Cityview Community Church - Sermons

About Cityview Community Church - Sermons

Cityview Community Church of Elmhurst

Publisher

Cityview Community Church

Category

religion & spirituality

Language

en

Explicit

No

First episode

22 Jul 2018

Latest episode

18 Oct 2026

Latest episodes

443 episodes in the feed.

1. 

   18 Oct 2026

   The Cost of Sin (Joshua 7)

   PODCAST The Cost of Sin October 18, 2026 | Kyle Bjerga Kyle Bjerga discusses that sin has consequences, and the story of Achan in Joshua 7 makes that truth impossible to ignore. After Israel’s miraculous victory at Jericho, one man’s secret act of disobedience led to a devastating defeat at Ai and affected an entire nation. God’s response revealed both His justice and His patience, as He gave Achan multiple opportunities to come forward before the truth was exposed. Achan eventually confessed, but confession alone is not repentance. True repentance, as Paul describes in 2 Corinthians 7:10, is driven by godly sorrow that leads to genuine change, not just regret over consequences. Ultimately, Achan’s story points forward to Jesus, who bore the penalty for our sin so that God’s wrath could be fully satisfied. The invitation is not to feel bad about sin but to truly turn from it and trust in what Christ has already done. TRANSCRIPT_______________________________________________+ The following is an uncorrected transcript generated by a transcription service. Before quoting in print, please check the corresponding audio for accuracy. Good morning. To learn from Jesus. Today we’re going to be in Joshua, chapter seven. So go ahead and turn there. It’s page 173. If you’re using one of the black pew Bibles there in front of you or maybe underneath your pew. If you have watched any of the Marvel Cinematic Universe movies, the mcu, then, you know, if you’re in the theater, you never leave when the movie’s done and the credits start, because you know there’s going to be a post credit scene, some sort of teaser to get you ready for the next movie, the next 50 movies. If Joshua Six last week is the Lord’s victory over Jericho. If that was a movie, it would end triumphantly with the Israelites going in and defeating Jericho. And once those walls come down, the final dust settles in the victory. You can almost hear the narrator kind of finish up some storylines that we’ve been paying attention to throughout Joshua so far. And so we hear about Rahab and her family being saved from the rubble because of the promise made to her. Maybe there’s another scene where we have some men carrying some things to a pile that they’re going to light on fire and destroy while some other men take the gold and the silver and they walk over to the treasury in the Lord’s house. And then the screen turns to black and the credits start rolling. Time to grab our empty popcorn buckets and head out. And as we’re headed down the stairs, the credits stop for a second and there’s a figure standing in the middle of the screen. We don’t know who this is. We’re thinking, this Joshua. No, it’s not Joshua. We know who he is. We don’t know this man yet. But here he is in the rubble of Jericho and he’s looking at the plunder. He sees some beautiful clothes. He sees some silver shekels, he sees some gold bars. And he quickly does a scan. Anybody around? Nobody’s around. Nobody’s watching him. So he grabs a bag that he finds and he starts to put some things in there, just enough that he can carry. And then in the distance, we hear somebody say, hey, Achan. Achan turns and looks. He’s got his little bag. And he runs off to celebrate the Israelite victory with the other soldiers. The screen goes black again and we leave the theater thinking, who is this man? Who is Achan? What has he just done? Why does it matter? We have to wait till next summer to find out. So as good as the battle of Jericho was and how it turned out for the Israelites, we’re going to see the tables turn on them very quickly in chapter seven, as they approach their next enemy, the city of AI. But what we learn is that the real enemy is not an external one. The real enemy ends up being in their camp. Actually, the real enemy ends up being inside of each one of them. And the reality for us is that the real enemy is inside each one of us. Because the enemy that they will face, the enemy that we face is the sin in our lives and the seriousness with which God deals with sin, while at the same time understand the amazing grace of God, of how he treats sinners, how he treats the rebellious, even in our sin. So the great thing is that we don’t actually have to wait until next summer to find out about this movie, this sequel. We get it today in chapter seven. So we’re going to see kind of in four scenes here, we’re going to learn a lot about sin. And so we’re going to start off first with the result of sin. So let’s look at verse one, reading through verse nine. But the Israelites were unfaithful in regard to the devoted things. Achan, son of Carmi, the son of Zimri, the son of Zerah, of the tribe of Judah, took some of them. So the Lord’s anger burned against Israel. Now Joshua sent men from Jericho to AI, which is near Beth Aven, to the east of Bethel, and told them, go up and spy out the region. So the men went up and spied out AI. When they returned to Joshua, they said, not all the army will have to go up against AI. Send two or three thousand men to take it. And do not weary the whole army, for only a few people live there. So about 3,000 went up. But they were routed by the men of AI, who killed about 36 of them. They chased the Israelites from the city gate as far as the stone quarries and struck them down on the slopes. At this, the hearts of the people melted in fear and became like water. Then Joshua tore his clothes and fell face down to the ground before the Ark of the Lord, remaining there till evening. The elders of Israel did the same and sprinkled dust on their heads. And Joshua said, alas, sovereign Lord, why did you ever bring this people across the Jordan? To deliver us into the hands of the Amorites, to destroy us. If only we had been content to stay on the other side of the Jordan. Pardon your servant, Lord. What can I say now that Israel has been routed by its enemies, the Canaanites and the Other people of the country will hear about this and they will surround us and wipe out our name from the earth. What then will you do for your own great name? So first, the result of sin. So verse one connects the last movie with the sequel. And so if we imagine this chapter seven being the next movie, the sequel’s gonna start off with a battle scene and the Israelites are losing and losing badly to their enemy. And as they do, we’re gonna hear these words from verse 1. The Israelites were unfaithful in regard to the devoted things. Achan took some of them. So the Lord’s anger burned against Israel. So sin and its consequences, including God’s wrath against sin, are major themes in this chapter. We’re gonna see it all the way throughout and we’re going to see it on display through most of the verses. Then we’re going to get to verse 26 and we’re going to see verse one and verse 26 kind of bookend this chapter with God’s wrath. And yet God’s anger is talked about in two different ways in these two verses. We read here that the people, Israel plural, were unfaithful. And how were they unfaithful? Achan, the Israelite singular, took some of the devoted things from Jericho. So was it Israel or Achan who took the devoted things? Yes, you see in verse one, it sets up a very important spiritual and cultural truth that we have a really hard time understanding in our hyper individualistic corporation culture. When Achan sins, Israel sins. In a strong group culture, which Israel was, you are not just an individual, you are part of the whole. You are representing the group. There was a corporate responsibility. You would help each other out, you would support each other, you’d pick each other up, you would raise each other’s kids. Some of you even know what that was like. How many of you got in trouble from somebody else’s parents back in the day? Right? Ask my dad. He got called on quite a few times with neighbors because that’s what you did. It’s a strong group culture. We’re all in this together. You feel the personal responsibility for the well being of other people. Not so today. We go in our garages and try and avoid everybody else. This isn’t the case here. And it’s important to understand because we’re going to see this pop up again later. Where do we see this today though? If you’ve ever been a part of a sports team, you know, you get a little bit of what this is like. We win and we what as a team, right? We win as a team, we lose as a team. When somebody does well, we all do well. When somebody goes after one of us, they go after all of us. One player breaks the rule, we all break the rule. One person misses curfew, we all get on the line and run sprints because we’re part of a team. We’re running for their stupidity, but they’re our teammate, and so we’re going to be there right alongside them running. The thing is, we all know the rules on a team. And Achan knew the rule. Achan knew the rule, just like all Israel did, because God’s instructions through Joshua in chapter six were very clear as they’re about to enter into Jericho. So you can look over in the last chapter, but I’ll just read it for us in Joshua 6, 17, 19, this is what God says through Joshua. The city and all that is in it are to be devoted to the Lord. But keep away from the devoted things so that you will not bring about your own destruction by taking any of them. Otherwise you will make the camp of Israel liable to destruction and bring trouble. And on it, Achan knowingly put himself, the nation, and his family at risk for trouble. By the way, Achan’s name means troubler. So he’s living up to that name, really leaning into it here. So that’s just verse one. So we as a reader know what’s going on right now, and Joshua has no idea. Joshua does not know what Achan has done at this point. So as he comes up to AI, there’s no prayer of seeking the Lord’s guidance on what should happen with the next enemy before them. But God just did an amazing thing by using some marching, some shouts and some trumpet blows to bring down the walls of this garrison. Joshua probably should have said, hey, Lord, any anything for this one? Anything different that we’re not expecting? But no. What does he do? He sends out spies and he has them kind of figure out, like, what is AI? Like, can we go after them? What should we do? And these spies maybe living high on the recent victory over Jericho, come back and say, eh, AI is nothing. You know, we don’t even need to send the whole army. 2,3000 should be enough. They’re small, it’s easy, let’s just relax. And he gives the okay and they attack. It’s a very quick fight scene. They get routed, 36 of their men die, and they are fleeing before their enemies. And the result of the defeat we read is that the people’s Hearts melt in fear like water. That should sound familiar to you because in chapter two, when Rahab is talking to the Israelite spies, they’re coming in, just knocking on the door, basically, of Jericho. She says, the people here, our hearts are melting in fear because of you and your God, because we heard what your God did by bringing you out of Egypt. And now God’s own people have their hearts melting in fear before him because they know what he has just allowed and they know what he might do. So what do you do after a massive loss like that? Especially when you aren’t really sure why you lost? Joshua has a prayer service. Him and the elders lay themselves before the ark of the Lord, before the presence of God. And Joshua basically asked God this, why did you bring us here to cross the Jordan to deliver us into the enemy’s hands. Now the people are going to think we’re weak. The people might even think that maybe their God isn’t with them anymore. They’re going to surround us and they’re going to defeat us. And Joshua, it’s just a prayer of desperation in this moment. And he’s going to the right place. He’s going to the Lord, but he has no idea why he lost. Was it something that he did? Was it his prayerlessness? Was it the bad advice of the spies? Was it bad strategizing? And you know, what? It might have been all of those things, all of that was probably lacking, but that wasn’t the reason they lost. He finishes where all prayers should end, seeking the glory of God in his name. When he says, what are you going to do about your great name, God? And in God’s mercy, he reveals to Joshua the reason for the loss. And not only this loss, but if they want to advance into the promised land, he needs them to know what’s going on in his camp. And that’s what we get. In the second scene, the revelation of sin. Look at verse 10. We’re going to read through 18. The revelation of sin. The Lord said to Joshua, stand up. What are you doing down in your face. Israel has sinned. They have violated my covenant, which I commanded them to keep. They have taken some of the devoted things they have stolen, they have lied. They have put them with their own possessions. That is why the Israelites cannot stand against their enemies. They turn their backs and run because they have been made liable to destruction. I will not be with you anymore unless you destroy whatever among you is devoted to destruction. Go consecrate the people. Tell them, consecrate yourselves in Preparation for tomorrow. For this is what the Lord, the God of Israel. There are devoted things among you, Israel. You cannot stand against your enemies until you remove them. In the morning, present yourselves tribe by tribe. The tribe the Lord chooses shall come forward clan by clan. The clan the Lord chooses shall come forward, family by family. And the family the Lord chooses shall come forward man by man. Whoever is caught with the devoted thing shall be destroyed by fire along with all that belongs to him. He has violated the covenant of the Lord and has done an outrageous thing in Israel. Early the next morning, Joshua had Israel come forward by tribes, and Judah was chosen. The clans of Judah came forward and the Zerahites were chosen. He had the clan of the Zerahites come forward by family, and Zimri was chosen. Joshua had his family come forward man by man, And Achan, son of Carmi, the son of Zimri, the son of Zerah, of the tribe of Judah was chosen. We’ll pause there. So we have a prayer meeting tonight that you heard about. Imagine the Lord answers that prayer right in the middle of whatever we’re praying tonight and says, stand up. And he gives us the answer. Here’s the answer to your prayers. And that’s what he does. For Joshua, the answer is simple. It’s none of what Joshua thinks it might be. God says, there is sin in the camp. That’s why you lost. You have violated the covenant that I made, doing what you were told not to do. And then he gives this rundown of the sins that are committed. He says, you’ve taken the devoted things you have stolen from God, tried to deceive God and everyone else by taking it and hiding it somewhere else in your own possessions. And so the destruction that came on the people, the loss of the battle, the loss of 36 lives, don’t forget, was all a very clear consequence of this action that God spelled out in Joshua 6. You’re liable to destruction if you bring these things in, if you take them. And what’s interesting is God doesn’t say, okay, now you’ve learned your lesson. You lost that battle against AI. Now you can go ahead and keep that stuff, right? I hope you slap on the wrist, you’ve learned your lesson. I mean, I had a friend of mine once who had a child that got a phone from somewhere they weren’t supposed to have a phone. And they found that phone and they said, all right, well, now that you know what you did was wrong, I’ll let you keep it. What? Like, how are you supposed to learn anything there so God doesn’t say, like, all right, well, you can keep the devoted things now because now you learned your lesson. He’s like, no, you need to do something decisively about this because these are devoted to me and they were stolen. Because God goes after sin. He takes it seriously. And he says, you’re going to keep experiencing the same thing that just happened at AI if you go against them again or any other nation, unless you devote everything to destruction, it has to be destroyed. But do you see God’s grace in this? He doesn’t have to tell them that. He could just let them keep going after AI and other nations that keep losing and keep losing. He says, I will make a way for you to have victory even though you sin. You just have to take care of it. And in order to do that, we have to find out who the guilty party is. Joshua still doesn’t know. The people still don’t know. Only Achan, only Achan knows. So he says, tell the people to prepare themselves for tomorrow, the next day. That’s important. Remember that the next day. This is now the time that people are going to find out what actually happened. One of them took the devoted things, and there’s no way to defeat AI or inanimation until that poison, that cancer is removed from the camp. And it’s not going to be fun. It’s not going to be an easy process. But sin is no light matter. And I want you to see in this moment, God could have shown a spotlight on Achan right then and there. That’s the guy. He could have done that very easily, but he doesn’t, because God is merciful and compassionate while he’s also a just judge. Listen to the process that they’re going to go through for this kind of discovery of the guilty party that God lays out for Joshua. He says, one, tell everyone to consecrate themselves, prepare themselves to stand before me tomorrow. So, yes, come in your Sunday best. Make sure you are clean and purified. But even more, prepare your hearts, search your hearts to see if there’s any sin in you. Did you take the devoted things? Because everyone in the nation is going to stand before the Lord. This is like one giant trial before God. The nation is going to court, and when you gather tomorrow, you’re going to stand by tribes and clans and families and by a process of elimination, there will be one person remaining. So this is the moment where, at least for the Israelites, if they know they’ve done nothing wrong, this is like that player on that team, when the Coach is disciplining the whole team, and eventually he wants to really find out who actually did it. Where you’re like, oh, phew, okay, it’s not me. I know I didn’t do the wrong thing. I did the right thing. So for some people, it’s probably like, all right, I’ll stand before God. I did nothing wrong. I know that. Maybe there’s like a handful of people, like, I don’t really know, did I? And then there’s Achan. And he knows. He knows. But this whole process to me sounds a lot like the mercy and patience of God to Achan, because this whole thing is set up to reveal the one who is guilty. And yet God has given him chance after chance after chance to confess and repent. Imagine this scene. It is highly organized. God is so intentional here, and he’s drawing on the seriousness of sin. So find your immediate family. Then start getting the cousins and the uncles and the aunts and the grandparents. You’re going to start to get together with your clans. Then you’re going to find the rest of the tribe. You’re going to gather around together. Maybe you’ve been in school. When they hand out, like, colored sheets of paper, say, anybody with green, you’re over here. Anybody with red, you’re over there. Like, this is highly organized and everybody’s getting to their place so they can stand before the Lord in their tribes. Imagine Achan, that morning, he gathers with his family before they head out. What’s going on in his head? Does he really think he’s going to get away with this? Is he really that blinded by his sin? Does he really not fear the Lord that much? It’s probably a combination of both of those. Of course, maybe God didn’t see through this whole process. We don’t know how it happened, but they start this process picking a tribe, a clan, a family, down to an individual. But what we know is that God has overseeing all of this because the guilty party remains. The man responsible is the one who is standing there in the end by himself. And now the people know who’s responsible. By my calculations, there are at least six times in this passage that Achan had a chance to drop to his knees before Joshua, before the nation, before God, and confess his sin. Verse 13. We have this general message regarding the need for consecration before the revelation of the sin tomorrow. There has been a stealing of the devoted things in the camp, and Achan stays silent. Verse 15. There is a personalized message, a warning to the one who is caught that all they have all that belongs to them will be destroyed by fire. Achan stays silent. Verse 16. The next day, he had a whole evening to search his heart. He had a whole evening to pray, to confess, to talk to his family, to call his friends over, to turn everything over, to grab Joshua in the morning and say, hey, Joshua, I need to talk to you for a second. I need to tell you what I did. Achan stays silent. And then through three rounds, from the tribe, to the clan, to the family, he stays silent over and over and over again. It’s just him now standing before Joshua, before the leaders, before the nation, before God. It’s too late. He’s had chance after chance. Cause you see, God responds to repentance. What we have here is he’s been found out. He is the remaining guilty party. But God responds to repentance, and we don’t get that from Achan. This man stands before God and before Joshua as guilty of stealing, of lying, of hiding his sin, and the death of 36 soldiers who went into AI and fell because of his sin. And he will be guilty of everything that happens to all his possessions and his family. So it’s important to ask here. What are you hiding right now? What are you hiding away buried deep in your heart? What secrets are you keeping? Because in the book of Numbers, it’s clear your sin will find you out one way or another. Sin will be pointed out. It can happen here as you humble yourself and bring it out in confession and repentance. Or it can happen at the final judgment when you will confess. But you will have no chance to repent because now is that time. Now is that time to repent, to turn from your sin, to believe in Jesus and see how that godly sorrow leads you to repentance and salvation. The easier thing in the moment here is for him to keep it hidden. That is the easier thing. But the easier thing is not the better thing. Bring it to light now and see how God responds to your repentance. My boys and I were watching a movie a couple weeks ago called We Bought a Zoo. Not the best movie, but it’s okay. But there was a quote in it, and the guy kind of lived by this quote. It was like, all you need is 20 seconds of insane courage to do something. To do something amazing, do something great, do something challenging in just 20 seconds of embarrassing bravery. And I just. This was running through my mind as I heard that quote. Aiken just. He needed two seconds. I did it. He just needed to, for two seconds, have the courage to Say, I did it to stand up, instead of seeing all of these different things happen until he is revealed as the one in sin. And so now Achan takes the stand, kind of for his defense, for what he has done. We start to see the kind of roots of his sin. So look at verse 19 through 23. Then Joshua said to Achan, my son, give glory to the Lord, the God of Israel, and honor him. Tell me what you have done. Do not hide it from me. Achan replied, it is true, I have sinned against the Lord, the God of Israel. This is what I have done. When I saw in the plunder a beautiful robe from Babylonia, 200 shekels of silver and a bar of gold weighing 50 shekels, I coveted them and took them. They are hidden in the ground inside my tent with the silver underneath. So Joshua sent messengers and they ran to the tent, and there it was, hidden in his tent with the silver underneath. They took the things from the tent, brought them to Joshua and all the Israelites, and spread them out before the Lord. So at this point, Achan is all alone. There’s no hiding anymore. Sin is out in the open. And so he stands there before everyone, guilty. And the meaning here of Joshua is he comes up to him and asks him or tells him to give glory to the Lord, the God of Israel. What he’s saying here in the Hebrew, it’s kind of like nuanced. He’s coming to me saying, in order to give glory to God, you need to confess. You need to confess in this moment. The Lord has revealed to all of us what you have done. You are guilty. Now give glory to God and honor him by confessing what you. There’s no point in running or hiding it anymore. And not just that, it carries the idea of confess and be ready to accept God’s just punishment for your sin. And so Achan speaks up, and he confesses now to what he has done, explaining how he got from standing in the plunder of Jericho to burying that treasure in his tent, which is exactly where Joshua and his men find it when they search for it. And Achan says, I saw a beautiful robe from Babylonia, shekels of silver, gold bars, the same plunder, by the way, that many of the other Israelites would have seen. And they didn’t take it when they went through the rubble. The key is what happened in Achan’s heart, because he says it right here. I coveted them and I took them. I thought my life would be better with them. This people has been in the Wilderness for a long time, not with a lot of stuff. God is providing food for them. God is providing what they need, but they don’t really necessarily have all that they want. So how enticing would it be to go through and see this enemy fall? It’s like, well, Jericho doesn’t need it anymore. Nobody’s going to miss just a little bit. So why don’t I just take a little? So he starts to play this in his mind, and he covets the. And then he takes them. If you know your Bible, it sounds very familiar. Genesis, chapter three. When the woman saw that the fruit of the tree was good for food and pleasing to the eye and also desirable for gaining wisdom, she took some and ate it. Achan saw the plunder. It looked good. He wanted it, desired it. So he took it and he hid it. And so he has confessed, but it’s with his back against the wall, right? He’s been found out. Confession is not repentance. You can confess without repenting. That’s very, very important for us to understand. You can confess without repentance. You can say, I did something wrong. I sinned against the Lord, I took something I wasn’t supposed to without a desire to stop or to change. But that’s what repentance is. It’s that turning. It’s that change. So he confesses. But we never see repentance here. And so the whole idea of feeling bad about what we’ve done, that’s worldly sorrow. That’s worldly sorrow. You are bummed about what the sin has done, the consequences that you’re experiencing, the feelings that you have. But that doesn’t lead to lasting change, because you’re not upset about the fact that you rebelled against God. You’re not upset about the grievousness of your sin against a holy God who has given you your very breath. And the Lord is looking for repentance. So what is repentance? I like this definition that I heard this week from Matt Chandler. Actually, this is funny. There’s no such thing as just a coincidence, right? Or just so happened. This happened. I was watching something else, totally unrelated, and the next video popped up was Matt Chandler talking about a culture of repentance in our churches. Like that seems pretty good because that’s what I’m preaching on this week. And this is what he says. This is the definition of repentance. Repentance is the act whereby one turns from his or her sin against idolatry and creaturely rebellion and turns to God in faith. See it’s not just confession. It’s the act whereby one turns from his or her sin, idolatry and creaturely rebellion and turns to God in faith. Listen to what Paul says in 2 Corinthians 7, which you heard read earlier. Paul has sent another letter to the Corinthians and it brought some sorrow to them. But he’s actually not feeling too bad about that. Cause he knows what the sorrow is doing in their lives. And this is where it picks up in verse nine. Yet now I am happy. Not because you were made sorry, but because your sorrow led you to repentance. For you became sorrowful as God intended and so were not harmed in any way by us. Godly sorrow brings repentance that leads to salvation and leaves no regret. But worldly sorrow brings death. I am sure Achan experienced regret. If only I could go back in that moment and say no to that temptation, I would not be here. How many times has that been you or me? But regret just wishes something didn’t happen, that we could go back, which isn’t enough to necessarily change things in the future. I know. Because we continue to sin and sometimes it’s really hard to give up certain sins. And that’s where we need repentance. When you say, yeah, that’s what I did in the past, I wish I didn’t do that. I can’t change that though. So now, in this moment, as I turn, how can I prepare myself so that I don’t do that again? So you’re not living with the regret you’re looking and seeing. How is God going to redeem this in my life? And how is he going to change things for me in the future? And when we realize that we’ve sinned against a holy God, that our sin is seriousness, every consequence we experience is just. That’s when we run to Jesus and we experience his salvation. That’s what 2 Corinthians 7 says. Godly sorrow brings repentance that leads to salvation and worldly sorrow. Regret, just confessing will lead to death. So if you’re hearing this and you know there is sin in your life right now, that what you have done is rebellion against against God, it is evil. It is grievous. Then you confess and repent. Come to God in faith. Don’t hide it any longer. We talk about this a lot here. The cross says there’s nothing that you’ve done that Jesus didn’t pay for on the cross. Nothing, surely. Yeah, but what about this? Paid for. Yeah, but what about that? Every Thought, every word, every action that, that we have done. What Jesus did on the cross is enough to cover all of it. But are we gonna repent of it? Are we gonna turn from it? Are we gonna see what Jesus has actually done, the cost of his life for us, so that we can say, I have been forgiven. I can change. He can change me. And now it’s just not regret of the past. It’s like, what is the Lord gonna do? Redeeming this. This leads to our last scene, Then the response to sin. Look at verse 24 through 26. Then Joshua, together with all Israel, took Achan, son of Zerah, the silver, the robe, the gold bar, his sons and daughters, his cattle, donkeys and sheep, his tent and all that he had to the valley of Achor. Joshua said, why have you brought this trouble on us? The Lord will bring trouble on you today. Then all Israel stoned him. And after they had stoned the rest, they burned them over Achan, they heaped up a pile of rocks, which remains to this day. Then the Lord turned from his fierce anger. Therefore, that place has been called the Valley of Achor ever since. So Achan, his children, his cattle, his possessions are all taken out of the camp, signifying the removal of sin from the camp. Very important. Everything he took from Jericho is out there as well. And at this point, we see Achan with his treasure. For where your treasure is, there your heart will be also. He’s standing there with what he thought in the moment was better than everything else God had given him. He’s there with his treasure. Is his treasure his family, or was it his stuff? We don’t know. But there he is, standing with everything that he has. Everything that has been associated with Achan has now become part of what is devoted to destruction, treated just like the city of Jericho, because the Israelites were supposed to go in and bring God with them. They weren’t supposed to take Jericho with them. But that’s what he’s doing, taking a little part of Jericho. And in that moment now, he has become what he has worshiped. We are what we eat. We are what we worship. And so here he is standing with all his stuff, with all his possessions. And there’s no doubt this is a difficult passage to read. Definitely difficult to read in front of your family. Difficult to understand and to walk away feeling good. And we need to acknowledge that maybe we can all see how Akin could get to this point, how he is getting what he deserves. Maybe that’s you. But his sons and daughters, like, what do the animals do all of his stuff. You know, when we think about sports too, there have been teams that worked really hard to win championships and then they get those championships stripped. Why? Usually because one person cheated. One person did something that wasn’t right, that went against the rules and they stripped the entire team of their championship. They take all that away from them. And we’re sitting there and how many of us have said, that’s not fair? I mean, am I the only one that’s not fair? So we’re sitting here like, that’s sports. This is people’s lives. That’s happening right here. So what do we do with this? Why the family? Why the animals? Why the other possessions? A couple things to say. We can’t stand on scripture on this firmly, but there is a chance that the family was complicit in what he did. We don’t know. What I do know is that I change things in my office a lot. Brandon loves to comment on that. When my family comes into my office, there’s like, usually, what’d you do? What’d you move? Why is that there? I don’t like that there. I do like that there. Like, I can’t move something in my office without my family recognizing it. And here he is digging a hole in his tent with his treasure, the stuff he was not supposed to have. You’re thinking, how in the world would he have done that without people knowing, going unnoticed? We don’t know for sure. It just seems really hard to think they didn’t know anything in that moment. And then the other thing is, think about maybe they just died because their father was guilty and sinned and they didn’t know about it. This is not a commentary on the sons and daughters life. It’s a commentary on Achan and what he did. So in these moments, like, is that fair? And I’m just saying, like, we have to wrestle with these things without walking away with a satisfactory answer because we get very little here. All we know is everything Achan had was devoted to destruction. A word to parents, just briefly on this. We need to watch our lives because again, what he did was by taking the devoted things was saying, God isn’t enough. We need these things in our life. And so our kids are watching. When we think about generational sin, we think things being passed down. The most embarrassing thing for me is to go to my kids and confess sin in my life that I see in them because I know where they saw it and it’s in me and they’re responsible for their Own actions. I’m responsible for my own actions on this side of the cross. We know that we’re each individually responsible for what we do, not the sins of others. But I can certainly pass down some bad DNA. I am passing down some bad DNA. And so I need to watch my life. I need to think about my life as an example to them. Because imagine if his family sees him do this and then get away with it. What kind of view do they have about God? What kind of view are they going to have about their own sin in their life? It’s not that big of a deal. I can hide it. God’s not gonna find out. No, we take sin seriously in our life. And parents or kids, students. Ah man, all the students are on the retreat. Bummer. Okay, I’ll tell them when they get back. Kids and students, like, if you see sin in your parents life, you should say something to them lovingly and respectfully. But if it is sin, you’re gonna want to say something. And I mean that. If my kids call me out for sin, I need to know that, not preferences, not I don’t like this. But if they say, dad, you’re doing this, I want to know that one. Because they’re seeing it, they’re noticing it, and I want to do something about it. But no matter how you look at this question of how this happened, why God did this, the text doesn’t say a whole lot. There are some truths that we can hold onto in moments like this. So there’s a truth with any sort of tough passage like this that, that I come back to over and over again. I’ve said it here before. I say it in journey group, community group, because we have to be very clear that God does not have to defend himself in this moment. He does not have to defend himself for his judgment, and he won’t defend it. So the question that I have is an anchor in my own soul for this. In tough passages and suffering and other moments, things like school shootings that happen, where you’re always like, why? Why? Why did you allow this to happen? When I can’t see the bigger picture? This is the question that comes to mind every single time. It’s the question that Abraham asked in Genesis 18 before God judges Sodom and Gomorrah, he says, will not the judge of all the earth do what is right? Will not the judge who sees everything, who was there with Abraham, who is there at this moment that we’re reading about today in Joshua 7? He was there at the cross. He’s here today. If he can see everything, know everything is good and right in all his judgments, will not the judge of all the earth do what is right? Did he not know Achan’s heart and his family’s hearts? Did he not have reason for why he did this? He does. Does he need to explain them to us? No. I do know that he sent his own son to the cross. Achan went to his death for his own sin. He paid for his own sin and he gives up his name. His family is blotted out because he went as an Israelite to say, I’ve become like a Canaanite in taking and stealing from God. And he is no longer in the books. Rahab the prostitute, the Canaanite becomes an Israelite because of her repentance and faith and belief. He in the God of Israel. It is very different. You see the contrast there. And then they pile these rocks on top of everything. We just had stones a few weeks ago, as the people cross over the Jordan river, they put these 12 stones up as a memorial to say, this is how the Lord has brought us into the Promised land. And these rocks will represent God’s holiness and how he takes sin seriously. So when we ask the question, why does God do this here in this time, he doesn’t always act in this way. We have to think about Israel’s history, read through their history. Every time they sin, and it goes unchecked. Every time there lacks in judgment. When people aren’t held accountable, when leaders get to do whatever they want, terrible things happen to the people of Israel. Exile and death and the like. And then remember, they just came out of the promised land or out of the wilderness for 40 years, kept out of the Promised land because of the sin of the former generation for their lack of faith in God. And now they’re going to enter in and sin against the Lord. Are they going to be in this for another 40 years? Say like, no, you guys are stopped here. No, he says, I am giving you away. Destroy the devoted things and you will be able to continue on in the Promise land. So why does this story matter for us? Remember I said that this book, the Wrath of God, bookends this chapter, verse one and verse 26. In verse one we read that the Lord’s anger burned against Israel and they lose in their battle against AI, their enemy. Now, with the things devoted to destruction destroyed, God said, if you do that, I will provide a way for you. And what we see in verse 26, it says, then the Lord turned from his fierce Anger. See the wrath of God right there burning against Israel. And now he has turned from his fierce anger toward them. It burned against Israel, it burned against Achan. And now it has been turned away because they finally destroyed the very last of Jericho. They’ve destroyed the very last of the devoted things. And the only way for God’s wrath to be satisfied is to judge sin. And while Achan’s sin brought guilt to the nation, while the nation experienced those consequences of that sin, they didn’t face the ultimate judgment of death. Achan took that spot, dying for his own sin, and yet representing the people. And because of his death, God turned away his anger from Israel so they can continue in the promised land. Ain’t Achan his family, the Israelites, you and me, all deserve what happened to Achan. We all deserve that. And if you don’t think that, then you don’t understand how great our sin is against this holy God cause God’s judgment, our sin, idolatry and creature rebellion against him deserves death. And yet he sends his son, Jesus, who was actually innocent without sin, no one could point a finger at him and say he was wrong in any way. And he was taken outside the city as a sinner, which he wasn’t, nailed into a cross representing us, our sin, the penalty for our sin. His lifeless body was not covered with rocks, but it was put into a rock. They hewn out this space there for this grave and somebody ends up giving it and he is put inside of that. Achan’s body remained under those rocks. Jesus did not stay in the rock. He rose from the dead victorious, showing that God’s wrath was completely satisfied in him. The one died for many. So when we think like, is it fair that this happened to Achan and all that we need to ask, is it fair that we’re here? Is it fair that we’re saved? Is it fair that Jesus Christ went to the cross? Because here’s the thing, Achan knew in that moment before he dies that he is guilty of his sin. Jesus went to the cross knowing he wasn’t guilty. So Achan didn’t give up his life. His life was taken from him, just like he took from Jericho, just like he took from God. Jesus laid down his life. There’s a big difference. He laid down his life for us. And God’s wrath was satisfied in that moment for all those who call on Jesus name. So when we understand all this, when we understand our sin against a holy God, the length and depth of his grace in sending Jesus to save us, we start to understand what godly sorrow actually looks like. Which leads to the big idea today. Let godly sorrow lead you to repentance. Let godly sorrow lead you to to repentance. Godly sorrow is understanding the evil and grievousness of our sin before a holy God. It’s seeing the distance between you and your intimacy with God. It’s taking full responsibility without any excuse for what you’ve done. And finally, it is coming up with a plan to keep yourself from stumbling again, that turn in your life. And you are going to get a chance to talk through that this week in community group. So be thinking about it now. Here’s what I don’t want to have happen. When you meet with your community group to say nothing. There is something in your life that you are living like with a worldly sorrow. You feel bad about it, you might confess it, but you’re not repenting of it. Start to ask the Holy Spirit to give you the courage those 20 seconds to say, this is what I’m dealing with. If you can’t do that in community group, you’re going to continue to hide your sin. Cause who else will you feel comfortable with? That’s what the community is for. That’s what the community was like. Then he should have felt comfortable to go to somebody and say, this is what I did. So you’re gonna get some time to do that in a few moments personally, before we take the Lord’s Supper, you are gonna have an opportunity to confess sin in your life. And I’m praying that you have 20 seconds of courage to say, lord, this is what I’m dealing with. You know it, but I am confessing it and I am repenting of it. Now, in this moment, examining your life just to make sure you are taking this meal in a worthy manner. And just a quick word to my City View family. Remember I said the strong group culture was kind of the norm back then. You know, that’s supposed to be us now. It’s not just the norm back then with Israel. Read through the New Testament, see all the one another passages. That’s exactly it. We confess to one another. It means be the safe place where people can confess and repent of their sins so that we can then encourage one another in the faith. It also has other community application for us in protecting our church against sin. When we see sin, when it’s there, we keep each other accountable. We call it out. Church discipline is a part of this so that we keep the purity of the church, so that we can continue to pursue God unhindered by sin, the things that we’re hiding in our lives so that we can represent Jesus Christ to the world. Well, in our church, the story isn’t over for the people of Israel. That’s just part one. You don’t have to wait a whole summer though again for the next blockbuster, but you do have to come back next Sunday. So you have to wait a week because the story of Israel and AI is not complete. But we see if they want to continue, if they want to advance, they needed to take care of this sin and, and take care of it decisively. And by God’s grace they did that. And by God’s grace, we will do that in our own lives, even as we come to the Lord’s table. Would you please pray with me? Lord, we come before you grateful that you love us, that you are filled with mercy and compassion towards the sinful people that we are, that even in our rebellion you have made a way for us to be saved. And Lord, I pray in these moments, as Brandon comes to lead us before we take of this bread and cup, that we spend these moments before you confessing and repenting the sin in our life so that we can take this meal today with glad hearts, with thankful hearts, with forgiven hearts. We pray all this in Jesus name, Amen.

2. 

   11 Oct 2026

   Holy War (Joshua 5:13-6:27)

   PODCAST Holy War October 11, 2026 | Brandon Cooper Brandon discusses the story of Joshua and the battle of Jericho confronts one of the most uncomfortable questions in Scripture: how could a loving God command the destruction of an entire city? Before the battle even begins, Joshua encounters the Commander of the Lord’s army, who refuses to take sides, reminding us that God is not partisan but is committed to justice and righteousness. The strange battle plan, with its seven-day march and trumpet blasts, was never about military strategy. It was a declaration that God alone wins the victory, and His people are called to trust and depend on Him completely. Rahab, a prostitute who believed what she had heard about God, was spared while the city fell, showing that salvation was available to anyone willing to respond in faith. Ultimately, this story points forward to Jesus Christ, who placed Himself under judgment in our place so that we could be rescued from the destruction we deserve. TRANSCRIPT_______________________________________________+ The following is an uncorrected transcript generated by a transcription service. Before quoting in print, please check the corresponding audio for accuracy. Good morning church. You can go ahead, grab your Bibles, open up to Joshua chapter 5, Joshua chapter 5. Starting in verse 13, Joshua 5:13. As you were turning there, there was a cartoon some years ago in a Christian publication. That’s an important part of the story. This was a Christian magazine, a cartoon that had two Israelite military commanders strategizing before a walled city, presumably Jericho. And the one looks at the other and says, what would Jesus do? The punchline captures the unease that most Christians. Again, this was in a Christian publication most Christians feel about the conquest of the promised land. And a holy war is in general because it feels so antithetical to the spirit of Christ, which we’ll leave undefined for now. The vibes that Jesus gives though, because Jesus said things like, love your enemies, pray for those who persecute you. So why exactly did God direct his people to invade this land and put the population to the sword? It’s a question that demands an answer, and a careful one at that. And I think we’ll get an answer as we examine our passage. This morning we walk through the famous story of Joshua fighting the battle of Jericho in three scenes. We’re going to do that first, kind of get the lay of the land, what exactly is happening, and then we’ll turn and tackle that question head on, armed with new understanding in the final third of the sermon or so. So let’s begin by walking through the story. Here is scene one. First of all, the plan. Joshua 5:13 through 6:5. I will read it for us now. When Joshua was near Jericho, he looked up and saw a man standing in front of him with a drawn sword in his hand. Joshua went up to him and asked, are you for us or for our enemies? Neither, he replied, but as commander of the army of the Lord, I have now come. Then Joshua fell face down to the ground in reverence and asked him, what message does my Lord have for his servant? The commander of the Lord’s army replied, take off your sandals for the place where you are standing is holy. And Joshua did so. Now the gates of Jericho were securely barred because of the Israelites. No one went out and no one came in. And the Lord said to Joshua, see, I have delivered Jericho into your hands along with its king and its fighting men. March around the city once with all the armed men. Do this for six days. Have seven priests carry trumpets of rams horns in front of the Ark. On the seventh day, march around the city seven times with the priests blowing the trumpets. When you hear them, sound a long blast on the Trumpets have the whole army give a loud shout and the wall of the city will collapse and the army will go up. Everyone straight in. Well, like Jacob at Peniel and Moses before the burning bush, we have here is a man of God called by God to be a leader, facing a life or death situation. Esau, Pharaoh, and now Jericho. So facing a life or death situation, who then encounters the living God. God. There’s a difference in this story, though, because of course, Jacob wrestles the angel of the Lord and Moses argues with God. But Joshua doesn’t do either, most likely because he’s got his sword drawn, this heavenly being that stands before him. Actually, are not too many times where we read that a heavenly being has his sword drawn. The only other two in the Old Testament are when Balaam is riding on his donkey to go curse Israel and the donkey stops because there’s an angel in front of their way with his sword drawn. Or David sees the angel with his sword drawn above the threshing floor when God sends his plague on Jerusalem after David’s sin. With the census in each case, you realize quickly, this is not somebody to be toyed with. That’s why the donkey stops and eventually talks to Balaam like, Bruh, we don’t want to keep moving here. Trust me on this, okay? Not somebody to be toyed with, because it’s the embodiment of. Of divine justice produces in those men, as it produces here in Joshua, a humble fear of the Lord. You can understand then, as he’s standing before a being like this, why Joshua went on to know what side he’s on. And so he asks, are you for us or are you for our enemies? And the commander of the Lord’s army says, no, not neither, by the way. He says, no, I think neither is a fine translation, but it’s a little blunter than that. It’s like he just declines to answer the question entirely, which makes sense because Joshua needs to remember what we often need to remember, which is that God is sovereign, not partisan, which will affect our answer. God’s answer here, maybe you’re getting the same texts I’m getting as it’s October and we’re coming up on election day, every couple of minutes, it seems somebody reaches out saying, hey, we just want to know, are you for us or are you part of the dark side? Are you for our enemies who are going to destroy this country in the next 12 minutes if they’re elected? Now, I just block the number at that point. That’s how I deal with the problem. But the answer is similar to what the angel of the Lord, the commander of the Lord’s army, says here. No, no. The answer I would like to give is, look, I am for justice. I am for the sanctity of life. I am for integrity, personal and professional in the lives of those elected to serve this country. I am for lifting the poor. I am. And I could go on from here, of course. Well, now, imagine how God would respond to that text. Hey, Jesus, you voting Republican or Democrat this fall? We want to co opt God for our side. That’s the issue here. We want to co opt God for our side, like snagging a celebrity endorsement. And that’s not how that works. That’s the point God is making to Joshua here. What he’s really saying is, joshua, you asked the wrong question. Like, imagine for a moment a kid in the back row of the lecture hall as the professor is droning on and finally raises his hand and goes, hey, will this be on the final? And then you leave off the second half of the question, but it’s there. Will this be on the final or can I forget it? And what would the professor say? No, you’re asking the wrong question. What you should be asking is, is this important information that will form me as a person, increase my knowledge and understanding so I can go out into the world equipped for what I have to do? Joshua asked the wrong question, as if to highlight just how uncomprehendingly he approached God. God says, why don’t you take your sandals off because you are standing on holy ground again like Moses before him at the burning bush. In both cases, God meets his man and then commissions him for service. In fact, this is a pattern often repeated in Scriptures. What happens with Isaiah as well. Holy, holy, holy is the Lord God Almighty. The temple’s shaking. Isaiah is undone. Woe is me. I’m a sinner. Seraph comes, burns his lips, Atonement, all of that. Now who will go? And Isaiah says, here am I. Send me Ezekiel. Same story. Even Mary, when the angel Gabriel comes to her. The same story. It is our story as well. If we follow Christ before God calls us to a life of service and discipleship, he meets us with his saving presence. Thank God. I mean, think what joy and relief Joshua must have felt in this moment when he figured out who this guy was. Joshua went to look at a problem and found himself looking at God like that is the sigh of relief. This is why we bring our cares to God in prayer. Because before we face the problem, we need to face God we need to meet with God, remember who he is, and then follow as he leads. And that is the point of this strange scene. And it is a strange scene before Jericho. It’s as if, as one commentator put it, we need to remember God’s position before we know his plans. Especially given how quick we are to jump to problem solving, to solutions. H.L. ellison put it like this. We can easily become more interested in special guidance than in a right relationship with the guide. And that feel like a good word for us today as we prepare to venture out in faith and plant a church. How many of you have problem solving questions right now? I know I do. How are we going to plant is not the question. The question is who? Who will build his church against which the gates of hell shall not prevail? The scene then continues, continues across the chapter break, but with this brief parenthetical note in verse 1, Jericho is shut tight. Gate is closed. It’s locked up. It is closed literally. It is closed spiritually, figuratively as well, because it has been closed to the invitation of God. Eyes are closed to God’s power, ears are closed to God’s word. But what happens here in verse one, it’s just like with the call of Moses. Before God addresses the problem, he makes it big. He wants to make sure that Joshua, Moses, we understand the obstacle first. When he was speaking to Moses, he said, I have seen my people’s misery. I’ve seen the oppression, the abuse they’re suffering at the hands of their slave drivers. I think God does this because he wants us to know our need to realize that we need him, that we are dependent on him for our salvation. In essence, what God says is, here’s the problem and then here’s the mission that will solve it. And that’s what God gives. Then in verses 2 to 5, notice by the way, I kept saying God when Joshua met the commander of the Lord’s army. Here’s why. Because in verse two, and as we’re continuing the same scene, the Lord said to Joshua, so somehow or other the commander of the Lord’s army, whether it’s the pre incarnate Christ or it’s just the manifestation of God’s glory in such a way that Joshua could actually see him. I don’t know. But this is God speaking, and he gives his strategy. It’s a strange strategy to say the least. Don’t let the fact that you maybe grew up in church, so you’ve heard this story a thousand times, dull your appreciation of just how absurd this is. It is a strange strategy, but it is a strategy fraught with symbolism. You’ll remember if you were here last week that Israel just celebrated the Passover feast. What follows after Passover is the feast of unleavened bread, which is a seven day festival. So for the seven days of the feast of unleavened Bread, Israel is going to be marching around Jericho. The feast of unleavened bread celebrated God’s victory over his enemies. In other words, this is going to be a living memorial of that first Passover, the truest celebration of it. Beyond that, of course we have echoes of the creation account. I’m sure we caught that because you got this 6, 7 pattern that we see repeated in scripture so often. Six days kind of the same, and then the seventh one is totally different. And so this is part of God’s act of recreation, restoration of the world after it fell into sin. And what happens on the seventh day in the creation account? God rests. And that’s what’s happening here. We’ve already talked about this in Joshua. By entering the promised land, Israel is in a limited sense entering rest. By the way, the trumpets that they’re blowing, these trumpets of rams horns are jubilee trumpets. That’s the word that’s used in Hebrew. What is the jubilee? It’s the seventh seven. So after 49 years, there’s a year of arrest. And these are the trumpets that are being blown. At this point you can’t miss what’s happening. Plus seven is the number of completion, perfection, showcasing God’s complete victory over his enemies. Like I said, a lot of symbolism. So it’s a strange strategy, militarily, but not theologically. And which do you think matters more? No, but really, which do you think matters more? Because if you’re at all like me, you’re going strategy like military, like help me out. No, what matters most is the theological question, the God who stands behind this pattern, this plan. So they march around just so we’ve got it in our minds, because we have a hard time picturing Jericho. I’m sure the hill of Jericho is, is about a half mile perimeter. So this is tiny. I know a lot of us picture in big here. It’s a half mile. Even though they’re probably about five miles away from it in terms of their camps. It’s an 11 mile round trip hike, not a big deal even for a population. They wrap it up, then on the seventh day they go seven times around that still, that’s like a normal evening walk, like not a big deal. They walk around Seven times. And they wrap it up with this shout. The shout is a big word. It shows up a lot in Hebrew Bible. Of course, it means a lot. Like what means in English, you shout when you’re sounding a note of alarm, like you’re startled or something. It is a war cry often, but it shows up in one other context a lot. Like Psalm 100, for example. Shout for joy to the Lord, all the earth. It is the sound of praise. And which one is happening here? And you’re going, yeah, all of them. Right, so that’s the strategy here. Let’s see it unfold though. That’s scene one, the plan. Here’s scene two, the battle itself. Verses six to 21. I’ll keep reading. So Joshua, son of nun, called the priests and said to them, take up the Ark of the Covenant of the Lord and have seven priests carry trumpets in front of it. And he ordered the army advance march around the city with an armed guard going ahead of the Ark of the Lord. When Joshua had spoken to the people, the seven priests carrying the seven trumpets before the Lord went forward blowing their trumpets and the Ark of the Lord’s covenant followed them. The armed guard marched ahead of the priests who blew the trumpets, and the rear guard followed the Ark. All this time the trumpets were sounding, but Joshua had commanded the army, do not give a war cry. Do not raise your voices. Do not say a word until the day I tell you to shout, then shout. So he had the Ark of the Lord carried around the city, circling at once. The army returned to camp and spent the night there. Joshua got up early the next morning, the priests took up the Ark of the Lord. The seven priests carrying the seven trumpets went forward, marching before the Ark of the Lord and blowing the trumpets. The armed men went ahead of them and the rear guard followed the Ark of the Lord while the trumpets kept sounding. So on the second day, they marched around the city once and returned to the camp. They did this for six days. On the seventh day, they got up at daybreak and marched around the city seven times in the same manner, except that on that day they circled the city seven times. The seventh time around, when the priests sounded the trumpet blast, Joshua commanded the army shout, the Lord has given you the city. The city and all that is in it are to be devoted to the Lord. Only Rahab the prostitute and all who are with her in her house shall be spared because she hid the spies we sent. But keep away from the devoted things that you will not bring about your own destruction by taking any of them. Otherwise you will make the camp of Israel liable to destruction and bring trouble on it. All the silver and gold and the articles of bronze and iron are sacred to the Lord and must go into his treasury. When the trumpet sounded, the army shouted. And at the sound of the trumpet, when the men gave a loud shout, the wall collapsed. So everyone charged straight in and they took the city. They devoted the city to the Lord and destroyed with the sword every living thing in it. Men and women, young and old, cattle, sheep and donkeys. Not a whole lot of new information here really. Joshua leads God’s people to carry out God’s commands. Exactly at the center of it all is the Ark of the Covenant. I mean literally at the center of it all, because you got the armed guard before it and behind it. And it’s just the priests at this point who are blowing their trumpets. They’re the only ones who are making any noise. We saw that in verse 10. Joshua commands the army very carefully, clearly, don’t shout. Don’t make any noise just yet. Make sure that you’re silent. This is a very weird parade at this point. God is highlighting the passive people who are dependent on the presence of Almighty God. He is trying to drive home the point that he drives home so often, just like at the Red Sea, that God’s people don’t participate in their victory. Sure, they get a little mop up action at the end there, that last paragraph, but God wants to prove his glory to his people and increase their feeling of dependence and trust. This is good. This is good for us because we are by our sinful nature, glory thieves. We like taking credit for God’s work. Paul is an excellent example of this. He’s talking about Paul, the most effective evangelist the world has ever known is talking about his ministry in many ways. And he’s saying, look, we have this treasure in jars of clay. 2nd Corinthians 4:7. We have this treasure in jars of clay. So there’s the treasure of the gospel. I mean, invaluable, priceless treasure. You’re thinking this belongs in crystal or porcelain. No, it’s in a cracked earthen vessel like you and me, to show that the all surpassing power is from God and not from us. People are going to look at the treasure and they’re going to look at the pot and they’re going to go, these are not organically related. Like, it is clear that the treasure is separate from the jar. And they’re going to look and go, well then where does the treasure come from? It comes from God, he gets the glory. That’s an evangelistic context, which is a good reminder for us, of course. I mean, Jake talks a little bit about this, even in making the invitation to something as simple as fall, a festival. And we get all nervous about it because we think it’s up to us, like, how am I going to do this? And so we think it’s going to be our clever arguments or persuasive proclamation that turns somebody to the Lord. That’s not going to happen. God may use those, sure, but it is God who turns the heart, which means the most important work we do evangelistically. It’s the first letter in our acronym, our going places evangelism acronym. The P is what? Pray. Pray. That’s kind of the lesson that God is teaching Joshua and Israel. Here we get the same story on six successive days. And then on the seventh, Joshua commands the people to shout, verse 16, shout, the Lord has given you the city and you’re expecting what, a shout. I don’t know if you noticed. You get a whole bunch of text before we get to the shout down in verse 20. This is so anticlimactic. Like, what a terrible time for a commercial break. Why the delay? Why does God interrupt the narrative here? We just want to see the walls come down already. But scripture here is highlighting the importance of the instructions that are given. It’s more important than the walls tumbling down. The most important part here is that what belongs to the Lord needs to be given to the Lord. You got to pay attention to these instructions. If you doubt me there, come back next week and listen to Achan’s story. God was right to do this. What are those instructions? The whole city is under the ban is what it’s called. They’re devoted to the Lord. If you’re looking in Niv, there’s a text note at the bottom. It says this. The Hebrew term refers to the irrevocable giving over of things or persons to the Lord, often by totally destroying them. So it’s stuff that’s either given to the Lord, like the gold and the silver, it goes into the temple treasury, or it is utterly destroyed, devoted to the Lord. In other words, put beyond normal use. It’s in the holy sphere. Now. You think of the gold utensils in the most holy place. Like, you don’t use a dish for some service to the Lord and then go home and serve your soup in it. Like once it belongs to the Lord, it belongs to the Lord. That’s what this word means here as well. And so in A sense, then those who are devoted to the Lord, people, animals, are sacrificed to the Lord. Now, this is a hard word. This is judgment on culture, not on an individual. We’re talking about culture wide judgment, specifically to prevent God’s people from assimilating to this sinful culture. Like, what’s being described here is like when you go into a wooded area and you rip out buckthorn, like from the roots, and then you poison what might be left of the roots, that it’s gone. Because you’re going, this is an invasive species. This will kill what is good in this world if it’s left alone. That’s what’s happening here. We know this because that’s exactly how Moses described the ban when it was first given back. In Deuteronomy 20, verses 17 and 18, it says this. Completely destroy them. The Hittites, Amorites, Canaanites, Perizzites, Hivites, and Jebusites, as the Lord your God has commanded you. Why? Because otherwise they will teach you to follow all the detestable things they do in worshiping their gods, and you will sin against the Lord your God. This is the hardest part to swallow, which is why we’re going to come back to it at the end. So leave your questions for now. The people shout, the walls collapse in on themselves, and then the army rushes in. Now, if somebody were to make a movie adaptation of this, they will at some point, I’m sure. This would be the longest scene. You get lots of bloody, gory action scenes, Braveheart, Gladiator kind of stuff. Not here. Scripture is totally uninterested in these sort of carnal delights. It’s just a brief. Yep. And then they did what they were supposed to do. But it is a tough description still. They put everyone to the sword. Men and women, young and old, cattle, sheep and donkeys. I think it’s important to see. By the way, scripture doesn’t hide this from us. This isn’t like the Chinese Communist Party in Tiananmen Square, you know. Sorry, your Google search results yielded no results. When you type this in, in China, it isn’t like that. Like Jericho. Don’t talk to us about Jericho. God’s going, yeah, this is what happened. Here it is in my infallible word. I’m not trying to hide this. That every living being in the city is put to the sword. Again, we got to talk about why in a moment. But every living being in the city is put to the sword, except for one family. Just one family. That’s our third scene. And let’s look at this. The aftermath the rest of chapter 6, verses 22 to 27 Joshua said to the two men who had spied out the land, go into the prostitute’s house and bring her out and all who belong to her in accordance with your oath to her. See, the young men who had done the spying went in and brought out Rahab, her father and mother, her brothers and sisters, and all who belonged to her. They brought out her entire family and put them in a place outside the camp of Israel. And they burned the whole city and everything in it. They put the silver and gold and the articles of bronze and iron into the treasury of the Lord’s house. But Joshua spared Rahab, the prostitute with her family and all who belonged to her, because she hid the men Joshua had sent as spies to join. She lives among the Israelites to this day. At that time, Joshua pronounced this solemn oath cursed before. The Lord is the one who undertakes to rebuild this city, Jericho, the cost of his firstborn son. He will lay its foundations at the cost of his youngest. He will set up its gates. So the Lord was with Joshua, and his fame spread throughout the land. Now, why isn’t Rahab under the ban? It’s because she’s already devoted herself and her family to the Lord. She is an Israelite now. You see that in verse 27 it says, even to this day, she, or at least her descendants are living there in Israel. So she is spared. The Contrast between verse 23 and verse 24 is stark and instructive because Rahab is saved and then the city is burned. And so the juxtaposition is the reminder that salvation is was available to all, because they all knew God. They had already seen him. Rahab tells us as much. That’s why Rahab and Jericho are so tightly connected, because the contrast is so important. Rahab said, everybody’s melting with fear. Everybody’s heard what God has done. Rahab repented. In light of that, Jericho did not hang on to that. And then, in accordance with Deuteronomy 13:16, I won’t read it for us. But Joshua pronounces a curse. Because what Deuteronomy tells us is that any population center that had been dedicated to pagan worship was to be left uninhabited. Foolishly, during the time of Ahab, who was effectively a pagan king, even though he was an Israelite, Hio rebuilt Jericho in 1 Kings 16. Of course, you may remember Jesus being in Jericho at point. So it is rebuilt. Hiyah rebuilds it at the cost of his oldest and youngest Sons, what an indictment of the age in which he lived. That that would have happened then. But as a result of all this, and wholly unsurprisingly, Joshua’s fame grows. We see here what we’ve seen throughout, that God’s presence is the indisputable key to what makes Joshua this military leader. But they know Joshua’s name. And that’s actually important for the rest of the campaign. Because now when Joshua leads his army, people are gonna go, I heard about Joshua. We should skedaddle. And so this will actually prevent further bloodshell, bloodshed. The fear of Joshua will drive people out. That’s the story. The opening question still stands. And so I’m going to try to answer it now with my thesis. For us today, the big idea is to bring his peace, God makes war on violence. To bring his peace, God makes war on violence. Now that is a bold. We’re going to need to unpack it carefully. We need to understand the problem that we’re addressing, which is the problem of violence, the violence of the people, but God’s violence against them as well. We’re also going to need to understand the purpose, which is peace. And certainly we need to understand the presence of God in all of this. So let’s dig in. Why are God’s people killing innocent Canaanites as they invade their land? If I were the commander of the Lord’s army, I would respond to that question. No, it’s the wrong question. That question gets everything totally wrong, like every part of it. Start with the innocent Canaanites. They are not innocent. The Lord has gone out of his way to show us that. So way back in Genesis 15, when God makes his promises to Abraham and says, I’m going to give you this land, he then explains, by the way, brief 470 year detour in Egypt, you’re going to be slaves there. Why? Listen to what he says. Genesis 15, 13 and 16. For 400 years, your descendants will be strangers in a country not their own and will be enslaved and mistreated. There, in the fourth generation, your descendants will come back here. For the sin of the Amorites has not yet reached its full measure. So Israel suffers for centuries because God is patient and unfailingly just. So while we’re asking the question, God, how could you do this? The Israelites for about half a millennium have been asking the question, how long, Lord? How long must we endure Injustice reminds us that there is a strange inconsistency in our complaints against God. How many of us have asked the question, why Didn’t God stop Hitler? And yet at the same time, how many of us are asking the question, how could God stop Jericho? Which is it? What we learn, especially in that passage speaking to Abraham, is that God won’t stop judge too soon. Our God is unimaginably patient with sinners. And so he says, the sins have to reach their full measure. Meaning we have reached the point of no return. As a culture. Canaan has become irremediable. What sin though? What’s the sin of the Canaan? Why aren’t we talking about the sin of the Egyptians? Like, why not punish mean Egypt for enslaving Israel? Well, he did. We covered that in Exodus not that long ago. But we get this sense of like, Canaan’s just there minding their own business. No, they are not. This is a culture built on injustice, conquest and enslavement. It’s actually interesting. Scripture presents all of this as like a. It’s this pattern that unfolds across Scripture. The battle between the city of God and the city of man. And in Scripture, often that’s the battle between the city of Babylon and the city of Jerusalem. If you were with us when we did Revelation not that long ago, those are the towns, the cities that show up. You’re going, why Babylon? Why not Rome? And that’s the one persecuting the church at this time. It is Rome. It’s a city built on the seven hills. That’s Rome. But it keeps referring to it as Babylon. So Babel, Babylon is like the type, the name given to the city of man in rebellion against God. And it makes sense because Babylon or Babel is the first place where culture de gods God, where a culture says, we don’t need him anymore. Knock him off the throne. We can do this on ourselves. In fact, let’s make a name for ourselves instead of glorifying him. And so they build the tower of Babel. At least they try to watch the progression of Babel across Scripture. So once Adam and Eve are kicked out of the garden, there’s an angel placed on the east side. Two angels with a sword between them placed on the east side. So they went out east. It’s got in the east gate. And then Cain, after he murders his brother, moves to Nod, which is east of Eden. And then keep reading Genesis 11. Here’s 2 and 4. As the people moved eastward, they found a plain in Shinar and settled there and said, come, let’s build a city. That would be the city of Babel. That’s really interesting, Brandon, but We’re talking about Canaan, we’re talking about the Amorites, we’re not talking about the Babylonians. Our problem, of course, is that we’re not familiar with the Amorites today. Abraham was. When God said this to him, Abraham was. Because the Amorites were the founders of Babylon who invaded Abraham’s hometown, Ur, and who kept moving west into the promised land into Eden. Which means for 400 plus years, God has been patient with violent conquistadors who are building their empire as they enslave. This is a story of Babylon invading Eden, which means when we read the story of Jericho, we’re not picturing Russia invading Ukraine, we should be picturing Ukraine. What they’ve been doing in the past few months under the Volvy operation, Ukraine taking back the territory that was stolen from them. But one other piece, this. And maybe it’s our chief concern here is. Yeah, but what about the non combatants? Like that’s a big question. But is it true? If you look back at chapter six, verse two, God says he’s given the king and the fighting men into Joshua’s hands because that’s who is there. Jericho is not a population center, it’s a military base. It’s a fortress. It’s an army post. I know, we hear city and we think Kiev population center. Why are they shooting drones at apartment buildings? But in an agrarian society, people didn’t live in the city, they lived outside of it. You come into the city because it’s a fortress. Scholars have shown that Jericho was this military fortress that would house about 150,000 soldiers. That’s it. Remember, you can circle the garrison seven times in one day, no problem. That’s why there’s a brothel there. Keep the soldiers happy. Tavern for the spies. It’s not women and children, although women and children aren’t innocent here. That is an important part to remember. They’re not present. Ah, but you, you’re looking at verse 21 and you’re going, no, no, no. There are women, men and women, young and old. But that’s a stock phrase to express the sum total of the population. Be like if a magician popped out at a birthday party and said, ladies and gentlemen, boys and girls, even though it’s an 8 year old girls party. And so there are only girls there and only moms that brought them. It’s just a stock phrase. It means everybody. Everybody that’s here. Even then, they don’t necessarily kill everyone. It says quite carefully they destroyed with a sword every thing in it, not those who fled. In fact, you can read later. In Joshua, we know that they often fled the battles and were not then killed. Joshua 10:20. So Joshua and the Israelites defeated them completely. But a few survivors managed to reach their fortified cities. So again, what we have here is not invaders attacking an innocent nation. We have oppressed slaves rising up against bloodthirsty conquerors. If you read this story and you are picturing Joshua as Hitler and Israel as Germany in World War II, you need to revise your image. This is much more like Jews rising up in Dachau to throw off their Nazi guards. All of this understanding changes our understanding then of God’s purpose. Because again, it means it’s not Israel invading for the purpose of conquest. In fact, it’s not even Israel really doing anything at all. It’s God who’s doing something. The ridiculousness of the story makes this clear. This is not based on power or strategy. I mean, the plan, as we saw, is absolute insanity unless God shows up. It’s like the Red Sea, as I keep saying. Exodus 14:14. Moses says to the people who are panicking, the Lord will fight for you. You need only to be still phrase shows up again. Addie, read it for us earlier today. Be still and know that I am God. And we think this is talking about our quiet times, right? We’ve got our little hobby lobby, Be still and know that I am God sign next to the you know this house runs on Jesus and coffee sign in our kitchen. This is not a verse for tired moms, guys. The verse comes in a holy war context. That’s why Addie, read the whole psalm for us where God’s saying, I’m gonna break the bow, I’m gonna shatter the spear. I will make wars cease to the ends of the earth. Israel is not fighting for God to expand his empire. What is happening here is that God is fighting for Israel to dismantle ungodly empires. If you were here with us when we did our people God killed series, or if you were here even in Revelation when we talked about some of the hard hell passages, you’ll be familiar with the idea of, quote, quarantine. Like, that’s what’s happening here. As God is saying, enough evil can go this far and no farther, or amputation is the image Jesus gives us for it. If your hand causes you to sin, cut it off, because there’s an infection that will kill you. And there’s an infection that will destroy the earth, and God is against it. God is kicking the hell out of earth, and he does so by Establishing the first colony of heaven Earth. Joshua Ryan Butler, in his excellent book the Skeletons in God’s Closet, writes this true holy war is not when we strap bombs to our chests and say, we will fight for God. But it’s contradiction when God steps in for the vulnerable and defenseless and says, I will fight for you. So how do we reconcile the violence of conquest with God’s love? We have to look at the purpose of the war. God is making war on violence. This is God’s holy love poured out against the destructive power of sin. It is like pouring water on a fire. Yes, it destroys the fire, but for good, to keep that fire from consuming the house. God’s purpose is peace. To bring peace, he has to destroy evil. And let’s not forget the possibility of redemption that is there. Throughout this whole story, everyone in Jericho had heard stories of God like Rahab, why not turn and and be saved then? I mean, that’s all the way back before they even start marching. And then six days Israel marches around Jericho and on the seventh day, they march around seven times. Think about how much time they had to repent. It’s like Noah building the ark. Took them 120 years to build a boat. That’s 120 years for the people on Earth to go, maybe I should get saved. Like, maybe I should figure out what this boat is doing here. Why is this army marching around? We know what’s about to happen. Like some saw and responded. Why didn’t the rest of them? This makes sense of another difficult passage in scripture, by the way. Romans 1, where it says the wrath of God is being revealed from heaven against all the godlessness and wickedness of people who suppress the truth by their wickedness. They suppress the truth. They know about God. They know who God is because God has made it plain to them so that they are without excuse. That’s Jericho. They saw the Exodus, the Red Sea. They saw the crossing of the Jordan River. They were without excuse. They knew who God was. And we know they knew enough because some saw that, offered grace and seized it, Rahab and her family. And the gate of the city was shut tight, but her window was open, just like her heart was open. Where are you today? Because we’re in that Noah building the boat. Time. We’re in that marching around the city time. If you have not yet responded to the offer of grace, today would be a great day. God is giving you time to turn and to grab his grace to bring his peace. God makes war on violence. He is so patient. He is so Slow to anger. But he must eventually address evil. And that is actually what we all want as well. We want him to put an end to evil. We need to know that evil has an expiration date. Let me make one last point, though, just before we close, because I haven’t hit this yet. God punished the wickedness of Jericho, but it was not because Israel wasn’t wicked. Moses said that to them. Deuteronomy 9:4. Do not say to yourself, the Lord has brought me here to take possession of this land because of my righteousness. No, it is on account of the wickedness of those nations that the Lord is going to drive them out before you. Israel didn’t deserve the promised land. Don’t believe me? Just read the rest of the Old Testament. They did not deserve the the promised land. You and I don’t deserve grace. Wouldn’t be grace otherwise. We come into this world under the ban, devoted to destruction. We are by nature objects of wrath, dead in our transgressions and sins. But because of his great love for us, God, who is rich in mercy, made us alive with with Christ even when we were dead in our transgressions. It is by grace you have been saved. Could there be sweeter words in any language? How can this be, though? How can we who are under wrath be made alive, reconciled to God? How are we not still under the ban? It is because Jesus Christ put himself under the ban in our place. And he was completely destroyed, devoted to God in our place. In the holiest war, God’s war against sin and death, there was only one casualty. And he died for you and me. That we might live for him and love for. That is why at this point, we do what Jesus did and we love our enemies and pray for those who persecute us. We don’t have to do holy war anymore. Our holy war is the proclamation of this good news. There is a way to escape judgment in Christ. Let’s pray. Father, we freely acknowledge our wickedness, our sin and unrighteousness, that we do not deserve the riches of grace that you have offered us. We are no different than Jericho. The only difference is that you have opened our hearts, our eyes and our minds to receive the grace that you have offered. And so God, may that reminder stir in us a deeper love for, a deeper gratitude for our salvation, a deeper commitment to holiness, a deeper trust. And the only one who could make a way for us to be saved. May it also stir in us a fervor for evangelism to make sure that everyone everywhere knows who you are, the coming judgment and the way to escape it. I pray for those in this room who do not know you. I hope the gates are not shut tight. I hope the windows are open and that this message is getting in. But God, would you open their hearts and eyes and minds to receive grace? By faith, even now we pray in Christ’s name. Amen.

3. 

   4 Oct 2026

   Remembrances (Joshua 4:1-5:12)

   PODCAST Remembrances October 4, 2026 | Brandon Cooper Brandon discusses how we are a forgetful people, and that forgetfulness can quietly erode our faith over time. In Joshua 4 and 5, God commands Israel to stack twelve stones from the Jordan River as a permanent monument to His faithfulness, designed to spark questions and keep the story of His power alive for future generations. The real threat to our spiritual lives is not always dramatic moral failure but the slow, gradual cooling that comes from forgetting what God has done. Just as Israel rehearsed God’s faithfulness through the Passover meal and the stones at the Jordan, we rehearse His faithfulness through baptism, communion, and the intentional daily practice of looking up at who God is, looking back at what He has done, and looking ahead with trust in who He will always be. TRANSCRIPT_______________________________________________+ The following is an uncorrected transcript generated by a transcription service. Before quoting in print, please check the corresponding audio for accuracy. Well, good morning, church. You can go ahead and open your bibles to Joshua chapter four, Joshua, chapter four. As we continue in our series, we’ll be starting in verse 1, Joshua 4:1. As you were turning there. We are often forgetful as people. Some of us are more forgetful than others. I would count myself in that category, just constantly forgetting the most basic things. Just to give you an example, I think I put it together that I have now left my credit card in four different restaurants this year, thankfully all local. So I’ve been able to go back and get them one Time I did leave it at a restaurant in an airport that was not o’, Hare, but I caught it before I flew away. So that was great news. But that, I mean, like, the writing’s on the wall here. I know how this story ends. I’m one of those, and I’m sure some of you are too. Who forgets why I came into a room, almost every room that I enter. True story. It’s not on my notes, but I had written the sermon, already written this illustration, and then the next day walked into Kyle’s office, as I often do, and stood there for a while and said, like, you’re not gonna believe this. This is my opening illustration. And I have no idea why I’m here right now though. So, like, that’s how it goes. Now, some of these are funny, of course. We forget things. Ha ha ha, didn’t remember to get milk on the way home, whatever, something like that. Sometimes they get a little more serious, you know, where you’re like, I forgot to pick up the prescription when I’ve got strep or something like that. And you’re like, okay, this is going to be a little bit worse for me. And then they start to get really serious where it’s not just I forgot to pick up the prescription, but I forgot to take the life saving medication that I’m on that I’m really not supposed to miss. It’s important to remember. It’s important to remember a lot in life, and yet it’s so easy to forget. And that’s especially true spiritually. The good news is God knows that we are a forgetful people. And so he provides the remedy because he provides memory aids for us. He doesn’t want us to forget. He didn’t want Israel to forget what had just happened to them. Not for the first time either, as we’ll see. And so our passage this morning, a lot of it is just answering the question, how will Israel remember to remember? And there we got three scenes that will show us how the Lord is going to help them here and then show how he will help us as well. So our first scene, a mnemonic device. Let me read chapter 4114 for us. A little longer chunk of text here. When the whole nation had finished crossing the Jordan, the Lord said to Joshua, choose 12 men from among the people, one from each tribe, and tell them to take up 12 stones from the middle of the Jordan, from right where the priests are standing, and carry them over with you and put them down at the place where you stay tonight. So Joshua called together the 12 men he had appointed from the Israelites, one from each tribe, and said to them, go over before the Ark of the Lord your God into the middle of the Jordan. Each of you is to take up a stone on his shoulder according to the number of the tribes of the Israelites to serve as a sign among you. In the future, when your children ask you, what do these stones mean? Tell them that the flow of the Jordan was cut off before the Ark of the Covenant of the Lord. When it crossed the Jordan, the waters of the Jordan were cut off. These stones are to be a memorial to the people of Israel forever. So the Israelites did as Joshua commanded them. They took 12 stones from the middle of the Jordan according to the number of the tribes of the Israelites, as the Lord had told Joshua. They carried them over with them to their camp, where they put them down. Joshua set up the 12 stones that had been in the middle of the Jordan at the spot where the priests who carried the Ark of the Covenant had stood. And they are there to this day now. The priests who carried the Ark remained standing in the middle of the Jordan until everything the Lord had commanded Joshua was done by the people, just as Moses had directed Joshua. The people hurried over, and as soon as all of them had crossed the Ark of the Lord and the priests came to the other side. While the people watched, the men of Reuben, Gad and the half tribe of Manasseh crossed over, ready for battle in front of the Israelites as Moses had directed them. About 40,000, armed for battle, crossed over before the Lord to the plains of Jericho for war. That day, the Lord exalted Joshua in the sight of all Israel. And they stood in awe of him all the days of his life, just as they had stood in awe of Moses. And pause there. All right, so I said this to you last week, right? It was like Gandalf saying, morning, the fifth day, everybody’s ready, right? And then you’re all going to forget. That was the 12 guys, right? Now, at long last, we know what those 12 guys were there for that Joshua had appointed. To do what? Well, now we know what they were appointed to do. One from each tribe. These 12 guys, they’re representing the whole nation of Israel. They are supposed to grab a stone from the center of the riverbed as a monument. Set up as a monument. Now, these are big stones, big enough that they needed to carry them on their shoulders. But more important than that, they are smooth stone. These are stones that have been made smooth by the relentless battering of the river’s waters. At least they had been battered by the river’s waters until the Lord made those waters stand up in a heap, as we saw last week. Well, now, these stones, taken out of the center of the river, they are stood up in a heap in this monument. And as a result, they would stand out to passersby. They’d look and they’d go, why is there a pile of rocks here? But especially, why is there a pile of smooth rocks here? Like, how did these get here? I can remember as a middle schooler when my family took a road trip out west, that at one point when we were driving through Kansas or something like that, I looked out the window and there was an ostrich running next to me. And I was a very bright middle schooler, and I was like, I don’t think ostriches live around here, you know, So I had to ask about that. Like, why are there ostriches here? Because I saw a bunch of them. It turns out right. There was a farm, of course, was the answer to that question. But in my head, I’m thinking, these don’t belong here. How did they get here? That’s what God wants these stones to do, to stoke a holy curiosity in the people who pass them by. Especially for those who still have curiosity, which would be kids. Kids are the ones who go, what’s that doing there? We, if I could paraphrase G.K. chesterton, we sin and grow old and lose that sense of wonder, that sense of curiosity. We begin to think we know answers instead of asking questions to find answers. And so this pile of rocks is meant to be. You can see it there in verse six, a sign to the children. It’s the same word that’s used of the Passover meal was meant to be a sign. If you know anything about the Passover, you know that was for kids also. Big part of the Passover, even today, is the kids asking the questions, why are we having bitter herbs? Why are we dipping the parsley and salt water? Like, what is going on here? And so that’s what’s meant to happen here. When kids ask, what do these stones mean? The parents would have a great story to tell. And that is the hope. Now, parents, there is a world of application here in this chunk of text. Our primary responsibility as parents is to ensure that our kids know as much about God as they possibly can. When they leave our care, we cannot make them believe that work belongs to God alone, but we can certainly make sure they know what we believe and why we believe it. Who is this God? Why do we serve Him? What does His Word say? How should we follow Him? That’s what we teach our kids. Are you teaching your kids that? Are you opening the Word daily with them? I mean, this book is a finer monument than river stones, I can promise you that. Are you opening it together as a family? Do you talk about God? About your relationship with Jesus Christ? All the time? Like, this is everyday talk, not just Sundays. Maybe on our way home from church. What do you do with opportunities that are there in front of you, like Lent, Good Friday, Easter, Advent, Christmas? Do they see you following Jesus? Do they see you praying? Do they see you studying His Word? Memorizing it? Do they see you confessing sin? Especially when you confess sin to them and the ways you’ve sinned against them? Do they see you serving, sacrificing, sharing the gospel with those who need to hear it? And if the answer to any of those questions, by the way, is no, talk to Kyle. He’s a family ministries pastor. Like, he lives to equip parents to do those things. Well, we got all sorts of workshops and stuff coming up this year. Just ask him about that. This is not just for kids, though, this pile of stones. Not just for kids, though. All of us forget, as we’ve seen and as you probably experience in your own life. And so God gives these stones to Israel as a mnemonic device. You know what a mnemonic device is? You had them way back in spelling class, which for some of us is a long time ago. Double the C, double the S, and you’ll always get success. Okay, Mnemonic device helps you remember. These stones are there to help us remember. And so the fact that God gives us this mnemonic like, reminds us of the threat that forgetting poses to our face. We take an analogy from marriage. You know, most of us think, oh, I know what the threat to marriage is. It’s adultery. Marriage is not the. Adultery is not the threat to marriage. Adultery is the effect of the threat to your marriage. The real threat to our marriage is just that cooling forgetting that happens over time. At one point, I was madly in love with this woman. I thought about her all the time. There was nothing I would not have done for her. Well, right now, the game. So I can’t do anything for her like that kind of cooling forgetting. That’s the danger, and we know that’s true of us spiritually. Isn’t this what Jesus says to the church in Ephesus in Revelation 2? I hold this against you, you have forsaken the love you had. At first, you’ve forgotten what it was like when I first saved you. That’s the danger. And so if that’s the threat, then the remedy is proactive remembering. And proactive is key in that phrase. In Hebrew thought, remembering is not just like, oh, it’s there. It’s a living reflection. It is, as one commentator put it, a remembering with concern. There’s a reason I’m trying to remind myself about this. You know what it looks like. One of my favorite quotes from church history comes from George Mueller, and he says, you know, the first business of every day is for me to get my. My soul happy in the Lord. That is an active remembering, because that’s what will get your heart happy in the Lord, is when you’re going, I remember who I am apart from Christ, and I remember who I am in Christ, what He has done for me, what it cost him to save me. So we preach the gospel to ourselves to remember that, who he is, what he’s done. Now, if you remember all that, you’re actively remembering all that, you are quite likely to obey when he commands you. And that’s exactly what the nation does. You see that starting in verse nine. And really the rest of this chunk, you know, the priests are there where they’re supposed to be, in the middle of the Jordan river till the whole nation crosses over. It’s not just those who cross over, but those two and a half tribes that are staying on the east side of the Jordan. We met them earlier. They cross over armed for battle. That’s their obedience. They are there. They cross over before the Lord. It even says, like he’s a witness to their obedience, which is also worth remembering. We live our lives Coram Deo is the phrase before the Lord. That is what they have done. Now, we don’t always keep his word. They do here, but we don’t always. But God always keeps his word. You can actually see that there in verse 14, because God keeps His promise to Joshua. When we came across last week. Chapter three, verse seven, when God says, I’m going to exalt you in the eyes of the nation. And here he is exalted like this is God’s man chosen for this task. And now Israel knows, and we’ll hopefully follow him as God’s representative. So there’s the mnemonic device that God has given this monument that is meant to catch attention and peak curiosity. Curiosity, which is good news for Israel. Is it good for anyone else, though? Let’s See as we go on. Scene 2 the Missional God verses 15 to 24. The rest of chapter 4. Let me read it for us. Then the Lord said to Joshua, command the priests carrying the Ark of the Covenant law to come up out of the Jordan. So Joshua commanded the priests come up out of the Jordan. The priests came up out of the river carrying the Ark of the Covenant of the Lord. No sooner had they set their feet on the dry ground than the waters of the Jordan returned to their place place and ran at flood stage as before. On the 10th day of the first month, the people went up from the Jordan and camped at Gilgal on the eastern border of Jericho. And Joshua set up at Gilgal the 12 stones they had taken out of the Jordan. He said to the Israelites, in the future, when your descendants ask their parents, what do these stones mean, tell them Israel crossed the Jordan on dry ground. The Lord your God dried up the Jordan before you until you had crossed over. The Lord your God did to the Jordan what he had done to the Red Sea when he dried it up before us until we had crossed over. He did this so that all the peoples of the earth might know that the hand of the Lord is powerful and so that you might always fear the Lord your God. The crossing is complete. The priests, remember, are carrying the ark, or the covenant of the Lord, which we talked a lot about last week. They were the first to go in and they are the last to come out. Now remember the ark. This is God’s throne, and this is the visible symbol of his presence. And so there it is. The Lord goes before us, the Lord is there with us, and then the Lord comes behind us. When the priests come out of the river, the river returns to flood stage and we are told the exact date on which this happens. The first day of the tenth month. Month. Sorry, tenth day of the first month. I just have numbers in my notes now. That would be important for us. We’re going up. Sounds cool, I guess. Hey, we’re in October. Whatever. But this month is an important month. It’s an important date in Israel’s history. It shows up once before. Here’s Exodus 12, 2 and 3, where God says, this month is to be for you. The first month. The first month of your year. Tell the whole community of Israel that I the 10th day of this first month, each man is to take a lamb for his family, one for each household. You catch the significance of what just happened. We are 40 years to the day after Israel selected the Passover lamb. The day after preparation for that first Passover, which was this mighty sign of God’s power and goodness before it happened. And so it preps us for what’s coming, especially in the next chapter, which we’ll get to in a moment. So that’s the date on which this is happening. And Joshua sets up the 12 stones there at Gilgal like he’s supposed to. He repeats the purpose, everything we looked at in that last section, although he expands it as well. Like, what do these stones mean when you get asked that? Tell them the next generation, especially God, dried up the Jordan river even when was that flood stage? And we crossed on dry ground. Okay, but why? Like, what was the purpose of that even? And so now we’re starting to see that we have not just mnemonic, but a missional mnemonic, because we serve a missional God. And he wants everyone everywhere to know that he is God. And so we see that in verse 24 in particular, like this missional climax, by the way. I hope everybody at this point is now tracking with us why we got a pile of stones on our graphic, but also where our title comes from. Like, that all might know. It’s right there in verse 24. He did this so that all the peoples of the earth might know the hand of the Lord is powerful. So God did this wonder, this amazing thing, performed this miracle so that all peoples would know who he is and so that his people would fear him in light of who he is. Now. To fear God is to give him proper reverence, like respect, awe before him. Every time I think of this, I think of the ocean. I love the ocean. I’m a water guy. I am happiest when I’m next to water or on the water. If it’s salty water, even better. I love the ocean. I delight in the ocean. I would like to be by the ocean. I’m also terrified of the ocean. Like, when we go swimming in the ocean, I get nervous. I get nervous for my kids especially. These are big waves. They’re rocks. The unfathomable depth of it all. Like, that’s the tension we have with the Lord as well. I love the Lord. I delight in the Lord. I want to be with the Lord. But just like I know the ocean could kill me and those I love, I know that God could wipe me out. And not only that, I know that God should wipe me out in light of my sin. And so there’s that reverence like that. That’s the fear that we’re talking about when we talk about The Lord Israel has seen both. Like, they just saw his power. This is a God who can just make a river stop. That’s scary. And at the same time, he is a God who makes the river stop so his people can cross into the land that he has given them. There’s the delight, there’s the love. So we’ve seen his power and his love. We’ve seen his strength and his goodness. If we understand that, we will live differently before Him. That’s the hope here. But we’re not the only ones who have seen this. Israel is not the only people who saw what the Lord did. We met Rahab two weeks ago, and she’s going, hey, we heard. Like, we know what the Lord has been doing for you. We’ll keep reading. We’re going to see it again in a moment. Like, Canaan knows the Lord at this point. Egypt knows the Lord at this point. They know God, even if they don’t fear Him. They’re scared of him, but they don’t fear him with that biblical fear, that reverent awe and love. But there is an implicit invitation in it. And that’s the. The idea almost like God is saying, even to the watching world, reckon with what you’ve seen. Like, there’s unmistakable proof of God’s power. You can’t ignore it. So Canaan, wrestle with it. Like, ask some questions about this. Who is this God? Of course, the invitation is still out there today for all of us. For you, if you’re skeptical, even now, in this morning, look at the stones. What do they tell you? Look at one stone in particular. In fact, the one that he rolled away so that we could see that the tomb is empty because Jesus has come out of the grave. God sent Jesus to die in our place, to take the punishment for our sins, the punishment we deserve on Himself. And then he raised Jesus Christ as a vindication of his message and the proof of his saving power. He raised him as the supreme sign of who he is and what he’s done. Wrestle with it. Wrestle with that sign. What does it mean? In church, we have the privilege of getting to answer those questions when people ask us, why are those stones in a pile and why are they smooth? Why do you believe in the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead? Talk to me about this hope that you have. Like, give me the reason for the hope within you in the midst of this or that or the other thing. Because we love God and want to see him magnified in and through us. We witness to and proclaim the mighty Deeds of our God. Our desire is that all might know what we have seen. Then we get seen. Three. The memorial ceremony. Really? Memorial ceremony. So let me read chapter five, verses one to 12. Now, when all the Amorite kings west of the Jordan and all the Canaanite kings along the coast heard how the Lord had dried up the Jordan before the Israelites until they had crossed over, their hearts melted in fear, and they no longer had the courage to face the Israelites. At that time, the Lord said to Joshua, make flint knives and circumcise the Israelites again. So Joshua made flint knives, knives, and circumcised the Israelites at Gibeah. Now, this is why he did so. All those who came out of Egypt, all the men of military age, died in the wilderness on the way after leaving Egypt. All the people that came out had been circumcised. But all the people born in the wilderness during the journey from Egypt had not. The Israelites had moved about in the wilderness 40 years until all the men who were of military age when they left Egypt had died. Since they had not obeyed the Lord. The Lord had sworn to them that they would not see the land. He had solemnly promised their ancestors to give us a land flowing with milk and honey. So he raised up their sons in their place. And these were the ones Joshua circumcised. They were still uncircumcised because they had not been circumcised on the way. And after the whole nation had been circumcised, they remained where they were in camp until they were healed. Then the Lord said to Joshua, today I have rolled away the reproach of Egypt from you. Says place has been called Gilgal to this day. In the evening of the 14th day of the month, while camped at Gilgal on the plains of Jericho, the Israelites celebrated the Passover. The day after the Passover, that very day, they ate some of the produce of the land. Unleavened bread and roasted grain. The manna stopped the day after they ate this food from the land. There was no longer any manna for the Israelites. But that year they ate the produce of Canaan. Verse one is an important introductory note. Here, here. Remember Rahab, right? She said, everybody’s already melting in fear before you. Okay? So they were already melting with fear because Israel was coming. And then God stopped the Jordan River. So they’re melting even more at this point, which means there’s no way they’re going to attack Israel. Like they are quaking in their boots. They are not advancing on Israel. And that matters because Israel’s got to go through a circumcision ceremony still, which will leave them highly vulnerable. This actually would have been a great time to attack them. If you’ve read Genesis, Genesis 34 in particular, you know that this is how Dinah’s brothers got their revenge on the men of Shechem. After they raped her, they were like, okay, yeah, sure, we can be friends, we can get married, all that kind of stuff. You just need to be circumcised first. And they killed them all after they were circumcised because they were. Were weak. They were bruised and bleeding still at that point. That’s where Israel is in this moment. And yet the Lord, because he has caused fear, panic to go before Israel, protects them in their vulnerable state. Why do they need to be circumcised, though? It’s actually kind of a remarkable moment. And yet we understand why it’s given to us pretty implicitly. But there in the text, verses 4, 5, and 6 in particular, the generation that came out of Egypt, like the adult generation, they had been circumcised. But then the generation that grew up in the wilderness, they had not been circumcised. And we can probably guess why, because in verse six, it talks about the fact that that adult generation didn’t get to go in the promised land because they didn’t obey the Lord. Well, here was another area where they didn’t obey the Lord. They didn’t circumcise their sons as they were were supposed to, which is really significant. This might seem like a small thing to us, but when you disobey in these ways, God says, you’re not really my people. Like here’s Genesis 17:14, when God institutes the covenant with Abraham. And the sign of the covenant, circumcision, it says this. Any uncircumcised male who has not been circumcised in the flesh will be cut off. Off from his people. He has broken my covenant. So here you have an entire generation of God’s covenant people who are cut off from God and not a part of his covenant. Not because their disobedience either. Because of disobedience of their parents. I mean, so this adult generation, this parent generation, effectively cut their children off from God, which is exactly what our disobedience can do to our kids. Kids, something we probably want to take pretty seriously. And yet God is merciful. And that’s what we see here. That’s our only hope, Our only hope for our kids. Anyway, it’s an interesting little paradox almost, because the circumcised generation dies in the wilderness because they didn’t obey. And yet it’s the uncircumcised generation that God raises up by grace to take their place. And who will obey in their stead? God keeps his promises even when we disobey. And so the failure of the parents didn’t doom their kids. And how many of us are clinging to that hope every day? But there is a lesson for us in that, because it means that you can have all the marks of Christian faith and yet be cut off, off by your disobedience. I mean, again, think of that adult generation. They’ve got the sign of circumcision. They’re eating manna. They crossed through the Red Sea. I mean, they, like, met God at Sinai and yet they were cut off. Same is true for us. Like, you can be in the flock but not know the shepherd. You can live in the king’s country, but reject his sovereignty. Simply coming to church, going through the motions of Christianity is not enough. We must listen to his voice. Of course, part of that means teaching the next generation to listen to his voice as well. We are not in the covenant community by an accident of birth or by our surface participation in the rights of the religion we profess. We are saved by grace through faith expressed in works manifest in concrete. Obedience. Obedience is key. It’s been a key theme in Joshua already. Just worth noting that they are circumcised in this moment so that they can take the Passover, because no one who’s uncircumcised can take the Passover. So God’s getting ready, getting them ready for the Passover meal. There’s a lesson there too, because obedience, then is part of how we remember. It’s proof that we remembered. Yes, but it’s also strengthening our memory. That’s what’s happening here. And make no mistake, both circumcision and the Passover are both, both memorial ceremonies. These are acts of intentional remembering. In circumcision, we remember the covenant God made with Abraham, with all its glorious promises, the blessing that would come to all nations as a result. And of course, the Passover. We remember the covenant at Sinai under Moses, Moses, with all its attendant mighty acts of deliverance. These memorials are vital to the Christian life. How vital? Just consider with me for a moment. I think this is quite clear. In Scripture, God’s standard operating procedure is an frequent miracles. Yes, God does a lot of miracles. He does miracles still today, absolutely. But Miracles tend to get bunched up even in scripture. A lot of miracles under Moses, a lot of miracles under Elijah and Elisha, certainly under Jesus and then the early church. But they’re not non stop like it seems like it when you read this book, of course, but you got like 1500 years recorded here. I mentioned this last week, like, yeah, he does a miracle, he stops the Jordan river and then they ford every other river after that. So God’s standard operating procedure isn’t frequent miracles. Instead his ordinary way of working is frequent witnesses to and teaching about those miracles. They crossed the Jordan river one time. The stones were there in perpetuity or the Passover. There was only one time where the angel of death actually passed over the nation of Israel in preparation for them to leave Egypt. And yet every year they ate the Passover meal together. So that’s his ordinary way of working, witnesses to and teaching about those miracles. Most obviously of course for us today, to his mighty acts of salvation in Christ’s death and resurrection. Which is why we remember it. What are you doing here right now? Why do you come every week? A lot of different reasons, but I think the chief reason we come together is to remember you’re not learning anything. I mean, sure, a little background information depending on what passage we’re in, but mostly all I’m doing is telling you stuff you already know. And what’s interesting is when I talk about what Jesus has done for us, which I do every week, unless it’s Kyle, Reeves, Shane, somebody like that who’s telling us what Jesus has done for us. When I get to that part in the sermon, you know what you all start doing? Do you know what’s happening in that moment? You remember a, what you already knew. Like that’s what I’m talking about. So what memorial ceremonies he’s given us a lot. Of course the Sunday gathering is one of them. But the two that come to mind and that are related to the two we see here are baptism and the Lord’s Supper. Baptism is the new covenant replacement for circumcision because it marks our entrance into the covenant community, an individual’s entrance into the covenant community, which in the old covenant happened by birth because it was a racial, an ethnic, a national community. In the new Covenant it is by faith. And so when someone puts their faith in Christ, we baptize them the memorial ceremony. And then there’s the Lord’s Supper, which is Passover, like literally was the Passover meal that Jesus co opted to kind of say, you know what Passover was pointing to this right here, guys. This is my. This is my body and that’s the Lord’s Supper, why we take communion. So what do we get? We get witnesses then, to God’s final decisive act to save his people in the Lord’s Supper and then that salvation experienced in the life of the individual in baptism. Peter calls us living stones, doesn’t he? Which means baptism is just pulling a stone out of the water going, do you see what God has done? It’s what we’ll celebrate today here in just a few moments. It is interesting, though, all this prep for the Passover, and then it’s like. And then they had the Passover meal period. So instead of that meal focusing on that meal, focused on that dinner, we actually focus on all the dinners thereafter. Because the next little bit is saying, there’s no more manna. Because now they’re going to eat from the fruit of that land. God kept his promise. That’s what he said was going to happen. So they’re going to eat the fruit of the land after they’d experienced God’s miraculous provision in the desert for a generation. Good reminder that God always provides. He just does so in different ways. And just because it’s the ordinary way doesn’t mean it’s any less gracious or bountiful. His provision, Dr. John Witherspoon, who was one of the signers of the Declaration of Independence, president of the College of New Jersey, which I think is Princeton memory serves, proved this. At one point, a man came rushing up to him, someone from his church, and said, why, Dr. Witherspoon, you must join me in giving thanks to God for his extraordinary providence in saving my life. For as I was driving from Rock Hill, the horse ran away and the buggy was smashed to pieces on the rocks. But I escaped unharmed. And Dr. Witherspoon understood this lesson here in this moment, and he said, why? I can tell you a far more remarkable providence than that. I have driven over that road hundreds of times. My horse has never run away, my buggy was never smashed and I was never hurt. It’s the same providence. We seem to want the spectacular always. And the Lord’s going like, I’m providing for you in the ordinary way. It is still my provision. A good lesson for us. But what should we do then with all of this? How can we keep from forgetting? Your big idea this morning is simple. Remember to remember. Remember to remember. Don’t forget. I think we’ve got three questions to ask of our big why must we remember what must we remember and how must we remember? So why must we remember? To remember. We’ve gotten this already. We remember to remember for our sake and theirs. We talk here about the fact that we are made to magnify and sent to serve. Both of those happen by our remembrance, like we are made, like Christ in our remembering. It’s what we’re learning in journey group right now. If you’re in journey group, the key to our transformation is the gospel. And so what do we do? Even the Gospel waltz that some of us are learning right now, we’re trying to repent, believe, obey, and the tricky step is believe. But that’s the one that holds them all together. That’s the one that makes the rest of it possible. What are we doing when we believe? We are remembering and rehearsing gospel truths. That’s how we are changed. But remember also that he did all this so that all might know. And so we are then sent by the gospel to proclaim this truth. We are all living stones plucked from the water, pointing to his glory. That’s why we remember. What must we remember? And here’s where it gets fun. We remember to remember that God doesn’t remember. Now, I should clarify before I’m accused of blasphemy. Because God is omniscient. What in the world could he possibly forget? Well, the glorious good news of the gospel is that he does forget. Isaiah 43:25, God says, I, even I am he who blots out your transgressions for my own sake and remembers your sins no more. I actually love that it says, he doesn’t remember, which is different from forgetting. Forgetting is passive. And when I walked into Kyle’s office, I wasn’t like, okay, you had a question about baptism. Just make sure that’s out of here. Make sure that’s gone, okay? Like, no, it just happens to me. Happens to all of us. Forgetting is passive, but not remembering, that’s active. That takes work, doesn’t it? I mean, picture when you see. Maybe it would be even here in this room, when you see that person coming towards you, that hurt you badly. If you’re looking at them going, they repented and I forgave. So I’m not going to remember that. I’m going to come at them like. Like, that wasn’t even there. That never happened. That’s over. That’s covered over. Or take a different example, like having your conviction expunged. You did something wrong, and at a certain point, whatever, legal jujitsu, it’s gone. And so you could walk into the courthouse and go, hey, tell me what this person did. And the clerk will say, there’s no record of that person. That’s what God does for us. He expunges our record legally and restores us relationally. I mean, how active is his not remembering? Here’s a different prophet. Micah 7:19. You will tread our sins underfoot and hurl all our iniquities into the depths of the sea, that terrifying ocean that we talked about earlier. Jerry Bridges, in his book Transforming Grace, tells a story. He was a naval officer, and there was a small boat and accident at one point, and some equipment was lost in the depths of the sea. And so they spent all day dredging the bottom, trying to find the equipment. In vain, it was lost forever. That’s what God does to our sins. By the blood of Christ, our record has been expunged, our relationship has been restored, and our sin has been hurled overboard into the depths of the sea. Remember that and see what it does for your soul. Remember to remember that he chooses not to remember. And then how must we remember? Three very brief steps that will help us fix our thoughts and hearts in three different directions in rapid succession so that we remember first of all, we remember by looking at up. We look up so that we remember who God is, our gracious and compassionate God. Slow to anger, abounding in love and faithfulness, maintaining love to thousands, forgiving wickedness, rebellion and sin. Our God, strong and loving. Our God who is good and able. We remember. We look up to remember who he is so that we can interpret our circumstances, whatever we’re going through, in light of that unchanging truth. Because we don’t look up first. We’re going to interpret God in light of our circumstances. And that is a dangerous place to be. But he’s unchanging. We have the proof of who he is. So we start there, because this is the foundation we look up next, we look back. We look back, remember God’s goodness and faithfulness in your life, the record of his love to you. One of the first songs I sang as a Christian after my freshman year of high school with an old spiritual, said this. He’s never failed me. He’s never failed me yet. And that’s what we’re remembering when we look back. He’s never failed me. He’s never failed me yet. So you want to, like, turn the pages of your life, like, flip through the spiritual scrapbook of your life. Where do you see Him? What has he done for you? And even Better honestly, turn the pages of this book. Right. Forget your scrapbook. That one’s good, too. But look at what he’s done for us. At the Red Sea, at the Jordan River. David standing before Goliath, Daniel in the lion’s den. And of course, the hill of Calvary and the empty tomb nearby. We look back, look up, look back. And then finally, we look ahead. We look ahead. Now that you’ve remembered, you can look ahead with resolute trust. He is who he always is. He’ll do what he’s always done. And that trust manifests. And exactly what we see here, prayerful dependence and faithful obedience. What the wilderness generation forgot and then didn’t offer. God. What a word for us, though, right here, in this season of our church’s life, when we look ahead to the church plant, we gotta remember to look up and look back first. Remember God’s faithfulness so that we’ll venture out in faith, in obedient faith, so that all people might know who he is. Or at least all the people in Lombard. I mean, we just sang what we need to do at the end of the last song. More to come, you know. All my hope, all my trust, all of my future is in the God who’s never failed us. Why would he start now? He won’t. Don’t forget. Remember to remember. Let’s pray. Lord, even now we remember the record of your faithfulness, of which we sang earlier this morning. It is great. Your mercy is new every morning. Which means for as many days as we have been alive, we have seen, or at least could have seen, your goodness, your love, your mercy, your compassion, your grace, your power, your wisdom. Help us to remember that now. Help us to remember what you’ve done for us as individuals and as a congregation. And help us then to remember all of that as we step out in faith. We don’t want to forget who you are. God. God. It’s too important. So by your spirit, stir up those memories in us in our every waking moment. And let us be the sort of community that encourages one another with frequent reminders of your goodness and glory. We pray this, Lord, for your name’s sake, that it might be proclaimed among all peoples that they too would come to know, know who you are, what you’ve done in the person and work of Jesus Christ. Amen.

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