Looking at our world from a theological perspective, this is the Theology Central Podcast, making theology central. Good morning, everyone. It is Friday, January the 24th, 2025. It is currently 10, 12 a.m. Central Time, and I am coming to you live from the Theology Central studio located right here in Abilene, Texas. So question, Yesterday, we talked about hard questions, right? We talked about difficult questions. This one is a pretty simple question, all right? If you are getting ready to listen to a sermon on Joshua chapter 3, Let's say that this coming Sunday you're going to church and you've been told your pastor is going to be preaching on Joshua chapter 3. Or you sat down, you opened up the Sermons 2.0 app, and you're like, oh, here's a sermon on Joshua chapter 3. If you were to take a piece of paper and a pencil, and write down five possible ways in which the pastor is going to misapply, mishandle, misinterpret Joshua chapter 3. What five things would you write down? What would be five ways you think a pastor may misinterpret, misapply, mishandle Joshua chapter 3? What would they be? Go, right? Now, if I was like at church and I had a live audience, I probably would literally just say, okay, no, write them down. Then we would go around and see everyone's predictions. Then I would then talk about a particular sermon. Or if I could, I would play it for everyone and see if their predictions were accurate. Well, I want you to make your predictions. Joshua chapter three. How do you think a pastor may misapply, misinterpret, mishandle Joshua chapter three? I mean, it's a pretty simple, straightforward chapter, right? By all means, open your Bible and look if you don't know what's there, right? If you want, I'll just, I've got a Bible open right here. I'll just give you the kind of little section headings, right? Preparing to cross the Jordan. The ark passes before Israel. Passage over Jordan. That seems pretty, I mean, how can you mess that up, right? I mean, how can you mess this up? It's pretty simple, it's pretty straightforward. Using the artificial intelligence for the Bible memory app, it tells me this, Joshua chapter three, verse one, introduces a pivotal moment in the history of Israel as they prepared to cross the Jordan River into the promised land. This verse sets the stage for God's miraculous intervention and the exercise of faith by the Israelites. So let's look for some clues there. Joshua 3, 1 introduces a pivotal moment in the history of, come on, say it with me, class, Israel as they, who is the they? Israel, prepares to cross the Jordan River, that's an actual physical river, into the promised land, actual physical land that was promised by God to Israel, okay? This verse sets the stage for God's miraculous intervention in the exercise of faith by the Israelites. I think you can see what I'm stressing, which is going to give you kind of a clue of where I think pastors are going to mess up. But there you have it. I mean, I think it's pretty simple. It's pretty straightforward, correct? Now, the argument would be, well, what is applicable? What isn't applicable? But before you ask the question of what is applicable, what you would want to do is just study the text and find out what happened in its historical context, what actually occurred before you start trying to apply it. But what do you do? So if you were to make your predictions about five ways you think a pastor will mishandle, misapply, misinterpret Joshua 3, I've already kind of give you a little bit of hint right there, what I think. I'm stressing that this text is not about us. So you can already tell that I know, based on everything we've been talking about for a long time in our sermon reviews, pastors constantly take passages not about us and make it about us. Well, just a few minutes ago, I was looking at the Sermons 2.0 app, I saw a new sermon added, and the name of the new sermon, are you ready? Facing Your Biggest Challenges. Facing Your Biggest Challenges. Now, if it was just a sermon on facing your biggest challenges, that would be one thing. But when I noticed that the text for the sermon entitled, Facing Your Biggest Challenges, was Joshua chapter three, I was like, oh boy, here we go. We haven't even started the sermon and you and I have already been included. Joshua chapter three is not about you facing your biggest challenges. It has literally nothing to do with you. So already I know it's about them, it's about they, but them, they becomes about you, me, us, we. No, I don't understand why this is such a problem in Christianity. So because we've been talking about artificial intelligence, this is what I did. I went to artificial intelligence. I'm going to scroll all the way up here because it's a long conversation. And I simply asked AI to do the following. You ready? I asked AI, predict all the ways a pastor may mishandle, misinterpret, and misapply Joshua 3 in a sermon. AI responded, here are potential ways pastors might mishandle, misinterpret, or misapply Joshua 3 in sermons. AI gives me, are you ready for this? One, two, three, four, five, six, seven, eight, nine, 10, 11, 12, 13, 14, 15 different predictions on how a pastor may mishandle, misinterpret, and misapply Joshua chapter 3. And it did it in five seconds. In five seconds, like, hey, here are 15 things you should be looking out for. Now, if you really think about this, this could really be a problem for pastors. I don't think pastors are yet prepared for the fact that the people sitting in the pew have these tools. But just think about how this could work. Are you ready? I don't know if you know what your pastor is preaching on Sunday. I don't know if you know. You may want to make a phone call, just find out, hey, what's the text for the sermon on Sunday? You can go ahead and ask AI, my pastor is going to be preaching on this text. What are all the possible ways he may mishandle, misinterpret, and misapply? Then you can go to church on Sunday and sit there and go, well, How many of the predictions did AI get right? And how many did they get wrong? Now, I'm not saying you should do that. You could do that. And pastors need to be prepared that the people now can show up already with a predictive model on what you're going to do wrong. And so far, every time I've asked AI to predict how a pastor may mishandle, misapply, or misinterpret a passage, And almost, I think, I don't think I've yet had a case where it was wrong. In some cases, it was so dead on right that it was somewhat shocking that AI is like, oh, a person, a human being is going to be preaching. Well, we know what they're going to do. It can predict. So, I'm gonna go through these. Now, I don't have time to, like, AI writes a small book here, basically. It gives me 15 different ways a pastor may mishandle, misapply, misinterpret Joshua chapter three, and it also explains each one in some detail. So this is like a small book AI put together in about five seconds. Let me just go through. I want you to write these down, because what we're going to do is we're gonna look at AI's prediction, and then we're gonna listen to the sermon. Now, I did not give AI the title of the sermon. I want to make it very clear. I didn't even tell them the title of the sermon at this point. Now, after this, I went ahead and gave AI the title of the sermon and then it kind of modified its predictions a little bit. Because immediately when AI saw the title of the sermon, it was like, well, it's obviously what this sermon is going to do wrong. It's obvious what it's going to do wrong. And I feel the same way. Now, AI could be wrong. I could be wrong. That's why we're going to listen to the sermon and figure it out. But here are the 15 things AI is predicting that a pastor may do in mishandling misapplying and misinterpreting Joshua 3. Are you ready? Number one, pastors, so there's a possibility, now AI uses the term pastors plural, pastors might mishandle, misinterpret or misapply sermons on Joshua 3 in the following ways. Number one, over-spiritualizing the crossing of the Jordan River. They're going to over-spiritualize it. They're going to make it some big spiritual thing. Treating the crossing of the Jordan River as purely spiritual metaphor, such as crossing into your personal promised land, okay, without recognizing the historical and covenantal context of the event. So, hey, crossing the river of Jordan, this applies to us. This is a spiritual picture for us. It has nothing to do with us! They cross over the Jordan because God had made a specific covenant with Israel. It's not about you! Okay, I'm gonna get mad just even trying to talk about this. AI's like, don't over-spiritualize it. So we're gonna be listening to see, are they gonna over-spiritualize the crossing? Number two, ignoring the covenant context. failing to emphasize that this event fulfills God's promises to Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob and instead presenting it as an isolated story about faith or leadership. That's mishandling, misapplying, misinterpreting the text. Number three, misapplying following the ark. Treating the Israelites instruction to follow the ark of the covenant as a direct analogy to following the Holy Spirit or following your pastor. That's not what the text is about. Number four, misusing the miraculous event and quitting the miraculous stopping of the Jordan's water with promises of modern day miracles such as guaranteed physical healing or overcoming insurmountable obstacles. Now, did you hear that? misusing the miraculous event. This miraculous event somehow teaches us how we can overcome our insurmountable obstacles. What is the name of this sermon? Facing Your Biggest Challenges. You can already see where AI is already, AI at this point did not even know the name of the sermon, but AI is getting really close to already kind of figuring out where this sermon is going. At least based on the title, AI could be wrong and I could be wrong. Number five, overemphasizing, overemphasis on leadership principles. Using Joshua's leadership as the primary focus, turning the passage into how to be a good leader sermon without recognizing God as the main actor. Number six, misinterpreting consecrate yourselves. Treating the call to consecration as a demand for moral perfection or self-sanctification through personal effort without the emphasis of God's role in sanctification or the unique context of the text. Number seven, misapplying the dry ground. Using the phrase the Israelites crossed on dry ground as a metaphor for life's obstacles being completely removed if one has enough faith. So, I mean, AI obviously knows how we typically mishandle this passage. Ignoring the role of the priest, overlooking the significance of the priest carrying the ark and stepping into the water first as mediators between God and Israel. 9. Allegorizing the Jordan River, treating the Jordan River as a symbol of death and the Promised Land as heaven, thereby turning the text into an allegory disconnected from its historical and theological significance. 10. Forcing a personal application, insisting that every listener identify their Jordan River or next step of faith without acknowledging that this was a specific event for Israel under specific circumstances. 11. Failing to address God's sovereignty. Focusing entirely on Israel's faith and obedience while neglecting to emphasize God's power and sovereignty in stopping the waters and leading His people. 12. Confusing promise and fulfillment. Treating the crossing of the Jordan as symbolic of promises made to New Testament believers without clarifying that these were specific promises to Israel in a specific context. 12. Neglecting the corporate nature of the event. Treating the passage as an individual faith journey, ignoring the corporate experience of Israel as God's covenant people. 14. Using the text as a springboard. Reading the text briefly and then using it as a jumping off point for unrelated topics like New Year's resolutions or success in ministry. Number 15, misrepresenting God's presence, suggesting that God is only present when there is visible evidence of miracles, like the stopping of the Jordan River. So those are the 15 ways in which AI predicts pastors mishandle, misinterpret, and misapply. Joshua 3, let me go through those one more time. I'm just gonna just read the title of each one. Overspiritualizing the crossing of the Jordan. 2. Ignoring the covenant context. 3. Misapplying the following of the ark. 4. Misusing the miraculous event. 5. Over-emphasizing leadership principles. 6. Misinterpreting consecrate yourself. 7. Misapplying the dry ground. 8. Ignoring the role of the priest. 9. Allegorizing the Jordan River. 10. Forcing personal application. 11. Failing to address God's sovereignty. 12. Confusing promise and fulfillment. 13. Neglecting the corporate nature of the event. 14. Using the text simply as a springboard. 15. Misrepresenting God's presence. Those are the 15 ways AI predicts a pastor will possibly mishandle, misinterpret, and misapply Joshua chapter three. Now that took us 15 minutes. I had to go through that as fast as I could. And I apologize if I was reading way too fast, but that's the only thing I could do. I want you to at least hear the predictions. Now, are you ready? Now we go to the sermon. Now, just remember, I have not heard the sermon. AI was not given the sermon. At this point, AI was not even given the title of the sermon. It was just given, hey, what are some ways pastors may mishandle, misinterpret, misapply Joshua chapter three. Gave me 15 specific predictive ways in which it thinks pastors can mishandle the text. We have the sermon in front of us. The sermon's title seems to give it away, but we're gonna jump in and we're gonna find out right now. You guys ready? Yeah? Let's do this. Let's pray and seek the Lord together. Father, we come into this room tonight, Lord God, asking you to Move in this place, Lord God. Lord, you know everything that we're wrestling with, every struggle, every temptation, every hardship, Lord God, there's nothing hidden from your eyes. And so, Lord, we just pray that you would move and have your way in this place, Lord God. As we look at Joshua and the life of Joshua, and we talk about being penned and Israel being penned for all the things in which you had planned for them, Lord God, we are your church. and you have things penned for us and places for us to go. And so Lord, pray that you would just have your way. For we ask it all to your glory, King Jesus, amen. Notice in the prayer. Hey, we're looking at Joshua, but immediately he starts talking about us, us, us. We are here with our problems, our struggles, our temptations. We, we, us, us, we, we, us, us, me, me, I, I. That's all we can ever do with the text, it seems. I don't get it. Okay, but all right. So we're going to start with already in the prayer, adding us. I mean, look, it's impossible. Okay, let's see what happens. I know I'm already going into it with just this feeling that it's going to go bad, and I know I shouldn't, right? I know I shouldn't, but the title and already the prayer, it's already inserting us. So let's see what—now the sermon's actually going to begin. How long does it take before we get inserted into a text has nothing to do with us. But let's find out. Are you ready? Here we go. So I'm an Android user. I don't know if anyone else in the room is an Android user. Anybody else Android? Okay, well, we're gonna stop listening to the sermon because we don't listen to sermons from heretics. And if you're an android user, we know you're unspiritual, you're unregenerate, you are apostate, you are a pagan, you are satanic, you're demon-possessed, you are wrong in every way possible. If you're an android user, your interpretation of scripture can never be right just on the basis that you're an android user. Okay, all right, all right, well. There's a little bit of seriousness there. Just, just a little bit. Just, just, okay. There's a lot of serious. Okay. Okay. All right. Now, trying to, trying to add a little humor. It's okay. No one's being injured by this joke. Okay. Everyone's okay. Android users are not real people. So if they're injured by the joke, we don't care, right? Okay. Because only us Apple users, we are superior in every way. Okay. All right. All right. All right. Here we go. All right, yeah, that's what I'm talking about. Christian, I knew I liked you for a reason, man. No, anyway, but like, so my wife is an iPhone user, and like, she's going to be getting me an iPhone because she's the one that's in control of all that stuff. Ladies, you know how that goes. And so she's gonna be getting me an iPhone when my phone comes back up. So I don't, I can't, I don't think you can pin anybody with Android, can you? You can? Someone's gotta show me how to do that then later, because I don't think I could do that. But I knew you could pin people with an iPhone, right? And so when you pin somebody, like what does it mean to pin someone, right? When you pin someone, you are saying, hey, where I am, I want you to be there, right? So like, here's where I am, you're trying to find me, let me pin myself so you know where I am at, right? And so you can get to where I am. And there are moments in our life in which God pins for us, Not that God isn't always with you, not that He's not everywhere present, not that He's not in every moment, not that He's not working on you in every second of every day, not that He doesn't have, you know what I mean? But there are moments and there are places that He wants us to go, and in order for you to get there, you got to trust Him. Ladies and gentlemen, do you already see where the sermon is going? There's times God pens us because there's someplace He wants us to go. Wait, what is in it? Where does that have to do with Joshua 3? It has literally nothing to do with Joshua 3, because Joshua 3 is not about us! Oh, for crying out loud. I just don't get it. I don't understand. This is, it's an epidemic. It's a pandemic. It's a cancer in preaching. So, so how long did it take for us to get inserted into a sermon about Joshua chapter 3? Immediately. Immediately. Amen? So he sends you a pen. He goes, I'm here. Are you willing to meet me there? God sends you a pen saying, I'm here. I want you to come here. Do you want to come where I am? Is that how it, does God send you a pen? He, he pens you and then you, you go to be where God, does God come to you or do you have to go to God? Does God say, I'm here, and then you've got to get to where God is? Is that how it works? Oh, we're already stumbling upon issues, but I keep interrupting. I got to let this play out a little bit longer. But sometimes when we meet God, the places where he pins us, there's things we got to give up. And we don't deal well with that because we're Sometimes to get to God, there's things we have to give up. So is God like, hey, you can't get to me unless you give something up. I thought the way we got to God was through faith in Jesus Christ. By putting faith in Jesus Christ, I am brought to God. I am brought nigh to God. I made a child of God. I'm adopted into the family of God by faith alone apart from works. Are you saying that what you can be saved, so you're with God, but you're not really with God. Because in life, God pens you, because God moves to a different location. Like, I want you to come here, and then you've got to give something up to get to God. Because God's not going to come to you to bring you to him. You've got to get to God by you giving something up. So it's all basic. This is a very law-based, works-based system is the way it seems to appear. I've got about a million theological. Remember the hard questions I said we have to ask? I've got some theological questions in regards to this sermon. Has literally nothing to do with this text, But that's okay. Like to hold on to our stuff and our things and our emotions. For some of you, God might be pinning you to forgive somebody. God may be pinning you to forgive someone? Does God have to pin you to forgive someone? Are we just not told in scripture that we must forgive as we have been forgiven? Do you need to be pinned? Does God just, oh, oh, pin, pin, pin. And then what do you feel? Is it a feeling? Oh, I think I need to forgive someone. Do you need to be pinned to forgive someone or you just know the scripture tells you to forgive? Like, I don't even understand this illustration This illustration raises more theological problems, and it seems that this is quickly going into the direction that God communicates with us somehow outside of the Bible with some kind of internal voice or some kind of an emotion or feeling, which then destroys really the concept of Sola Scriptura in any meaningful way. And it basically is very charismatic. So I don't know if this is the direction it's going, but that's the direction I'm getting. And again, this is all about us, us, us, us, us, us, us, us, has nothing to do with the people in Joshua chapter 3. But I'm assuming we're going to get to Joshua 3, and I have a feeling that everything AI predicted is about to come true. I'm hoping I'm wrong. I'm hoping AI was wrong. Amen. Right? And you're like, not them. And God's going, in order for you to get to where I want you to go, there's going to be some things you have to let go of. So God says, in order for you to get to where I want you to go, you have to give up things. God wants you to go somewhere, but you can't get there unless you do something. So what happens if I don't get to where God is at? Does it mean I don't go to heaven? Hey, God wants me to go here, but I can't get there unless I give something up. So it's all based upon me. I mean, there's so many issues here. There's so many theological issues here. So Israel, right? We know the story. God literally pins Israel in Abraham, remember? God goes to Abraham and says, I'm gonna make you a mighty nation, right? Abraham is good as dead. His wife, Sarah's like 90, 100, you know, she's old, right? And she's gonna have a child and like, He's the promised child in Abraham. And God tells Abraham, listen, I'm pinning you to go to this place that I'm going to prepare for you and prepare for your people. You're going to be a mighty nation. All the nations will be blessed through you. Like all the promises that Abraham told, all the promises that God told Abraham is happening in Joshua's day. Right? Those things are coming to fruition and they ultimately are fulfilled in Jesus. Amen. So God pins Israel way back then. and Israel's gotta go through a journey to get to where they are. And if you remember, there are some people, so Moses, are you guys with me so far? All right, so Moses, who represents the law, never enters the promised land, right? All right, so God penned Israel and Abraham. All right, I'm not gonna get too nitpicky here. All right, we'll go with this concept. Daddy, go through a journey. Okay, all right. You see, he's gonna try to make this a parallel to us, and which is, this is where this whole thing falls apart, right? Moses represents the law. Moses represents the law, okay. We're going to use a little typology here. Okay, I'll go, I'll play along. Okay. Obviously Moses is connected to the law, so I'll go along with it. All right. Moses doesn't go into the promised land. So are you going to say then the law doesn't go into the promised land? So when they get into the promised land, they're not to operate on the basis of law? Is that like how, once you start doing the analogy or typology, you see, It always opens the door, and where do you stop it? Where are the guidelines? Where are the rules? Because you can just go crazy with it. Well, let's just let him go where he wants to go, and then we'll try to address it. I'm not going to try to break apart every little thing. You can have your own questions. And your predictions about how pastors may mishandle Joshua 3, were they pretty close or no? Paul said this, by the law, no flesh will be justified. So by the law, no flesh, none of us can make it into the promised land in which God has for us, right? Moses, who represents that law, he himself does not enter the promised land, right? Cana, he doesn't enter it, right? But God's Joshua, Yeshua, which is Jesus' name in Hebrew, leads God's people into the promised land. interesting. Okay, so he's spiritualizing all of this, allegorizing all of this. All right, someone in the congregation is greatly impressed by this. They're like, hmm, so they think this is really good stuff. Okay, all right, this is typical allegorizing typology. All right, we'll let it play out. Now, when he said, we don't get into our promised land by the law, what does he mean? Because wait a minute, he already said, this is where I get confused, because earlier in the sermon, did he not say, God wants you to go somewhere, but you can't get there until you give something up. Was that not law? But now he's saying, no, no, no, no, no, we don't get into our, and what does he mean, our promised land? Is he making promised land So is he taking promised land, not making it a picture of heaven? Because that would make sense, right? If you want to say, well, we don't get into heaven by the law, we get into heaven by Christ, but now is he taking the promised land, not making it a picture of heaven, but it's just our promised land? Like we all have our own individual promised land? that we don't get in by law, but earlier he said we can't get to where God is or to where God wants us to go until we give something up. Well, if I am told to have to give something up and there's something I must do by theological definition, that is law. So already I'm getting very convoluted and confused messaging here, but let's let him clean this up so we have a good understanding. Isn't it awesome that the gospel can be found in the Old Testament like that? Isn't it awesome that we can read whatever we want to in any text that we find? I mean, you can read anything into any text. You can say, well, this represents this and this represents this and this. If you're the one guiding what this represents and this represents, you can make it represent whatever you, oh, I found the gospel because you just said this. this, and this represents this, and this represents this. See, it's the gospel, because you're imposing what these things represent. Now, do you have New Testament scripture that says, this represents this, and this represents this? If you do, then okay. If not, you're just making it work. I can go to anything and say, well, this represents this, this represents this. Isn't that amazing? Yeah, it's amazing. Because I, of course it's amazing because I just told you what it represented. I'm the one controlling the picture. Now the issue is, does the text give you that picture? Are you turning the text into a picture that it was never designed to do? That's the question. If you remember, the people of Israel are grumbling, complaining, right? They don't trust. They're sent out to say, hey, go see if we can overtake this land, if God's giving it to us. Two people come back, Joshua and Caleb, remember? And Joshua and Caleb are like, God is giving it into our hands. The rest of them are like, I don't know, man. There's some big people up in there. Like, I don't think we can take them. You know what I'm saying? Which... Sorry, Philistines, nine feet tall, bro. Like I'm 5'6". I couldn't even imagine going up with my shoes on, I'm 5'6". I'm like five, five and a half, right? Like I claim 5'6", because my shoes are usually on, but like five, five and a half. Like I couldn't even imagine that. So like the fear that's going on in Israel, maybe there's some real fear there, but like God just parted the Red Sea and He walked across on dry land. He drowned the whole Egyptian army. Like, do you not think that He can take care of those stupid Philistines? There are places that God wants you to go. And in order for you to get there, there are going to be people, there are going to be things, there are going to be giants that God wants you to go up against because He's already given you the victory. Here we go. So now we're going to take the story. There's places God wants you to go, but there's going to be giants in the land. But God's already given you the victory. God's already given me the victory of the giants and the things in my life that I'm going to face. God already gave me the victory over being abused as a child. What, what, what? God already gave you victory. Hey, in your life to get where you want to go, you're going to have to face maybe sexual assault, sexual abuse, maybe being molested, maybe being beaten. Maybe cancer, maybe being mugged, maybe your child being murdered. But hey, it's all good. God's giving you the victory. Giving me the victory, meaning what? See, those are the kinds of questions I said yesterday that Christians have to ask when we hear these sermons. This is all motivational. That's right. God wants me to go here and there may be challenges, but I have the victory. So what does that mean? All the challenges are going to go away. You're going to overcome every challenge. You're going to overcome cancer. You're going to overcome this. You're going to overcome. What does that even mean? Oh, it sounds good. And everyone in the pew will be like, hey man, that was so encouraging pastor. And they will leave feeling better. And so they will love church. That's great. I don't know what that happens when you, you know, when life hits you, you know, when you, when all of a sudden you wake up and you realize, wait a minute, life just punched me in the face. Let me go back to that sermon. Hmm. Okay. So, so God has a promised land for me and I can get into that promised land, even though there's going to be challenges and there's going to be giants because I have the victory. Now, of course, Joshua 3 has nothing to do with any of that, and it's not teaching that at all. And AI predicted that that's exactly what could possibly happen in sermons on Joshua 3. The predictions AI gave are coming to pass almost just as it described. Amen? But those people doubted that God was going to give them the land. So they have to wander in the wilderness for 40 years. But those people have died, Moses has just died, and Joshua's got the whole Israelite people with him. And God says to Joshua, just like I was with Moses, I'm gonna be with you, bro. Right, and Joshua's like, let's go. So here we go, you guys ready? Joshua chapter three, let's do it. Then Joshua rose early in the morning, and he had all the sons of Israel set out from Shittim and came to the Jordan. We're going to pass over that word. And they lodged there before they crossed. At the end of three days, the officers went through the midst of the camp, and they commanded the people saying, when you see the Ark of the Covenant of the Lord your God, with a Levitical priest carrying it, then you shall set out from your place and go after it. However, there shall be between you and it a distance of about 2,000 cubits by measure." That's like three-fourths of a mile. So pretty good distance. "'Do not come near it that you may know the way by which you shall go, for you have not passed this way before.' Then Joshua said to the people, consecrate yourselves, that word consecrate means sanctify, set yourself apart, like what God's getting ready to do, you gotta be set apart for the journey in which he has for you, right? So that's what he's saying, he's like, you gotta consecrate yourself, there can be no other journey before your eyes, there can be no other thing in which this is it, this is it, consecrate yourselves, for tomorrow the Lord will do wonders among you. Do you ever think that possibly the reason why Look, a lot of you in this room maybe see God move a lot, but some of you in this room haven't seen God move in a long time. And is it possible you haven't seen God move because you haven't consecrated yourselves onto him? Oh my goodness gracious. Hey, you haven't seen God move because you haven't consecrated yourself. Hey, maybe you haven't seen God move in that cancer situation because you haven't consecrated yourself. Maybe you haven't seen God move in that situation because you haven't consecrated yourself. Maybe it's your fault. That's the reason God hasn't moved. Remember what AI said? Misinterpreting consecrate yourself. Treating the call to consecrate as a demand for moral perfection or self sanctification through personal effort. So God only moves, or maybe the reason God is not moving is because you haven't sanctified yourself. Taking that from Joshua 3, has literally nothing to do with you. Has nothing to do with you. It has nothing to do with you. It has nothing to do with you. I'm knocking everything off the table. It's descriptive. It's not prescriptive. And just note how, hey, the law doesn't go into the land. Jesus takes us into the promised land apart from the law. Remember how he said that? Isn't that wonderful? But now all of a sudden, God's not gonna move unless you consecrate yourself. Hmm, if I have to consecrate myself, that's law. So this sounds like I've got to obey the law. If you really go with the way this now the sermon is working, I've got to consecrate myself. I've got to make myself clean before God will move or before I get into the promised land. You now just took the gospel picture you gave, destroyed the gospel picture, and you've replaced it with law. And you've just told everyone in the congregation that maybe the reason God is not moving in their life is because they haven't consecrated themselves. But I guess the other people who God is moving in their life, I guess they're consecrated enough. Now, exactly how much consecration do you need to get God to move? Do you need 50%? 70%? Because no one in that congregation is a hundred percent. And if no one's a hundred percent consecrated, that means they're in a perpetual state of sin. So God will move if someone's in a perpetual state of sin, simply because they have a certain level of consecration. Oh man, the whole thing. And you haven't prepared yourself to walk into the places in which he's calling you. Because this one thing I know about God is that He wants you to know Him more than you want to. God wants you to know Him more than you want to know Him. Look, God is never, He's always calling to you. We're the one that's always like, I don't have time for that. And Joshua spoke to the priest saying, take up the ark of the covenant and cross over ahead of the people. So they took up the ark of the covenant and went ahead of the people. Now the Lord said to Joshua, this day I will begin to exalt you in the sight of all Israel, that they may know that just as I have been with Moses, I will be with you. You shall moreover command the priests who are carrying the Ark of the Covenant, saying, when you come to the edge of the waters of the Jordan, you shall stand still in the Jordan. Then Joshua said to the sons of Israel, come here and hear the words of the Lord your God. Joshua said, by this you shall know that the living God is among you. and that he will surely dispossess from before you the Canaanite, the Hittite, the Hivite, the Perzite, the Girgashite, the Amorite, and the Jebusite, and the Mosquitobites. I'm just joking. It's a lot of ites in that passage. Behold, the ark of the covenant of the Lord of all the earth is crossing over ahead of you into the Jordan. Now then, take for yourselves 12 men from the tribes of Israel, one man from each tribe. It shall come about when the soles of the feet of the priests who carry the ark of the Lord, the Lord of all the earth, rests in the waters of the Jordan, the waters of the Jordan will be cut off, and the waters which are flowing down from above will stand in one heap. So when the people set out from their tents to cross the Jordan, with the priests carrying the ark of the covenant before the people, And when those who carried the ark came into the Jordan, and the feet of the priests carrying the ark were dipped in the edge of the water, for the Jordan overflows all its banks all the days of harvest, the waters which were flowing down from above stood and rose up in one heap, a great distance away at Adam, the city that is beside... Yeah. Sorry, they skipped that word. And those which were flowing down toward the sea of the Ereba, the salt sea, were completely cut off. So the people crossed opposite Jericho. Is that it? And the priest who carried the Ark of the Covenant of the Lord stood firm on dry ground in the middle of the Jordan while all Israel crossed on dry ground until all the nation had finished crossing the Jordan. I think that's it. Okay. I think it's interesting that God doesn't stop the river from flowing until the priest's feet hit the water, right? Because look, we like to think, we're like good with doing what God wants us to do, as long as he just starts doing it before we do anything. Oh, for crying out loud, ladies and gentlemen. Now, this is where I just start losing it. Okay. All right. So, first of all, he goes to them and then immediately comes back to us because he's just simply using the picture. He's just using the text to insert us, insert us, insert us, insert us. The text has nothing to do with us, but okay. If you're even going to use this picture, then let's use this picture. Remember, AI predicted that the sermon would go this direction. Everything AI has said has been perfectly to the letter exactly what's went wrong. It's crazy. AI knows how pastors are gonna mishandle the text before we even listen to the sermon. That's insane. Like why even listen to sermons anymore? Just go to AI. You can tell me this, hey, oh, that church is preaching on this text. This is all the ways they're gonna do it wrong, okay? So, let's just make this clear. In fact, let me pull up what AI said about this whole principle here. AI said, they're going to overlook the significance of the priest carrying the ark and stepping into the water first as mediators between God and Israel. Now, he immediately makes it about us, right? No, this is about the priest stepped in first. He turns it about us being willing to step into whatever. We want God to do it first. It's not about us. If you want to draw a spiritual picture, listen, I cannot stress this enough. This would be, you would miss the opportunity. This is what AI says. Pastors miss the opportunity to connect this priestly role to the ultimate mediator, Jesus Christ. Jesus Christ is the one who steps into the water. Jesus Christ is our mediator between God and man. He's the one who brings us into the... Remember, he acknowledged this picture at least briefly at the beginning. If you want to make it a picture, Jesus is the one who steps into the water for us and separates the waters. Now, you could say... Now, again, if you want to go typology, you could just go crazy here, but if you're going to even try to offer typology, It's about the priest stepping into the water, not the people. The people didn't step into the water first. The priest stepped into the water first. The priest did, not the people. The priest stepped into the water first, then the waters parted. The priest did. Well, if you're going to draw a typology, who's our priest? Either you could go with a Catholic idea that we have priests who are kind of our mediator, right? We go to the priest for confession and penance. All right, if you want to go to a Catholic system, but if you're going to remove it from a Catholic system, we have a priest. His name is Jesus Christ. He stepped into the water for us. He parted the water and now we can go through. He kept the law for us. He was a propitiation and satisfied the wrath of God, so now the wrath of God is parted so that we can enter into heaven. It's through Christ. It's through His priestly work. If you want to draw a typology, You know what I mean? Like, God, you just start doing what you do, and then once I see you doing that, then I'll act. And God is going, no, we're acting in tandem. When you step in the water, that's showing that your faith is willing and ready to go into the land in which I've given to you. Amen? Or conquer the situation in which you're in. Or doing, like, you have to take the step. Amen? And people in the congregation are amening that. What are you amening? That's a complete destruction of the entire text. It's the priest who stepped in, it wasn't the people. And I, look, when I was young, I made the same mistake. I preached it the same stinking way because that's how I was taught to preach the text. over-spiritualizing, allegorizing, all of the nonsense that's happening here. It's not about you stepping in. It's about the priest. Well, if you're going to use typology, you either have to connect that to religious leaders, pastors, priests, or you have to say, well, in the New Testament, Christ is literally identified as our priest, our high priest. Therefore, then it only makes sense to say, that's Christ stepping into the water. He parts the waters. He gives us access to God. It is through Christ we have access to heaven. It's through Christ we have access to the Father. It is through Christ. He is the way, the truth, the life. No one comes to the Father except through Him. Nobody gets through the water except through Christ. Christ stepped into the water through, for us. If you're going to use typology, at least go that direction. At least makes more sense. But no, no, no, no. It turns into you got to go step into the water. No, if I go step into the water, I'm going to drown. I was a new Christian. Um, This only happened to me one time, and this is gonna be like crazy sounding and insane and like all that stuff, but like I had this inclination in my soul. So I was going to a college, and I'll never forget this, because it's never happened again. It's never happened again. But there was this person who was blind sitting on this bench far off, and I saw them sitting at this bench, and I just felt in my soul that God wanted me to go pray for their sight. Now that's crazy. I'm getting charismatic vibes all over this. I really am. I really am here. Okay, let's see. Maybe I'm wrong here. Let's see. So he gets, so God is guiding, directing with some internal feeling. Okay, so this is not scripture alone. All right, let's see what happens. I don't know what this has to do with Joshua chapter three, has literally nothing to do with Joshua chapter three, but let's see here. All right, let's see here. Leading up to that though, I'd prayed over vehicles and they had started, I'd done like other, like God was showing me that he would prevail, right? He had been showing, you ever done that before? Listen, that happened to me recently, but we're in the car and like my car won't start and my son's sitting next to me and I was just like, and I was like, we're gonna pray, Alden. And he was like, okay. And so I'm like, dear Lord, please let my car start. And then boom, start right up. My son literally was like, yo. And I was like, I know, right? Yeah, my God's, anyway. So like, Alright, so you can pray over your car to start. Well, if you can pray over cars to start, and they will, Maybe you could get in that car, drive to Nashville, and raise the girl who got shot and killed in her school and who's dead. You could raise her to life. Maybe you could stop by some children's hospitals and heal some children who are, I don't know, dying of terminal diseases. I mean, if you can pray and start a car, What does this got to do with Joshua chapter 3? I do not know, ladies and gentlemen. In fact, A.I. gets everything right about this sermon, other than A.I. didn't go far enough, it appears. All right, let's hear the rest of the story. But praying for someone's sight is different than praying for my car to start. You know what I mean? So I did what you probably have done this before. So I did the thing where I'm like, okay, God, if they're still there when I walk around and come back. I'll pray for them, you know? So I walked around and came back and they're still there. So I was like, God, I really will know it's you if I walk around the second time and they're still there. So I walked up the steps and around and I took like a really long time and I came back around, they're still sitting there. So I was like, Lord, if it's really you, let me do it one more time. I did that until they weren't there anymore. And I've never been asked again. OK, now the story did take a unique turn. I thought he was going to go pray for the person they were going to see. So this takes a unique turn. But now you see, he's never been asked again. So God was like, hey, I want to heal this blind man, but I want you to go pray to do it. But because you didn't do it, I'm never going to ask you to do it again. And why wouldn't God just heal the blind man? But OK, I guess. I guess that guy's just out of luck, so there's some man walking around blind because this pastor wouldn't just heed the supposed call coming from God. Okay, the whole thing just, oh, this is so charismatic. It's not even funny. Don't tell me it's not charismatic. This is stinking charismatic. That's what it is, okay? I thought there wasn't supposed to be charismatic stuff on the Sermons 2.0 app. I thought that's part of the statement of faith. I'm gonna look here. I really thought that it wasn't supposed to be there. I'm gonna just look here. I'm gonna look here. Give me a second here. I'm looking. All right, so to become a broadcaster, hang on, where's the statement of faith? All right, so become a broadcaster. All right, here we go. Articles of Faith. All right, here's the Articles of Faith. All right, here we go. All right, yeah, sermon audio is not open to the dissemination of such distinctive charismatic and Pentecostal views as extra-spiritual revelation. That's extra-spiritual revelation if God's telling you to go do something. Tongues, healing, women pastors, preachers, elders. It seems like this is right in line. I don't know. All right, but let's see what he's... So he didn't heal the man, but he's never been asked again. And guess where he's gonna go? Because he didn't step into the water first. But guess what? Joshua chapter three is... Oh, it's not about us stepping in the water. Okay. I'm not saying that God won't ever ask me again. But I am saying in that moment I was disobedient. Because faith takes you and I making a step before God does. God's going, I'm gonna do it. I'm gonna do it. I'm giving you the promised land. I mean, he literally tells Israel, I'm giving it to you, right? But you have to take possession of it. I'm gonna fight everybody that's there. I'm gonna destroy the people that are before you. I'm gonna move them out so you can come in. Like, I'm giving you this land, but priests, you gotta step in the water. Otherwise, it ain't going nowhere. least there he did say priest, at least there he did say priest. He identifies the right people there, and his application, he makes it about everybody. I guess you could argue, well, in Christ, the royal priesthood of all believers, I guess you could go that direction if you want to try to extend the typology, but okay. I don't know what it is that you, listen, your unbelief, my unbelief can keep us from the things in which God has for us. It's just true. You and I, when we walk in unbelief, is keeping us from the thing in which God has for us. So there are things that God wants to do in you, there are things that God wants to do with you and through you, but our unbelief is keeping us from that. God wants to do things, but God can't get those things done because of our unbelief. All right, that's a whole concept that we could expand, obviously, but the main thing you're seeing is, there's nothing, literally none of this, this sermon has not a thing to do with Joshua chapter 3. It has nothing to do with Joshua chapter 3. Joshua chapter 3 is simply being used as Plato. It's just being molded into making it about whatever he wants to make it about, which is us. Let me prove it to you. Remember when Jesus is going into a city and town and says he wasn't able to do certain miracles because of their unbelief. It wasn't that God couldn't do it. It wasn't that he was unwilling to do it. It was that they didn't want him to do it. And how many of that is us? Listen, you have to operate, look, for some of you in this room, this is like a message you've heard a thousand, a gajillion times. Maybe you've heard it here, maybe, I don't know, right? You've heard it a lot, maybe. But you know what, there's a lot of things in the Bible you hear over and over and over and over again, amen? I don't think we ever move past this. Because every moment of my life is a moment for me to have faith or have unbelief. to believe or not to believe. And there is something in your life right now that God is asking you to believe that you're going, I don't know if I can, I don't know if I can trust you there, Lord. I trusted you here, I trusted you here, but I don't know if I can trust you there. Because you know what was going on through my mind when he wanted me to pray for that blind girl? It was like, what if it doesn't work? Right? Because then you're like, look, if someone's car doesn't start, so what? If I pray for someone's eyes to see and it doesn't happen, I look like an idiot. And I don't know if I'm okay with looking like an idiot, Lord. And God's like, bro, sometimes, look, you look like an idiot anyway. You might as well look like an idiot for me. Maybe you can relate. What's amazing about these two people that exist for a little while, because remember, it was 38 years, 40 years before those people died off and God was able to get them into the promised land they were going, right? Amen? So for 38 years, for 38 years, two people existed, the unfaithful and the faithful. Right? The unfaithful constantly were going, God, we are hungry. God gives them bread, manna from heaven, manna, right? By the way, just a little caveat here. Once they enter the promised land, bread stops. Why? Because they can eat the food of the field. And God's like, you're welcome. Right? No more bread from heaven. As soon as they enter the land, God's like, eat it, man. Land full of milk and honey. Eat it up. Right? So God's providing for them in the wilderness for 38 to 40 years. Right? Bread coming down from heaven. Then they get sick of the bread. Remember? They're like, oh, this stupid bread, which is crazy in and of itself. Listen, if I walked up in the morning, God was like, hey, I'm going to provide bread for your family. When you go outside, there's going to be something on the ground. Pick it up and eat it. Right? I'm grateful for that every day. You know what I'm saying? Especially when I'm starving to death. I say that, maybe I wouldn't be. You know what I'm saying? Because I probably wouldn't be. Anyway, I mean, I can relate to them. Maybe that's a better way of saying that. But like, didn't they're like, hey, give me some quiet, give us meat. We want some meat. God sends them quiet. Birds are flying, birds are falling from the sky. Now listen. If birds are falling from the sky around me, I'm not eating the bird, right? Because I'm, sorry, I'm spitting this way, I'm sorry. My automatic thought is, what happened to this bird that it just fell from the sky? Because that's not normal. Birds are supposed to fly, right? But they're eating the quail and they're living, which is good. There's two people that exist in this passage. or through those 38 years, the believing and the unbelieving. To the unbelieving, constant grumbling and complaining. Listen, there are things that God is doing in your life, but because of your unbelief, you can't see it. Your eyes aren't open to it. You're not seeing all the things that God is doing before you. You don't even know how good you have it, right? But because of your unbelief, it's hindering your vision of God. It's hindering your, it's hindering everything that God's wanting to give to you, everything that God has given to you, right? And you get caught up in the grumbling and complaining. Why? Because of unbelief. Now he does set up this distinction, this contrast that for 38 years, so for 38 years, that's the number he keeps throwing out, 38 years there was Those, there was unbelievers and believers. Belief is required for God to work. That seems to be the idea. Now, we will have to take this apart. Now, the main thing we wanted to do is everything AI said that the sermon would do wrong, it basically has done every single one of those or pretty much all of them to some level. Now, I did what I did do. is after AI gave me all those 15 predictions, right? This is what I said. I said, the name of the sermon, and this is what I said to AI, the name of the sermon in question is facing your biggest challenges. Does that information impact your prediction or change any of them? The sermon title, Facing Your Biggest Challenges, does impact the prediction slightly, as it suggests a specific emphasis on using Joshua 3 as a motivational or practical guide for overcoming difficulties in life. This focus could lead to particular types of mishandling or misapplication, including the following adjusted additional points. 1. Over-emphasis on personal application The sermon is likely to focus on identifying the Jordan River as a metaphor for each listener's biggest challenges, health issues, career obstacles, relational conflicts. This risks reducing the text to an overly individualistic application while neglecting the corporate and covenantal significance of the crossing for Israel as God's people. 2. Treating the Jordan Crossing as some formula for success. 3. Promoting the idea of guaranteed victory. 4. Neglecting the context of God's redemptive plan. 5. The risk of overemphasizing human agency 6. Turning the text into a self-help manual 7. Ignoring the role of divine sovereignty 8. Flattening the typology The sermon might attempt to connect the Jordan River directly to modern Christian challenges without exploring typology of the ark, the crossing, or God's presence. For example, the ark could be flattened into a generic symbol of God helping you in hard times rather than representing maybe his holy presence or his covenant. So it's just basically going to destroy that. Misusing a consecrate yourselves. Number 10, glossing over God's purpose. So basically AI was like, hey, the title goes in this direction. And basically, the sermonist done every single thing AI said it was going to do. And this is what I love, is I didn't tell AI what the mishandling was or misapplication was. I asked it to tell me how this text could be mishandled and misapplied. AI itself believes that the way the text is being handled is misapplied, misinterpreted, and mishandled without even knowing what it was going to do. So in other words, AI sees if you do that stuff to the text, it's wrong. AI is already just starting with the idea that that is wrong to handle the text that way. Not by me guiding it to think it's wrong, it's declaring it wrong without me saying anything. Because AI knows that's not how you handle the text of scripture. How come AI knows this but pastors don't? there's Joshua chapter 3. Now, we may need to return back to this to some point and do some work on this, but we're already over an hour, so we won't do it now. But maybe we'll come back to this, how does unbelief stop God? And if God is the one who gives faith, oh, there's so many theological issues to get into play here. But Yeah, it's just, it's kind of bizarre. It's very, it's hard not to hear the charismatic part in it. That basically is, God could do miracles, you just have to believe. Almost God wants to do the miracles. The reason God doesn't is because we don't believe. So it means we're really in charge, not God. I mean, this raises all kinds of theological issues. I'm just kind of shocked that it's very charismatic, very charismatic. I mean, put it this way, if it's not charismatic, it's charismatic light, it's charismatic influence. It just seems odd on a site where you have to sign a statement saying you're not going to promote charismatic ideas. I don't know. That's my own feelings. I was a little surprised. That's usually the one thing I don't expect to hear because I know you have to sign a statement saying you're not going to promote that idea. So I always expect that what I'm going to hear are sermons that are as far from charismatic theology as you can possibly get. What's weird is what used to be charismatic is now no longer really viewed as charismatic. It's just viewed as normal, because charismatic theology has been so influential that even people would say, well, I'm not a charismatic. You've got charismatic ideas and ideology and concepts all over your theology. You just may not be going full-blown speaking in tongues, or you may not be going full-blown charismatic, but it's still there. So, I don't know. I think charismatic is far more than just speaking in tongues. I mean, but there we go. That was Joshua 3. Now, if you listen to that sermon, you know what you would walk away with? Not understanding Joshua chapter 3. But you know what, that's how Joshua 3 is always handled. Because it's about us, it's about us, it's about us, it's about us, it's about us. We make a descriptive passage prescriptive, and we insert ourselves into a text that has nothing to do with us, and we forget that Joshua chapter 3 is about what God promised Israel, and He's fulfilling His promise to Israel. But it turns into almost like, hey, if we have faith, God will do this for us and do this for us. Just remember, Israel's supposedly great faith here to get them to cross the Jordan, they demonstrate unbelief and a lack of faith and weak faith constantly, even into the promised land. So, I mean, we could get into a whole discussion about the whole thing. All right. We didn't finish the sermon. I have no desire to finish the sermon. If you want to, you can. I may listen to it on my own as I'm uploading. But, yeah. And if I hear something else, we'll talk about it. But the goal was just to see, could AI predict the problems in a sermon? And once again, AI did flawlessly. That's troubling. All right. Thanks for listening. give up. God bless.