SPEAKER_00: Ministering to the heart of Western Arkansas's River Valley for over 165 years, welcome to Chapter and First, the Bible teaching ministry of Fort Smith's First Baptist Church.
SPEAKER_00: You'll find sermons and teachings from Pastor Greg, our ministry staff, and guest speakers.
SPEAKER_00: Thank you for listening.
SPEAKER_01: Turn with me, if you will, in your Bibles to Joshua chapter 1, verse 8.
SPEAKER_01: And I want to talk to you today about a topic, a little bit selfishly for Mother's Day, that is one of my mother's favorite topics, and it is certainly one of Janet's favorite topics and ministries in our family, and that is the Word of God.
SPEAKER_01: So I want to talk to you today about owning and obeying Scripture.
SPEAKER_01: It is the only, let me say that again, the only foundation for making life work, or the word here in Joshua chapter 1, success.
SPEAKER_01: We are so grateful in so many families.
SPEAKER_01: Mom is the one who spends a little extra time or has times in life to teach us scripture.
SPEAKER_01: That's certainly the way it was in my house and in Janet's house as well.
SPEAKER_01: Both of our parents were longtime Sunday school teachers.
SPEAKER_01: Both of them loved the Word of God.
SPEAKER_01: Both of them taught the Word of God.
SPEAKER_01: We are both blessed to have mothers who had such a deep love for the Word of God and still do that they have passed that on into our lives and into our families.
SPEAKER_01: My mom, I remember when I was a kid, still in elementary school, she was a Bible study fellowship lady.
SPEAKER_01: I know we have a lot of Bible study fellowship ladies here, and some of the men who've done that as well.
SPEAKER_01: We're honored to have a heritage with them here at our church.
SPEAKER_01: And mom took the first one I ever did, she took the book of Genesis and she gave me her notes and walked me through a lot of those and taught me how to do that.
SPEAKER_01: She would place scripture verses all over our house.
SPEAKER_01: She would put them on the refrigerators and things like that.
SPEAKER_01: We were raised doing Bible drill, and mom would drill us on Bible drill, myself and my brother Wayne and my sister Kathy.
SPEAKER_01: I remember the first time that I had a chance to preach.
SPEAKER_01: I was in uh I was in my office, and the way that worked where the church where I worked, it was a large church, and uh our offices, if we were putting it here in context, would have been up there on the second floor, and I would come down through that way to the church.
SPEAKER_01: And my mom has such a strong love for scripture, and she has such a demand, as we'll see in a moment in the book of Joshua, that we're careful with Scripture.
SPEAKER_01: I came down out of my office and I was coming in the back door into the sanctuary, and my mom was standing there waiting on me.
SPEAKER_01: It was a Wednesday night, and in that church, what we did was we had uh we turned the campus into a big Bible college, and there were probably 50 or 60 Bible classes all over the church on all kinds of topics, and uh, our pastor taught a class for young uh for young Christians and for new members of the church, and then in the sanctuary, we still had about six or seven hundred people on uh Wednesday night in there, and we had uh worship service in there as well, and they would let young guys like me walk through there and preach and learn how to preach and practice and that sort of deal.
SPEAKER_01: So it was a great setting to be preaching.
SPEAKER_01: It was my first time to preach at my home church in front of all my friends, all my Sunday school teachers, and all that.
SPEAKER_01: My parents were there.
SPEAKER_01: I came down out of the office, walked over to that step, and my mom was standing right there waiting on me at that step.
SPEAKER_01: And I said, Hey, mom.
SPEAKER_01: She says, Greg, are you prepared?
SPEAKER_01: I said, Excuse me?
SPEAKER_01: She said, You forget, I watched you fake your way all the way through school and college, and I suspect you did quite a bit of that in law school.
SPEAKER_01: I know how you are, and I want to know if you're prepared.
SPEAKER_01: You're teaching the word of God, and all our friends are in the sanctuary tonight.
SPEAKER_01: I said, Yes, mom, I'm prepared.
SPEAKER_01: I had to put screens on the and turn those in.
SPEAKER_01: So mom still to this day has a deep love for the word of God.
SPEAKER_01: When we go visit at home every morning, uh, we'll stay with her, and every morning I know where mom is.
SPEAKER_01: She gets up and she goes to a chair.
SPEAKER_01: She has a special spot, her devotional Bibles, her Bible, and she spends time with the Lord in the Word of God, praying and praying for us and studying God's Word.
SPEAKER_01: My wife, Janet, taught our children how to study God's Word.
SPEAKER_01: She began when we had our first home and we started having babies.
SPEAKER_01: She prayed over Scripture and over every door facing in every door in our house on both sides of the door.
SPEAKER_01: She had Bible verses placed there that were a pronouncement over our kids and a picture of God's word.
SPEAKER_01: And so we raised our kids with scripture in the home and all of that.
SPEAKER_01: She would find Bible stories on tape when they were very little, one and two and three.
SPEAKER_01: And every time we were in the car, she was playing Bible stories and uh those programs.
SPEAKER_01: She has now made copies of those and given those to our grandson so that he'll be raised in the Word of God in that fashion.
SPEAKER_01: Janet was the one that helped me learn the form of Bible study that we do most often, the inductive method of Bible study that I use in writing our sermons, and she's taught our kids that.
SPEAKER_01: And every day is praying scripture for all of her children and grandchildren.
SPEAKER_01: And so I just want to say to moms, to grandmothers, and to great-grandmothers like my mom and Janet's mom, thank you for all the time you spend in prayer, and thank you for all the time you spend teaching us the word of God and modeling us the word of God.
SPEAKER_01: The word of God is the only path to hope, life, and joy.
SPEAKER_01: The word of God is how we know that Jesus staked the ground, that he is the way, the truth, and the life, and no one comes to the Father but by him.
SPEAKER_01: It is through the Word of God that we know Jesus said these things.
SPEAKER_01: It is through the Word of God that we know what the gospel it is.
SPEAKER_01: It is through the Word of God that we know and have a historical confidence in the fact that Jesus died for our sins and rose again because the Holy Spirit took eyewitnesses in the gospels and he directed them how to write the scripture to tell us who Jesus is.
SPEAKER_01: The word of God says about itself, faith comes by hearing, and hearing by the word of God.
SPEAKER_01: The Bible says about itself, grass withers and the flower fades, but the word of God lasts forever.
SPEAKER_01: In the same way that we have honored our mothers today with the gift to first choices, we have changed how we do when we have going home services or funeral services or celebration life services or whatever you want to call for our folks who have loved the Lord and they've gone to be with Him.
SPEAKER_01: Instead of giving flowers or things like that, we just put that scripture in practice.
SPEAKER_01: Flowers, the grass withers and the flower fades, but the word of God lasts forever.
SPEAKER_01: And so we work with the Gideons here in our church.
SPEAKER_01: And every person we uh buy Bibles on their behalf in honor of them, of those saints who've loved the word of God here at our church, and we buy those through our Gideon partners to spread the word of God.
SPEAKER_01: You know, last year the impact that we had when we came together as a church and we bought Bibles to present those through a ministry partner in Africa.
SPEAKER_01: This is a church that is founded on the Word of God.
SPEAKER_01: For well over a hundred years, men have stood in the various spots in the various sanctuaries where the pulpits or the spot where the preacher stood was.
SPEAKER_01: Since the 1850s, men have been standing in front of the first Baptist Church of Fort Smith, preaching the Word of God as the inerrant, infallible Word of God.
SPEAKER_01: It is an incredible heritage in our church.
SPEAKER_01: And praise God, with our generation and your love for the Word, and our staff and their love for the Word, and our commitment to the Word of God, it is our hope and desire and our plan and our commitment to be preaching the Word of God until Jesus comes back, just like the Word of God says He will.
SPEAKER_01: It is the only foundation for success, for understanding life, for hope, for joy, for accomplishing what God wants us to accomplish.
SPEAKER_01: Here in the book of Joshua, as we've started this study, we are talking about being on mission to live in victory.
SPEAKER_01: We have talked about last week as we began the study that the land of Canaan is an Old Testament illustration of the abundant life in Christ for New Testament Christians.
SPEAKER_01: It is as you go into the land of Canaan where God is growing his people and he's turning them into his people, and he is accomplishing the process of being the bringing the Messiah into the world by establishing the Jewish people as his people and setting them there in that place that he gave them as an inheritance to be the path that he brings, the promised Savior into the world.
SPEAKER_01: And so it is an incredible picture for us as New Testament Christians, and as we've talked about, as we look at the battles and the things they went through and how they grew into the nation of Israel, it is an illustration for us as Christians how we grow and learn and become that Christian who walks in the abundant life in Christ.
SPEAKER_01: How we obtain that inheritance, that portion of that inheritance that is ours here in this life as a follower of Jesus.
SPEAKER_01: Now, we, as we saw last week, find Joshua, where God is speaking to him directly as the leader of the nation of Israel.
SPEAKER_01: And he is saying, You're about to go lead the people in.
SPEAKER_01: And Joshua, here's how we're going to do this.
SPEAKER_01: Now it's interesting.
SPEAKER_01: You think of all the things that God could speak to Joshua about.
SPEAKER_01: You're going into the land, you're going to face all these enemies.
SPEAKER_01: There needs to be a strategy as you go into the land of Israel.
SPEAKER_01: The only way that they would come in at that point from where they were on the other side of the Jordan was to come in right in the center of the nation, and the first place that they would find was the fortress city of Jericho that rested on the major junctions for the north and south and east and west roads across the nation.
SPEAKER_01: You think of all the things that he would have to do.
SPEAKER_01: Joshua, you're going to have to pull all these millions of people together.
SPEAKER_01: You're going to have to lead them.
SPEAKER_01: You're going to have to guide them of all the logistical issues that they would have to face.
SPEAKER_01: If you think about all of the leadership issues that Joshua is facing, not to mention the fact that he is taking the reins for the first time after the passing of the longtime iconic leader Moses.
SPEAKER_01: Of all the things that God would speak to him about, of all the wisdom that he could give, of all the instructions that he could give.
SPEAKER_01: Here's what God tells Joshua.
SPEAKER_01: Read with me here in Joshua chapter 1, verse 6.
SPEAKER_01: Joshua, be strong and courageous, for I will distribute the land I swore to their fathers to give them as an inheritance.
SPEAKER_01: Above all.
SPEAKER_01: Do you see that right there?
SPEAKER_01: If you mark in your Bibles, that's a great spot to mark right there.
SPEAKER_01: Above all.
SPEAKER_01: That means God is saying, Joshua, pay attention to me, son.
SPEAKER_01: This is the most important thing I'm going to tell you.
SPEAKER_01: Above all, be strong, very courageous for this purpose.
SPEAKER_01: Not strong in battle, not strong as a leader, not strong and visionary and casting your vision with the people.
SPEAKER_01: But you be strong and very courageous to what?
SPEAKER_01: Carefully observe the entire instruction my servant Moses commanded you.
SPEAKER_01: His most important statement to the leader he had appointed to lead his people, the most important character trait that he speaks to Joshua about is you be strong and courageous to stand on the word of God and carefully observe all of it.
SPEAKER_01: He says, Do not turn from it to the right or the left, so that you will have success wherever you go.
SPEAKER_01: This book of instruction must not depart from your mouth.
SPEAKER_01: You are to recite it day and night, so that you may carefully observe everything written in it, for then you will prosper and succeed in whatever you do.
SPEAKER_01: Haven I commanded you, be strong and courageous.
SPEAKER_01: Do not be afraid or discouraged, for the Lord your God is with you wherever you go.
SPEAKER_01: And he gives him that clear instruction and the promise to be with him and the command to follow his word.
SPEAKER_01: In fact, this verse, Joshua 1.8, this is the key verse to understanding the entire book of Joshua.
SPEAKER_01: This is the key right here.
SPEAKER_01: Everything that happens is following God's word.
SPEAKER_01: When they are victorious, when they take the land, when they defeat enemies, it is because they are following the word of God and standing on his promises.
SPEAKER_01: When they fail in places like a little place, little town called Ai, when that happens, it is because they have not followed the Word of God.
SPEAKER_01: This is the key verse to this entire book.
SPEAKER_01: And it is the key verse that unlocks the book on how to obtain the inheritance that God has promised his people so that we will understand in pursuing what God has for us in our lives, this is the key verse and principle for us as believers.
SPEAKER_01: It is to follow the word of God in exactly the way that God has commanded Joshua.
SPEAKER_01: Jesus said, He it is who loves me, who keeps my commandments.
SPEAKER_01: It is the word of God that is the roadmap, that is the path.
SPEAKER_01: And every time Scripture speaks of itself or you get a command of Scripture in the Old Testament, you have a picture in the New Testament of exactly what we see.
SPEAKER_01: You see right here when God tells him, listen, this book of instruction, you are to meditate on it, you are to carefully observe it, and when you do that, then you will prosper in whatever you do.
SPEAKER_01: If you want a New Testament verse, you don't have to look very far.
SPEAKER_01: Second Timothy chapter 3, verse 15, all scripture is inspired by God and is profitable for doctrine, reproof, correction, instruction, and righteousness, that the man of God may be thoroughly equipped for every good work.
SPEAKER_01: Scripture all throughout teaches us that it is the Word of God written to do exactly what God is reiterating in the life of Joshua.
SPEAKER_01: And if we are going to live in victory, if we're going to live in the abundant life in Christ, it is going to be when we own and observe the Word of God.
SPEAKER_01: It is when it becomes a part of our heart, it is in our minds, it is in every process, thought process in our lives.
SPEAKER_01: It is when we are pursuing to obey it with a refusal to turn to the right or to the left.
SPEAKER_01: When we stand on the promises of God and we seek the person of God, he promises to always be with us in the same way he promised with Joshua.
SPEAKER_01: And he promises to equip us in the same way he promised to equip Joshua.
SPEAKER_01: This is the key verse to understanding the book.
SPEAKER_01: You can run every moment, every battle, every question, every leadership decision.
SPEAKER_01: You can run it all through this verse right here.
SPEAKER_01: It is the key that unlocks the mission to victory.
SPEAKER_01: Let me show you kind of how this verse breaks apart.
SPEAKER_01: One of the things I love about Scripture is that it gives us everything we need to understand it.
SPEAKER_01: First, let me show you.
SPEAKER_01: God has a definition of success.
SPEAKER_01: He uses that word here, and I don't want to back away from that word.
SPEAKER_01: There's no reason that we should let culture take that word away from us.
SPEAKER_01: When we say things like success, we tend to either place on it a financial or a professional, a secular kind of definition.
SPEAKER_01: In fact, sometimes that is such a clear thing, cultural definition, that in the church we may pull back from that and say, oh, I don't want to use the word success because that sounds all worldly or something.
SPEAKER_01: Or I don't want to sound like a preacher on television, you know, kind of a deal.
SPEAKER_01: I may have told you the story one time I was flipping channels and I found this guy who was preaching on television, and it just caught me.
SPEAKER_01: He was talking about credit card debt and all of that.
SPEAKER_01: And uh and he got into this deal and he said started saying, Listen, if you'll tithe and you'll give to the church and you'll step out in faith, you know, God could send a thunderstorm to the bank headquarters where your credit cards are.
SPEAKER_01: And God is great enough and promises success.
SPEAKER_01: He could strike that building with a lightning strike and wipe out all their computers and wipe out your credit card debt.
SPEAKER_01: I told Janet, we're going shopping.
SPEAKER_01: We're gonna step out in faith and try that.
SPEAKER_01: I do not suggest you do that.
SPEAKER_01: I mean, you know, we we're afraid of that kind of stuff, but listen, here's what God says: you will be successful in these endeavors.
SPEAKER_01: You will win.
SPEAKER_01: The Bible talks about us being victorious.
SPEAKER_01: The Bible says in Romans chapter 8, in all things we are more than conquerors through him he loved us.
SPEAKER_01: Now, that does not mean that we're gonna be rich and happy and life is gonna be hard.
SPEAKER_01: Jesus never promised that.
SPEAKER_01: He said, in fact, talking to disciples, listen, there are two ways the life works.
SPEAKER_01: One, there's this big, wide, easy road in life, and lots of people are gonna go down that and they're gonna end up in hell.
SPEAKER_01: And there's another road.
SPEAKER_01: It is a narrow road, it is a hard road, but at the end of that is life.
SPEAKER_01: And what he's saying is we've got to come to grips with the fact that we're going to have to repent of our sin, return every desire and thought we had to Jesus, we're gonna have to surrender ourselves to him, walk by faith, trust in him as our Savior, and walk through these battles like in the book of Joshua, as he grows us and develops us.
SPEAKER_01: We're gonna have to have the faith to stand on our convictions in every moment.
SPEAKER_01: That's why he tells Joshua to be strong and courageous to obey the word of God.
SPEAKER_01: It is not easy.
SPEAKER_01: It is a journey of faith where you are being transformed and grown.
SPEAKER_01: But it is deeply valuable.
SPEAKER_01: And what God promises is in every one of those moments, whether it's easy or whether it's hard, you will know the presence of God.
SPEAKER_01: You will grow, he will do his purpose in your life, he will use you and your testimony to bring others to Christ, and you will be successful in the endeavors that he puts in front of you.
SPEAKER_01: Why would he put an endeavor in front of you and then cause you to fail?
SPEAKER_01: That doesn't make sense.
SPEAKER_01: But what he does, whether it is a battle, whether it is a joy, whether whatever moment in life, we all go through those.
SPEAKER_01: And Scripture tells us we're going to face all of those ups and downs and all of those questions and all of those battles.
SPEAKER_01: That's why this is such a powerful book to study.
SPEAKER_01: But what he says is in the midst of every one of those things, Joshua, if you are standing on my promises and you are obeying my commands, I will make it work.
SPEAKER_01: That's why the Bible says in the book of Romans, all things work together for the good of those who love God and are called according to his purpose.
SPEAKER_01: And so what we have to understand is God's definition of what he means when he says success.
SPEAKER_01: And he defines that word, that concept, that picture for us, as being transformed into his people for his purpose, possessing his promised inheritance.
SPEAKER_01: That's what he means.
SPEAKER_01: We are becoming his people.
SPEAKER_01: Just like here he says, go, I'm going to distribute the land I promised as an inheritance.
SPEAKER_01: We are being transformed into his people.
SPEAKER_01: We are receiving and obtaining that inheritance.
SPEAKER_01: Why was he doing that?
SPEAKER_01: Because he was establishing a nation to be a light to the world and the path for the gospel to come in.
SPEAKER_01: And that's why it's so important that they look like who God commanded them to be, and they do what God commanded them to do so that they can be that light of the gospel.
SPEAKER_01: And he says, Listen, Joshua, if you are being transformed into my people, if you are obeying me and you are being a part of this purpose, and you are obtaining.
SPEAKER_01: The promised inheritance as I've commanded, then Joshua, this will be successful, and I will make it work.
SPEAKER_01: And so we don't need to back away from that.
SPEAKER_01: We need to live in the promises of God.
SPEAKER_01: We need to understand the promises of God.
SPEAKER_01: We need to stand in the promises of God.
SPEAKER_01: We need to cling to the promises of God.
SPEAKER_01: We need to pray the promises of God.
SPEAKER_01: Now, here's how this process works.
SPEAKER_01: It's a very simple process.
SPEAKER_01: It is repeated all throughout Scripture.
SPEAKER_01: And here's what it looks like.
SPEAKER_01: Here is the practical way that he is teaching Joshua to own the Word of God.
SPEAKER_01: He begins with his mission.
SPEAKER_01: Be strong and courageous, for I will distribute the land I swore to your fathers to give to them as an inheritance.
SPEAKER_01: He starts off with the motivation of why Joshua should be clinging to the Word of God.
SPEAKER_01: Joshua, remember the mission.
SPEAKER_01: We are going to become my people.
SPEAKER_01: I have promised you this land.
SPEAKER_01: I am going to take the enemies out from under you.
SPEAKER_01: You are going to grow, and your people are going to flourish, and they're going to be my people in this promised inheritance.
SPEAKER_01: It is the mission for why we follow the Lord.
SPEAKER_01: Then he commands him to meditate on Scripture.
SPEAKER_01: Look at what he says.
SPEAKER_01: Verse 7.
SPEAKER_01: Above all, be strong and very courageous to carefully observe the whole instruction my father Moses has commanded you.
SPEAKER_01: Do not turn from the right to the left.
SPEAKER_01: You'll have good success.
SPEAKER_01: Verse 8.
SPEAKER_01: It's the same process here.
SPEAKER_01: You are to meditate on it day and night.
SPEAKER_01: We are to engage the Word of God in a constant, never-ending work in our lives.
SPEAKER_01: It is not a book to read.
SPEAKER_01: It is not a novel to fascinate.
SPEAKER_01: It is a character, life-changing book of faith that we are to own and stand on in every decision of life.
SPEAKER_01: And we cannot do that if we don't own it.
SPEAKER_01: And so we are to meditate on it and be in it.
SPEAKER_01: And then it affects our mind and how we see.
SPEAKER_01: He says, listen, do not let this book depart from your mouth.
SPEAKER_01: You are to recite it day and night.
SPEAKER_01: In other words, as we are meditating on it, it should then become how our mind works.
SPEAKER_01: And so when you speak something, it's a picture of authority in Old Testament Israeli culture.
SPEAKER_01: And so what he's saying is, when you speak, you speak in line with the Word of God.
SPEAKER_01: You've meditated on it.
SPEAKER_01: It has affected your mind.
SPEAKER_01: And now as you move, as you see things, as your perspective is defined, it is defined by the Word of God.
SPEAKER_01: And then he says, carefully obey it.
SPEAKER_01: You meditate it, do not let it part from your mouth, and you are careful to obey it in every way.
SPEAKER_01: The movements of our life should be in line with the teaching of Scripture.
SPEAKER_01: How often do we have decisions that we can literally hang Bible verses on?
SPEAKER_01: As a husband, as a mom, as a parent, as a child, as an employee, as a supervisor, in your finances, in how you make retirement decisions, in how you deal with the people around you, and how you handle conflict.
SPEAKER_01: How often can you put an attachment to a Bible verse that focuses the perspective of how you handle that moment?
SPEAKER_01: The movements of our life should be in line with Scripture.
SPEAKER_01: And if we do that, then we are accomplishing the mission.
SPEAKER_01: How do we get to the mission?
SPEAKER_01: We begin with the picture and the promise of the mission.
SPEAKER_01: It becomes our focus and pursuit.
SPEAKER_01: How do we do that?
SPEAKER_01: By meditating on the Word of God.
SPEAKER_01: It changes our mind and our focus, and then we move in line with it, and we are moving to the mission.
SPEAKER_01: It's just a simple process.
SPEAKER_01: It's how the human brain works.
SPEAKER_01: It's how decisions are made.
SPEAKER_01: It's how we process and function things.
SPEAKER_01: It's how we deal with emotions and handle them properly so they don't mess up how we face things.
SPEAKER_01: This process is taught all throughout Scripture.
SPEAKER_01: Last year we did a study on renewing your mind.
SPEAKER_01: If you went back and listened to some of those, it'll line up directly with this.
SPEAKER_01: Scripture all throughout teaches this methodology and this process.
SPEAKER_01: Psalm 119.
SPEAKER_01: If you go back and spend some time and you read through all those stanzas of that incredible song that talk about the word of God, how often does it do this process?
SPEAKER_01: Psalm 119 says, Open my eyes that I may see wondrous things from your law.
SPEAKER_01: It's incredible.
SPEAKER_01: This same simple process, all throughout Scripture, is taught.
SPEAKER_01: We teach it here this way.
SPEAKER_01: We talk about how our spiritual life grows, how we live in victory, how we become like Jesus.
SPEAKER_01: And often we'll use the issue, use the illustration of a triangle, an equilateral triangle.
SPEAKER_01: It's made up of three different elements, and this is the spiritual chemistry, if you will, of how we grow.
SPEAKER_01: Your identity in Christ.
SPEAKER_01: This is who I am.
SPEAKER_01: I am saved, and because I am saved, I am in Christ, and I am a member of the body of Christ.
SPEAKER_01: Those two things are inextricably linked.
SPEAKER_01: A Christian is not a Lone Ranger process, it is a part of a family and an army.
SPEAKER_01: You are in the people of God and connected to the people of God in the same way that you're connected to Jesus.
SPEAKER_01: It is our identity and who we are.
SPEAKER_01: And then our relationship with Jesus is how we grow to be like Him.
SPEAKER_01: And ministry is how we serve and express Jesus-like character as it grows out of us.
SPEAKER_01: And those things grow as an equilateral triangle together.
SPEAKER_01: And if you think about the relationship part of that, the way we teach a relationship grows is prayer, Bible study, and then God places in front of you choices of obedience, and we are to step out in faith on what he's speaking in our lives and obey him.
SPEAKER_01: That's how that relationship grows.
SPEAKER_01: Prayer, Bible study, choices of faith.
SPEAKER_01: It follows exactly the same pattern right here.
SPEAKER_01: The only way for you to walk with Jesus is to spend time in the Word of God.
SPEAKER_01: You cannot live in victory without being in the Word of God.
SPEAKER_01: I just I thought about ways to illustrate that as I prayed through this and I worked through that.
SPEAKER_01: Preachers are always trying to find a great illustration.
SPEAKER_01: We're always trying to find some way to like get to your get in your grill and all that kind of stuff.
SPEAKER_01: And the Lord just told me, Greg, you just need to remind everybody straight up.
SPEAKER_01: You cannot walk with Jesus without being in the Word of God.
SPEAKER_01: That's the entire sermon.
SPEAKER_01: We can all go home and eat lunch now.
SPEAKER_01: Thank you for not amening right there.
SPEAKER_01: That's what he tells them.
SPEAKER_01: This book of instruction must not depart from your mouth.
SPEAKER_01: You are to recite it day and night so that you may carefully observe everything written in it, for then you will prosper and succeed in whatever you do.
SPEAKER_01: Do not be afraid or discouraged.
SPEAKER_01: The Lord your God is with you wherever you go.
SPEAKER_01: That is our relationship.
SPEAKER_01: It is built on the Word of God.
SPEAKER_01: When I'm talking to young guys, pastors, you know, working through some of those things, sometimes I'll tell them, listen, whatever you do, you have got to build in how you preach, how you do ministry, when you spend time with people, you have got to build in having a quiet time, spending time with God, meditating in Scripture, because as a pastor, you have nothing to work with if your people are not in the Word of God.
SPEAKER_01: We have three things to get through life with God's given us.
SPEAKER_01: He's given us the indwelling presence of the Holy Spirit when you're saved.
SPEAKER_01: He's given you the Word of God, and He's given us each other that identity.
SPEAKER_01: If you remove yourself from the Word of God, you've lost a third of the spiritual tools that you have to live in victory.
SPEAKER_01: If you take the Word of God out, then now you're down to one third, and the Holy Spirit, that one third that's left, has been relegated to the role of convicting of your sin and calling you back to the Word of God and the body of Christ.
SPEAKER_01: That's how it works.
SPEAKER_01: And so that's why he gives him in this passage three commands.
SPEAKER_01: And so we need to see those three commands and understand what they are.
SPEAKER_01: He begins and he ends with carefully obey.
SPEAKER_01: Look at what he says.
SPEAKER_01: Verse 7.
SPEAKER_01: Above all, be strong and very courageous to carefully observe the whole instruction my servant Moses commanded you.
SPEAKER_01: And then he ends this section in verse 8, when he says, You are to recite it day and night, so that you may carefully observe everything written in it.
SPEAKER_01: And so he begins and ends with the obedience to the word of God.
SPEAKER_01: So the ultimate test for our walk with Christ, as Jesus said in the book of John, he it is who loves me, who keeps my commandments.
SPEAKER_01: I love Jesus.
SPEAKER_01: I am pursuing that mission of walking with him, becoming his, obtaining what he has saved me for.
SPEAKER_01: And so in order to do that, I have got to walk according to his instructions.
SPEAKER_01: Now, what's beautiful about it is when he begins with the mission and he ends with the mission, he is reminding us this is not some weird behavioral alteration thing.
SPEAKER_01: Or this is not some deal where you gave your life to Jesus and now he's the boss and he gets to tell you what to do, and you don't get to do stuff you wanted to do, and instead you have to do all that church stuff, and you can't do this, and you can't do that, and all that kind of stuff.
SPEAKER_01: Listen, that is a lie that Satan has been telling since the Garden of Eden.
SPEAKER_01: We've got to return to what it means that the word of God is the picture and the path to victory, the abundant life, relationship with him.
SPEAKER_01: We pursue it because we want to, because we're pursuing him, because we want to know him more closely, because he loves us and we want to be in his presence.
SPEAKER_01: We want to stand in his promises, and that's why we obey the word of God.
SPEAKER_01: And then he tells them the other two things your mouth always.
SPEAKER_01: That's that picture of your mind.
SPEAKER_01: It is your focus.
SPEAKER_01: You are approaching decisions from the Word of God because you have been meditating on it, because you've been meditating continually.
SPEAKER_01: And here's what he says Verse 8 this book of instruction must not depart from your mouth.
SPEAKER_01: You are to recite it day and night so that you cannot observe it day and night without meditating on it day and night.
SPEAKER_01: It will depart from your mouth if you have not been meditating on it day and night.
SPEAKER_01: You cannot spend enough time in the Word of God.
SPEAKER_01: Parents, I started out with the testimony of my parents and my mom and Janet's mom and Janet's impact in our life.
SPEAKER_01: I started out with that because of this.
SPEAKER_01: I need you to think through, parents.
SPEAKER_01: When have you taught your children enough scripture?
SPEAKER_01: When have you taught them enough?
SPEAKER_01: How much is enough?
SPEAKER_01: That's a vital question.
SPEAKER_01: Remember, the children of Israel are going into a land that they have been warned.
SPEAKER_01: Pagans live in this land, and you are to defeat them and reject evil.
SPEAKER_01: Remember, we talked about that the first week.
SPEAKER_01: And he says, if you do not deal with that evil and remove it from around your children, you will eventually embrace it and you will marry your children to their children, and you will be led astray and can and start to worship the way they worship and walk away from your God.
SPEAKER_01: He warns them of that.
SPEAKER_01: And so he tells Joshua, listen, Joshua, there is not enough study of Scripture that you can do.
SPEAKER_01: There is never a threshold where it's enough.
SPEAKER_01: He does not allow him to say, you've studied this much, and that's fine.
SPEAKER_01: He says, you never stop because of all that's around you, and it's going to be pulling at you and your people, and you meditate on it day and night, and you never let it out of your mouth.
SPEAKER_01: Parents.
SPEAKER_01: It used to be when I was in junior high kid, some guy at school would teach you some dirty word and say, go home and tell your parents this.
SPEAKER_01: It now happens in second grade.
SPEAKER_01: You with me?
SPEAKER_01: I mean, I just can't give you enough pictures of that.
SPEAKER_01: We are doing literally what the children of Israel are doing.
SPEAKER_01: We are walking into a world that is lost and desperately needs Jesus, and we are becoming God's people for his purpose, embracing his promised inheritance so the people around us will know how to come to Jesus.
SPEAKER_01: And we cannot do that or fight those distractions and temptations if we are not meditating constantly on the Word of God.
SPEAKER_01: That's what He's teaching you.
SPEAKER_01: So it's so vital that we spend time in the Word of God.
SPEAKER_01: I'll just show you these screens.
SPEAKER_01: I preached too long.
SPEAKER_01: I don't have time to finish them.
SPEAKER_01: I just want you to see them.
SPEAKER_01: We'll post the notes.
SPEAKER_01: Dave will post the notes for us on social media.
SPEAKER_01: How do you own Scripture?
SPEAKER_01: You should have a process.
SPEAKER_01: I shared how my mom has a chair and a place, and every morning she goes to the place where she meets with Jesus.
SPEAKER_01: I have a place in my office at home every morning where I go to meet Jesus.
SPEAKER_01: And meditating, it's not that hard to spend time in the Word of God.
SPEAKER_01: We talk about brew, there's all kinds of messages with that.
SPEAKER_01: You believe God has something to say to you.
SPEAKER_01: You just read and repeat the verse over and over and over.
SPEAKER_01: You stop and you spend time with each word and you let each word teach you, and then you write down what God's telling you.
SPEAKER_01: I would encourage you, if you have not been meditating on Scripture, the best thing you can do this week is to brew Joshua 1, 8.
SPEAKER_01: Memorize.
SPEAKER_01: When you memorize Scripture, that's where it goes from the paper it's printed on to the perspective that you see life with.
SPEAKER_01: And then make choices for what God's teaching you.
SPEAKER_01: Make choices for what you're learning.
SPEAKER_01: Put it into practice and watch God step into your life and do things you never thought he could do.
SPEAKER_01: All of this begins with the mission and why we do this.
SPEAKER_01: We study God's word and we follow God's word because we want to be with Jesus.
SPEAKER_01: And if you've never trusted Christ as your Savior, listen, there's no better time for you to see who Jesus is in your life.
SPEAKER_01: He died for you.
SPEAKER_01: We've sung that all morning.
SPEAKER_01: He rose again conquering death and sin for you.
SPEAKER_01: We started off the message saying it's the Word of God that teaches us that.
SPEAKER_01: And if you want to know life, you want to know hope, you want to know forgiveness of your sin, you step out in faith on the Word of God that promises you'll be saved.
SPEAKER_01: I want you to bow your heads as we close this morning.
SPEAKER_01: And if you've never accepted Christ as your Savior, I'm going to invite you to come.
SPEAKER_01: We'll have pastors at the head of our aisles.
SPEAKER_01: We'll just sing a verse or two of a hymn that's nothing more than a testimony of God's people.
SPEAKER_01: And they are singing because they are saying, this is what we believe and this is who we are.
SPEAKER_01: And they are inviting you to be a part of that.
SPEAKER_01: If you've never trusted Jesus as your Savior, come.
SPEAKER_01: We won't keep you a long time.
SPEAKER_01: If you just want to start a conversation and you have questions, just come and speak to us.
SPEAKER_01: Let us start a journey with you in a conversation.
SPEAKER_01: If you're ready to give your life to Christ, there's no better time than right here and right now.
SPEAKER_01: Come and give your life to Jesus.
SPEAKER_01: I'm going to pray that God's people are going to stand and sing.
SPEAKER_01: Lord, we love you and we thank you for salvation, and we thank you for the word of God that teaches us how salvation works.
SPEAKER_01: It is because your word tells us that Jesus said He is the way, truth, and the life, that we know we can be saved through Him.
SPEAKER_01: Use this in the lives of people today.
SPEAKER_00: In Jesus' name we pray, and all God's people said.org and let us pray for you and help you in any way we can.
SPEAKER_00: Thank you for listening to Chapter and First, the Bible Teaching Ministry of Fort Smith First Baptist Church.