Joshua Take’n Cities

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0:00 Good morning. Glad you made it this morning. Hope your week has been alright and that you are able to carve out a little bit of time just to be available to God this morning. That's what we want to do together now. Find a way to quiet the things of the week and the things coming up, the questions and the answers and be available to God. And to do that we are finishing up this book that Jordan gave me a while back that I stumbled

0:37 on called Poverty of Spirit. It's been really helpful for me. It's raised a lot of deep questions that are encouraging for me to think about in this Easter season, that all around what it means to be fully human, to be, to have what Jesus calls in his Beatitudes the Poverty of Spirit. And this theologian, this Johannes Baptiste Met passed away just last year, was a German

1:07 theologian in the Catholic Church, makes the case that Poverty of Spirit is the doorway into life with God. That in order to engage with the God of creation and life, the God of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob, the God of Christ in the Church, humanity must start from a place that recognizes we are limited and have a deep poverty or limitation. And that can be not fun.

1:43 Last week, especially we talked about the reality of our limitations, that we cannot undo the things we've done, we cannot unsave the things we've said, we cannot will ourselves to be different than we are, that there is extreme limitation. But then we said the beauty of being people of faith, of following the way of Jesus, of

2:14 engaging with the God of creation and life is that that God at our place of limitation meets us most directly. And in this last section of the book, he talks about what we do when we recognize, now that we are aware of our limitations, and last week we made the point, when we run up against our limitation, we don't turn away or run from it.

2:47 So when you realize your struggle to provide for yourself, when you realize how difficult it is to love generously or forgive freely, there can be a temptation to avoid the feeling of your limitation. And today that might be really easy to do just with distracting yourself from your own shortcomings. I don't have the emotions I'd like, so I'll avoid emotions altogether.

3:17 I'm concerned about my ability to provide for the future, so I'll pretend money doesn't matter, I'll just buy stuff and make myself feel better. There can be a temptation when you come up against your limitation to grasp for things that you can control. What the way of Jesus tells us is when we come up against our limitations, not to grasp for control, but to press into our limitation. Because as we press into our limitation, we encounter the God. And he says here at this very beginning that this feeling of limitation or poverty is,

3:58 we encounter it in some of the greatest moments of our lives. This is all the great experience of life. All the great experiences of life, freedom, encounter, love, death are all worked out in the silent turbulence of an impoverished spirit. He says, a sense, a gentleness comes over us when we confront such decisive moments. We are quietly but deeply moved at many encounters.

4:29 We become suddenly humble when we are overtaken by love. As I reflected on my life and thought about when are the moments when I have been deeply taken? The first one, this is odd. It's not a memory that comes to me very often, but in college, I took this trip with some high school kids. I was helping leading a high school youth group and we went to North Georgia and we crawled down in this cave. It was outside of Chattanooga and it was in this national park and we were on the side.

5:05 We were taken by this guide and there is this little hole of rocks in the ground that looks like nothing. You have to sit down and slide down kind of like a curve and you get down to the bottom of this curve and all of a sudden there is cold air and you turn on a light on your helmet and a room like the size of a cathedral opens up onto the ground. I remember just being enamored at the size and scope of creation, a place like that,

5:38 like a place the size of a cathedral could exist just hitting under the feet and that memory of feeling kind of small and in awe of creation stuck with me. In another moment, I can remember in Colorado when Megan and I lived there and on Fridays there was a season where I got to go ski by myself on Fridays and I got confident enough one day to start at the very top of the mountain up above the tree line where the snow drifts

6:13 is clean and you can see for miles and I remember getting up there and being a little intimidated at the size and scope but then just having so much fun being able to coast down the side of a mountain and that feeling in that moment when you look at the grandeur, the size and scope of creation, part of what amazes you is how small your place is inside of it. I remember another moment, the next moment that came to mind was like 2017 years ago,

6:51 standing in this little room waiting to walk out and greet Megan coming down the aisle and thinking I cannot believe I'm gifted the responsibility of caring for this woman for the rest of my life and it was a similar like feeling small and not up to the task but also overwhelmed at the beauty of the opportunity and the scope of what lays in front of me. The author says that

7:23 all of us are familiar with this feeling of our own limitation and that at the most critical moments of our life, from exploration to love even in the face of death, there is this somber reality of our limitations and he wants to ask if we are people who recognize that feeling of

7:57 our limitation as this great Christian principle, this original experience of humanity being poor in spirit, we don't want to run away from it, we stay available to the God, what do we do with our emotions in the moment? How do we engage God in that space? He goes forward and as I was thinking

8:34 about, he goes on and talks about exactly how we should do that and if you have the time or the space you should read the book but as I worked through the chapter, the story that came to mind was this story in Joshua, the story of Joshua and if you have a copy of the scriptures it might be fun to look there with me. The memory that came to mind is in Joshua chapter 5 and at this point

9:08 in Joshua's life he has taken over from Moses and they've been wandering in the desert for 40 years, there's a generation that won't inherit my rest and so we're going to wait for them to die off in the desert and then he he buries Moses with his own hand and inaugurates Joseph and now Joseph is going, Joshua is going to lead God's people into the promised land and they walk up to

9:41 the river Jordan and much like the Red Sea, Joshua has his own parting experience where they take the ark up to the river Jordan and the Jordan stops and they walk across on dry land and they they place 12 stones in the middle of the river to mark the time when God provided for them. It's a great experience and then on the other side of the river God says now you need to circumcise all of your people, get them ready, mark them as the covenant so he circumcises all the men, grown men,

10:11 circumcises them and then as they cross the Jordan then they celebrate the Passover and the moment that occurred to me is when Joshua takes a walk by himself after the Passover, you can imagine kind of the scope of the moment the people born in the desert and come out of Egypt as children have been walking around for 40 years eating manna with the Passover they for the first time those kids ate something that wasn't manna and quail they ate leavened bread for the first time

10:42 they just walked across the Jordan river and placed 12 huge stones as a testament to the character of God they've celebrated the Passover and ate in real fruit for the first time and they noted in the morning they're getting up and going to take the city of Jericho and Joshua feels the excitement of the moment and also you know as he walks by himself he's realizing he's taking the legacy of slaves up to wall fortified cities if anyone is acquainted with their limitations it's Joshua

11:14 as he goes to do the thing that his people have been afraid to do for four decades for a whole generation and he walks by himself in chapter five verse 13 when Joshua says was by Jericho he lifted up his eyes and looked and behold a man was standing before him with his drawn sword in his hand and Joshua said to him are you for us or for our adversaries

11:54 and he said no but I am the commander of the army of the lord and now I have come Joshua fell in his face to the earth and worshipped him and said what does my lord say to his servant and the commander of the lord's army said to Joshua take off your sandals for the place where you're standing this holy and Joshua did so and he goes on to tell him I've already given you the city walk around it seven times and he'll collapse and be with us I thought about this story as I was thinking about what do we do once we encounter emotions whether it's on the top of a mountain

12:29 right or in critical moments of love or in dark moments of death what do we do when we encounter our limitations and the author says we turn towards that emotion that deep place of peace that waits when you recognize your limitations you turn towards it and you encounter that place of peace as Immanuel and I thought about where is a story how can I root myself in the story of our people where God shows up as Immanuel and I thought about him God the angel of the lord with sword drawn

13:07 ready to fight for Joshua in this critical moment and as I read the story I realized this is this is the culmination of long faithfulness and waiting for Joshua if you look back Joshua's story or this portion of Joshua's story starts all the way back in numbers if you look back to your left jenestys exodus Leviticus numbers dude eronomy in numbers chapter

13:41 14 right when they came out of egypt god had intended they go to cyanide he gives them a description of what their life will look like now that he's their god undisputed and he then starts charge of course for them to go straight into the promised land they don't have to wander for 40 years and he sets out 12 people tells Moses pick one from each of the tribes send them up in the land to scout it out and they come back and they are amazed I mean they're carrying a bushel a bushel of a bunch of grapes and it has takes two people to carry it they're so big they're like this land

14:18 supports giant it's flowing with milk and honey and 10 of the 12 are enamored with their limitation they see a project in front of them and they are overwhelmed at their shortcoming and can't soon pass their limitation when they look at the scope of a project that might have beauty and

14:53 adventure they see only their frailty and failure 10 of the 12 say there's no way we can do this but joshua 40 years before god meets him outside of Jericho in chapter 14 verse 6 joshua the son of nun and calab the son of jeff then jeff hune who were among those who had spied out the land

15:24 tore their clothes and said to all the congregation of people viscera the land which we passed through to spy it out is an exceedingly good land if the lord delights in us he will bring us into this land and give it to us the land that flows with milk and honey only do not rebel against the lord and do not fear for the people of the land for they are bred for us their protection is removed and the lord is with us do not fear them for 40 years joshua said hey yeah that's a big deal

15:56 we are children of slaves but god is with us this is the answer for the people of god aware of our limitations opens us up to participate in the scope or the power or the capability of god

16:30 when we are aware of our limitations it opens us up to participate in the scope the power the capability of god joshua when he saw Jericho came in he said this land is amazing and beyond the is amazing and beyond the scope of our capacity but not beyond the capacity of god

17:01 and so if we go and it is his prerogative he will give it to us people were afraid and said no thank you god said fine live under your own capacity and wander in the desert and when that generation had died joshua together with the angel of the lord lead the people into the promise i don't know about you but i have encountered my limitations a lot i mean i uh i i mentioned

17:38 earlier i i can remember feeling kind of inadequate and in awe when we got married and i have encountered my limitations in trying to love my family well i have encountered my limitations in the work that i have set out to do i want to be a person who impacts my city and it is a job larger than i am capable of it but the unique thing of the people of god is that we do not stop at our limitations we

18:16 are not defined the scope of our potential in the world is not defined by our capability by our intellect by our money by our influence the scope of our capability in the world is set by the god of creation and life the god of abraham isak and jigap the angel of the lord soren sore drawn walking into cities like this is what defines your scope so as you encounter

18:55 your limitations then you pause and you say indeed i am human frail and limited lord where are you in this scene and where can i go with you the apostle paul in like the genius wisdom that he has this is our last text for the this morning he writes a letter to the church in quarant um and it's in the second one that we have

19:32 so it's in chapter 12 of second karenthians he's like well we won't get into all of it but if you go to verse nine of chapter 12 uh paul is talking about like his credentials to be an apostle for the church and and then he says i would be great except for this one thing that i that that points out to me my limitations

20:07 how this one struggle that i wish would go away he doesn't say what it is he calls it a thorn and inside has been a lot of speculation but he said i've asked the lord to take it away so that i wouldn't feel like such a failure all the time he says in verse eight three times i pleaded with the lord about this that it should leave me verse nine but he said to me my grace is sufficient for you for my power is made perfect in your weakness therefore i will boast all the more gladly among weaknesses so that the power of christ may rest on me look you are limited

20:45 in some ways you will fail over and over again you do not have the capacity in yourself to live up to who god has called you to be but the god of creation and life the god of abraham isa good jake up the god of christian church does not leave you alone in your frailty and failure he comes and stands with you fights for you and with you in order to elevate you to the fullest potential you have you become most fully yourself moving through your limitation and into the infinite possibility of the god of the universe he has set out for you work to do now people to love cities to serve you are now in the world

21:41 you are not capable of your own self to live out your calm but he will not abandon you to your failure he will come just as he did on the cross through the grave before joshua for paul for me let's come for me maybe we'll come for you pray that you are people who can sit in your limitation and find god as you have you are god with us

22:14 in his name