2006 Overflow Series: Preaching from the book of Joshua
Don’t Blow it now!
On last week we witnessed the miraculous deliverance of a former prostitute and her whole family from the destruction of a city called Jericho. When the 6th chapter opens we find her literally, “Hanging on by a Thread”! A red scarlet-like thread hanging from her window signified a covenant agreement between Rahab and her new found faith in Joshua’s God. And because she kept her end of the agreement God, through Joshua kept His.
How many know that we are in a covenant relationship with God?
• You see our Overflow potential and our place of abundance is conditional!
• Somebody say “conditional”
• In other words God does not have to keep His end of the agreement if we don’t keep ours.
• Look somebody in the eye and tell them “Don’t Blow it now!”
Watch this: Israel is almost home! They have come out of bondage in Egypt, they have miraculously survived the wilderness, they have defied the law of nature by crossing a river called Jordan with out even getting wet!; they have taken down a city called Jericho not with a shot but with a shout! God has kept His end of the covenant. They can smell the land flowing with milk and honey! Teachable moment: I wish you could smell what I smell…anybody here sense what I sense! God is taking us some place… I can smell our land of Overflow!
• But unlike Rahab we have a brother in the text, here in chapter 7 that just flat out blew it in the ninth inning! In the home stretch…
• The bible in V. 1 - identifies this covenant breaker as A-chan, the son of Carmi, the grandson of Zimri and the great grandson of Zerah all from the tribe of Judah.
• Interestingly enough his name means “trouble”! and that is exactly what he did, cause trouble.
• Why? On this post-Mother’s day Sunday would anyone name their child “trouble”? …Listen: What you call your child is what he or she will become;
o If you call your child stupid, guess what…
o If you call you child a nobody, guess what…
o If you call your child ugly, guess what…
My son Curtiss who is a first year medical student called his mom and I to tell us that he had gotten in trouble this past week at the doctor’s office. Of course we thought that he had given some one the wrong shot or something but it wasn’t that at all. One of the nurses had called my son "Dr. Moore" and he had corrected her by saying that he was "just" a medical student. The doctor over heard the conversation and called my son in to his office: And said Curtis!
Let them get use to the title.
But most of all let you get use to it!
Let them speak now - what will be - as if it is!
• I wish I had some college students to stand up and say “I am a college graduate!
• I wish I had some folk that need a job stand up and say “Pastor, I got that Job!”
• I wish some sick folk would stand up and say I am healed!
• I wish I had in the house somebody that will make the devil mad and say “I may not look like it but “I am blessed”!
V.1- BUT somebody in our text is about to blow it!
How many know that God always makes His expectations clear either in His Word or by His preacher/pastor/prophet?
• God always establishes His covenants by first establishing clear parameters: In other words - this is what you do and this is what you don’t do; Watch this: These same parameters provide the same framework in which God operates.
• God established with Joshua and the entire congregation the parameters He wanted them to know and observe even before He gave them victory at Jericho.
o Look at V. 17 – “The city is mine!”
o Everything in it is mine! (sounds like the Psalm 24)
o Look at V.19, to be more specific – it is as if He knew the money might be a problem – “the silver and gold, and bronze and iron all belong in my offering!” In other words, don’t take my offering!
o Warning to all of us: Don’t put in your house what ought to be in God’s house!
Look at V.1 – It ends by sharing that God is angry!
• Why? The text says God is angry because “ Israel has acted unfaithfully toward the devoted things” NIV
• A-chan (alias trouble) has taken some of God’s stuff! And put them not in God’s house but in his house!
• How many know that God has entrusted some stuff to you that really don’t belong to you?
o That son or daughter - (Psalm 127:3)
“Lo, children are an heritage of the LORD: and the fruit of the womb is his reward”
o That tithe; the dime of every dollar you make is God’s.
• Remember in the book of Malachi
• There was a hold –up taking place right in the church every Sunday! Malachi calls it highway robbery; Joshua calls it stealing; Grandma called it being cheap with God’s money.
• Malachi (3:8) READ IT! WARNING LABEL…
o Anytime you put in your pocket what belongs in God’s plate! You are breaking the covenant; Which means that God does not …His end of the agreement; This is what happens as a result of the curse in verse 9
Windows of heaven will shut.
The pest will come and eat up your harvest!
The land (your environment) will be harsh
No one will see or call you blessed!
V.2 - Joshua is one victory away from his Overflow! He is beaming from the recent thrill of victory and the awesome way that God had delivered the children of Israel at Jericho. Joshua and his fighting men are confident they can take Ai.
V. 3 – Well, Joshua decides to invade Ai. On paper it looked like a good idea.
- Ai is twice as small as Jericho and has three times as fewer soldiers;
- Israel should have routed their enemy! But There was one major problem – God because there was sin in the camp had removed His Favor!
• Lesson #1 – v.6 - Never try to fight your enemy without God’s favor!
o They defeated Pharoah and his armies at the Red Sea.
o They annihilated the Kings of the Amorites in the wilderness!
o They even took Jericho without a fight!
o All because of God’s favor!
o Yet this small bad of fighting army drop outs whipped Israel so bad that Joshua cried like a baby!
o Sin in the camp will suspend God’s favor!
• Lesson #2 – Stick with what bought you to the dance!
All the previous times before Joshua moved he waited to hear from God!
• Before sending spies in to Jericho (Chapter 2)
• Before sending the children across Jordan (Chapter 3)
• Before attacking Jericho, He talked with God
o This time Joshua forgot to pray!
o Became over confident – but NEVER under estimate the Devil!
• V.10 - God commanded Joshua in to get up! Stand up! Shut up! Stop complaining and go and clean up your house!
• Lesson #3 – Never break covenant with God! V.19 20
o Watch that “I” disease!
o Four steps to Spiritual Death
I saw
I coveted
I took
I sinned
• Lesson # 4 – Don’t let trouble stay when he shows up!
Trouble has your address! He knows where you live. But when he shows up don’t let him stay!
o Joshua called a “coming to Jesus meeting!”
o Some one here needs to call one!
o Trouble you got to go!
o You know those things in your life that spell trouble!
It might look good! Somebody holler – Trouble!
It might talk good! “” Trouble!
It might walk good! “” Trouble
It might even smell good! “” Trouble
It might feel good! “” Trouble
Closing:
o Anybody here ever done something you wish you could do all over again? I call it Replay theology!
We see it in sports: We all do it! Even though you know the outcome, every time they rerun the replay; you find yourself watching it intensely as if you might have a chance to change the outcome! Remember the Colts Championship game: The Jerome Bettis fumble recovery!...Oh, If the defensive back had only gone to his right and not his left...this play still haunts me to this day! We almost won...
Closing
A-chan , Don’t Blow it now! You are almost there!
A-chan God has brought you out of bondage - Don’t Blow it now!
A-chan God has brought you through the wilderness - Don’t Blow it now!
A-chan God has brought you through your Jordan – Don’t Blow it now
A-chan God has brought down your Jericho walls - Don’t Blow it now
I can hear A-chan now: Oh if I could only do it again!
But it was too late for A-chan; Don’t let it be too late for you. You are almost there, Don’t Blow it now!
New Era don’t Blow it now!
