I rebuild what I have once destroyed, I prove myself to be a transgressor.  

 

GAL 2:19 "For through the Law I died to the Law, so that I might live to God.   

 

GAL 2:20 "I have been crucified with Christ; and it is no longer I who live, but Christ lives in me; and the life which I now live in the flesh I live by faith in the Son of God, who loved me and gave Himself up for me.  

 

GAL 2:21 "I do not nullify the grace of God, for if righteousness comes through the Law, then Christ died needlessly."

Jews in the Roman Empire enjoyed the protection of Roman Law. Jews who became Christian were faced with the persecution that would come if they stepped out publically as Christians. It must have been tempting to go on pretending to be in the old Jewish religion, but what kind of witnesses would they be?

 

Declaration for the gospel would mean burning their old bridges and entrusting themselves to the dangerous uncertainties of a new way of life in the company of people, other Christians, with whom they were unfamiliar, and whose lives were very different from the old Jewish ways (especially the rules of cleanliness and food intake), and with whom they were uncomfortable. The old familiar environment exerted a strong attraction.

 

If Christian Jews in the Roman Empire boldly asserted the gospel of Jesus Christ, they were opening themselves up to persecution. If they continued to pretend to be Jewish they would not.

 

Their persecution would not just come from the state but also from their fellow Jews, who were the first great persecutors of the church.

 

As believers they were commanded and entreated to come out of the Jewish closet, though they would face persecution for it.

 

To them the epistle of the Hebrews was addressed.

 

HEB 2:2 For if the word [Law] spoken through angels proved unalterable, and every transgression and disobedience received a just recompense,

 

HEB 2:3 how shall we escape if we neglect so great a salvation? After it was at the first spoken through the Lord, it was confirmed to us by those who heard,

 

The great salvation proclaimed in the gospel was not brought to earth by an angel, but by the Son of God Himself.

 

The point is that if the Mosaic Law was not to be treated lightly, and it was mediated by angels, then certainly the gospel should not be treated lightly, as it was brought by the Son of God.

 

For the Jewish Christians to pretend to still be Jewish or to return to Judaism because of the persecution that was brought upon the gospel of Christ would be to take that gospel very lightly. And if they do so, how will they escape the discipline of God and the loss, not of their salvation if they have believed, but a loss of the life of Christ flowing through them while they walk the earth.

 

MAR 1:14-15

And after John had been taken into custody, Jesus came into Galilee, preaching the gospel of God, and saying, "The time is fulfilled, and the kingdom of God is at hand; repent and believe in the gospel."

 

HEB 2:4 God also bearing witness with them, both by signs and wonders and by various miracles and by gifts of the Holy Spirit according to His own will.

 

The miracles performed by the Lord and by the apostles in the early apostolic age were obviously matters of common knowledge and widespread Christian experience, or else there would be no reason to appeal to their occurrence so plainly.

 

The miracles, which were well known to have occurred were tokens granted by God to attest to the truth of what was being proclaimed.

 

HEB 6:9 But, beloved, we are convinced of better things concerning you, and things that accompany salvation, though we are speaking in this way.

 

HEB 6:10 For God is not unjust so as to forget your work and the love which you have shown toward His name, in having ministered and in still ministering to the saints.

 

Deeds of kindness and service done to the people of God are reckoned by God as done to Himself.

 

This becomes more difficult in times of great persecution. During the Tribulation when Christian Jews are fleeing into the wilderness due to the greatest persecution of anti-Semitism in history, they will stop at Gentile homes in need of help - shelter and water - for their journey.

 

MAT 25:41 "Then He will also say to those on His left, 'Depart from Me, accursed ones, into the eternal fire which has been prepared for the devil and his angels;

 

MAT 25:42 for I was hungry, and you gave Me nothing to eat; I was thirsty, and you gave Me nothing to drink;

 

MAT 25:43 I was a stranger, and you did not invite Me in; naked, and you did not clothe Me; sick, and in prison, and you did not visit Me.'

 

MAT 25:44 "Then they themselves also will answer, saying, 'Lord, when did we see You hungry, or thirsty, or a stranger, or naked, or sick, or in prison, and did not take care of You?'

 

MAT 25:45 "Then He will answer them, saying, 'Truly I say to you, to the extent that you did not do it to one of the least of these, you did not do it to Me.'

 

MAT 25:46 "And these will go away into eternal punishment, but the righteous into eternal life."

 

HEB 6:9 But, beloved, we are convinced of better things concerning you, and things that accompany salvation, though we are speaking in this way.

 

HEB 6:10 For God is not unjust so as to forget your work and the love which you have shown toward His name, in having ministered and in still ministering to the saints.

 

[Again]

Deeds of kindness and service done to the people of God are reckoned by God as done to Himself.

 

HEB 6:11 And we desire that each one of you show the same diligence so as to realize the full assurance of hope until the end,

 

HEB 6:12 that you may not be sluggish, but imitators of those who through faith and patience inherit the promises.

 

They are admonished to continue in this same zeal of service to their fellow saints even though it has come with more persecution. They are to keep the diligence they had from the beginning and not become sluggish.