Words of Encouragement

  This page is dedicated to bringing encouragement and insight to God's people and reaching the lost for Christ.

January 27, 2023

Joshua 24:15

Choose Ye This Day

1/14/2023

This morning during my devotional time, I began to ask the Lord to guide me and put on my heart what he would have me put in the website today. I had begun a discussion of the phrase take advantage of every opportunity. That narrative had been on my heart for quite a while, but I had not found the appropriate time to work on it let alone write it up for the website. So once again it looks like I will be putting off taking advantage of every opportunity.

There were specific scriptures that ran through my thoughts this morning but by the time I had completed my devotional and finished breakfast most of the original thoughts seemed to have receded into the background.

So at this moment as I sit down to write the one verse that is foremost in my thoughts is from Joshua 24:15 “And if it seems evil to you to serve the LORD, choose for yourselves this day whom you will serve, whether the gods which your fathers served that were on the other side of the River, or the gods of the Amorites, in whose land you dwell. But as for me and my house, we will serve the LORD.”

Israel brings the ark of God into their camp, and they are so jubilant. They are anticipating a great deliverance because now they have their God among them.

To their great horror the Ark of God did not bring them the great victory they expected. Instead verse 10 reveals, So the Philistines fought, and Israel was defeated, and they fled, every man to his home. And there was a very great slaughter, for thirty-thousand-foot soldiers of Israel fell.  And the ark of God was captured, and the two sons of Eli, Hophni and Phinehas, died.

Joshua’s admonition to the people was not without cause. Joshua had lived through the 40 years of wandering in the wilderness until all the men who had been too fearful to trust the Lord to defeat the inhabitants of the land had died off. (Numbers 13,14)(Numbers 26) Toward the end of his own life, he now wants to bring to the people’s attention the importance of remembering who the Lord is. He reminds them of the LORD’s great works on their behalf. This too is not without cause. Joshua knew the propensity of those who would fall away from obeying the Word of the Lord. He remembered the sin of Achan the son of Carmi, (Joshua 7:10-26) who hid some of the forbidden things from the battle of Jericho among his own things. The impact of one person’s sins was like leaven as it permeates the bowl of dough. Every person in the family, in the tribe, in the nation is impacted by the sin of one person. The sin of Achan cost the ives of 30 of Israel’s elite troops. Joshua knew the dangers of offending in even the least of God’s commandments. So, he is calling all of the people to take a stand and choose the Lord.

Just as a correlation to our own circumstances, the scriptures remind us that sin is a condition that all mankind shares. It is as Romans 5:17 says, “For if by one man's offence death reigned by one; much more they which receive abundance of grace and of the gift of righteousness shall reign in life by one, Jesus Christ.” Paul is making reference to the sin of Adam that was passed along to the rest of mankind. But thanks be to God Almighty for his plan of salvation. God in grace and mercy, sent his only begotten son to die in our place to atone for the sin of Adam and Adam’s race.

I am grateful to the Lord God Almighty that he has given us the choice. Because when we make the choice to follow him it is our choosing him not us blindly following what he has programmed us to do.  

Why is that significant?

This morning my thoughts kept wandering from the normal process of my prayer time. I kept being reminded that the scriptures say that many are called but few are chosen.

So, I decided to reread the account in Matthews 22:14.

Jesus offers this parable of a King who has invited several people to attend a wedding feast. But one by one those who were specifically invited found excuses for why they could not attend. Some of the ones who were invited turned on the King’s messengers and killed them. The King responded with great anger and destroyed those who had killed his messengers. The King then sent his servants out into the streets to bring in replacement guests. The King deemed those who refused as unworthy of his generosity. But then as he enters the banquet area, he notices a guest who did not have a wedding garment on. This individual had accepted the invitation but on his own terms not accepting the full invitation and recognizing the generosity of the King but came in his own simplicity. He did not accept and put on the wedding garment that was offered him. Once again, the individual had the choice to come and be a part of the celebration, but the individual decided he would do it his way not the way the King had arranged.

That individual was taken by the King’s servants and cast out of the celebration, because he was not worthy.

As long as we try to accept God’s invitation our way we will find ourselves in the same place as the individual without a wedding garment.

To put it in terms of our acceptance into the Kingdom of heaven, we must be clothed in the righteousness of Christ. We can never be righteous in the sight of our Holy God. There is nothing we can do to cleanse the sin stain upon our lives. We must choose God’s redemption. We must choose Jesus’ atoning death upon the cross as the one and only way to eternal life.

But like the men who found excuses to not attend the wedding feast, many still reject Jesus as the atonement for their sin stain. Like the individual who did not have on the wedding garment, when we choose to accept only portions of God’s invitation, we will find ourselves rejected by God Almighty, because we are found unworthy.

The book of Hebrews (in the New Testament) makes us aware that God has been speaking (calling) to men down through the generations of time. Sadly not too many have called upon the name of the Lord. Hebrews 1:1-2a  “God, who at various times and in various ways spoke in time past to the fathers by the prophets,  has in these last days spoken to us by His Son”

In our day, with the access that we have to the teachings of the Word of God, men still find it easier to disregard the call of God.

Men are still choosing to reject the Word of the living God.

But when one does surrender to the call of God there is rejoicing in heaven over the return of a lost soul.  

It is therefore part of our service to the Lord to be sure that others not only hear the message of God’s salvation, but we must labor in prayer, interceding before the throne of God, that by the grace of God those who do not know him will soon choose the LORD.

Father, I thank you for the timelessness of your Word and your Promises. I pray you will use these words to encourage your children as they grow in their relationship with you. I pray that you will work in the heart of every person who does not know you as Lord to bring them to yourself, through Jesus Christ our Lord.