Whom Will Ye Serve

Whom Will Ye Serve?

Joshua 24:14-16

1.      Before we look at our passage, let’s take a quick trip back in time to the beginning of this book.  Look at how the book starts.

2.      Joshua has served Moses for 40 years.  He was one of the 12 spies.  He and Caleb brought back the good report of the land.  He was on the mountain, between Moses and the camp, not sure what was going on at the top of the mountain or at the bottom of it.

3.      Now, Joshua has been given the nod to lead the children in the conquest of their land.

4.      After the incomplete conquering of the land of promise, Joshua stands at the end of his life.  He’s been a constant soldier for the Lord and he brings Israel together on last time to Shechem to deliver his farewell address.

5.      Let’s look quickly into Joshua 24.

6.      –Passage—

7.      This chapter continues with Israel’s response to Joshua, followed by a stone of testimony, planted under an oak tree in verse 26.

8.      The chapter closes the book of Joshua with the death of Joshua, Eleazar, the burial of Joseph’s bones, and this historical note.

9.      Joshua 24:31 (KJV) 31 And Israel served the LORD all the days of Joshua, and all the days of the elders that overlived Joshua, and which had known all the works of the LORD, that he had done for Israel.

10.  Joshua called the people to a decision point and as we look forward to the Lord’s Supper tonight, let us all respond to that call.

11.            We Must Commit to Christ.

I.                   By Choosing the Lord

1.      As we look into this passage, Joshua calls the people to make a choice.

2.      Look at verses 14-15.

3.      It’s almost like he says, I don’t care whom you choose, but choose.

4.      As we think about the Lord’s Supper, we stand in a place of decision.  Will we choose the Lord, or not?

5.      When it comes to the Lord, there is no middle ground.  You cannot hold to God and to idols.

6.      1 Kings 18:21 (KJV) 21 And Elijah came unto all the people, and said, How long halt ye between two opinions? if the LORD be God, follow him: but if Baal, then follow him. And the people answered him not a word.

7.      Hundreds of years later, Elijah tells the people the same thing.  You cannot sit on the fence with God.  It just doesn’t work.

8.      We’ll deal with the end of verse 15 in a minute.

9.      If we are going to commit to Christ, we have to choose Him.

II.                By Rejecting Idols

1.      Going back to verse 14, we see that Joshua clearly tells them that choosing God excludes the option of choosing idols.

2.      He tells them to serve Him sincerely and in truth and to put away the idols.

3.      The word that is translated put away has some interesting shades of meaning.

4.      Before getting into meaning, this word is written in the imperative mood.  For our foreign language scholars, that means that it is written as a command.

5.      The meaning of this word includes these thoughts: cause to depart, remove, depose, reject, or abolish.

6.      Here’s a good modern English word, evict.  Depose adds a great shade of meaning.

7.      Depose – To remove from a throne.

8.      Abolish – To end the effect of.

9.      God is telling us that if we’ve committed to Him, we’ve chosen Him, we have to evict the idols of our hearts.  We have to depose the kings of our lives.  We have to abolish the idols we cling to.

10.  That means that anything that comes between me and God gets the boot and anything that drives a wedge between me and my Savior gets locked out of my house.

11.  If we are going to commit to Christ, we have to reject all idols.

III.             By Committing Publically

1.      Now let’s look at the end of 15 and all of 16.

2.      ILL: Throwing down the gauntlet.

3.      This is what Joshua does at the end of verse 15.  He challenges these people to make the commitment to God not by brow beating them or making them feel bad, but he does it by making his stand clear and obvious.

4.      Verse 16 follows with Israel’s response.  They begin to go into a long answer, saying that they choose the Lord.

5.      As believers, we cannot keep our stand secret.  I’m not saying that we must kick in the doors of all of the bars and houses of sin, but we need to let the world know that we’re here.

6.      That’s why baptism is so important for the believer.  It is an outward symbol of an internal transaction.

7.      That’s why we say that we’ll gather at the meetinghouse on Sunday and Thursday.  That’s why we gather to partake of the Lord’s Supper.  This is another sign of our commitment to Christ.  It is to allow us a moment to renew our lives in Him and to commit publically that we are following Him.

1. How committed are we to Christ?
2. Have we decided to follow Him alone?
3. Have we decided to scrap the idols of our age for Him alone?
4. Have we stood up publically to proclaim like Israel, “God forbid that we should forsake the Lord, to serve other gods…”