God’s Call

And so I actually, I ran into charity at Chick fil A and I asked her to go to church somewhere and she said, Yeah, I go to Choice Hills. And so I Googled it, looked it up and sent an email because that’s what a missionary does, introduce myself and then pastor reached back out and here we are. And so I’m thankful for for that and and for an area that has people working in the public place that that love God and and attending church. And so I’m very, very, very thankful for everything that God has done and for churches like this that are supporting missionaries around the world. I know a few that y’all support.

I know the Browns in Cambodia, we ran into them in a missions conference. And then the Muscots in Guyana. In fact, if you notice my leather Bible cover, Blake Muscat made that for me and he’s talented in that way. And so we just had a few connections there that made it easy to connect. However, the biggest connection is the fact that your sin and my sin are washed away by the same blood.

And it’s been really, really neat how we’ve traveled across America, churches all over from Florida to Alaska to Rhode Island to Southern California. And no matter what church you walk into, I take that back, no matter what legitimate church you walk into, you immediately have a connection with people because you love Jesus and because you have a debt that you cannot repay to him. And that’s a wonderful, wonderful thing. It’s the tie that binds, it’s that blood, that blood that flows through the church, it’s the love of God, and we’re very, thankful for that. I’m gonna ask you to take your Bibles and open them up to the book of Joshua chapter number one, please. Joshua chapter number one.

So I I was born in Texas, Northeast Texas. My folks are from there and when I was a year and a half, they moved down to Costa Rica to be missionaries. And so that’s where I grew up and I worked for about a year and a half after high school as a call center agent and worked for AT and T and HP tech support, BlackBerry, if you remember the BlackBerry phones and they they had a tablet. Indian accent. Indian accent? Yeah. Know.

That’s why I got hired real quick, you know. I knew I didn’t have to have any kind of training or education. I could just speak English and they hired me right away. But I got a burden for people through that job. I worked in a mall. It was in a very populated area and people would come especially around lunchtime and fill the food court. And sometimes it was hard to find a seat and I remember just looking at people and watching people of all ages, of all walks of life, of all social statuses and I’d watch them go into stores and out of stores and spend money on stuff to fill a want or a need or a desire.

And I just wondered how many of them had the biggest need filled in their life which is the need for salvation, the need for a relationship with God, the need for restoration and redemption with the Lord. And just watching people, I got a burden. Know, the Bible says, my eye affected my heart. And that’s what happened. And so, I made a decision that I couldn’t keep doing what I was doing. I needed to do something. I needed to do something. I didn’t feel like a specific call or that God had, reached out and spoken to me in a burning bush or anything like that, but I had a burden and so I made the decision to go to Bible College at least for a year and, that year, the Lord, used his word to, penetrate my heart and, I made a decision to stay and serve God full time, preaching the gospel.

And it was later on after my wife and I had been married, several years that the Lord confirmed that Uruguay was the place that he wanted us to go. We’re in Joshua chapter number one and similarly to the way that the Lord directed my family and I to Uruguay, I see that there’s a direction given to Joshua in his life at this particular time. Now, if you know anything about the story of Joshua, you know that Joshua didn’t just suddenly appear in the book of Joshua.

His name is found in the book of Exodus. In fact, he was one of the 12 spies that went into the Promised Land to spy it out. Know, 10 men or 12 men went to spy on Canaan, 10 were bad and two were good. And those two were Joshua and anybody remember the other guy? Caleb, Joshua and Caleb. And so Joshua kinda has a track record already of being different, being different.

And by the way, if you wanna serve God, if you wanna have faith, if you wanna have a real relationship with God, you’ll be different, you will be different. And so Joshua has a history of walking with the Lord and we’re gonna find here in Joshua chapter number one that God gives him a call, a call. And if I titled the lesson anyway, it would just be simply God’s call, God’s call.

Flashy, but there’s nothing more flashy than things related to God. Let’s pray and then we’re gonna dig into this chapter right here. Lord, please open our hearts. Yes, we need to hear, but we need we really need to hear. He that hath ears, let him hear. Help us God to zone in, to tune in to to what you have to say to us this morning. We thank you for your word, we believe that it is the word of God and so it is supernatural and I ask God that you would encourage your people, your children and if there’s somebody here in attendance today that is not truly saved that they would make a decision to trust Christ in Jesus name. Amen.

I want you to look at Joshua chapter one verse one and I’m gonna read verse one. It says, now after the death of Moses, the servant of the Lord, it came to pass that the Lord spake unto who? Joshua, the son of Nun, Moses’ minister saying. And by the way, the fact that he’s the son of Nun does not support the point that I’m about to make but there are other areas in scripture that teach us that it doesn’t matter who you are, you can be the son of nobody, the son of none and God can still use you. Now, Joshua was renowned in the camp of Israel. I mean, he was Moses’ minister.

And so verse two says, does God speak in Joshua? He says, Moses my servant is dead. Now, therefore, arise, go over this Jordan, thou and all this people into the land which I do give to them, even to the children of Israel. I see here God has a calling for Joshua. But before God directly speaks to Joshua, Joshua was already in a position of seeking a relationship with God. If you go back to the book of Exodus chapter 33, it explains that the tabernacle was a place where anybody that wanted to seek the Lord would go to in the camp of Israel. And there’s this one passage where it says Moses is speaking to God as a man speaketh to his friend face to face and Moses gets up and leave and then there’s this little kind of parentheses that says, and Joshua remained at the tabernacle.

Joshua had a personal relationship with God. And that’s important because if we’re going to follow God’s leading in our lives, it can’t just be, okay, God, I’m gonna do what I want and you tap me on the shoulder whenever you want me to make a move in my life, whenever you want me to do something and I’ll be happy to do it. No, because God’s will isn’t a location or a vocation, it’s a relationship with him. And it took me a long time to figure that out and to obey that principle.

God’s will is a relationship with him. Many times I would hear preachers say, well, was called to this, or I was called to that, the Lord called me to, and I would think, man, I wish the Lord would tell me what I’m supposed to do with my life. And yet, the Scripture’s full of clear instruction on what God’s will is for our lives. I see here that Joshua has a personal relationship with God. And so when we come to Joshua chapter one verse one, I want you to understand this isn’t just out of the blue. God didn’t just randomly go, Joshua, come on up here. I’m gonna put you to work. No. God already had a relationship with Joshua and I think that qualified Joshua for this calling. He had a relationship with God.

I wanna ask you something. If the Lord were to come to you and hopefully you have a vibrant, thriving, real relationship with God this morning, but if God says, I got something for you to do, what will be your response? What will be the afterwards, the result of that call? God had a plan for Joshua’s life and here God calls him to complete it. It was not a passive command or a suggestion.

God did not say, Joshua, if you feel like it, how do you feel? Do you feel like doing something? No, no, he came along and he said two things. He said, Arise and go. Let’s say those two words together. Ready? Arise and go. One more time. Arise and go. Very good. Arise and go. Look at verse number three. Every place that the sole of your foot shall tread upon, that have I given unto you as I said unto Moses. From the wilderness in this Lebanon even unto the great river, the river Euphrates, all the land of the Hittites and under this great seed toward the going down of the sun shall be your coast.

And so God says arise and go and Joshua was either to obey or disobey it. There was no middle ground. To do nothing would have been to disobey the call. God’s command requires a response of trust and obedience. The word arise means it means to stop what he was doing and move. Arise means you have to get up from what you’re doing and give your attention to what your commander is telling you to do.

He couldn’t remain as he was doing what he was doing. And sometimes we think that when God wants us to move forward, we wanna hold on to where we’ve been. We wanna hold on to what we’ve been doing and God’s asking us to leave that and go forward to something else, to something different. Listen, I want you to think about your personal relationship with God and your personal walk with God. Think about perhaps your marriage. Think about your relationship with your children, your relationship with your family, your relationship with coworkers.

Where does God want you to move forward in your life because I guarantee you there’s probably something you’re gonna have to leave behind and stop or change in order to go forward where God’s calling you to go. Sometimes it’s difficult to reach out to somebody that maybe there’s a rocky relationship or even to reach out to somebody that you don’t know to share the gospel with them. You have to leave a comfort zone of I’m not having to risk rejection and you have to enter into a risky situation with somebody in order to share Christ with them because that’s what’s God’s calling you to do. And so, implies leaving what you’ve been doing and going into what God has called you to do. As the Lord was leading us to go to Uruguay, I had to begin stopping things that I was doing, whether it was what I was involved in at church and my responsibilities at work, my hours at work, I had to start tapering them off. Why? Because God had called me to arise.

And here Joshua’s been called to arise. The word go means to immediately and confidently move forward, to do what God had called him to do. Filling a vacancy and because God said Moses is dead, God wasn’t just trying to, he didn’t need a body to just fill a spot. And so just Joshua having an attitude of, well, I’m just gonna kinda fill this role and be a plug temporarily until something else is figured out. No, he is called to get involved in a work. God had a vision that needed to be accomplished. He explains it in verses three and four, there’s land to be conquered. And let me tell you something, if you’re a Christian that’s breathing, God has land, spiritual land for you to conquer and I don’t think there’s ever a time in your life where He doesn’t have land for you to conquer because being a Christian is a soldier of Jesus Christ. It’s a war. There’s always battles to be fought. There’s always sinners that need rescuing. There’s always believers that need rescuing. There’s always work to be done. And so, let’s not think that perhaps we have arrived or our time is coming to an end. Listen to me, if you’re here this morning, God has work for us to do. God has a arise and go for us.

But I want you to notice once again, and I’m emphasizing this on purpose, that God will not give you an arise and go until you’re already in a good relationship with him. God’s not interested in human doings. I need somebody to go do something. Who can help me? No. God’s interested in human beings, that we would have a walk with him. And we find that when people go and serve God but they don’t have a relationship with God, what happens is they and their ministry implode.

Ask me how I know. I’ve imploded. Things crumble when there’s no real relationship with God. And so Joshua has a call from God. He has a relationship with God already which qualifies him for that call. God gives him the call in verses one through four, but God adds two things to this call. Number one is counsel. Look at verse number six. What is the counsel of God for Joshua?

What does Joshua need? He needs advice, he needs instruction from the Lord. In verse number six, God tells him this, he says, Be strong and of a good, what? Courage. For unto this people shalt thou divide for an inheritance the land which I swear unto their fathers to give them. Only be thou strong and very courageous. Why did Joshua need strength and courage?

I mean, he was gonna face Jericho. Remember Jericho, right? The walls were so thick, people lived inside of them. That’s where Rahab was, remember? There were giants in the land. Remember when the 12 spies came back? They said, We were like grasshoppers to them. I mean, there’s giants to be fought. There’s land to be conquered. Mean, God just told him he has the Hittites and the Jebus. He has all of these people groups that God has has commanded them to go and conquer. There’s work to be done. That’s gonna take strength and courage. I mean, what about leading people? In verse number six, he says, Be strong and of a good courage for unto this people thou shalt divide for an inheritance the land. I mean, that takes a lot of work, especially when you’re dealing with people.

People, I’ve heard pastors say, ministry is a piece of cake if it weren’t for the people. That he’s gonna need strength and courage, but in verse number seven, God specifies why he needs the strength and the courage. Verse seven, it says, that thou mayest observe to do according to all the law, which Moses my servant commanded thee, turn not from it to the right hand or to the left that thou mayest prosper whithersoever thou goest.

This book of the law shall not depart out of thy mouth, but thou shalt meditate therein day and night, that thou mayest observe to do according to all that is written therein. For then thou shalt make thy way prosperous, and then thou shalt have good success. Have not I commanded thee? Be strong and of a good courage. Why did Joshua need this counsel from God? Because he knew, the Lord knew that Joshua would be tempted to not believe God.

That Joshua would be tempted perhaps to do things in his own power and in his own might. Joshua perhaps would be tempted to depart from the law of Moses and maybe mingle with the people of the land and worship their gods. And if you remember the the situation where Phinehas rose up and he grabbed a javelin, a spear in his hand and he thrust through this man that had brought a Midianite woman into the camp. And so this was a serious deal that that that Joshua do according to all the law. They were not to do things that the world did. They were to be separate. They were to be different. And so Joshua has this need for strength and courage. Why? Because there were giants, because there were great walled cities, because there was great battles to be fought. Well, here’s what he really needed courage and strength for. He needed courage and strength to believe and obey God’s Word.

And listen to me people, we need strength and courage to live and do God’s word. Uruguay is a secular nation. It’s not like Costa Rica where I grew up and I’ll talk more about it tonight. But it has long been known to be a secular place. Most people are not believing anything. They’re non believers, unaffiliated non religious people in Uruguay. It very much mirrors European just coldness when it comes to religion.

And sometimes I think about that and I wonder, Lord, how’s it gonna go? When I talk to people, is it just gonna fall flat? They’re very friendly. Uruguayans are very friendly. They come from Italian descent, so they have that culture of very closeness. I mean, they’ll kiss you on both cheeks, but they may not believe or listen to what you have to say regarding spiritual matters. And sometimes, you know what I feel?

Fear. I feel worry. I feel fret and a little anxiety maybe. What is gonna happen? How’s it gonna go? What am I gonna do? And sometimes I think about well, have other missionaries perhaps failed and left the field and I think is that gonna happen to me? You know what Joshua needed? He needed strength and courage. He needed the counsel of God to strengthen his heart, to have courage in his heart, and to settle and ground himself, how? In the word of God, in the law of Moses.

God told him, be strong and very courageous, why? That thou mayest observe to do according to all the law. Doing all the law was difficult. I wonder how much pushback he had when there was sin in the camp and they had to deal with Achan’s sin. He hid the accursed thing in his tent. I wonder how difficult it must have been when Joshua came and said, hey, guys, we have a battle plan for Jericho.

And then he tells them what God said. And they’re like, what? And he says, God said it. That’s all I need to know is God said it, and that’s what we’re gonna do. We’re gonna believe God, and we’re gonna move forward. He needed strength and courage for this work. Listen to me, the scripture is clear on how we are supposed to accomplish the Great Commission. We’re supposed to go into all the world and preach the gospel and and and and not change the gospel, not not water down the gospel, but preach the gospel.

And that’s what God is commanded to do. And so what are we supposed to do? We’re supposed to obey and trust that God is going to do the work. Strength, according to the Merriam Webster dictionary, strength fundamentally means the capacity to exert, withstand or resist force, pressure or strain. Regarding mental and emotional fortitude, it’s inner resilience, courage or the ability to endure challenges and maintain one’s convictions.

It’s the material ability to withstand stress, wear, or damage without breaking or collapsing. Strength. Are you strong? Are you strong today? What is courage? It’s mental or moral strength to venture, persevere, withstand danger, fear or difficulty. It’s the choice and willingness to act, persevere or stand up for your values in the face of fear, pain or uncertainty. It’s not the absence of fear, courage is not the absence of fear, but rather the mental strength to move forward despite it. And God says, Joshua, this is what you need. You need strength and courage.

Strong and courageous to obey the call to take the promised land in verse number six, divide for an inheritance the land and then strong to do God’s will, God’s Word, do what God had told Moses to do. Someone once said, either God’s book will keep you from sin or sin will keep you from God’s book. So, need to heed it. We need to hide it. We need to meditate on it. Psalm one nineteen nine says, wherewithal shall a young man cleanse his way by taking heed thereto according to thy word. Thy word have I hid in my heart that I might not sit against thee. I will meditate thy precepts. Sometimes, we need to maybe intentionally take some time and just think about God’s word.

Replay verses in our minds, read. That’s why it’s important to have a steady diet, a healthy diet of the Word of God in our life daily, so we don’t become biblically and spiritually anemic. God promises to bless His Word to those who obey it. In Psalm 106 verse three, it says, blessed are they that keep judgment and he that doeth righteousness at all times. Blessed are they that keep his testimonies that seek him with the whole heart. Now, therefore, Proverbs says, hearken unto me, O ye children, for blessed are they that keep my ways.

God’s Word is a treasure trove. It’s deep, a deep well of fresh water. And God says, I want you to be strong and courageous to stay in the book, to be faithful to my word. And then he gives him comfort. God calls him, he gives him counsel for that call, but then he comforts him with the call. Remember how I said you can be fearful? And as we get closer and closer to the date, we have a date of July 5 to leave and take our survey trip to Uruguay.

And as these things are falling into place and the time is coming when we’re gonna make the final trip down there, I do experience thoughts of, well, how’s it gonna go? Part of me feels like I have no clue what I’m doing. I mean, I’ve never done this, not as as the missionary going somewhere. I’ve always worked underneath the spiritual headship and leadership of someone else. And you know what brings me comfort?

What brings me comfort is verse number nine. God says, have not I commanded thee be strong and of a good courage? Be not afraid, neither be thou dismayed. Now, it’s easy to tell somebody, hey, cut that out, stop being scared. Don’t be afraid. It’s like the great counselor that calls someone into their office and they’re struggling in their marriage and their life is a wreck and they have habitual bad habits that they can’t get rid of. And the counselor sits there and the lady’s like, what do I do? And he goes, stop it, just stop it, stop it. And she shares with him another struggle that she has in her life and he goes, Stop it.

That’s easy to say. God’s not just saying, Well, stop it, Joshua. Quit that being scared. Stop being afraid. God gives him a reason why he doesn’t have to be afraid. He says, Be not afraid, neither be thou dismayed, why? For the Lord thy God is with thee whithersoever thou goest. Turn over to Matthew chapter 28 real quick. Matthew chapter 28.

This is what we refer to as the the Great Commission passage. Matthew chapter 28 and verse 18, and Jesus came and spake unto them saying, all power is given unto me in heaven and in earth. Go ye therefore and teach all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Ghost, teaching them to observe all things whatsoever I have commanded you. And that’s not the end of the Great Commission. I mean, up until this point, God has told us what to do, but that’s not all God had to say for the Great Commission.

There was something else that God knew we needed. At the end of verse 20, Jesus says, and lo, I am with you always, even unto the end of the world, amen. You know what brings me comfort? In knowing no matter the situation that I find myself in in Uruguay, no matter the obstacles that I face, no matter the spiritual warfare that we experience, no matter the opposition that that we that we have, God is with us.

I am with you whithersoever thou goest. This is the comfort of God for me. Where God guides, He provides. Where He leads, He feeds, and where God directs, He protects.

Psalm 27, turn over to Psalm 27 real quick. Psalm chapter 27. David says, The Lord is my light and my salvation, whom shall I fear? The Lord is the strength of my life, of whom shall I be afraid? When the wicked, even mine enemies and my foes came upon me to eat up my flesh, they stumbled and fell. Though an host should encamp against me, my heart shall not fear.

The war should rise up, should rise against me and this will I be confident. Verse number 10, When my father and my mother forsake me, then the Lord will take me up. Teach me thy way, oh Lord, and lead me in a plain path because of mine enemies. Deliver me not over under the will of mine enemies for false witnesses are risen up against me and such as breathe out cruelty.

I had fainted unless I had believed to see the goodness of the Lord in the land of the living. Wait on the Lord, be of good courage and He shall strengthen thine heart. Wait, I say, on the Lord. The strength and courage that David’s talking about is an emotional strength. Be of good courage, okay? Be strong. Wait on the Lord. God will strengthen your what? Your heart, your emotions. When we feel fear and Satan loves to instill fear and cripple with fear, that’s the whole point of Goliath, right? He had an entire army frozen in what? In fear. And it took somebody that to rise up and know and believe that he’d see the goodness of the Lord in the land of the living, even as a shepherd boy, and realize it doesn’t matter the odds.

I mean, that the odds are stacked against Goliath. That’s how David thought. And so he had strength and courage, why? Because the Lord was with him. You know what brings me comfort? Hebrews thirteen:five, I will never leave thee nor forsake thee. And so God called us to Uruguay. He has called us and God has given us counsel. The counsel is to obey His Word, to stand strong in strength and courage on the word of God. And God has comforted us letting us know he’s with us. And let me tell you, believer, brother, sister in Christ, God is with us.

Because those same verses in the Great Commission, Jesus, lo, I am with thee, He’s talking to you too. He’s talking to us. He’s with us. And so let’s march forward. Let’s conquer whatever the Canaan land is that God has for you to conquer. Do it in strength and courage, knowing God’s called us and God has comforted us and counseled us for this work. We’re going to Uruguay.

God has you here in Berea and around the world. I mean, I’m looking at the different countries that y’all have gospel presence in and a gospel impact. The Lord is using you in these places. Let’s move forward with strength and courage, with the counsel and comfort of God. Amen?