The Power to Prevail

Moses is dead, and now the Israelites find themselves positioned on the east of the Jordan

Over looking he Promised Land.

Moses led them there in the power of God,

But now it’s time for Moses to fade into history, and for a new hero to enter.

That hero is none other than the prophet Joshua.

He is a prophet because he tells of the things to come through the power of God.

He was also a priest, although not a Levite, he was a minister to Moses.

He is now tapped by God to take over the leadership of Moses, and to lead his people Israel into the promise land,

Take possession of it, and to distribute the land allotments according to their inheritance.

Which Joshua does.

I have said to you that one can find Jesus on every page of the scriptures.

Jesus even said

John 5:39 (CSB)

39 You pore over the Scriptures because you think you have eternal life in them, and yet they testify about me.

And in

John 5:46 (CSB)

46 For if you believed Moses, you would believe me, because he wrote about me.

To be even clear on the matter, the very name of this person whom leads the people from this point in history is named

Yehoshua = In the Hebrew and Joshua in English

The New Testament written in Greek, has his name as Jesus

It means God is salvation or Yahweh is salvation.

His name was originally Hosea

Numbers 13:16 (CSB)

16 These were the names of the men Moses sent to scout out the land, and Moses renamed Hoshea son of Nun, Joshua.

Hoshea means = He Saves

But recognizing the Spirit within him, Moses renames him, Yehoshua, to which we get Joshua in the greek

I am a Junior,

Anyone else here a junior, named after their father or even named in honor of someone else?

I am named after my father,

It is no secret, I am not a fan of my name,

I can’t stand it to be sincere, however, I still take pride in it for having been named after my father.

I am not sure I can live up to the legacy of my father’s but can you imagine being the name sake of the creator of the heavens and the earth?

Wow.

Thats a lot to live up too.

As we learn more about Joshua, we’ll discover that he does a pretty good job of it.

For there are again, a lot of parallels between the story of Joshua and that of his names sake Jesus.

The savior of the world.

One that stands out to me is the phrase repeated over and over again to the Israelites

Don’t fear, be of good courage

Joshua 1:5–6 (CSB)

5 No one will be able to stand against you as long as you live. I will be with you, just as I was with Moses. I will not leave you or abandon you.

6 “Be strong and courageous, for you will distribute the land I swore to their ancestors to give them as an inheritance.

Jesus said in

John 14:27 (CSB)

27 “Peace I leave with you. My peace I give to you. I do not give to you as the world gives. Don’t let your heart be troubled or fearful.

Matthew 28:20 (CSB)

20 teaching them to observe everything I have commanded you. And remember, I am with you always, to the end of the age.”

No matter what you have going on in life,

God wants you to know brothers and sister, Christian, is this

Fear not and believe that God is with you, He will never leave you, even in times like these, He is with you, just cling to Him.

Hang in there, keep praying, your victory is coming over this is coming

So, as Joshua stands at east of the Jordan, with all of God’s people looking to him for leadership,

Let’s reflect.

God has promised Abraham, Isaac and Jacob, that their descendants will one day inherit this land,

After God brought them out of Egypt, through Moses, He leads them to the land with in a period of several weeks,

about 40 years earlier, Moses sends out 12 spies, to spy out the land, but 10 came back filling Israel with fear, to the point that they want to stone the only two witnesses that said they should go in and take the land.

But then Caleb and Joshua tried to convince them that God was with them and not to be afraid,

Yet, they became angry with these two witnesses and threatened to kill them.

Numbers 14:6–10 (CSB)

6 Joshua son of Nun and Caleb son of Jephunneh, who were among those who scouted out the land, tore their clothes 7 and said to the entire Israelite community, “The land we passed through and explored is an extremely good land. 8 If the Lord is pleased with us, he will bring us into this land, a land flowing with milk and honey, and give it to us. 9 Only don’t rebel against the Lord, and don’t be afraid of the people of the land, for we will devour them. Their protection has been removed from them, and the Lord is with us. Don’t be afraid of them!”

10 While the whole community threatened to stone them, the glory of the Lord appeared to all the Israelites at the tent of meeting.

There is on of those end time nuggets for us right there.

You know this scenario repeats itself

In the future, the Bible tells us that the world will be in chaos once again, and people will be looking for a way out of their mess,

Then two witnesses will come on the scene telling people that the Lord provides a way out of that mess, but this time they succeed in killing them.

Revelation 11:3 (CSB)

3 I will grant my two witnesses authority to prophesy for 1,260 days, dressed in sackcloth.”

Revelation 11:7 (CSB)

7 When they finish their testimony, the beast that comes up out of the abyss will make war on them, conquer them, and kill them.

Later they are resurrected. Praise God.

But now, forty years later, with Moses dead, and Joshua in command, He prepares to crossover the Jordan into the land

flowing with milk and honey.

So, before he gives the order to cross over, Joshua sends out two of his own spies into the land’

This time the report comes back in the positive, and they prepare to crossover and take possession

But, something interesting happens to the two spies while they are in Jericho spying it out

They go into the house of a prostitute,

Joshua 2:1 (CSB)

1 Joshua son of Nun secretly sent two men as spies from the Acacia Grove, saying, “Go and scout the land, especially Jericho.” So they left, and they came to the house of a prostitute named Rahab, and stayed there.

So, here we have staring us the face is the big elephant in the room.

What were two Israelite dudes doing at a prostitutes house?

Well, there are several conjectures as to what they were doing there,

but all I can say is there are no coincidences with God,

Whatever their reasoning was, God took advantage of it and introduces Rahab into the story.

Rahab, the harlot feared the God of Israel and made a wise decision to plead for mercy before the God of Israel.

God not only granted her plea for mercy for aiding and abetting the spies, but wrote her name into the genealogy of Jesus Christ our Lord,

Matthew 1:5–6 (CSB)

5 Salmon fathered Boaz by Rahab, Boaz fathered Obed by Ruth, Obed fathered Jesse, 6 and Jesse fathered King David. David fathered Solomon by Uriah’s wife,

David being King David of course, ancestor of Jesus the Christ.

There is a valuable and undeniable lesson here brothers and sister Christian

If you are willing to submit, everything, all you have, to the Lord, God,

It is possible that He could not only use you, but use you so much as to write your name into the history of the world.

No matter what kind of person you are or were.

But notice the parallel here.

The spies commanded her to hang a scarlet rope, Scarlet= (being the color red with a hint of orange), outside her window in order that she might be spared.

About forty years prior, the nation of Israel was commanded to paint red Lamb’s blood on their doors to be saved

This is another lesson.

Brothers and sisters Christian, if you want to be spared before the end of your life, you better have the door post or window of your soul painted red with the blood of Jesus over it.

So, Joshua gives the order and they cross over into the promise land once and for all.

Another parallel.

Watch this:

The land of promise, flowing with milk and honey was given to them, but they had to cross over and take possession.

Brothers and Sisters, Salvation through Jesus’ blood is freely given, but you will have to cross over and get it

Meaning, you will have to leave this present life of who you are and be reborn into the image of God you were created to be,

Once and for all.

Tradition holds this illustration well,

It is believed that the very spot in which Joshua and the nation crossed the Jordan into the place of promise is the exact place where

John the Baptist baptized our Lord Jesus.

Illustration here is, entrance into the promise land is crossing over through Jesus.

Jesus becomes our Jordan. Amen.

One thing we notice from this point in the story of Joshua is, from here on

They are always on the offensive.

They are always on the attack through the promise land in victory.

That is because God promised He would always be with them as long as they adhered to Covenant

Where ever they went, the nations feared them just like Jericho.

Brothers and Sisters,

Thats exactly how you and I should live in this world, on the offensive.

We should be Bold, Outspoken, let our voiced be heard in the ballot boxes, in the town halls, in the federal buildings, in the halls of congress, and on the streets right here at home.

Why not?

What do we have to fear, God said to Fear Not, He is with us,

So, we should be on the offensive.

Israel didn’t start out small and work their way up either,

They went right for the jugular of the world at the time.

Jericho!

Jericho was an important large town of the land at that time,

They went right for the big guns and then worked their way down

They started on top and worked their way down.

Ever wonder what Matthew Jesus is trying to get us to understand about His power in us?

Matthew 16:18–19 (CSB)

18 And I also say to you that you are Peter, and on this rock I will build my church, and the gates of Hades will not overpower it. 19 I will give you the keys of the kingdom of heaven, and whatever you bind on earth will have been bound in heaven, and whatever you loose on earth will have been loosed in heaven.”

It says the gates of Hades, (Hell) will not overpower it.

The greek word for overpower is = katischyō, (Katis-hiyo) which means Prevail.

Meaning it will not be able to withstand the blast, the force, the push against it

That’s what you and I have in Jesus name, is the power of God to be able to say to this mountain, pick yourself up and be thrown into the sea.

Amen!

You and I have that power.

What we don’t have is the confidence of Joshua to use it.

Shame on us.

Peter was able to walk on water, but started to sink when he doubted the power he had holding him afloat.

Thats what happens to many a good hearted and well meaning Christian blazing his or her way through in the name of Jesus,

Then through all the victory they had along the way, they turn their attack on the gates of hell.

But then the battle gets hard, things get real, real fast.

And the moment they start to doubt the power they have, the gates of hell swallows them right up to where they are now worse off than when they started,

When I was in eight grade, our teachers name was Mr. Zawaki,

He was the same one that told us all, that statistics at the time, conveyed that our eight grade graduation would be our last graduation ever.

He also told us on our first day of eight grade, that we all started out with an “A”

All we had to do was, maintain it.

Well the Israelite started with an “A” and the next few books tell us how they failed to maintain that “A”

Brothers and Sisters, don’t fail,

Maintain it, Believe it, Live it every day.

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Invitation