September 27, 2020 Sermon

Introduction

How many of you have clear memories of the first place you lived as a married couple? Ashley and I remember the tiny apartment we had across the street from one of the largest UPS hubs in the country. It was one of those apartments you could give someone a complete tour just having them stand in one place and spinning in a circle. It’s wasn’t the best of neighborhoods but it was ours. It was our first place as a married couple and that made it exciting. It was also where God showed up, provided and guided us in so many different ways.

Our first year of marriage taught Ashley and I many hard lessons about living with another flawed human being up close and personal. It taught us much about managing our finances and living as adults.

The families of Israel are at their first place living in the land God had promised for so long. Crossing the river very realistically put them in the land they planned for so long to get to.

I remember Ashley and I driving to Texas with our moving truck. We decided to stop and get a hotel in TexArkana to put off actually driving into the country of Texas where we would live for the next 5 years. It was a big moment.

This moment of camping in the new land was very important for Israel. God also directed them to some specific actions to renew them and prepare them to be His People in the new land. Let’s take a look.

Gilgal

This was the name of the campsite where they stayed the first night.

Joshua 5:2–9 ESV

2 At that time the Lord said to Joshua, “Make flint knives and circumcise the sons of Israel a second time.” 3 So Joshua made flint knives and circumcised the sons of Israel at Gibeath-haaraloth. 4 And this is the reason why Joshua circumcised them: all the males of the people who came out of Egypt, all the men of war, had died in the wilderness on the way after they had come out of Egypt. 5 Though all the people who came out had been circumcised, yet all the people who were born on the way in the wilderness after they had come out of Egypt had not been circumcised. 6 For the people of Israel walked forty years in the wilderness, until all the nation, the men of war who came out of Egypt, perished, because they did not obey the voice of the Lord; the Lord swore to them that he would not let them see the land that the Lord had sworn to their fathers to give to us, a land flowing with milk and honey. 7 So it was their children, whom he raised up in their place, that Joshua circumcised. For they were uncircumcised, because they had not been circumcised on the way. 8 When the circumcising of the whole nation was finished, they remained in their places in the camp until they were healed. 9 And the Lord said to Joshua, “Today I have rolled away the reproach of Egypt from you.” And so the name of that place is called Gilgal to this day.

Circumcision

This is the practice of cutting away flesh of the male reproductive organs. God gave it as a way to initiate and signify membership as part of the covenant community. It was a sign and a sacrifice of belonging to the community of people who followed God.

As one author put it

Opening Up Joshua Circumcision (vv. 2–9)

The circumcision of the flesh was designed to express circumcision of the heart. In other words, it was intended to depict that the men had experienced in their hearts the painful surgery of repentance.

Opening Up Joshua Circumcision (vv. 2–9)

It was important that this new group of Israelites realize that they could hope to succeed only as they yielded their hearts to the Lord, hearts that had experienced the cutting away of sin by the knife of repentance.

So because of the disobedience of the Israelites they wandered in the desert 40 years. Can you imagine how the Egyptians must have looked down on and mocked the people of Israel for that generation? They escaped Egypt and the luxury of the Nile river only to become homeless wanderers in the desert?

Israel had been delivered from Egypt to conquer Canaan and all they did was wander in the desert 40 years. They truly would have been better off in many ways to stay in Egypt.

But now they have entered Canaan with a bang. God stopped a river to make an entrance for His people. God is starting to fulfill His promises to this new generation so He gives the order.

Joshua 5:2 ESV

2 At that time the Lord said to Joshua, “Make flint knives and circumcise the sons of Israel a second time.”

It wasn’t repeated circumcision. It was that the next generation hadn’t been circumcised.

Joshua 5:5 ESV

5 Though all the people who came out had been circumcised, yet all the people who were born on the way in the wilderness after they had come out of Egypt had not been circumcised.

God was working a changed for the country. He was “Rolling away their shame.”

Joshua 5:9 ESV

9 And the Lord said to Joshua, “Today I have rolled away the reproach of Egypt from you.” And so the name of that place is called Gilgal to this day.

After decades of being mocked for their failure to do what they set out to do they were now in the land. They were in the land only because of God’s faithfulness and circumcision was a reminder of this. It was a moment when the nation made real their commitment to seek God first.

What moments do we have in our lives where we put our faith into action? Where we are willing to endure pain and discomfort for our faith? Where we are willing to make an irreversible change in our lives that signifies our commitment to God?

Passover

Joshua 5:10–12 ESV

10 While the people of Israel were encamped at Gilgal, they kept the Passover on the fourteenth day of the month in the evening on the plains of Jericho. 11 And the day after the Passover, on that very day, they ate of the produce of the land, unleavened cakes and parched grain. 12 And the manna ceased the day after they ate of the produce of the land. And there was no longer manna for the people of Israel, but they ate of the fruit of the land of Canaan that year.