Joshua and Judges: The allotment of the land, part 35 - Predestination

Title: Joshua and Judges: The allotment of the land, part 35 - Predestination - Beholding God's glory.

Announcements / opening prayer:

Glorified: The believer shares in God's glory, which is all the goodness that He is. It is to be shared in time through spiritual growth and will ultimately be shared in heaven.

Paul saw firsthand the victory over the enemies of the gospel.

2Co 2:14 But thanks be to God, who always leads us in His triumph in Christ, and manifests through us the sweet aroma of the knowledge of Him in every place.

2Co 2:15 For we are a fragrance of Christ to God among those who are being saved and among those who are perishing;

2Co 2:16 to the one an aroma from death to death, to the other an aroma from life to life. And who is adequate for these things?

2Co 2:17 For we are not like many, peddling the word of God, but as from sincerity, but as from God, we speak in Christ in the sight of God.

2Co 3:1 Are we beginning to commend ourselves again? Or do we need, as some [false teachers peddling the word], letters of commendation to you or from you?

2Co 3:2 You are our letter [letter of commendation], written in our hearts [confirming to Paul and his men the blessing of their ministry], known and read by all men [living letters introduce Christ to all they meet];

2Co 3:3 being manifested that you are a letter of Christ, cared for by us, written not with ink, but with the Spirit of the living God, not on tablets of stone, but on tablets of human hearts.

2Co 3:4 And such confidence we have through Christ toward God.

2Co 3:5 Not that we are adequate in ourselves to consider anything as coming from ourselves, but our adequacy is from God,

2Co 3:6 who also made us adequate as servants of a new covenant, not of the letter, but of the Spirit; for the letter kills, but the Spirit gives life.

"The letter kills" - In essence they were teaching that the law can be fulfilled without Christ. Such teaching only brings condemnation and death.

For instance, take love, joy, and peace. These things are commanded of the believers in the OT, but now they are given to us in Christ. The love of God is poured out within our hearts and the Lord plainly stated that His peace and joy were given to us.

We are not commanded to achieve these wonders, but we are commanded to walk in them because they are ours. What we have in Christ cannot be separated from the virtue and ethics of Christ.

Let's walk through some passages that show this. In each case you will see how the gift is already given and that it is our decision in time to walk in the gift or to put it into practice. You will also see that knowledge of the given gift is to always be increasing.

Eph 2:10 For we are His workmanship, created in Christ Jesus for good works, which God prepared beforehand, that we should walk in them.

We are not achieving the works. They have already been given to us. Walk in them.

Eph 4:1 I, therefore, the prisoner of the Lord, entreat you to walk in a manner worthy of the calling with which you have been called,

Eph 4:2 with all humility and gentleness, with patience, showing forbearance to one another in love,

Eph 4:3 being diligent to preserve the unity of the Spirit in the bond of peace.

We have been given the calling to walk in.

Eph 4:17 This I say therefore, and affirm together with the Lord, that you walk no longer just as the Gentiles also walk, in the futility of their mind,

Eph 4:18 being darkened in their understanding, excluded from the life of God, because of the ignorance that is in them, because of the hardness of their heart;

Eph 4:19 and they, having become callous, have given themselves over to sensuality, for the practice of every kind of impurity with greediness.

Eph 4:20 But you did not learn Christ in this way,

Eph 4:21 if indeed you have heard Him and have been taught in Him, just as truth is in Jesus,

Eph 4:22 that, in reference to your former manner of life, you lay aside the old self, which is being corrupted in accordance with the lusts of deceit,

Eph 4:23 and that you be renewed in the spirit of your mind,

Eph 4:24 and put on the new self, which in the likeness of God has been created in righteousness and holiness of the truth.

The old man has been crucified and the new man given. Both "lay aside" and "put on" are aorist infinitives which can be translated "have laid aside" and "have put on." Walk in the new man.

The sister passage to this states that you have already put off the old man and have put on the new man.

Col 3:5 Therefore consider the members of your earthly body as dead to immorality, impurity, passion, evil desire, and greed, which amounts to idolatry.

Col 3:6 For it is on account of these things that the wrath of God will come,

Col 3:7 and in them you also once walked, when you were living in them.

Col 3:8 But now you also, put them all aside: anger, wrath, malice, slander, and abusive speech from your mouth.

Col 3:9 Do not lie to one another, since you laid aside the old self with its evil practices,

Col 3:10 and have put on the new self who is being renewed to a true knowledge according to the image of the One who created him

Col 3:11 — a renewal in which there is no distinction between Greek and Jew, circumcised and uncircumcised, barbarian, Scythian, slave and freeman, but Christ is all, and in all.

The old man has been crucified. Lay aside his rotten fruit. God made you a new creature. Constantly feed him true knowledge.

Eph 5:1 Therefore be imitators of God, as beloved children;

Eph 5:2 and walk in love, just as Christ also loved you, and gave Himself up for us, an offering and a sacrifice to God as a fragrant aroma.

You were already made a child of God and given Christ's love. Now, walk in love.

Eph 5:7 Therefore do not be partakers with them;

Eph 5:8 for you were formerly darkness, but now you are light in the Lord; walk as children of light

Eph 5:9 (for the fruit of the light consists in all goodness and righteousness and truth),

Eph 5:10 trying to learn [proving] what is pleasing to the Lord.

Eph 5:11 And do not participate in the unfruitful deeds of darkness, but instead even expose them;

Eph 5:12 for it is disgraceful even to speak of the things which are done by them in secret.

Eph 5:13 But all things become visible when they are exposed by the light, for everything that becomes visible is light.

Eph 5:14 For this reason it says,

"Awake, sleeper,

And arise from the dead,

And Christ will shine on you."

Eph 5:15 Therefore be careful how you walk, not as unwise men, but as wise,

Eph 5:16 making the most of your time, because the days are evil.

Eph 5:17 So then do not be foolish, but understand what the will of the Lord is.

Eph 5:18 And do not get drunk with wine, for that is dissipation, but be filled with the Spirit,

Eph 5:19 speaking to one another in psalms and hymns and spiritual songs, singing and making melody with your heart to the Lord;

Eph 5:20 always giving thanks for all things in the name of our Lord Jesus Christ to God, even the Father;

Eph 5:21 and be subject to one another in the fear of Christ.

You were made a child of light. Walk in the light (goodness, righteousness, and truth).

Col 1:9 For this reason also, since the day we heard of it, we have not ceased to pray for you and to ask that you may be filled with the knowledge of His will in all spiritual wisdom and understanding,

Col 1:10 so that you may walk in a manner worthy of the Lord, to please Him in all respects, bearing fruit in every good work and increasing in the knowledge of God;

Col 1:11 strengthened with all power, according to His glorious might, for the attaining of all steadfastness and patience; joyously

Col 1:12 giving thanks to the Father, who has qualified us to share in the inheritance of the saints in light.

We have been given the inheritance of Christ so invest it in time and bear fruit and increase in the knowledge of it.

Col 2:6 As you therefore have received Christ Jesus the Lord, so walk in Him,

Col 2:7 having been firmly rooted and now being built up in Him and established in your faith, just as you were instructed, and overflowing with gratitude.

You have received Christ Jesus the Lord. Walk in Him - from day one.

1Th 2:9 For you recall, brethren, our labor and hardship, how working night and day so as not to be a burden to any of you, we proclaimed to you the gospel of God.

1Th 2:10 You are witnesses, and so is God, how devoutly and uprightly and blamelessly we behaved toward you believers;

1Th 2:11 just as you know how we were exhorting and encouraging and imploring each one of you as a father would his own children,

1Th 2:12 so that you may walk in a manner worthy of the God who calls you into His own kingdom and glory.

God elected you into His kingdom and glory. Walk in them and always excel more and more in them.

1Th 4:1 Finally then, brethren, we request and exhort you in the Lord Jesus, that, as you received from us instruction as to how you ought to walk and please God (just as you actually do walk), that you may excel still more.