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What if the abundant life Jesus promised feels perpetually out of reach, even for longtime believers standing on the edge of something greater? Could the ancient story of a nation poised on a riverbank, facing both promise and conflict, hold the keys you need to step into blessings you already own? Find out whether you're truly living in everything God has secured for you through Christ.
📝 Study Notes, Scripture List, Transcript, and more: https://medicallake.church/sermons/beyond-the-jordan
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📝 Study Notes, Scripture List, Transcript, and more: https://medicallake.church/sermons/beyond-the-jordan
#mlcc #church #churchonline
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LearningTranscript
00:00When I was a child, I liked to take my Christmas presents and shake them and try to guess what
00:04was inside of them. Now, anyone of you liked that before? I'll be honest now, come on.
00:11How many of you like that? You like to shake your presents, you like to try to figure,
00:15yeah, I see a double hand over here. Watch out, mom, over here. Watch out, Donna. Got
00:20double hands over there. Watch out. Hide her presents. One year, I was 13, and just one
00:29ones. Just one Christmas, I was 13. I was playing with one of the gifts, and I noticed
00:36it was in a square box, and I could put my hands inside and feel a roundness to it, and
00:42I'm thinking, well, a bowling ball maybe, but it was not heavy enough for a bowling ball,
00:47so it couldn't have been a bowling ball. So then as I felt around a little bit more, I
00:51got, uh-huh, I got it. I know what it is. It's a motorcycle helmet. At that time, I
00:58didn't have a motorcycle. So as bright 13-year-old as I was, I figured there must be something
01:05that goes along with this motorcycle helmet, or that would have been a very cruel gift to
01:09give a 13-year-old child. So when my parents weren't looking, and they were out of the
01:15room or gone, parents, this is what happens. You did it. Your kids do it. This is what it
01:20is. You go and you play with the gifts. So I would play with this motorcycle helmet. I wouldn't
01:25open it, of course. I would play with a motorcycle helmet, and in my mind, I was
01:29already on my motorcycle. I was, it was a dirt bike because I was 13. I couldn't ride
01:34on the road, so it was a dirt bike. So I'm on my motorcycle. I'm burning around the dirt
01:38track. I'm taking jumps, popping wheelies, burning them out, having a blast in my mind,
01:43okay? I mean, I was having a great time. I was flying off jumps. See, the anticipation
01:52for the coming Christmas was nearly unbearable, but yet at the same time, it was satisfying
01:58because I knew that Christmas was coming, and all of this that I thought in my mind,
02:03all these things that I was thinking about riding my motorcycle, I would finally come
02:07in possession of my motorcycle at Christmastime. And then all these things I was thinking about
02:12would become a reality. I could actually fly off jumps. I could actually pop wheelies.
02:16I could actually have a great time. So only thing that was lacking was my Christmas.
02:22And sometimes I would lay in bed at night and dream about riding my motorcycle, and I'd get
02:26so excited I could hardly sleep. See, what I was doing was I was enjoying the pleasures of
02:33a future event. That's what I was doing. I saw that the motorcycle was coming at some
02:39point in time, and it was Christmas in this sense, and I was laying there enjoying the
02:44pleasures of a future event. Possessing my motorcycle would only come at Christmas.
02:51That's when the fulfillment of the possession of everything I dreamed in my mind about my
02:56motorcycle would finally come to reality at Christmastime. I was awaiting the unveiling,
03:04and whoo, with anticipation and excitement. There was a possession to be possessed, and the
03:11realization of that possession was at Christmas it was coming. And there was such an intense
03:17anticipation in me, I couldn't wait for Christmas. When we come to the text today, that's exactly
03:24what's going through the mind of the nation of Israel. There's an anticipation. They're standing
03:29on the east side of the Jordan River. There was a promise made to them centuries ago, over
03:37450 years prior, a promise was made to them that they would inherit a possession. And the possession
03:43that they were going to inherit is what we know as the promised land. And so they're standing on this
03:49side of it. They are ready to enter in to possess their possession and to receive now what God had
03:55promised to them over 450 years earlier. And you can imagine the sense of anticipation that was taking
04:01place at this time. Moses, that great leader of the nation, the greatest up to that time, probably the
04:09greatest of all, he's dead. That complaining generation that came out of Egypt, the one that
04:16was unfaithful, the one that didn't believe God, the one that wasn't obedient, they're dead. And so along
04:23with that anticipation is the question that's there is, is this guy Joshua, is he able to take us into
04:29our
04:30possession? Can we really receive all the things that God had promised to us? Can this guy do it?
04:35So there's also a bit of an apprehension on the nation at this part, because Joshua, although he
04:39was directly related to Moses in the sense of being his aid, we have to understand that they weren't
04:45sure whether he was the one who could actually do it. There was a question in their mind.
04:50Open your Bibles to Joshua chapter 1. I hope that you're already there.
04:53Let's read verses 1 through 9. And in this verses 1 through 9, we see Joshua's commissioning.
05:00Joshua commissioned.
05:03After the death of Moses, the servant of the Lord, the Lord said to Joshua, the son of Nun,
05:09Moses' assistant, Moses, my servant, is dead. Now therefore arise, go over this Jordan, you and
05:15all this people, into the land that I am giving to them, to the people of Israel. Every place that
05:21the
05:21sole of your foot will tread upon, I have given to you, just as I promised to Moses. From the
05:29wilderness, and this Lebanon, as far as the great river, the river Euphrates, all the land of the
05:34Hittites, to the great sea, toward the going down of the sun, shall be your territory. No man shall be
05:41able to stand before you all the days of your life, just as I was with Moses, so I will
05:46be with
05:47you. I will not leave you or forsake you. Be strong and courageous, for you shall cause this people to
05:54inherit the land that I swore to their fathers to give them. Only be strong and very courageous,
06:00being careful to do according to all the law that Moses, my servant, commanded you. Do not turn from
06:06it to the right hand or to the left, that you may have good success wherever you go. This book
06:12of the
06:12law shall not depart from your mouth, but you shall meditate on it day and night, so that you may
06:17be
06:17careful to do according to all that is written in it, for then you will make your way prosperous, and
06:22then you will have good success. Have I not commanded you? Be strong and courageous. Do not be frightened,
06:29and do not be dismayed, for the Lord your God is with you wherever you go. The very first verse
06:36opens up after the death of Moses. So we see that there's a time frame between the death of Moses.
06:42Now there's always a 30-day mourning period for a big political figure, a big national figure like
06:47Moses. There's a mourning period of 30 days. So 30 days have happened. They've mourned for Moses. Now
06:52we're picking up the story after the mourning, after the death of Moses. Now we continue on. So this
06:58links Joshua right back to Deuteronomy chapter 34. So this is a continuation of Deuteronomy. It links the
07:04two books together. You're going to see a graphic up here of a place called Mount Nebo. Mount Nebo,
07:10if you read Deuteronomy chapter 34, Mount Nebo is a place where Moses climbs up on this mountain. And
07:17if you remember, God said to Moses, listen, you are not obedient to my word. I asked you to do
07:23this,
07:24and you did this. Because you were disobedient and didn't obey my word, you may not see this land
07:30that I promised to your forefathers. But what I'm going to do, and that's what he did in Deuteronomy
07:35chapter 34, is he took them up to this place on Mount Nebo, and he said, okay, Moses, look out.
07:40I
07:40want you to see the land. As far as your eye can see, I want you to understand, Moses, I
07:45have given
07:45this. This is my promise to the people. I'm giving you this land. You're not going to be able to
07:51go into
07:51it, Moses, but the children of Israel will inherit the possession. I've given it to them. So on top of
07:57this mountain, Mount Nebo, Moses dies. Now we don't know where his body's at. God took it somewhere,
08:02hid it. I'm glad because you and I probably would have made an idol out of his body. God put
08:07it
08:07somewhere. I don't know. But it's on this mountain that he has died. 30 days have happened in the
08:12morning, and now we're moving on. That rebellious generation also that came out of Egypt is dead,
08:17died in the wilderness as well. At this time in Joshua, many of the people that Joshua is commanding,
08:23that Joshua is going to be leading, they weren't even born when the Exodus took place.
08:29They weren't even born when the law was given through Moses on Mount Sinai. They weren't even
08:34around. These people, some of them had never seen the Exodus or never seen the law given,
08:39had never seen other than the fact that their clothes never wore out, their shoes never wore
08:43out. They had manna every day from heaven. They saw those miracles of the Lord. They didn't
08:46see the great deliverance or the giving of the law. They had never seen that.
08:52They're standing now on the east side of the Jordan River. They came up on the back side
08:56around the east side of the Dead Sea in what's modern day Jordan today, and they're standing
09:02on the east side of the Jordan River. This is a picture of the Jordan River. Why it's important
09:07is what I want you to notice on the right hand picture, right hand of the picture, you see
09:11the bank of the Jordan River. That's the bank at flood stage. Do you see how large the river
09:19becomes at flood stage? Now that's important later on in the book of Joshua, where we're
09:23going to see that they enter in at the time of the flood stage. Right now, it's just a
09:27small little river running through this valley, but at flood stage, it reaches all the way
09:30up to the banks. You see they're on the right hand side. They're standing now on the east
09:35side of the Jordan River, looking into the land that God has promised to them. They're saying
09:39to themselves, with anticipation, there's the fulfillment of the promises of God in our lives.
09:45Over 450 years ago, he promised Abraham this. Now we see it with our own eyes. There it is.
09:52And also at the same time of the anticipation is a bit of apprehension. Can Joshua do it?
09:59Even though Joshua was Moses' field commander, he was the one, he was his field marshal.
10:03He was his personal aid. We see this tight relationship between Moses and Joshua. So Joshua was a man of
10:10war, but being a commander of troops and being a leader of a nation could be two separate things.
10:17It's easy to tell people what to do, but to lead people is not the same thing.
10:23So Joshua, you remember, is the guy that was sent out, one of the 12 spies. He and Caleb came
10:28back
10:28and said, hey, God's going to give us this land. Let's go take it. Another 10 said, no way. And
10:32you
10:33know the rest of the story. They wandered around for another 38 years in the wilderness
10:36till the whole generation died off. What's important for us to know at this point is,
10:41even though the people were apprehensive about Joshua, God was not. God had chosen Joshua to
10:47be the successor of Moses. Numbers chapter 27, he already said, look it, Joshua is going to take
10:53your place, Moses, when you die. So God had already chosen Joshua. And this is a guy that's full of
10:57the
10:58spirit of wisdom. Here's a guy that really had a close connection with God, had a relationship with
11:03him. I like verse three. Verse three says, every place the sole of your foot will tread upon. Look
11:11what it says. Will tread upon. That's future. I have given it to you. Don't you like that? He said,
11:19wait a second, that's still future. How could you say, I have given it to you? That's a past tense
11:23verb. Well, look at the certainty of God's promise is here seen by the fact, even though it's yet future
11:30to them, it is certain in the mind of God, I have given you this land. There is a certainty
11:34that this
11:35prophetic perfect that comes out and says, there's a certainty in the promise of God. It will come
11:39into fulfillment, even though they hadn't seen it at that point. Now the borders we are told here of
11:45the promised land is something I need to say. Be very careful today in our secular society that wants
11:52to trade land for peace in Israel. It will not happen. We must understand the land given to the
12:01nation of Israel is a perpetual inheritance forever. As a matter of fact, in Genesis 13,
12:09God says, for the land that you see, I will give to you and your offspring forever. It's not to
12:14be
12:14given away. You're not going to get peace through giving away land. Don't buy into that. God promised
12:20the land to the people of Israel forever. And it went like this on the west side, all the way
12:25to
12:25the Mediterranean Sea, on the east side, all the way to the Euphrates River that encompasses a large
12:31portion of land, south down to the Nile River and north all the way up into Lebanon. Now the next
12:37picture you're going to see is a picture of Solomon's kingdom. Solomon in his heyday, in the
12:42golden age of the nation of Israel, only reached up to the Euphrates River, not all the way over to
12:47the Mediterranean. There's a slice that has not been conquered or down there in Philistine area,
12:52but all the way down to Egypt. You see, that's the largest extent that the Israel ever got of their
12:57land. That tells us the full promise is yet to come. The full inheritance has not come into place
13:04yet. You see a modern day picture of Israel, and I know it's kind of tough. I'm sorry. If you
13:09can see
13:10up there, Jerusalem has a red star by it, and then there's a green line that runs right by the
13:14city of
13:14Jerusalem. That's the borders of Israel. You got the Golan Heights, the Gaza Strip, but they're willing
13:20to give away so much land that the maximum width will be about nine miles in some place, or even
13:25less than that. I mean, it's really small. You see now they do not have the full possession of the
13:31land that God has promised them. It will come someday, but right now they don't have it. And the
13:37nation of Israel was going to enter into this land called Canaan, led by a bunch of city-states. And
13:42what that simply means is every city had their own king. There was no central government. You
13:46couldn't go to Washington, D.C., conquer Washington, D.C., and have all of America. You
13:50couldn't do that in Canaan. You had to go from city to city to city to city to conquer all
13:55of
13:55these cities and all of the kings before you could possess the land. So it was going to be a
13:59tough
14:00battle for them. I like this, though, when God gives a command, He commissioned and commanded
14:06Joshua, I like what He says is, He always adds a promise to that. Isn't that nice to know? When
14:13God says, I've asked you to do this, and you say, but God, I don't know. I mean, that's, I'm
14:17not sure
14:17if I can do that. And then He attaches on the back end of that, here's a promise. And the
14:22promise He
14:23gave to Joshua was this, I will not fail you, and I will not leave you. I will be with
14:30you at all
14:31time. There will be a protection from me. No man will stand against you, He told them in the text.
14:36And I like this idea of, I will not fail you. In other words, I will not be weak towards
14:40you.
14:41Wouldn't that be nice to stand up in a hostile work environment where you and I may be at, well,
14:46I'm not because I have a great work environment with Johnny up in the office, but you may be in
14:50a
14:50hostile work environment, to stand up and say, God will be strong towards me at all times.
14:56Isn't that a wonderful promise? God will be strong towards me. He will not fail me.
15:01He will not leave me. What a great promise. Thank you, Johnny, for not a hostile work
15:05environment. I appreciate that. He is told three times by God to be strong and courageous,
15:11one time by the two and a half tribes. And this comes four times in the text. Be strong,
15:16be courageous. God says it three times, the two and a half tribes says it once.
15:21Now I want you to see verse number eight. This is one that you've probably heard preached on before,
15:25you've read it, it's probably familiar to it. But it's an interesting statement here about Joshua's
15:30relationship to the law of God. Verse number eight. Let me read it again.
15:35This book of the law shall not depart from your mouth. Now let's stop right here for a second.
15:40There are some that say the book of the law now is the five books of Moses, the book of
15:44the law.
15:45That's the Torah, the book of the law. Some say that this was oral tradition handed down for centuries
15:51centuries and centuries and centuries and centuries. And much later they wrote it down on a piece of
15:56paper or parchment at that time. So because of the time difference from the actual event to when it
16:01was recorded, there was so much time in between, they got some things wrong. They're historically
16:07inaccurate. They're not necessarily true. That's what the critic will tell you of the Bible.
16:12But I want you to see right now, at this point, Joshua already has the book of the law.
16:17What does that tell us? It's already written. It's already been written down. It's already been
16:22recorded somehow that Joshua has the book of the law. He couldn't do these things if he didn't have
16:27it. It's a great encouragement to us to know that so close to the events, these things were recorded
16:33down for us. Three things that Joshua in his relationship to the book of the law was to do.
16:39Number one, see in verse number eight, this book of the law shall not depart from your mouth.
16:45So first thing is he's supposed to speak the word. He's supposed to speak the word. That which he has
16:51heard from God, he's to speak it out. It shouldn't depart from your mouth. It should be in your
16:55judgments. It should be in your conversations. It should be in everything that you do, Joshua.
17:00The second thing here in verse number eight is this, but you shall meditate on it day and night. So
17:05not only shall it be in his conversation, it should be in his mind as well. He should be thinking
17:10about
17:11this, pondering the thoughts of God, pondering the ways of God, pondering how great and as Brad
17:16said, awesome God is. He's to meditate upon it. And I like the last part because the last one,
17:22you can do the first two, but you're not successful unless you do the last one. Look at the last
17:26one
17:26says, so that you may be careful to, what's your translation say? Say it out loud. I heard someone
17:33say it. Okay. Another one is to do it. Be careful to do it. You can talk about it. You
17:41can think about
17:42it, but if you don't do it, there's a disconnect there. So that all three go together. He says,
17:48be courageous. In other words, that's just act like a man, Joshua. Just be a man. Be hundred percent
17:54dedicated to God. Don't cut corners. Don't shortcut God. Don't shortcut the people. Be courageous.
18:01Give a hundred percent. Look at verses 10 through 18. Now we see Joshua has been commissioned by God.
18:06He's going to now command the people. Joshua commanding. And Joshua commanded the officers
18:12of the people, pass through the midst of the camp and command the people, prepare your provisions
18:16for within three days you were to pass over this Jordan. Oh yes. Oh right. 450 years we've been
18:23waiting for this. That's 450 Christmases that we never got our possession. That's like it's always
18:30winter and never Christmas. Pass over the Jordan to take possession of the land that your Lord,
18:37your God is giving to you to possess. And to the Reubenites, the Gadites, and half the tribe of
18:42Manasseh, Joshua said, remember the word that Moses, a servant of the Lord commanded you saying,
18:46the Lord, your God is providing you a place of rest and will give you this land. Your wives,
18:53your little ones, your livestock shall remain in the land that Moses gave you beyond the Jordan.
18:58But all the men of value among you shall pass over armed before your brothers and shall help them
19:03until the Lord gives you rest to give rest to your brothers as he has to you. And they also
19:08shall
19:08take possession of the land that the Lord, your God is giving them. Then you shall return to the land
19:13of
19:13your possession and shall possess it. The land that Moses, a servant of the Lord gave you beyond
19:18the Jordan toward the sunrise. And they answered, that's the two and a half tribes of Moses and
19:23they, of Israel, they answered, Joshua, all that you have commanded us, we will do. And wherever you
19:29send us, we will go just as we obeyed Moses and all things. So will we obey you only may
19:34the Lord,
19:34your God be with you as he was with Moses, whoever rebels against your commandment and disobeys your
19:40words, whatever you command him shall be put to death. Only be strong and courageous. Now Joshua
19:46has heard from the Lord. He's going to go out now and speak to the people. The Lord has spoken
19:51to
19:51Joshua. He's now going to go speak to the people and the buzz, the excitement in the camp, you can
19:55imagine three days, here it is. Finally, we're going to take possession of what God has promised to
20:01us. You've been playing with that gift for 450 years. Let's go take possession of it. Imagine how excited
20:09they were. They wanted it. They've been waiting for it, but it wasn't going to come easy for them.
20:15It was going to be a battle. It wasn't that these cities are just going to roll over and say,
20:19hey,
20:19sure, come on and take over our land. Each city was going to be hard to fight against. And some
20:23of
20:23the kings of the city states would band together and fight against the nation as a whole. It would be
20:28a
20:28very fierce battle that they were going to run into. Now you may be wondering what this whole deal of
20:34these two and a half tribes are. Let me briefly explain what happened. They came up to the east
20:39side of the Jordan River before they passed over into their land. And they said, this land over here
20:46on the east side of the Jordan River, this is prosperous land. And we got lots of cattle. We've
20:52got lots of sheep. We've got all kinds of stuff. We need all of these things, all of this land.
20:57It's
20:57great land for our possessions. Can we stay here? Two and a half tribes say that. Moses says,
21:05goes to the Lord. The Lord says, okay, yes, they may stay there. But when they go into the land,
21:11they must promise they're going to go help their brothers possess the land that I promised in the
21:15nation of Israel. They must help them. So the two and a half tribes settle in that area, leave some
21:21of
21:21their men. According to the text, when we compare them, about 70,000 of their men stay there in that
21:26area. 40,000 go with the nation of Israel to go to possess the land, to go help them. See,
21:31they got their possession already. We have to understand that. That was their possession.
21:36Now they're sending men to help Israel take its possession of the land. So that's where the two
21:41and a half tribes come in here. They were to remember the promise that they made to Moses and
21:46to God. The principle is this. See, those who had already possessed their inheritance were to help
21:54those who hadn't possessed their inheritance yet. That's what God was trying to enforce.
21:59You can't just sit back and say, I've got my inheritance. It's good. I don't care about anyone
22:03else. You go help your brother is what God is telling them. And they said, sure, we're going to
22:06do that. Now what's God saying to us today? We're going to bring it into the 21st century to Medical
22:13Lake right here, Medical Lake Community Church, 21st century. We're going to bring it into us.
22:17What's God saying to us? Something we need to be careful when we sing some of the hymns.
22:22I love hymns. I have no problem with hymns. We just need to be careful. And some of the hymns,
22:26they equate Canaan, the promised land, with heaven. That's not a good metaphor. That's not a good
22:32picture. Because when they entered into Canaan, I guarantee, and we'll see here shortly, they had
22:38battles, they had fights, they had temptations, they had problems. I don't know about your picture of
22:44heaven. But when I get to heaven, I don't think there are going to be any more battles, temptations,
22:48problems, or fights. Do you? I don't think so. So saying heaven is like, or Canaan is like heaven,
22:54that's not a good comparison. A better comparison is this. Canaan is a picture of the Christian's
23:02spiritual inheritance. That's a better picture. It's the picture of the Christian's spiritual
23:09inheritance. For Israel, it was physical. For us, it is spiritual. It is our spiritual
23:15inheritance. They have been redeemed in Egypt through the blood of the Passover lamb. As
23:21the death angel passed through, when he saw the blood, he would pass over those houses that
23:25the blood was there. Then Joshua took them into the land to possess it. I want to say this
23:33morning, we have someone better than Joshua. In the New Testament, the name for Joshua is
23:39Jesus. We have Jesus who is our Passover lamb. And in his blood, we find security. And the
23:48death angel will pass over us when he sees the blood of Jesus Christ on us. We have something
23:53and someone better than Joshua. Not only is he in our redemption, Jesus, he is also the one
24:01that leads us into our spiritual inheritance. He's the one who leads us into God's rest according
24:07to Hebrews. He did what Joshua couldn't do for the people. He provided a redemption and
24:13he provided us a spiritual inheritance and it's all in Jesus Christ and no other place. Not
24:17in me, not in this church. It's in Jesus Christ. Ephesians 1.3 says, Jesus being our Old Testament
24:26Passover lamb, he leads us into our spiritual inheritance. Ephesians says this, blessed be
24:31the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ who has blessed us in Christ with every spiritual
24:40blessing. Say that with me, every spiritual blessing. Are any of them left out? With every
24:48spiritual blessing in the heavenly places. Someone better than Joshua is here today. That's Jesus
24:56Christ who has redeemed us with his blood and leads us into our spiritual inheritance.
25:01Remember you saw the picture of Solomon's golden days for the nation of Israel and how I mentioned
25:07to you that they did not ever possess all of the land that God promised to them. That's true.
25:13And just as Israel has not possessed the full extent of God's promises to them in the land,
25:21I say to you this morning, there are many Christians who have never possessed all the spiritual inheritance
25:28that God has given to us. You're standing in a sense, metaphorically, on the other side of the
25:35Jordan. You've never entered into the spiritual blessings of the spiritual inheritance provided for
25:40us in Jesus Christ. There are many just like the nation of Israel who have not got the full extent
25:47of
25:47what God has promised them. They've got bits and pieces of it, but they don't quite grasp it.
25:53And the battle that we as Christians fight is not a physical battle like they fought. It's a spiritual
25:58battle. And the spiritual battle is going to keep us out of the possession that God wants us,
26:03try to defeat us, try to say God's promises are not true. That's what the spiritual battle does all
26:09the day to you and to me. He wants us, the spiritual battle wants to keep us out of the
26:15possessions
26:15that God has promised to us, our inheritance. But I want to assure you today, we believers,
26:23we have a very good reason and multiple reasons, three to be exact that I've listed. We have good
26:29reasons to remain strong in the faith, to withstand the spiritual temptations, to withstand the spiritual
26:35battle that you and I face always. We have good reasons to be strong. They're the same reasons that
26:40Joshua had. The first one is this, God's promises. God's promises. He has promised to you and me
26:49believers certain things that are true. And he says, you will inherit these. I have given them to you.
26:57And you say, wait a second, I don't have them right now, God. I've given them to you. I've given
27:01them to
27:02you, but I don't have them right now, but I've given them to you. They're my promises.
27:07And all of his promises in Jesus Christ are yes and amen. They are true. The first reason for
27:15remaining strong in the faith to possess our inheritance is God's promises. The second is
27:20we have God's word. We have God's word. We have the revelation of God himself. You see, a promise is
27:28no good if the person promising cannot fulfill his promise. It's not a good promise. And just to have
27:35a promise would not be any good if we didn't know the character of the person making the promise.
27:40So therefore we have his revelation. We can read in his word all about, as Brad said,
27:45this awesome God who makes awesome promises to us and will fulfill them in us. So we have his word.
27:53And the third thing that is a good reason to remain strong in the faith is this.
27:57We have God's presence. You say, wait a second. Jesus was here. I understand God in the flesh,
28:03but he's not here right now. But he did send us someone so that we would not be orphans or
28:11without
28:11comfort or without counsel. He sent us his Holy Spirit. And in the presence of his Holy Spirit,
28:18God is with us today. He's right here in our presence. And the promises he made to Joshua is,
28:25listen, I will not fail you. I will not be weak towards you. And I will never leave you. I
28:30promise that.
28:31I promise I am with you through the indwelling Holy Spirit.
28:38Now, here's an important principle. I want to speak to you who would consider yourself mature.
28:42Now, I'm not talking about being arrogant, but I'm talking about those of you who are mature in your
28:46faith. Okay. There were two and a half tribes that had already received their possession,
28:55but they were willing to help their brothers who had not yet received their possessions.
29:01And I want to ask you here this morning who are strong in your faith, who understand the spiritual
29:08possessions we have in Christ. You get it. You got it. You understand. What about the person that's
29:15sitting right by you who doesn't get it yet? Are you willing to help them enter into their
29:21possessions? Are you willing, whether it's through discipleship, whether it's through counseling,
29:26whether it's just taking someone through the word and showing them the promises of God,
29:29are you willing to help your brother or sister who have not possessed yet their inheritance?
29:40It's all ours. All the promises are ours. In Jesus, there are yes and amen. They're all ours.
29:48They must be possessed though. The land was Israel's, but they had to cross the Jordan.
29:54It was theirs. But if they never entered into it, they would have never possessed it.
30:00And all the promises of spiritual blessings in Jesus Christ are ours as believers, but you have
30:05to possess them. You have to enter into them. How do I do that? First way I can do that
30:12is this,
30:12by obeying the word, by obeying the word. I can enter into the possession by obeying the word of God.
30:19As God speaks, as God gives direction, as God gives me wisdom, I enter into and obey. I obey his
30:27word.
30:28The second thing is, I can now claim the promises. Now, I'm not talking about laying your hands
30:34on a Cadillac, or in my case, a Jaguar, and I claim the promise that God is going to give
30:40me
30:40this word. That's not what I'm talking about. What I'm talking about is you placing your hand on this
30:45word, and you say, I claim every promise to the believers in this word. I claim them today, Jesus.
30:50I believe you. Claim the promises. Every promise in here that's been given to you and me as a believer
30:57in Jesus Christ, say, I believe it. And as Doug has so well laid out for us, we have to
31:04know what they
31:05are before we can claim them. Thank you for your Bible reading plan, Doug, that helps us find those
31:12promises and claim them. Third thing is, we have to fight the good fight. We have to fight the good
31:19fight. The spiritual battle you and I are up against is a tough battle. We have an enemy that's been
31:24around for a long time, and he knows exactly how to tempt us. He knows which buttons to push in
31:28us.
31:28He knows exactly how to get us off track. He knows that. He's, in that sense, malignantly wise.
31:34He knows how to do that. He knows how to tempt us. So we have to fight the good fight.
31:38We have to stand
31:39with all the armor of God on and stand in that day and fight against him. Don't turn our backs
31:43to him, but head him straight on. Shield of faith and all those pieces of armor. We've got to fight
31:47the good fight. I have an assignment for you this week. Here's your assignment. Wait, this is church.
31:54You don't get an assignment. Yeah, you're going to get one today. I want you to ask God this week.
32:02Ask God what he has for you as a believer that you have never possessed.
32:10That's your assignment. Ask God what he has for you as a believer that you have never possessed.
32:17A promise that you've never claimed.
32:24And the great thing is, you don't have to wait till Christmas.
32:31It's every day.
32:34What's holding you back today from possessing your inheritance as a believer?
32:44What part of the abundant life that Jesus promised in John 10 are you missing out on?
32:54Possessing the inheritance.
32:57That which has been given to us, but we have never entered in on.
33:01What has God got for you?
33:04Your spiritual inheritance that you have never possessed.
33:08What part of the abundant life are you missing out on?
33:13And what's holding you back from possessing your inheritance?
33:18Those promises to us in Jesus Christ.
33:20Those are the three questions.
33:22Those are the three questions.
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