5 And Joshua said to the people, "Sanctify yourselves,
for tomorrow the LORD will do wonders among you.".
If the Book of Joshua teaches us one thing, it is that we
must learn to live by faith everyday if we are to live victorious and exciting
Christian lives! I will never forget arriving at Lynchburg Baptist College in
1971, shortly after my salvation experience, and attending Thomas Road Baptist
Church. Dr. Jerry Falwell had a daily radio broadcast and weekly television
program called “The Old Time Gospel Hour”. Everyday the program began with Doug
Oldham singing, “We’ve Come This Far by Faith”! Honestly those four years of
college were some of the most exciting years of my life as I observed Dr.
Falwell teach us by his example what it means to trust and obey the Lord and to
live by faith!
Unbelief says, "Let's go back to where it's
safe"; but faith says, "Let's go forward to where God is
working" (see Num. 14:1-4). Forty years before, Joshua and Caleb had
assured the Jews, "Let us go up at once, and possess it; for we are
well able to overcome it." That's faith! But the people said, "We
are not able!" That's unbelief, and it cost the nation forty years of
discipline in the wilderness (see Num. 13:26-33). "And this is the
victory that has overcome the world—your faith" (1 John 5:4).
One of the joys of my Christian life has been the study of
Christian biography, the lives of the men and women whom God has used, and is
using, to challenge the church and change the world. The Christians I've read
about were all different in their backgrounds, their training, their
personalities, and their ways of serving God; but they had one thing in common:
They all believed God's promises and did what He told them to do. They were men
and women of faith, and God honored them because they believed His Word.
God hasn't changed, and the principle of faith hasn't
changed. What seems to have changed is the attitude of God's people: We no
longer believe God and act by faith in His promises. His promises never fail
(Josh. 21:45; 23:14; 1 Kings 8:56), but we can fail to live by the grace of God
and not enter into all that He has promised for us (Heb. 3:7-19; 12:15). God
has "brought us out that He might bring us in," but too often we fail
to "enter in because of unbelief" (Heb. 3:19). In Joshua 3 and 4, God
illustrates for us three essentials for moving ahead by faith and claiming all
that He has for us: the Word of faith, the walk of faith, and the witness of
faith.
First, we find that God has given us the Word of faith
(Josh. 3:1-13). As the nation waited by the Jordan River, the people must have
wondered what Joshua planned to do. He certainly wouldn't ask them to swim the
river or ford it, because the river was at flood stage (3:15). They couldn't
construct enough boats or rafts to transport more than a million people over
the water to the other side. Besides, that approach would make them perfect
targets for their enemies. What would their new leader do?
Like Moses before him, Joshua received his orders from the
Lord, and he obeyed them by faith. "So then faith comes by hearing, and
hearing by the word of God" (Rom. 10:17). It has been well said that
faith is not believing in spite of evidence but obeying in spite of
consequence. When you read Hebrews 11, the great "faith chapter" of
Scripture, you discover that the people mentioned there all did something
because they believed God. Their faith wasn't a passive feeling; it was an
active force. Because Abraham believed God, he left Ur and headed for Canaan.
Because Moses believed God, he defied the gods of Egypt and led the Jews to
freedom. Because Gideon believed God, he led a small band of Jews to defeat the
huge Midianite army. Living faith always leads to action. "For as the
body without the spirit is dead, so faith without works is dead also" (James
2:26).
What step of faith is the Lord leading you to take today?
God bless!
