Lenten Devotions - Day 06
“But if you don’t want to worship Yahweh, then choose right now! Will you worship the same idols your ancestors did? Or since you’re living on the land that once belonged to the Amorites, maybe you’ll worship their gods. I won’t. My family and I are going to worship and obey Yahweh!” Joshua 24:15
Joshua again! This is only one verse later than what we read two days ago. He was pretty emphatic with these people. In the same context, he will tell them that he does not believe they will be faithful, regardless of their cries of fidelity to Yahweh. He knew them too well. They were too enmeshed in their way of life to let God change them in any meaningful way. They knew all the right answers to Joshua’s cry for commitment, but their words were empty.
If we went back, we would find Moses giving the people pretty much the same challenge a generation before. We would have heard about the same response, too—all the right answers, all the declarations of fidelity to Yahweh, and all the same empty content of a people following a tradition of faith without a real commitment to allow that faith to change them from the inside out.
Joshua made a stand against the people. It wasn’t a stand against a nation that volubly rebelled against God to serve its own immoral interests. He took a stand against a people who were more like the church. They were a people who claimed to honor God. They were a people who claimed allegiance to God. They were a people who made a loud, public show of their faithful worship. They were a people who were still not committed to God beyond those external trappings of allegiance.
They checked into their religious forms of expression. They repeated all the right words. They sang the songs, offered the right sacrifices, and repeated the prescribed prayers. They railed against the excesses of others, the wickedness of their neighbors, and the abuses of the poor and disenfranchised. At the end of the day, they went back to their patterns of living for self instead of for God. They refused to discard the idols that were still in their possession.
They prayed to Yahweh, and then they performed the fertility rituals associated with the idols of their forefathers. They sacrificed as Yahweh prescribed and presented the required offerings, and then used them as an excuse to go on with their plans for revenge, enjoyment of the thrills of the cultures surrounding them, and accepting the conveniences of their idolatrous neighbors with little regard for Yahweh’s demand that they be holy.
They set aside the command to reflect on the uniqueness of Yahweh as a daily practice that would consume their activities. They ignored that they were called to actually love Yahweh, not simply agree to a few descriptions and statements about God. Joshua took a stand to be different from within a nation that outwardly accepted being the people of Yahweh. It was not enough to hide in the crowd. God called him to a different quality of service and dedication the crowd would never accept.
It is too easy to adapt to the standard practice of acceptable worship. How will you allow God to make a difference in your life that is deeper than that of run-of-the-mill Christianity all around us? Find a practical way to make your relationship with God one that truly makes a difference in your life.
“Lord, you have called me to more than a mere existence alongside your name. Help me to serve you as you wish to be served, not as the patterns for which I have settled.”
—©Copyright 2009 Christopher B. Harbin http://www.sermonsearch.com/contributors/104427/
Joshua again! This is only one verse later than what we read two days ago. He was pretty emphatic with these people. In the same context, he will tell them that he does not believe they will be faithful, regardless of their cries of fidelity to Yahweh. He knew them too well. They were too enmeshed in their way of life to let God change them in any meaningful way. They knew all the right answers to Joshua’s cry for commitment, but their words were empty.
If we went back, we would find Moses giving the people pretty much the same challenge a generation before. We would have heard about the same response, too—all the right answers, all the declarations of fidelity to Yahweh, and all the same empty content of a people following a tradition of faith without a real commitment to allow that faith to change them from the inside out.
Joshua made a stand against the people. It wasn’t a stand against a nation that volubly rebelled against God to serve its own immoral interests. He took a stand against a people who were more like the church. They were a people who claimed to honor God. They were a people who claimed allegiance to God. They were a people who made a loud, public show of their faithful worship. They were a people who were still not committed to God beyond those external trappings of allegiance.
They checked into their religious forms of expression. They repeated all the right words. They sang the songs, offered the right sacrifices, and repeated the prescribed prayers. They railed against the excesses of others, the wickedness of their neighbors, and the abuses of the poor and disenfranchised. At the end of the day, they went back to their patterns of living for self instead of for God. They refused to discard the idols that were still in their possession.
They prayed to Yahweh, and then they performed the fertility rituals associated with the idols of their forefathers. They sacrificed as Yahweh prescribed and presented the required offerings, and then used them as an excuse to go on with their plans for revenge, enjoyment of the thrills of the cultures surrounding them, and accepting the conveniences of their idolatrous neighbors with little regard for Yahweh’s demand that they be holy.
They set aside the command to reflect on the uniqueness of Yahweh as a daily practice that would consume their activities. They ignored that they were called to actually love Yahweh, not simply agree to a few descriptions and statements about God. Joshua took a stand to be different from within a nation that outwardly accepted being the people of Yahweh. It was not enough to hide in the crowd. God called him to a different quality of service and dedication the crowd would never accept.
It is too easy to adapt to the standard practice of acceptable worship. How will you allow God to make a difference in your life that is deeper than that of run-of-the-mill Christianity all around us? Find a practical way to make your relationship with God one that truly makes a difference in your life.
“Lord, you have called me to more than a mere existence alongside your name. Help me to serve you as you wish to be served, not as the patterns for which I have settled.”
—©Copyright 2009 Christopher B. Harbin http://www.sermonsearch.com/contributors/104427/
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