Welcome to the ministry of First Reformed Church of Aberdeen, South Dakota. Our worship services are at 9 o'clock every Sunday morning. Now we join Pastor Hank Bone as he brings us God's Word. Turn your Bibles to the book of Joshua chapter 24. That'll be the last chapter in the book. Then Joshua gathered all the tribes of Israel to Shechem and called for the elders of Israel, for their heads, for their judges, and for their officers, and they presented themselves before God. And Joshua said to all the people, thus says the Lord God of Israel, your fathers, including Terah, the father of Abraham, and the father of Nahor, dwelt on the other side of the river in old times, and there served other gods. Then I took your father Abraham from the other side of the river, led him throughout all the land of Canaan, and multiplied his descendants, and gave him Isaac. To Isaac I gave Jacob and Esau. To Esau I gave the mountains of Seir to possess. But Jacob and his children went down to Egypt. Also I sent Moses and Aaron, and I plagued Egypt according to what I did among them. Afterward I brought you out. Then I brought your fathers out of Egypt, and you came to the sea. And the Egyptians pursued your fathers with chariots and horsemen to the Red Sea. So they cried out to the Lord, and he put darkness between you and the Egyptians, brought the sea upon them, and covered them. And your eyes saw what I did in Egypt. Then you dwelt in the wilderness a long time. and I brought you into the land of the Amorites, who dwelt on the other side of the Jordan, and they fought with you. But I gave them into your hand, that you might possess their land, and I destroyed them from before you. Then Balak, the son of Zippor, king of Moab, arose to make war against Israel, and sent and called Balaam, the son of Baor, to curse you, but I would not listen to Balaam. Therefore he continued to bless you, So I delivered you out of his hand. Then you went over to the Jordan and came to Jericho. And the men of Jericho fought against you. Also the Amorites, the Perizzites, the Canaanites, the Hittites, the Girgashites, the Hivites, and the Jebusites. But I delivered them into your hand. I sent the hornet before you, which drove them out from before you, also the two kings of the Amorites. But not with your sword or with your bow. I have given you a land for which you did not labor, and cities which you did not build. And you dwell in them, you eat of the vineyards and olive groves which you did not plant. Now therefore fear the Lord, serve him with sincerity and in truth, and put away the gods which your fathers served on the other side of the river and in Egypt. Serve the Lord. 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." So the people answered and said, far be it from us that we should forsake the Lord to serve other gods. For the Lord our God is He who brought us and our fathers up out of the land of Egypt. from the house of bondage, who did those great signs in our sight and preserved us in all the way that we went and among all the people through whom we passed. And the Lord drove out from before us all the people, including the Amorites, who dwelt in the land. We also will serve the Lord, for he is our God. But Joshua said to the people, you cannot serve the Lord, for he is a holy God. He is a jealous God. He will not forgive your transgressions nor your sins. If you forsake the Lord and serve foreign gods, then he will turn and do you harm and consume you after he has done you good. And the people said to Joshua, no, but we will serve the Lord. So Joshua said to the people, you are witnesses against yourselves that you have chosen the Lord for yourselves to serve him. And they said, we are witnesses. Now therefore he said, put away the foreign gods which are among you and incline your heart to the Lord God of Israel. And the people said to Joshua, the Lord our God we will serve and his voice we will obey. So Joshua made a covenant with the people that day and made for them a statute, an ordinance in Shechem. Then Joshua wrote these words in the book of the law of God, and he took a large stone and set it there under the oak that was by the sanctuary of the Lord. And Joshua said to all the people, behold, this stone shall be a witness to us, for it has heard all the words of the Lord which he spoke to us. It shall therefore be a witness to you, lest you deny your God. So Joshua let the people depart, each to his own inheritance. Let us pray. Our Almighty God and Heavenly Father, we have heard Your Word, and we pray, Father, in the hearing of Your Word, we may sense the challenge in it, and that we might respond to that challenge, even as the people of Israel said, we have heard His voice, we will serve the Lord. So Father, add Your blessing to the hearing and the giving the sense of Your Word this morning. For we ask these things through Jesus Christ, amen. Well, beloved congregation of the Lord Jesus Christ, history is the record of what has happened looking back. Making history is the activity of events going forward. But in the mind of God, all history is simultaneous, meaning God knows the beginning from the end because all things work according to his good pleasure and plan. At the start of a new year, people often take a look at their lives historically. That is, they look back at what they have done and they look forward to what they would like to accomplish in the year to come. Now, I've been hearing several times this past week that the second Friday in January has a special name. It's named Quitter's Day. the most likely day for people to give up on their new year resolutions. Takes them a long time, two weeks. Transition times, however, do call for people to seriously consider the direction of their lives, to set priorities and commit to a certain course of action. In Joshua 24, the people of Israel had come to one of those times. Joshua had led them across the Jordan on dry ground and they had come into the promised land. The book of Joshua is the record of the conquest of Canaan and God giving them the land as their inheritance. These early chapters in Genesis and Exodus are a history of God delivering those people from whom he had chosen and establishing them as a people identified as his own. Israel's entrance into Canaan begins at Jericho when God instructs Joshua to take the Ark of the Covenant to the River Jordan and to have the priest stand at the edge of the water in it. And God parts the waters and they go through on dry ground so that the army of Israel could pass over. It is reminiscent of Moses and the dry sea as Israel could pass over on dry ground. And God then brings that multitude of the Hebrews across, followed by Egypt's chariots and army being swallowed up by the sea while they sought to pursue them. And God recounts this history. a victory over victory over victory. Interestingly, as we come to Joshua 24, where the land has now been conquered, the land has been divided up between the tribes according to their allotments, and the people begin a new era in their history as a nation under God. Now Joshua calls the tribes to Shechem to challenge them to serve God and not to chase after the other gods that surround them. Interestingly, Shechem is the place where God called Jacob in Genesis 35 to go up to Bethlehem and dwell there. But first, Jacob said to his household and to all who were with him, put away the foreign gods that are among you. Purify yourselves and change your garments. So they did this in Shechem and buried all those things associated with worshiping other gods under the terebinth tree that was by Shechem. And here we are, all these generations later, and Joshua calls them to the same place and says, bury all the false gods. The point is that Shechem would have a special significance as a place where the fathers of the people of Israel had consecrated themselves to serve only the Lord. And that's the theme of Joshua 24, and particularly verse 15, where God's people are challenged to choose who they will serve going forward. This theme will be considered under three points. First, the challenge in the choice you must make. Second, the consequence of your choice. And third, the commitment to your choice. So first, the challenge in the choice you must make. Notice what he says at the end of verse 14. Well, he says it in the whole of the verse. Now, therefore, fear the Lord, serve him in sincerity and in truth, and put away the gods which your fathers served on the other side of the river in Egypt. And then he exclaims, serve the Lord. Marriage is to be an exclusive relationship, right? Let's say our marriage is patterned after what our relationship to God is to be, an exclusive relationship. The first question you should answer is, who is Joshua? Or, what role is he serving at this point? He was the second in command with Moses, he was the general through the conquests, but the conquests are over, so now what role is Joshua fulfilling here in the 24th chapter? The name Joshua is the Old Testament name for Jesus. Joshua stands as the figure of our Lord Jesus who comes to deliver His people to safety and rest. In this context, Joshua challenges the people to serve the Lord. Based on verse 2, he is speaking as the mouthpiece of God. He is functioning as the shepherd of the sheepfold of God. He opens his sermon by recounting all of the victories that the Lord had given them from Egypt to the present day. He builds upon the foundation of the redemption provided by them through the acts of God. There's a reason that we open our service when we gather with the call to worship. And what is that? It's those words we begin with. Our help is in the name of our God who's made the heavens and the earth. It is a reminder as we come into God's presence to think about all that God has done and will do for us and is doing for us. This being the first Lord's Day of the year, you are likewise reminded of the great theme of the catechism. What is your only comfort in life and in death? And it is that you are not your own, but you belong to your faithful Savior, Jesus Christ, who has satisfied for all your sins and redeemed you from all the power of the devil. Our worship is built upon the redemption of God through the merit of the substitutionary death of His Son, Jesus Christ, who paid the penalty for our sins to purchase for us a place in heaven. But also, it is the comfort that comes from knowing that He so preserves me that not a hair can fall from my head without His will. And that speaks to God's providence, which is knowing that God is in control of all the events of my life. It is also in the recognition that by His Holy Spirit, He also makes me heartily willing and ready from now on to live unto Him. All of those things become the essence of the gospel for us. And that becomes really what should draw our attention all the time. Coming back to Joshua 24 verse 15. Note the odd way that Joshua challenged them. He says, and if it seems evil to you to serve the Lord. That seems weird. If you think, brothers and sisters, serving our God is not a good thing, is a bad thing for you, that's what he's saying. And he goes on, he says, if that's the case, then choose for yourselves this day whom you will serve. Because we're going to serve something. He says, whether the gods which your father served that were on the other side of the river, or the gods of the Amorites in whose land you dwell. Choose something. You're gonna choose something. If you're not gonna choose the true God, then you're gonna chase after some false thing. But choose. Go ahead. And of course, he goes on, but as for me and my house, we will serve the Lord. If serving God with all your heart and soul and mind and strength seems evil to you or seems like a bad thing, if following or believing in Jesus or obeying God is not that important to you, then you choose for yourselves this day whom you will serve. My mother once said shortly after I had been converted to Christ, to faith in Christ. She said, a little religion is OK, but too much is a bad thing. She said, that because I went to church twice on Sunday, once on Wednesday. I read my Bible and I prayed. A little religion is OK, but too much is a bad thing. And Joshua is kind of saying the same thing here. He's saying, if you think committing your life to love the Lord your God with all of your heart and all of your soul and all of your mind and all of your strength is a bad thing, then decide for yourself what you're going to follow. But remember what the Lord said in Matthew 6, 24. He said, no one can serve two masters, for either he will hate the one and love the other, or else he will be loyal to the one and despise the other. You cannot serve God and mammon. You cannot serve God, the God of heaven, and also serve the gods of this world. So Joshua's challenge is that if you are not going all in on serving God, then who are you going to serve? False gods? The world? Your job? Your sport? Yourself? Well, secondly, we note the consequence of your choice. Look at verse 20. He says, if you forsake the Lord and serve foreign gods, then he, God, will turn and do you harm and consume you after he has done you good. God's been pouring out his blessing upon you, and you respond by saying, yeah, I don't need you. Joshua's warning is for God's covenant people. One of the weaknesses in the church today is that people do not take the time to understand the importance of the covenant of God with His people. In other words, you need a covenant theology. I heard somebody this past week made a great point, and they said that if you're a Christian, you're a theologian. You go, oh, no, no, theologians, that's like the pastor. No, because theology is what? Theology is just simply the study and understanding of who God is. So to study covenant theology is to pick up your Bibles, to read it, and to ask yourselves, when God makes a covenant, what is that? How am I to understand that? And how does that apply to me? We are to be theologians. We may not be great academic theologians, but every one of us has an understanding of the Bible and who God is, and that makes you a theologian. So you can go like this now. I'm a theologian. But that's how it begins. It begins where God, by His Spirit, perks within you an interest in your mind to pursue a knowledge of God, to know God in the church. We do not so much speak of one who is a believer or not a believer, but rather we speak of those who are covenant keepers and covenant breakers. You are either walking in obedience to Christ or you are breaking the covenant that God has called you into through your baptism and through your profession of faith. The church is not about running your life, but holding you to the vow you take when you make a profession of faith. The professing Christian is and will be held to a higher standard before God. That's what Joshua's point is. After God has done good to you, if you go after other gods? In Hebrews 10, verse 26 and 27, it says, for if we sin willfully after we have received the knowledge of the truth, there no longer remains a sacrifice for sins, but certain fearful expectation of judgment and fiery indignation, which will devour the adversaries. And then verse 31, it is a fearful thing to fall into the hands of the living God, to sit under The ministry of the gospel, to read the scriptures, to have that blessings of God in bringing you into that context, and then to turn your back on that is a fearful thing. Joshua's harsh words here are designed to accomplish two things. First, he is seeking to provoke the people to a conscious confession of their being God's people. He's preaching confrontationally. This is too often necessary because we become comfortable in our security that we belong to the Lord, and therefore there is no condemnation upon us because we are in Jesus. And we cherish that. That's our comfort, that as we are in Christ, there is no longer any condemnation to us. But we have to be careful that that stirs us to greater walking with Christ, not with a confidence that, well, so I don't have to worry too much. where we get sluggish and lazy. Joshua seeks to shake them out of that. This is necessary because we become comfortable in our security. But Joshua knows that through the inspiration of the Holy Spirit that can happen, so he seeks to shake the people out of their lethargy. Each of you should challenge yourselves as you come into this new year and ask to what degree You can say you love God with all your heart, soul, mind, and strength. We should ask ourselves that all the time when we read the Ten Commandments every other Sunday. That should come upon our mind, right? We know the law of God. We know what the first and great commandment is. And we should ask ourselves, am I faithful to this? Is it important to me? Are these just words that we hear? And I think that's Joshua's concern, is that the Word of God doesn't just simply become a routine and these are words that we hear, but rather that this is the voice of God seeking to provoke us. Now, God, in calling us, also calls us to examine ourselves. Joshua's words here are challenging the people with the question, are you holding back? Are you an all-in Christian or a Christian when it is convenient for you? What are you? What's the nature of your serving? God promises great blessings to you in a faithful walk with the Lord. Will there be hardships? Of course. But God promises to give you strength to meet those challenges that you take head on. Now reflect back here in Joshua 24 to verse 13. where God said, I have given you a land for which you did not labor, and cities which you did not build, and you dwell in them. You eat of the vineyards and olive groves which you did not plant. He's saying, think of all the blessings I poured out upon you that you did nothing for. And you bring that forward into their inheritance. Our inheritance is the Lord. God gives you the forgiveness of sins and mercy and strength and eyes that can see and ears that can hear. He gives you a new heart and He gives you the mind of Christ. And none of these things did you work for. He gave you all of these things. It's the same kind of a concept. Reflect back upon all that God gives to you. He gives you such a great redemption and you did nothing for it. And because of that, now going forward, Joshua asked the question, so who are you gonna serve? Think about all the blessings of the things that God pours out in your life and ask if you are thankful specifically for those things. When was the last time you actually sat down and you prayed, Lord, thank you for Jesus being my Redeemer. God, thank you for the mercy you give to me. You know, how often do you pray for those specific kinds of things that are yours, that belong to you? And that's kind of what's coming through in this challenge. Remind yourself of Jesus' words in Matthew 6, 33. But seek first the kingdom of God and his righteousness, and these things, all the material things, all the mammon things, will be added to you. And when you think about that verse, then you can ask yourself the question, you know, introspectively ask yourself, how true is this in my daily life? Which brings us to our third point, the commitment to your choice. If you choose to serve the Lord, what is your commitment to that choice? Think about the words of Joshua, but as for me and my house, we will serve the Lord. Joshua throughout his history with Moses and leading the people was completely committed to serving the Lord. When Moses was up on the mountain for the 40 days receiving the two tablets of stone, Joshua was at the base of the mountain. What were the rest of the Israelites doing? They were busy making a golden calf and having a big feast and festival to their newly formed golden calf mini God. But Joshua had no part with it. When Moses came down off the hill, Joshua was the one that said, Moses, there's a great noise in the camp. He was the one of the two spies who spoke out saying, God has promised the land to us and we should go in and take it. Joshua and Caleb. It was Joshua who took the mantle of Moses to lead the people, and here it is Joshua challenging the people as their spiritual leader to serve the Lord. Joshua could back it up, back up his challenge, because he had lived a life worthy of his calling. He challenged himself with the same thing. The people followed his lead. They embraced his challenge, vowing to serve the Lord. So Joshua said in verse 22, you are witnesses against yourselves that you have chosen the Lord yourselves to serve him. This is their profession of faith, right? When you come and you join the church and you come up and you answer four questions, you make a profession of faith. That's what these people are doing. They're making a profession of faith. Those were vows just like you see the Israelites doing, the vows that you make here when you're confirmed or when you join. That's why it's important even when I come, became your pastor, my wife and I came up and we made profession of faith before you as a congregation. We answered the same questions, we made the same vows. We were saying we will serve the Lord. Every Christian should rejoice in that opportunity. This is an interesting portion of the Bible to meditate on. Joshua gives a forceful challenge to any who would profess the name of Christ. He is confrontational in an extreme sense in not choosing kind words, but words to make the people uncomfortable. Some people go to church just because the pastor always makes them feel good. That's not real biblical. The Word of God should make us uncomfortable. If you have not been uncomfortable during the preaching of the Word in the course of the year, then I'm doing something wrong. Even if I don't intend it, the Word of God, if it's proclaimed properly, will make us uncomfortable. I remember trying to find the biggest guy in church when I first started going to church to sit behind because I swore the pastor was looking right at me the whole time. He didn't even know who I was. But the Word of God does that. The Word of God drills in upon us, and it should, and that's a good thing. It's a good thing if it provokes us to serve the Lord. Joshua has a final challenge in verse 23. He says that, now therefore, he said, put away the foreign gods which are among you and incline your heart to the Lord God of Israel. For your purposes, you should understand foreign gods as anything that you are tempted with that would get in the way or draw you away from serving God. Right? Because that's what idolatry is. Idolatry is to place anything alongside of or in place of God. That could be anything. The general principle of the Christian is to serve God first, others second, and self last. But Joshua has a two-pronged challenge, to put away anything that gets in the way of serving God, and secondly, to incline your heart to the Lord God of Israel. Now that's to be a conscious thing every day. The idea of incline is to settle in. It's like settling into your seat to listen to the teacher begin his lesson. It is the idea of commitment to pay attention and follow along. Incline yourself, incline your heart to listen to God. So in conclusion, we recognize that many Christians commit to reading the Bible in the year, or attending a Bible study this year, or some other activity to increase their serving the Lord. New Year's resolution, I'm going to get more into the church this year. The question is, will you make it past Quitter's Friday? By God's grace, you will persevere, and you will get your Bible read this year. Amen?