The Joy of Glory

Joshua 24:1-15 (click here)
I took your father Abraham from beyond the River…
I gave him Isaac…
I gave Jacob…
I sent Moses and Aaron…
I plagued Egypt…
I brought you out…
I brought you to the land…
I gave them into your hand…
I delivered you…
I gave you a land…

“Now therefore fear the LORD and serve him in sincerity and in faithfulness. Put away the gods that your fathers served beyond the River and in Egypt, and serve the LORD. And if it is evil in your eyes to serve the LORD, choose this day whom you will serve, whether the gods your fathers served in the region beyond the River, or the gods of the Amorites in whose land you dwell. But as for me and my house, we will serve the LORD.” (Joshua 24:various selections and 14-15)

Reflection

As the people of God, we have a history… a history of God’s faithfulness to fulfill all his promises.

Yet, we are each under constant temptation to forsake the Lord, often because we have bought into the lie that he has forsaken us.

When Israel finished conquering the promised land, Joshua, their leader, knew that the temptation would be strong upon the people to return to the foreign false deities their forefathers had so often served in Egypt. He knew that as the people experienced individual hardships, they may think the Lord had forsaken them. Or… as they experienced individual blessings they may think they had gained everything in their own power and didn’t need the Lord.

So what did Josh do?

He reminded the people of their history… a history of God’s faithfulness to fulfill all his promises.

He reminded them of how God had not forsaken them as a people, but had worked on their behalf generation after generation. Even if they were to experience individual circumstances that felt like God was absent, they could stand amongst the people of God and look over their collective history to see that the Lord was always present and faithful to his people.

Joshua reminded them of how all their blessings had been given to them by the Lord. Even if they were experiencing individual success, when standing amongst the people of God, hearing their history, they should recognize that all success belonged to the Lord… the glory was his alone!

This is one of the reasons the church community is so vital for us as Christians. We will all experience various times in our lives when we believe the Lord has forsaken us. We need to stand amongst the people of God and hear the whole of our story. God’s faithfulness to Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob IS his faithfulness to us as well!

We will also likely have times of success, and we will be tempted to take all the credit and forget the Lord. Who needs to rely on God when they can rely on themselves? We need the community and our collective history to remind us that all blessings come from the Lord.

In light of our history and all God’s faithfulness… in light of all his goodness… in light of him and amongst his people… it is form that perspective that we should and must choose who we will serve each day.

As for me and my house… we will serve the Lord.
 

*All previous devotionals may be found at www.thejoyofglory.com
*The complete SVCC Lenten reading guide is available here.

Worthless-Idolatrous Community
Exodus 32:1-29 (click here)
On Sundays during Lent, there will not be an email devotional because I actually preach on the passage for that day. If you would like to listen to today’s sermon, you can find it on iTunes by searching for “Shades Valley Community Church” or simply click here.

Deuteronomy 24:19-22 (click here)
“When you reap your harvest in your field and forget a sheaf in the field, you shall not go back to get it. It shall be for the sojourner, the fatherless, and the widow, that the LORD your God may bless you in all the work of your hands.” (Deuteronomy 24:19)

Reflection
God called the Israelites to be a people who mirrored his own loving-kindness. They were to do this not only by loving people like them… from the same socio-economic status, education level, occupation, or even ethnicity.

No.

Their loving-kindness was to extend to those who were least among them… to the foreigner sojourning in their midst… to the orphan who was not their own flesh and blood… to the widow who was not their “responsibility.”

But how were they to do this? Often, I think many of us want to love and help the least among us, but we feel powerless when it comes to knowing how to do this.

God did not leave the Israelites in the dark, nor has he left us, the church, paralyzed in our cluelessness. The Bible is replete with ways we can show God’s love toward the sojourner, the fatherless, and the widow. In Deuteronomy 24:19, God very practically shows his people one way such loving-kindness might be put on display.

Israel was an agrarian society. Many were farmers, and the Lord instructed them not to pick their crops clean. If they missed some while they were harvesting, they should leave it behind and allow the poor to walk through their fields and glean some for themselves.

This was not a simple hand-out, but invited those struggling into the dignity of work. This cut into the profits of these farmers for the sake of people who were struggling. It was sacrificial love that did not demean the other, but promoted and dignified them.

What does such a command teach us about the heart of God, and the call he has placed upon his people?

We may not live in a primarily agricultural society, nor are many of us farmers, but we all have “fields” of resources. More than that, we live in a culture that not only picks its fields clean for the sake of self, but has trained us to actually pick what is not there and live beyond our means!

Could it be that the radical call of God is for us to live our lives in such a way that we need not scrape together and spend every last resource we have on ourselves? Could it be that God has called us to live sacrificially that we might be less concerned with our own profits and more concerned with promoting people?

What creative ways could you dignify, love, and help the immigrant, the orphan, and the widow, if you freed up resources specifically for that purpose?

It’s fun to dream about… only it shouldn’t be a dream.

May we be a community that displays the loving-kindness of the Lord to the least of these as he displayed it to us when we were spiritually the least of these… he poured out his loving-kindness through the cross. May we put that love on display before the watching world. May we be a cruciform community.

*All previous devotionals may be found at www.thejoyofglory.com
*The complete SVCC Lenten reading guide is available here.