I Am Built for This

I want to say praise the Lord everyone. First off, we want to say thank you for joining the St. Thomas Chapel family for our regular broadcast. My name is Roger Cooper, I am an associate minister here at St. Thomas Chapel and I am excited about the Word that God has for us today.

I want to say thank you to my Pastor Bishop Dr. Tyrone D. Hunter and everyone who works to make this broadcast possible. Then just to all of God’s children, in whatever place you occupy in the Kingdom. Always remember, in spite of everything going on and no matter how you may feel, you are somebody in God’s Kingdom. Can we say AMEN.

Today, I want to go a relatively familiar passage of scripture in the Book of Joshua.

Read Joshua 5:6 & Joshua 6:1-5

Joshua 5:6 KJV 1900

For the children of Israel walked forty years in the wilderness, till all the people that were men of war, which came out of Egypt, were consumed, because they obeyed not the voice of the Lord: unto whom the Lord sware that he would not shew them the land, which the Lord sware unto their fathers that he would give us, a land that floweth with milk and honey.

Joshua 6:1–5 KJV 1900

Now Jericho was straitly shut up because of the children of Israel: none went out, and none came in. And the Lord said unto Joshua, See, I have given into thine hand Jericho, and the king thereof, and the mighty men of valour. And ye shall compass the city, all ye men of war, and go round about the city once. Thus shalt thou do six days. And seven priests shall bear before the ark seven trumpets of rams’ horns: and the seventh day ye shall compass the city seven times, and the priests shall blow with the trumpets. And it shall come to pass, that when they make a long blast with the ram’s horn, and when ye hear the sound of the trumpet, all the people shall shout with a great shout; and the wall of the city shall fall down flat, and the people shall ascend up every man straight before him.

Subject: I Am Built for This & Prayer

What we read here today is such a familiar story and passage of scripture, as many of us know the story of Jericho, but I think that through it God will speak to us about our situations and it will encourage us so that as we face the difficulties of our daily lives, we can be strengthened yet again.

For even the youth shall faint and be weary and young men shall utterly fall but they that wait upon the Lord.... He shall renew their strength. I think this word may be the strength that some of you that may need it in this hour. Knowing that, I want you to take this time and this word as a moment of introspection and that leads me to ask you.

Introduction

Have you made mistakes, in your life?

Or have you been through hard times in your life, that in retrospect you can say were SELF-INFLICTED?

These questions are basic in nature but are rhetorical because if you live any amount of time, in this life, it is almost guaranteed that you will make some mistakes.

For when I would do good, evil is always present. Romans 7:21

In the scriptures, the Bible lets us know quite emphatically that mistakes and problems are a part of life and you cannot sooner be rid of your problems than God can not be God.

Mistakes are a common part every day living and if you live long enough you will find yourself making mistakes, and some of them may be worse than others.

But their are different ways you can make mistakes because every mistake made is not the same;

You can make mistakes in ignorance, make mistakes on accident, and make mistakes due to negligence.

Mistakes made in ignorance

These occur when you do something not realizing the error of your actions.

An example of this could have happened to you over this most recent holiday. Perhaps you looked in your refrigerator and saw the last piece of sweet potato pie and you ate that piece of pie, not realizing that your spouse wanted it and had set it aside for later that day. In this situation, you were ignorant to the meaning or the special nature of that last slice because it had not been communicated to you who the pie was for. In ignorance, you ate the pie and you spent the night on the couch because you ate that slice...

Mistakes made on accident

Occur when you unexpectedly and unintentionally commit an action that violates a norm, standard, or rule that results in damage or injury.

Accidents happen on the road all the time and their is rarely the case you will find someone who purposefully gets themselves into a car accident. Often times a series of variables combine that cause an accident., such as; slick roads, thunderstorms, and bad vision could easily cause an accident. It is important to recognize that people who make accidental mistakes know better but some things are simply beyond your control and happen regardless of what you may do to avoid them.

Mistakes made due to negligence

Negligent mistakes occur when you ignore what you know and act in a way contrary to what you are aware of as the best course of action.

You know you have three write-ups at work and call out anyways. Then get upset when you are in the unemployment line, it does not work like that. Yes you made a mistake by not showing up, but your negligence has a price that you have to be willing to pay.

And yet, despite the differences between each of these categories of mistakes, they all have the same capacity to go horribly wrong.

Some types of mistakes may be better than others, but the reality is that all mistakes have consequences and can lead to exchanges that embarrass you or can even alter your life/ or social standing.

And despite unequal amounts of awareness in your mistakes, whether your mistake was in ignorance, on accident, or due to negligence, each circumstance has the ability to produce the same outcome.

Whether you ignore the speed limit or did not read the sign with the posted speed limit, the price on that ticket will be the same for speeding no matter what. Accident or negligence in this case can yield the same result.

Understanding the types of mistakes we can make and the potential results of mistakes, it is important to understand that despite what some people would have you to believe, mistakes are a natural part of the learning process.

Mistakes identify what it is you are doing wrong but on some level they also give you guidance as to what you need to be doing to improve your behavior and increase your success.

If you scratch your car on the mailbox leaving your driveway, its letting you know that you need to swing wider when backing out of your driveway.

If you hurt your wife’s feelings by talking about her cooking it’s going to let you know that you need to be more tactful in how you address that topic with her to keep from hurting her feelings.

If you burn your hand ironing your clothes, it let you know to be more attentive when dealing with something hot, especially the iron.

Such mistakes are not meant to deter you from driving completely.

They are not meant to silence you if your wife can’t cook.

And they are not supposed to have you coming to Church looking like a Wrinkle In Time.

But it does serve as a warning that you need to change your behavior even if you do not know EXACTLY what change you need to make going forward.

Maybe you need to start backing into the driveway so you don’t hit the mailbox when you leave early in the morning.

Maybe you should offer to take a cooking class with your wife.

Maybe switch to a clothes steamer rather than an iron.

But no matter what you do, you owe it to yourself to HEED THE WARNING SIGNS and MAKE THE CHANGE.

So many of us get alerts and warnings from OUR mistakes but we ignore them and wonder why we are struggling and having problems.

When life presents you warnings and red flags, you have a responsibility to heed those and alter your life.

When you make mistakes, it is up to you, will you learn from it and take back your power. Or will you allow yourself to be consumed by guilt from others and yourself and remain stagnant in your situation.

I say all of this because I want you to realize the power of your mistakes and you need to be able to identify the warnings and alerts in your own life so you can avoid some of these mistakes and if you can, learn from them.

This leads me to my original question

Have you made mistakes, in your life?

Joshua 5:6

It is in this question that we find my text, as in Joshua 5:6 we see that Joshua is recapping the time that the Israelites spent in the Wilderness wandering aimlessly waiting on the faithless generation to die.

I want you to learn from the mistakes of your past, because You are Built for This.

Joshua is talking about this wilderness experience because it was a really formative time for Joshua, as it let him see the consequences of lost faith.

But it also gave him 40 years to learn under Moses as he was preparing, probably unbeknownst to himself, to be the leader who would actually help Israel enter into its promise.

See its one thing to lead people to a promise and another thing to lead them as they enter into their promise.

Those 40 years wandering in the Wilderness shaped Joshua into the Man who would lead the people of Israel into the Promised Land as they sought to conquer and entire land.

Through these verses we see the desire of God to use EVERYTHING from your past to make you a capable witness of his glory.

He wants to use your testimony, your walk, your relationship, your faith… and most importantly, he wants to use your mistakes. He wants to use your problems. He wants to use your difficulties, because You Were Built for This.

I want to be clear in establishing that the wilderness experiences of Israel represent a huge period of mistakes.

When the time came to enter the land, the did not have Faith in God to deliver the land to them

They heard reports about cities with big walls, large armies, and other defenses and grew scared of their prospects to win the land. They made the mistake in ignorance. They knew what God had done for them but they remained truly ignorant of his ability to provide. Its funny how many of us cannot trust God to do something until he does it… You trust him for a car but when you need a house....

They made mistakes of negligence when they ignored his commandments and broke them, worshipping the Golden Calf. Literally, before God could put pen to paper and write them down, they had ignored his word.

And these are just a few because we could really stay here all night talking about the mistakes of the Wilderness Generation.

They made mistake after mistake and God grew impatient with them and after some negotiations from Moses, they were sentenced to wait for 40 years in the wilderness until the older saints passed on.

What I love about this is he could have solved that problem any number of ways. Put bluntly, he could just killed those of little faith… But he instead chose to use the wilderness to get some glory. You Were Built for This.

Joshua 5:6, shows us how the Israelites messed up. It shows up where God grew impatient. It shows us where they made their mistakes. But it also shows us the deliverance that sometimes come with mistakes.…

God will use the things that you messed up. The mistakes you made, to deliver you simply because he can.

Joshua 6:1-5

Now we move on to Joshua 6:1-5.

The first thing we have to establish and remember is that the area of wilderness they were in was only so big.

God allowed me to use my Holy Ghost Imagination to put myself in their shoes in the Wilderness, and it occurred to me that they had to spend 40 years, walking in circles in the wilderness. I am going somewhere.

Now, imagine what the people in the Land of Canaan were saying about them. What the Egyptians were saying about them. What their enemies were saying about them.

Their enemies who heard what happened in Egypt (Pestilence, plague, and death) and heard what happened at the Red Sea (The entire army disappeared in the Red Sea, definitely conversation worthy), surely they were waiting in fear for God and his people to come across that Jordan River into the land of Canaan. They may have fortified their cities, swelled their armies, and made sacrifices of their own in preparation for what they surely thought would be a hard fought battle.

Then, its like the people just disappeared and everybody had to be wondering what happened to them in the wilderness… Some God they must serve.

Thats what some of your haters are saying about you now. Thats what some of the world is saying about the Church right now. Thats what they say but they do not realize just how powerful and amazing our God is.

In Joshua, God reaches into the wilderness and the very first thing he did was tell them to take the ONE city that seemed the most impossible.

The first thing he did was send them to Jordan, a military city, was known for the impenetrability of their wall.

Now, a generation of children who had never fought a war, never carried a sword, and never even seen the field of Battle… God is sending them to one of the most fortified cities in the Promised Land.

Whatever your situation, you have to know that God is going to use your mistakes.. your weaknesses… your failures… your losses to do the very thing that was impossible for you to do before. Because You Are Built for This.

God knew they weren’t really ready to fight. He knew they did not have the weapons, tools, and artillery to take the city… But he knew one thing they could do and that was to walk in a circle.

He used the skills they did have and sent them to conquer a city.

That would be like showing up to conquer a military base today with a bow and arrow. But if that bow and arrow is anointed and called by God, their is not limited to what can get accomplished. Because You Are Built for This

Conclusion

Now here is the deliverance in this message, as I draw to my close, just to show you how great God is… The story goes on and finishes with the Israelites following God’s exact instructions and the wall comes down.

When the wall comes down, they raid the city and perform a swift and hostile takeover...

But when they take the city… God told them to abandon it and he cursed the very place the city stood.

You may ask yourself, how is that a deliverance to have God take away the very thing you wanted.

Because the very thing that are worried about, God has already decided its not even worthy of you. Its not worthy of the God in you.

He has something greater for you if you can just press a little deeper into your promise.

The problem you are facing, God is just using that to prove to you that the mistakes in your past are cast into the Sea of Forgiveness.

GOD BUILT YOU FOR THIS. HE MADE YOU FOR THIS. HE CALLED YOU FOR THIS. And when he did it, he knew what he was working with, so who are you to question him.

God wants to use you; and even with your flaws, your problems, and your mistakes he can do it. God wants to give you the desires of your heart; and even with your flaws, problems, and mistakes he can do it. God wants to heal you and in spite of it all HE CAN DO IT.

You were built for this. For this time we find ourselves in, for this season that you are in, for the struggles we ARE ALL facing, for the heartache you feel in your heart right now. God birthed each of us into this generation because he knew we had what it took to survive every bit of it. He knew he could trust us to get the job done and that's exactly what we do every single day. Because YOU were built for this. You may ask, preacher, how do I know that I am built for this. Two Things. One, Because he died for you and in the end, that's enough to close this out but I got one more. Two because you have, up until this point and this time, survived 100% of your hard days.

I hope something has been said that gives you the strength to go on just a little bit longer. It is my prayer that God continually blesses you and that this word will serve both as a comfort and a catalyst. I want you to go forward strong, in the power of his might and always know that his strength is made perfect in weakness. Because you were built for this.