Chapel Sermon - Choose a Side - Serve the Lord

Joshua

Joshua 24:14–15 ESV

14 “Now therefore fear the Lord and serve him in sincerity and in faithfulness. Put away the gods that your fathers served beyond the River and in Egypt, and serve the Lord. 15 And if it is evil in your eyes to serve the Lord, choose this day whom you will serve, whether the gods your fathers served in the region beyond the River, or the gods of the Amorites in whose land you dwell. But as for me and my house, we will serve the Lord.”

Big Idea: Pick a Side

1. Let of your past, culture or even your family and friends if they don’t line up with God

Explanation: We can be distracted by so many things.

Illustration: My dog Tobias is fairly obedient. He’ll sit. He’ll stay. He’ll wait. But if sees a squirrel. He’s off.

Many of us are like this. We love God. We go to church. We might even read the Bible and pray. But we see a squirrel and we’re off.

What’s your squirrel? So often it is a member of the opposite sex. Maybe it’s food. Maybe it’s the ambition that drives you to succeed. Grades. Money. For adults it can be a career. We can start out just like the Israelites in Joshua’s day really genuinely looking to serve God and live for Him. Sadly many get distracted and begin caring more about being rich and powerful and meaningful than serving God.

Application: If something distracts you from serving God, you have to make a choice between your distraction or God.

What’s crazy is that the Bible promises that if we seek God first, then we’ll get all of those other things as well. We’ll have godly relationships. We’ll have food. We’ll have success even if it’s not the world’s success. We’ll have the things we need and even many things we want. More than anything we’ll have a future that goes beyond this life. We’ll have eternal life.

2. Indecision is still a decision.

Explanation: Now Joshua makes it clear that you need to make a decision and then live with that decision. So even if you don’t want to serve God. You don’t want to give your life to Jesus, don’t be fooled into thinking that you aren’t serving something or someone. We are all controlled by something that we’ve given control to.

Illustration: It’s like taking a multiple choice test. Obviously knowing the answer is always best. But if you don’t know the answer at least take a guess. Leaving it blank you have a zero chance of getting it right.

Application: Now Joshua knows that God is the right answer. And today we know that God is the right answer. But don’t straddle the fence thinking that Jesus can be your fall back plan. Are you going to serve Him or not. Don’t live in a false sense of your own salvation. Make a decision.

3. Follow Good examples

Explanation: Joshua obviously wanted people to live for God. But he wasn’t going to let them control him. You see even in our churches, we can spend so much time trying to convince people to follow Jesus that this in turn becomes something that controls us. I love that Joshua says, “you know what you should do…so do it. But if you don’t, I’m not going to lose sleep.” In essence you have been warned.

Joshua is an example for us to follow whether we follow Jesus or not. If you aren’t following Jesus, Joshua is a good example to get you on track. If you are following, Jesus, his example of presenting people with the option by pointing to Jesus is great. We need to present people with the option. But we don’t need to twist their arms or guilt them with manipulation. The gospel stands on its own merits and not our ability to convince someone. We share it and then let them choose.

Illustration: Joshua is simply saying, imitate me. Paul also said imitate me as I follow Jesus. ()

Application: Who are those people in your life after who’s life you model yours? And please don’t say the Kardashians! My hope is that your parents are following Jesus and you can look to them. But if not follow godly teachers, leaders, and maybe even pastors.

But pastor James, there are so many hypocrites! And those hypocrites are evidence that it’s all a fraud. Well that’s not logical. Just because there are losers in the church doesn’t mean the church is bad....

Otherwise we’d have to say that all of the NBA are losers because Lebron didn’t make the playoffs this year....

There are some bad people in churches who have done awful things. But lets not let a few bad eggs color our opinions of the many more good people who want to serve you.

Reflection: Which side are you on?