Introduction
Let me begin with a discipleship question: how will you follow Jesus in prayer and dependence on God this week?
Main Points
In this lesson shaped by Calvary Boise's teaching on JOSHUA: The Excitement of a Living Faith, Christ invites us to receive truth with humility, practice repentance, and walk in faithful obedience.
Repentance and Renewal
Now we're going to take a pivot in our study because we find ourselves a very appropriate chapter break chapter 1 is the vision. That Joshua receives that he gives to the people and chapter 2 which is absolutely necessary as you go through the new things in.
- Life you must pivot to the next chapter which is vision turning into mission this is a very important shift that happens as you.
- Get to know God and you refreshed and renewed by the vision that he has for this world and your life and it is.
- Only as good as it turns into a tangible action point of your life and that's what we'll look at in Joshua chapter 2.
- Let's start by looking at verse 1 I also want to look at in the of this pivot and our Sunday sermon by also.
Looking at the last two verses of Joshua chapter 2 so let's set the stage by looking at the first verse and the last. Two verses as Joshua the study in it shifts from vision to mission look what it says now Joshua the son of nun sent.
Faith and Obedience
On and it's really cool it's good stuff it's stuff that's got them really excited about all this vision of what God's gonna do. It's stuff that makes them believe it's gonna happen look what it says in verse 24 and they said to Joshua truly the Lord.
- Has delivered all the land into our hands for indeed all of the inhabitants of the country are faint-hearted because of us the vision.
- That God is going to give his people this land they go out to spy it out and to see it and they come.
- Back excited that it's going to happen this is the moment of faith that all of us are really made for the moment where.
- We go and we see what God is up to and we return believing that his promises are valid and true this is what.
It means to belong to a living and active Church is with me the stories of God come back to us and we. Realize that what we're actually hearing in the vision and the study and the theology is happening in the world it's actually seeing God.
Faith and Obedience
Sign I said yeah that's kind of true I wish you would have told me that four years ago now college is good and. It's valid and learning is good invalid in classrooms are so good we were made to learn we were made to be inspired we. Were made to receive information as long as we're applying it college is good as long as there's experience that allows us to take. That education and see it played out the classroom is good but the field trip is better remember that from being in school the. Day that you went on the field trip that's when you actually got excited about what you were learning now what we're doing right. Now 21st century church this feels very much like a classroom this feels very much like the vision of chapter one go forth because. We believe in a God who's on the move and he's alive and we have reason to believe that he's on our side and. That with him redemption is possible because we've studied the story of his Redemption from Genesis all the way up to Joshua he keeps. Invading human history to pull people to himself and then we take the story all the way down to the fulfillment of the preview. Of Joshua in Jesus Christ because God has redeemed the world to himself by sending his son into the world to capture those who. Believe in him and win them over for what he is doing so we believe that God is on the move but we need. To see it in action you want to have a faith that looks like this verse 24 of Joshua chapter 2 that says God. Truly is giving us this land God truly is on the move I am seeing things to remind me that we believe in a. Living and moving and gracious and redemptive God then you better go from chapter 1 in your life with God to chapter 2 you. Better go from receiving the vision and learning about God in the classroom and you better go into living it out in the mission. Field the field trip of the believer is and the vision turns into the mission because experience will teach you things that you can't. Learn from the sanctuary and so the question that I want to ask this morning as we study one of the most exciting stories. Of the Bible these are the stories that were long to be.
Faith and Obedience
Inspired by we want to read these stories we wait for the Bible to come along and this were alive in this way because. This is what we were made to experience with God the experiential God not simply the theological God the God who puts people on. The move to show himself strong and that he is with them not simply the God who gathers people to himself to understand him. Those are two necessary appropriate chapters of your life but if you get stuck in chapter one which is all vision and you never. Go to chapter two you will find yourself bored in the classroom of Christianity and so we study the Spy's this morning and will. Take time to study Rahab in her own right because we're gonna meet this incredible woman who becomes a hero of this mission we'll. Study her next week but first we look at this through the lens of the spies and I ask you this question is your. Faith alive with excitement of what God is doing in our church in our city and your family in your life do you want. To have a faith that's a life or is it good enough for you to simply read chapter 1 of Joshua and understand that. The promises of God are still valid and leave that for someone else to enjoy those are hard questions that I hope you ask. If you're interested in the first answer which is to say I want to see what it looks like when I go from chapter. 1 waiting and hearing vision to chapter 2 stepping out in faith if that's you then we look at these spies as a case. Study because they model for us what it looks like to live expecting and waiting on and visibly seen the God that is on. The move in this story and in our lives I'm gonna draw four things from their example that I believe will categorize our church. And your life as someone who is walking towards a walk of faith with God that will end an excitement of what he's up. To in our world that's what happens to these guys they go and they've heard everything about what Joshua is explaining needs to happen. But now they get to see it and because they see it they're excited the first thing that I draw from this is right. In the very first verse that we already read you want.
Faith and Obedience
To have exciting faith then you need to listen to this part Joshua the son of nun sent out two men to go now. It's kind of simple it's almost elementary to restate it but if you want to see a God that it's on the move you. Have to be willing yourself to be on the move you have to yourself be willing to be sent and this is a model. That we see in Joshua repeated from what Moses did because it's a model of God to send people first to go in and. To see the land to live commissioned is something that we see it's performing a fulfillment in for the opportunity of anyone who believes. In Jesus was someone who was always gathering himself people who he could then send out that is what we see in the disciples. Gathering to Christ so that he could send them out as people who can represent who he is to the world we see that. In the Gospels and then we see that in a brand-new way in the book of Acts when Jesus says to his disciples stay. In Jerusalem wait on the power of the Holy Spirit and then you will be sent from Jerusalem to Judea to Samaria to the. Ends of the earth to believe in the God who has revealed himself through his son is to be sent like his son that. Is what the next appropriate step in your belief in that God looks like he is always sending people to join in the mission. And here's a couple things I'll say about that if you want to live commissioned if you want to live as someone who's leaving. The classroom and looking towards the field there's two ways that I draw from that in the model given to us from Joshua and. In Jesus and in the ways that we see people actually stirring up what God wants to do one its sent to a specific. Place he says to these spies go out secretly to view the land especially Jericho which means this is not a random sending the. Promised land is a big and vast land that has many inhabitants many cities there are many ways they could go in to try. To randomly take it but there's a strategic way the strategic way is that Jericho is the Gateway to Canaan the strategic way says. You start there and the rest of it will open.
Hope in Suffering
Up on the map that's where you begin and he says go there specifically to view it what I'll say about the Commission that. God has for all of us is that he's strategic he puts his people in certain times and boundaries of their dwellings for a. Reason acts 17 says the time and boundary of the dwelling are part of the way God causes you to grope for him are. You living specifically for the place that God has you in have you understood the difference between randomly living in the City of Boise. And being called in to the City of Boise specifically and strategically for the kingdom of God that's a question that you have to. Answer and I get a preview of how that question is being asked and also answered in my role at this church because when. You're part of the church leadership in a city that's growing you get to meet a lot of people who are coming in this. Is one of the lighthouses of the city a church classic lighthouse of the city you got the church you got the town square. So the mayor's office the DMV those are people who can get an understanding of who's coming in the teachers get an understanding of. Who's coming in the real estate agents your understanding who's coming in I get to understand that you know what people ask me in. Two categorical things about our city one is people come up to me and they want to know the economics of our city they. Are coming here strategically because it's a good place to position yourself for success in this world Boise is great for that we have. Low cost of living we have four seasons so you'll have nice healthy engagement with the weather I hope we have things that you. Can do to continue education and after you graduate things you can do to work in the in the corporate sector those are all. Good things and people asked me about those things what's Boise like what are the good restaurants what are the good towns what are. The what are the good neighborhoods what how what's a reasonable commute those are questions about living in the city good questions to ask. If you're here I'm happy to help you with that but then there's a second kind of question and these are people who are. Living on mission these are people who realize.
Sin and Salvation
That if god is sending them to Boise it must be for a greater cause than to get a job it must be for. A greater cause than to go to school there's something that God's up to in every city he sends too and some people ask. Me those questions what's the spiritual need here what are the opportunities to actually do ministry those are the people who are looking at. Their placement that God has for them when they think about moving or landing anywhere and they're thinking strategically about a commission and those. People need to make up a lively church a lively church thinks about its corner in a city and says why are we here. We have been commissioned now the second thing I'll say about being specific and strategic isn't just for a place it's also for your. Life it's also for how you go into the city look what it says about these people who are sent these two men that. Are sent out are sent to a specific city and then they're sent to spy secretly there's they're sent to go in under disguise. They're sent to go in and almost blend in so they can get an accurate reading of what that city is really like and. They get an accurate reading of who's really in that city now if there's ever a time to connect the Bible to a somewhat. Pagan and probably far-off heathenistic holiday like Halloween this is the time I don't know if I've ever come across a more appropriate Halloween. Verse than the story that we're reading this morning think about what we just read there is this idea that God has his people. And he wants them to go into a city to overtake that city for his cause because apart from God every city lives in. Darkness apart from the power of God's people living out God's way for the city it's a city that's doomed for destruction and that's. Jericho a city that's got homes of harlotry and prostitutes a city that we'll see has corruption dealing in its government it's not a. Good city it's a city that is in darkness and it celebrates darkness and here we are Christians wondering what should we do with. Halloween our whole city's living in darkness and they're celebrating it what should we do about that well what if what if we were. Here to go into our city not just on October 31st but.
We return to the opening teaching: discipleship is not just information, it is transformation through faith and obedience to Jesus. If we receive His Word and walk it out, He will shape us into people who endure and bear fruit.
Lord Jesus, help me hear Your Word, obey it with faith, and grow as Your disciple. Amen.
Conclusion
We return to the opening teaching: discipleship is not just information, it is transformation through faith and obedience to Jesus. If we receive His Word and walk it out, He will shape us into people who endure and bear fruit.
Closing Prayer
Lord Jesus, help me hear Your Word, obey it with faith, and grow as Your disciple. Amen.