Joshua and Judges: A nation of gratitude and a visit from the Prince of the angelic army. Jos 5:10-15; Exo 3:1-6.Title: Joshua and Judges: A nation of gratitude and a visit from the Prince of the angelic army. Jos 5:10-15; Exo 3:1-6.
Announcements / opening prayer:
Jos 5:10 While the sons of Israel camped at Gilgal, they observed the Passover on the evening of the fourteenth day of the month on the desert plains of Jericho.
We determined the great distinction between presumption and gratitude.
Presumption - world is here, as it always has been, to be taken by the cunning and ruthless.
It is an irreverent presumption because it comes short of the very reality that the world need not be the way that it is. Men's hearts can change, families can change, and nations can change from evil to good. While it is true there are no utopias because the world is full of sinners, it is also true that great people and nations can exist if they are governed by principles of freedom, morality, and spirituality.
Is it true that if I aggrandize great amounts of stuff through cunning and ruthless greed and that I have more than everyone else that I will be better off and more prosperous than if I had limited myself within the bounds of natural law [life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness; i.e. justice] and the spiritual law [love God and neighbor]?
God gave the command that His nation was to be a nation of justice from one man to another.
Deu 24:17-18 "You shall not pervert the justice due an alien or an orphan, nor take a widow's garment in pledge. But you shall remember that you were a slave in Egypt, and that the Lord your God redeemed you from there; therefore I am commanding you to do this thing.
"You shall be holy, for I am holy," says the Lord. God desires His nation to be a nation of justice and righteousness since this is His very essence. Though there are no theocracies in the church age the justice and righteousness demanded are the fairness and goodness of natural law or divine establishment law, which was also demanded of the Jews in the ten commandments. Any nation which does not pursue natural law will be weak and eventually perish.
It wasn't long before justice was nowhere to be found.
Isa 59:15 Yes, truth is lacking; And he who turns aside from evil makes himself a prey. Now the Lord saw, And it was displeasing in His sight that there was no justice.
It breaks my heart to set this same way within America growing at a rapid pace. We see an enormous portion of our population living in dependency and a ruling elite who are more than willing to provide even more dependence in exchange for wealth and power, while reinforcing the lie that they are victims of class and race discrimination, which is all unjust and untruth.
Clarence Manion, the dean of the Notre Dame law school from 1941-1952: Man begins his existence in bondage, and rises from bondage through spiritual faith, from spiritual faith to courage, from courage to liberty, from liberty to abundance, from abundance to selfishness, from selfishness to complacency, from complacency to apathy, from apathy to dependency, from dependency back into bondage. [Clarence Manion]
This is the cycle of civilization. The only hope of breaking this cycle is the believer who gives his attention to the Word of God.
We are rapidly increasing the weight of the second to last one and if it continues, that weight will cause a collapse.
Christ will establish justice on earth during His Millennial reign.
Isa 42:1 "Behold, My Servant, whom I uphold; My chosen one in whom My soul delights. I have put My Spirit upon Him; He will bring forth justice to the nations.
He is the only One who can make justice upon the earth through His own power. In any nation, if there is to be justice, it cannot be accomplished by one man, but there has to be enough within the nation who choose justice. In Israel, as it is in the US, there was always a remnant of people who loved justice, even in the time of their great discipline and captivity, but there were not enough to make the nation one of justice. Christ is the only One who can do this on His own, as He will reveal at His second coming. Yet sadly, there will be a large portion of the population of the Millennium that will hate being forced to live under perfect justice.
Gratitude - everything is a gift to us by a Creator including our very being and everything that is around us. None of it is ours and we are not the masters of any of it.
It is vital that those such involved, as those who participate in such a nation that has been so blessed, such as Israel or the US or any other Gentile client nation of the past, recognize that they are not the masters of their world, nor even of their own natures or that we can do with existence whatever our will dictates.
So then, there are some things that must always be remembered.
"Forgetting those things which are behind" (Php 3:13) is wise counsel for most areas of life, but there are some things we must never forget.
This great truth was embodied in their annual Passover feast. They were never to forget that they were a redeemed people, set free by the blood of the lamb, set free from the bondage of Egypt, and awaiting the coming of their Messiah.
In his farewell address to the nation, Moses repeatedly commanded the Jews to remember that they were once slaves in Egypt and that the Lord had delivered them and made them His own people (Deu 6:15; 15:15; 16:12; 24:18,22).
Jos 5:11 And on the day after the Passover, on that very day, they ate some of the produce of the land, unleavened cakes and parched grain.
Jos 5:12 And the manna ceased on the day after they had eaten some of the produce of the land, so that the sons of Israel no longer had manna, but they ate some of the yield of the land of Canaan during that year.
The richness of the land, which was at harvest at the time, gave enough abundance to Israel that manna was no longer necessary.
Thus ended a forty year miracle.
God changes things in our life. Some changes we like and others we dislike. His timing and ways are perfect and gracious. Everything we have is a gift from Him; things from the earth and things from other people as well as the work of our own hands. Don't look back and desire the things of the past. The reversionists in the desert desired to go back to Egypt. Maybe some here desired the manna still, not wanting to work for harvest.
Leave the things that God has changed in the past. It was necessary at the time for your growth and if God saw fit to discontinue it, then it is done and not to be returned to or desired.
Col 3:2 Set your mind on the things above, not on the things that are on earth.
The reversionistic Jews in the wilderness grew to hate the manna, though it was a gift from God that guaranteed that their survival was secure. Now that it ceased and the grains of Canaan would be theirs, would they forget that God gave them the land with the grain in it, just as He had given them the manna? Just because it is coming out of the ground instead of the sky doesn't change the fact that it is a gift from God.
No doubt the inhabitants of the area had left grain behind when they fled to Jericho for safety; thus that grain was also available.
The Lord prepared a table for His people in the presence of their enemies, and Israel didn't have to be afraid.
Psa 23:5 Thou dost prepare a table before me in the presence of my enemies; Thou hast anointed my head with oil; My cup overflows.
A land was flowing with the grains of the spring harvest. Likely there are some portion of the flocks left behind as well, since not all the people and the animals could have fit inside the walls of Jericho. All the signs of God's gifts are around them as well as the signs of a hasty retreat on the part of their enemies. God put fear in the heart of the enemy and their very bounty in the hands of Israel.
A meeting with the Lord of Hosts.
Jos 5:13 Now it came about when Joshua was by Jericho, that he lifted up his eyes and looked, and behold, a man was standing opposite him with his sword drawn in his hand, and Joshua went to him and said to him, "Are you for us or for our adversaries?"
Jos 5:14 And he said, "No, rather I indeed come now as captain of the host of the Lord." And Joshua fell on his face to the earth, and bowed down, and said to him, "What has my lord to say to his servant?"
Jos 5:15 And the captain of the Lord's host said to Joshua, "Remove your sandals from your feet, for the place where you are standing is holy." And Joshua did so. |