Fourth Sunday of Lent – We Need Help
I. Introduction
I was sitting down with a converted friend of mine who used to be Muslim He told me the story of what he believed was the greatest difference between the teachings of Muhammad and the teachings of Jesus of Nazareth. [PAUSE] He used the story of the woman caught in adultery to highlight the difference, because the story exists in both the Bible and the Quran.
We probably all know the Christian story. Jesus was teaching a group of disciples when some leaders brought to him a woman caught in the very act of adultery. I always wonder what they did with the man, but that’s a different sermon. In any case, the religious leader rightly claimed that the Law required she be stoned. Instead of condemning her, though, Jesus found a path for forgiveness and reconciliation.
Islam has a similar story (in fact, it has many parallel stories, but let’s focus on this one today). The Quran tells of a woman who was brought to Mohammad after being caught in adultery. She was discovered because she was pregnant and unmarried. Mohammad’s ruling was that because the unborn child had done no wrong, that the woman must be allowed to live long enough to give birth and to bring her back then. After the child was born, she was brought back to Mohammad. He again declared that since the child had done no wrong, the woman must be allowed to nurse the child until it was weaned and could eat on its own.
Now, remember, this was over 1000 years ago. Formula and baby food didn’t exist. The average child in that culture would nurse for two to three years. So, after two to three years had passed and the child was fully weaned, the woman was brought to Mohammad a third time. He declared she could not be stoned to death, and she was immediately executed (pause to let that sink in). [Story in Hadith, Muslim, 17:4206]
My friend explained that it was the difference in reactions of Jesus and Mohammad to the adulterous woman which caused him to first start to seek Christianity. One is a path to death, he explained, while the other is the path to life.
In today’s text, we will see that even through disobedience and distrust, God actively sought to restore His covenant with His people. God actively seeks to restore His covenant with His creation.
II. Presentation of Today’s Text
Joshua 5:9-12 (NET)
9 The Lord said to Joshua, “Today I have taken away the disgrace of Egypt from you.” So that place is called Gilgal even to this day.
10 So the Israelites camped in Gilgal and celebrated the Passover in the evening of the fourteenth day of the month on the plains of Jericho. 11 They ate some of the produce of the land the day after the Passover, including unleavened bread and roasted grain. 12 The manna stopped appearing the day they ate some of the produce of the land; the Israelites never ate manna again.
This is the Word of God for the people of God…
III. God Takes Away Our Sins
So, how does God restore covenant relationship with His creation?
First, God acts in our lives by taking away our past sins. Look with me again at the beginning of verse 9:
Joshua 5:9a (NET)
9 The Lord said to Joshua, “Today I have taken away the disgrace of Egypt from you.”
Now, the Hebrew phrase translated here “taken away” literally means “rolled away”. To modern, American, Christian listeners, what phrase comes to mind, especially in the Easter season, about the phrase “rolled away”? [SMILE] To understand why the author would choose this phrase, we have to go back a couple of verses:
Joshua 5:7-8 (NET)
7 He replaced them with their sons, whom Joshua circumcised. They were uncircumcised; their fathers had not circumcised them along the way. 8 When all the men had been circumcised, they stayed there in the camp until they had healed.
You see, the Israelites had forsaken their covenant with God while they were roaming in the desert. Now, you can argue different reasons for this: sanitation while in the desert, constantly moving not allowing recovery time … but the bottom line was they were in the wrong.
In His infinite wisdom, God wanted His people to be set apart rather than acclimating to the people around them as they wondered in the wilderness. He wanted them to keep their distinct identity, so God had a covenant promise with them. Among other things, all they had to do was cut off a little flap of skin; but they didn’t even get that right, and as a result were living in what God considered disgrace. God chose to step into history, though, and provide a means to enable him to remove their disgrace.
Some folks may feel like their disgrace – their sin – is too great to be forgiven…
My brother’s father-in-law is a veteran of the Vietnam War. He was a Marine Advanced Recon. I don’t know if you know about these guys, but they are the baddest of the bad. They are tough, gritty, and get the job done at all costs. His unit was ambushed one night while they slept, and every member of his unit was killed except him by having their throats slit. He was captured and held as a POW. While a POW, he escaped and made his way back to friendly territory. After he recovered and against orders, he went back to the POW camp, rescued the other captives, and killed the leadership of the camp in very gruesome ways. He still has nightmares about what happened to him and about what he did to them. Once, while I was speaking to him about my walk with Jesus, he said to me, “Justin, you don’t understand. God can’t forgive me. What I did was unforgivable.”
You see, ironically, guilt can prevent us from receiving God’s forgiveness.
Others, still, don’t feel like they have any disgrace – any sin in their life which needs forgiveness. How often, when telling our story of Jesus, have folks responded with something like this: “Well, that’s fine for you, Justin, but I’m a good person. I am nice to others. I obey the laws. I follow the rules at work. I don’t need your Jesus or His forgiveness.”
But this is greed. This greed causes people to refuse to view the world through any lenses except those which make them look good. But the apostle Paul tells the Romans something very different:
Romans 3:23 (NET)
23 for all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God
Have you ever felt like you weren’t worthy of God’s forgiveness? Yeah, me, too…. The truth of the matter is that none of us are. But God, in His infinite grace, forgives anyway. You see, God is still in the business of removing our disgrace. God is still looking for what prevents us from being in communion with Him … in right relationship with Him … and removing it, fixing it, making it right because only He can.
That is the Easter story. That is the redemptive power of the Cross. And once we take that journey with Him, like the shepherd who rejoiced over finding his one lost lamb, God celebrates with us.
IV. God Celebrates with Us
Second, God acts in our lives by celebrating with us when we are in relationship with Him. Look with me at verse 10 of our text:
Joshua 5:10 (NET)
10 So the Israelites camped in Gilgal and celebrated the Passover in the evening of the fourteenth day of the month on the plains of Jericho.
Have you ever really thought about God celebrating? I mean, here they are in the desert, wanting – chomping at the bit – to cross over into the land they were promised, but instead of doing so right away, they stopped to party. That’s what Passover is – a celebration of Israel with God about what He has done for them – a way to remember how He and He alone rescued them from the slavery of Egypt.
Now, if we back up just a bit we will see that the place was named Gilgal. Which is Hebrew sounds very similar to the verb “to roll away”, which is what was used when God “rolled away” the disgrace of the past. Also, I want to offer a word of caution. It’s easy to read things like “to this day” and look on your map. You won’t find it. “To this day” is a contextual statement which meant that at the time that the story was transcribed from oral history to written history, it was still called Gilgal.
Yeah, but pastor, you may ask, what man is his right mind wants to party right after, well, right after that happened to him? What’s the big deal about Passover, anyway? Well, to help put that in context, flip with me over to a different world, in a different time, and in very different circumstances.
Luke 22:7-13 (NET)
7 Then the day for the feast of Unleavened Bread came, on which the Passover lamb had to be sacrificed. 8 Jesus sent Peter and John, saying, “Go and prepare the Passover for us to eat.” 9 They said to him, “Where do you want us to prepare it?” 10 He said to them, “Listen, when you have entered the city, a man carrying a jar of water will meet you. Follow him into the house that he enters, 11 and tell the owner of the house, ‘The Teacher says to you, “Where is the guest room where I may eat the Passover with my disciples?”’ 12 Then he will show you a large furnished room upstairs. Make preparations there.” 13 So they went and found things just as he had told them, and they prepared the Passover.
After that, Jesus instituted the Eucharist, a celebration in which we will participate in three weeks as we celebrate Easter together. After that begins the Passion of the Christ – and Jesus knew it. Now, when I say “the Passion of the Christ,” I am not talking about a Mel Gibson movie. I am talking about what the historic church calls the arrest, trial, death, burial, and resurrection of Jesus Christ (which is why Mel named that movie like he did), and this celebration was so important to God Himself, that he paused to celebrate right before he was to die.
Romans 12:15a (NET)
15 Rejoice with those who rejoice…
When I think of the whole of Scripture, it seems to me that God loves a good party. In many ways, the celebration of Passover by Israel was both a response to what God had done for them as well as a way for Him to revel in a celebration which was to remember His actions for them in Egypt.
V. God Provides Exactly What We Need
Let’s look back at our text one more time.
Joshua 5:11-12 (NET)
11 They ate some of the produce of the land the day after the Passover, including unleavened bread and roasted grain. 12 The manna stopped appearing the day they ate some of the produce of the land; the Israelites never ate manna again.
For 40 years God had fed these people every meal. He provided bread, meat, and water. Yet now that they were ready to pass into the Promised Land, the author goes out of his way to tell us that God provided that no longer. Now they would live off the land.
You see, God give us exactly what we need exactly when we need it. But pastor! What about poverty?!? What about starvation?!? What about all the stuff that happens in this world to even His people?!?
It’s funny in a way, how we think about needs verses how God thinks about needs. Jesus mentioned living water instead of running water. He talks about the bread of life, rather than a baked loaf. God is concerned with our spiritual condition, and He acts to correct that through the power of the Cross. God is still providing for our needs.
That is the power of the Easter story.
VI. Conclusion
So how will you respond? God has done so much for us. God continues to act in our lives by taking away our disgrace, our sin. God desperately wants to celebrate with us in relationship with Him. God provides just what we need, just when we need it. In the presence if such a gift, how will you respond to Him?
You don’t have to decide right now. Go home. Think about it. Pray about it. See if God wants to do something completely new in your life this Easter.
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