Joshua and Judges: The allotment of the land, part 25 - Predestination; Jos 14-17.

Title: Joshua and Judges: The allotment of the land, part 25 - Predestination; Jos 14-17.  

 

Announcements / opening prayer:  

 

 

The believer, due to his union with Christ and the power of GHS is able to have a knowledge of the truth (1JO 2:20) and to intensively investigate the will of God (1CO 2:15).

 

The fall had shut man out from these treasures due to his disunion with God. In Christ the mystery has been opened and all who believe in Him may know and discern.

 

And so we fully judge in the realm of God's will, as Christ did. Christ's judgment was not to condemn, as man does, but to save (reconciliation):

 

JOH 3:17 "For God did not send the Son into the world to judge the world, but that the world should be saved through Him.

 

JOH 3:18 "He who believes in Him is not judged; he who does not believe has been judged already, because he has not believed in the name of the only begotten Son of God.

 

JOH 3:19 "And this is the judgment, that the light is come into the world, and men loved the darkness rather than the light; for their deeds were evil."

 

In the same way, the Christian judges all things, not to condemn, but to do the will of God in reconciliation, love, help, lifting up the fallen, showing the way to the straying, exhorting, comforting, etc., and in cases, separation.

 

If a separation causes the violation of a command then it is not a part of God's will. One must put a lot of prayer and intense investigation into a situation before they warrant separation.

 

What matters is the benefit to the other in terms of their salvation and if brothers and sisters in Christ, their deliverance and knowledge of the truth. The believer judges and knows all things that are God's will and he is heavens above the knowledge of good and evil that man is so proud of and strives for all to notice in him.

 

The knowledge of man was and is dead and barren, but the mind of Christ is alive and powerful.

 

The knowledge of man is the negation of all true action, but the knowledge of Jesus consists solely in true action or fruit.

 

HEB 2:17 Therefore, He had to be made like His brethren in all things, that He might become a merciful and faithful high priest in things pertaining to God, to make propitiation for the sins of the people.

 

He was made like His brethren in all things. In Christ there is no race, gender, nationality, economic status, or any other physical characteristic that men use to differentiate and group people. He died for all. In Christ race and gender do not matter at all.

 

LUK 11:27-28

And it came about while He said these things, one of the women in the crowd raised her voice, and said to Him, "Blessed is the womb that bore You, and the breasts at which You nursed." But He said, "On the contrary, blessed are those who hear the word of God, and observe it."

 

There is, and always has been in this world, prejudice against race and gender and nation and culture and the believer will inevitably find himself or herself the victim of it. Should he or she join the protesters and scream injustice?

 

Christ told us that we are blessed when we are persecuted for the sake of righteousness and when men cast insults at us.

 

Did Christ protest the injustice that was cast upon Him? When we get insulted we are thinking too highly of ourselves. It is Christ who is being insulted, not us. People hate because they hate Christ. Those who love Christ do not do hate others.

 

We bear up under the persecution and return love and peace instead, for blessed are the peacemakers. Do not fall into this trap and think that because you are a certain color of Christian or political party or gender that such injustices, which can be very real, are aimed at you alone and not at the Lord. This is a snare of the devil.

 

ACT 5:40-41

after calling the apostles in, they flogged them and ordered them to speak no more in the name of Jesus, and then released them. So they went on their way from the presence of the Council, rejoicing that they had been considered worthy to suffer shame for His name.

 

Paul wrote that he desired to know the fellowship of Christ's sufferings, being conformed to His death. He wrote to the Corinthians that they were to remain in the condition in which they were called, circumcised or uncircumcised, a slave or free. He wrote that if a slave could be legally emancipated then he should do so, but if he couldn't that he was not to worry about it for he was free in the Lord just as all who belong to Christ, slave or free-men were the Lord's slaves.

 

LUK 4:18

"The Spirit of the Lord is upon Me,

Because He anointed Me to preach the gospel to the poor.

He has sent Me to proclaim release to the captives,

And recovery of sight to the blind,

To set free those who are downtrodden,"

 

1CO 7:23 You were bought with a price; do not become slaves of men.

 

1CO 7:24 Brethren, let each man remain with God in that condition in which he was called.

 

2CO 6:1 And working together with Him, we also urge you not to receive the grace of God in vain — 

 

2CO 6:2 for He says,

 

"At the acceptable time I listened to you,

And on the day of salvation I helped you";

 

behold, now is "the acceptable time," behold, now is "the day of salvation" — 

 

2CO 6:3 giving no cause for offense in anything, in order that the ministry be not discredited,

 

2CO 6:4 but in everything commending ourselves as servants of God, in much endurance, in afflictions, in hardships, in distresses,

 

2CO 6:5 in beatings, in imprisonments, in tumults, in labors, in sleeplessness, in hunger,

 

2CO 6:6 in purity, in knowledge, in patience, in kindness, in the Holy Spirit, in genuine love,

 

2CO 6:7 in the word of truth, in the power of God; by the weapons of righteousness for the right hand and the left,

 

2CO 6:8 by glory and dishonor, by evil report and good report; regarded as deceivers and yet true;

 

2CO 6:9 as unknown yet well-known, as dying yet behold, we live; as punished yet not put to death,

 

2CO 6:10 as sorrowful yet always rejoicing, as poor yet making many rich, as having nothing yet possessing all things.