Choose Today Whom You Will Serve

While preaching through the Book of Joshua, I came to see his remarkable faith, and I found myself wishing I could meet Joshua in person. Of course, the Bible has many people of faith, and the faith they showed is precious beyond anything I would dare to judge. But Joshua’s faith, which never wavered, whether he was in a lowly place or God had raised him up as the leader of Israel, is worth following. In every situation he had a humble faith, and he had the fine character to obey Moses’ commands at all times. Of course, when I look at Moses’ faith, I also think that anyone would have had to obey such a teacher. But the humility and obedience Joshua showed when he went out to battle, and at Moses’ side while Moses was receiving the law, are not a faith anyone can show easily. Unless you love God as Joshua did, you cannot show a faith that obeys to the death, even if your teacher is Moses. For when we look at Gehazi beside Elisha, Joab beside David, and Demas beside the apostle Paul, betraying the teacher one served is, in the end, evidence of never having truly met God. Yet Joshua, though his faith was as deep as Moses’, never put himself ahead of Moses. God, who loved Joshua, answered whatever he asked, and the more God blessed him, the more uprightly Joshua lived.

His faith, which feared God and loved him at the same time, was so beautiful. People usually grow proud when God blesses them, but Joshua loved God and feared him until the moment he drew his last breath. Even when, having entered Canaan, he faced the hard circumstance of carrying out circumcision, Joshua told the people that God is the living God and helped them believe in God’s work. Because he always let the people see him full of faith, the people were able to obey God. Joshua is the finest of leaders, and a preacher as well.

When he came through a great crisis because of Achan’s cunning, Joshua may well have feared that God’s plan, which had led them all the way to Canaan, would come to nothing. That fear showed itself in a still deeper faith and a thorough obedience, and bore fruit in earnest prayer to God. This is the faith that believers who look at Joshua today must have. Just as the people of Israel were shaken as they watched a world living in plenty, believers are swaying to the left and to the right as they look at the world. Just as Samson, a Nazirite, saw honey flowing from a dead lion and ran to eat it with no sense of sin, believers, who ought to dwell in the light of God, are sinning by running toward the greed and lust that fill a lifeless world. I hope that all of us will follow Joshua’s faith. The faith of Joshua, who became like God, the First and the Last, and kept his faith to the end, still shines on us today and is an example to us.

As I preached through the Book of Joshua, I applauded his faith, I learned from the way Joshua strove to lift God high, and I saw the broad heart with which he loved the people. Though the war with Canaan was fierce, Joshua made God’s merciful love known to the people, and he himself kept his faith, enjoying peace within that love. On the day I preached my last sermon on the Book of Joshua, I wept. I was sad to let so faithful a Joshua go, sad, I suppose, because all that time I had been running alongside him, following his faith. Dear friends, our destination is heaven. However much the world tempts them, believers who must go on toward that heaven must drive it back as Joshua did, with a faith of belief, obedience and loyalty. His words, that to the last moment “as for me and my house, we will serve Yahweh,” remain in my heart. I will pray earnestly that Joshua’s beautiful confession becomes your confession.

Every book Watercourse Church has published is precious, but our book on Joshua is the one I treasure most. I am all the more grateful that through this book I can pass on to you the love of God, who kept Joshua’s faith and guided his life. I give deep thanks to the deacons of our publishing team, who worked hard to publish these sermons on Joshua. Through the labor of those deacons, who read it and read it again dozens of times as they edited, it became a book we can share with joy. Watching the deacons wrestle over how to make a cover everyone would love, I found myself giving deep thanks to God. The books published so far were paid for with offerings given in prayer by all the members of Watercourse Church with one heart, and so we have been able to share them with many people, with a heart for evangelism. I am all the more grateful because this book on Joshua was published through the devotion of our newly ordained deacons. I earnestly hope that God’s gentle love and deep grace will remain in your hearts, and that you will serve our good God as Joshua did.

Cho Chun-sook, Pastor of Watercourse Church