Courageous Christians
Scripture: Joshua 1:1-9
Romans 15:1-6
Moses is dead.
Now YOU go and inherit the land I am giving you.
I will not fail you. I will not abandon you.
Three times in the first nine verses of the first chapter of Joshua, we are called to be STRONG and COURAGEOUS.
Right there, with the discipline of being obedient to scripture, and the promise of God to be with us wherever we go, and his promise that we will be successful - in with all of that - we are told, not once, but three times, to be strong and courageous.
Now why would God tell Joshua, and US, something THREE times? Could it be because HE knew WE wouldn’t likely get it the first time. Is it because God knows OUR courage, like Joshua’s is sometimes hard to hold on to.
So God has to remind Joshua, and us, MOSES IS DEAD.
Now Moses was their leader.
Moses was the glue that held their world together.
Moses was the one they looked to for guidance - for the next step.
Moses was the one they complained to when they weren’t happy.
And now, God is telling them - point blank - Moses is dead.
Who, or what, is your Moses?
What is it that keeps you going? What is it that holds your world together? What is it, that if you loose it today, you’ll just fall apart?
Let me make some suggestions of what some us may have as the Moses in our life...
Money
A retirement nest egg
A job
Education
A mom, or dad
Your spouse
your health
or maybe it’s something not so tangible - maybe your Moses is knowledge, control, power, prestige, looking good.
What might churches hold up as their Moses?
Money
The doxology
The Lord’s Prayer
Order of service
fund-raisers
the building
the choir
a particular family
tradition
MOSES IS DEAD
God tells Joshua Moses is dead. Now Joshua knew Moses was dead - they were all in a time of mourning for him. So God didn’t tell Joshua this just so that he would become aware of it - he knew Moses was dead. God TELLS Joshua Moses is dead so he’ll let go. So he’ll move on from his time of mourning over something that cannot and should not be resurrected, and trust GOD for what is ahead.
Because you see, courage comes with TRUSTING.
And courage comes, not from the ABSENCE of fear, but in going FORWARD in spite of the fear. That’s courage.
And I believe if we’re going to have courage - if we’re going to be, and become, Courageous Christians, there are at least three truths we will always encounter - three truths we will have to be fully aware of, and understand.
1. IF we are going to be Courageous Christians, we must turn our potential to posses into the power of possession.
We must turn our potential to posses, into the POWER of possession.
God wants us to go forward to possess that which is potentially here for us, right here in Mapleton. And the victory is already there. It is God’s will for you, and it’s God’s will for me, that we ARE victorious. We just have to exercise the POWER God has put within us to be victorious.
May I suggest this morning one of the greatest temptations for us today, I believe, is to underestimate our potential. We get into a kind of negative mind-set and we don’t even see the wonderful potential God has placed within us and around us.
I imagine Joshua felt that way after Moses died and he was to carry on.
After all - no prophet had risen in all of Israel, we’re told, like Moses.
No one had done the miraculous signs and wonders Moses had.
And Joshua was just Moses’ aide.
I’m sure Joshua probably felt like he couldn’t possibly measure up to Moses. Ever felt like a Joshua.
But you know what? Moses fell. Deuteronomy tells us Moses broke faith with the Lord.
Great Prophet? Yes. Ordinary person just like you and me.
TRUST - GO FORWARD - despite the fear.
How can we do that? How is it that Joshua could go forward.
Because Joshua was never to rely on his own wisdom or on the great size of the Israelite army. The sole source of Joshua’s strength would be the Lord’s presence with him wherever he went.
And the sole source of OUR power is God’s presence with us wherever we go.
The potential is there for us to enjoy - we just have to reach for it. God is not going to force us to possess it. He’s not going to pour out the victory where there has been no battle.
And that leads right into our next point.
# 2 If we are to be courageous Christians, we can expect to have problems.
Think about poor Joshua. Moses is dead. And there’s Joshua, sitting there with all those Israelite people around him, thinking to himself, “Well, what do I do now? Where do we go from here?”
God comes along and reminds Joshua of the reality of the situation.
“Get up Joshua. Don’t be sitting around here - there’s work to be done.”
You see, Joshua was frozen by his own anxiety, and he God had to remind him to be strong and courageous.
And one of our temptation in not achieving what God has for us, is the fear of not being good enough - anxiety about past hurts and failures. Fear of failing again. The “what-if’s” of life.
And we fall into the Old Testament, what I call, MANNA MENTALITY. - Just making it through the day. Manna only feeds one person, one day at a time.
The New Testament philosophy - the philosophy for us today, is to have, not a MANNA MENTALITY, but a MARCHING MENTALITY.
Illustration:
When the young Theodore Edison was experimenting with a “glass bottle bomb” in his father’s lab one day, the experiment exploded and some of the glass from the bottle got stuck in the young Edison’s hand. While his father, Thomas Edison, was caring for his son’s hand, the boy asked, “Some of your inventions blew up too, didn’t they father?” “Yes, they did, Son, admitted the famous inventor, but I went at them again.”
The most successful people in the world are the ones who have experienced the most FAILURES.
# 3 If we are to be courageous Christians, we must trust God’s promise to PROVIDE.
Verse 8 of our scripture tells us God WILL keep his promise if we do our part.
Our part is OBEDIENCE to Christ. We are to meditate on the Bible (the Word of God) both day and night. And we’re not to turn to the left or to the right of what is written in the Word.
But isn’t that what the world wants us to do? Isn’t that what is meant today in our politically correct society. In a world of “do your own thing” and make allowances for everyone. Don’t be too precise about what the Bible says - just leave out this bit, and scoot around this bit.
Do you remember that little rhyme:
Good, better, best, never let them rest,
Until good is better and better is best.
Well, if my way is just as good as your way, and if no-one really knows the truth, and if it feels good, then go ahead and do it, because it’s o.k. for you - are we not compromising better and best for something that is less than mediocre?
My Bible tells me JESUS is the WAY, TRUTH, and the LIFE and that NO-ONE comes to the father but through him.
And I believe the genuine Christian will occasionally have to put his or her foot down and say, “No.” I cannot and I will not compromise my Christian principles in this situation. We may have to say no to our children, our boss, our spouse and our friends.
The most devastating effect of our society today is that it encourages us to have a double loyalty. Work is work, school is school, and church is church. It forces us to have two masters. You and I both know we cannot have two masters. Scripture says we will either serve God, or we will serve Satan.
He is either Lord of ALL, or he is Lord of NOTHING.
On the coast of Scotland, at the top of a steep and dangerous cliff there stood a little company of rescuers planning how they might let someone down over the edge in order to search for the one who was lost and to take a rope to him. They wanted to use a small shepherd boy who was used to the mountains, and his father consented. But the boy, although experienced, hesitated. The rescuers tried to show the boy the strength of the rope and that it would certainly hold his small frame, but still he was fearful. Finally, his eyes brightened, he looked at his father standing nearby and said, “I’ll go if my father will hold the rope.”
Ladies and gentlemen, our Father is holding the rope. We need not fear what lies ahead for us. Our potential as Christians is beyond anything we can imagine no matter how small or insignificant we might feel. We only have to do as he commands - be strong and courageous.
