We come to the end of Joshua chapter 24 and it is here that I'm bringing you
into a story that you have not been hearing week after week. Though I have
been immersed in Joshua this past season you have not been. So I have to bring you
up to speed a little bit. I want to start this morning by asking you a question.
Is there a such thing as a happy slave? Is there a such thing as a happy slave?
It seems like a oxymoron that you would say that there could be a happy slave.
When I think of slavery I think of just a couple of different periods in history.
I think of the Egyptians enslaving God's people and I think of them using
an entire population of people for their physical labor with no pay. I think of
Roman slavery and how people were treated as property and just like you
would eat an apple and then throw it away. So also would you use a slave and
then cast them aside. I think of the horrible American history that we have
with chattel slavery in the transatlantic slave trade. Horrible times. And then I
think also of the modern slave trafficking movement in the world where
there are institutions that claim that slavery is actually at its peak now in
our time. And yet we live in a free country and are pretty much unaware of a
lot of these things that are happening all across our world. Is there such a
thing as a happy slave? One of the most despicable things I think I've ever
read is Frederick Douglass commenting on what is now called the myth of the happy
slave. And the myth of the happy slave is a story that white plantation owners in
the South would use to justify their enslavement of Africans. They would say
when they're in the fields and they're working they would be singing. Right? We
know those songs. We call them spirituals. You heard that before. They would be in
the field singing. And so the white plantation owners would say these slaves
are lucky to be in my keeping. Look how happy they are. Frederick Douglass calls
this despicable. And in one of his quotes about the situation he says of it,
they sang when they were most unhappy. And that was the true grace. Now I agree. Is
there such a thing as a happy slave? My goal this morning is to convince you to
fear the merciful God and joyfully serve him in sincerity and faithfulness. Let me
repeat that again for those of you who like to write stuff down. My goal is to
convince you to fear the merciful God and joyfully serve him in sincerity and
faithfulness. The title of my message this morning is Joyfully Enslaved by
the Merciful God. And I want all of us to recognize and to remember this morning
that there is no better way to be happy, to be joyful in this world than to be a
slave of Jesus Christ. I do think that there is such a thing as a happy slave.
And as we look today in Joshua 24, we may see this together. I just want to
summarize where we are in the book of Joshua. If you remember God has brought
the nation of Israel out of the land of Egypt. He has brought them through the
wilderness through many trials. He has brought them across the river Jordan and
they have begun a conquest of the land. At this period in the book Joshua, the
leader of Israel who has trusted in the commander of the Lord's army to fight
his battles for many, many years is at the end of his life. As he says he is
about to go the way of all the earth. That means he's real old. So this is
where we are at the end of the book of Joshua. The conquest is done. Not
everything is finished in the land but the conquest at least is done. And it is
here at the end that Joshua gathers all of the people of Israel. Look at me in
the beginning of Joshua chapter 24. Joshua gathered all the tribes of
Israel to shek'em. Now if you're paying attention and you're a good Bible reader
you may think I think I've heard of this place before and you have. It's in the
beginning of what you would do if you're reading the Bible in a year. You
hit this pretty soon in the early part of the year. Genesis chapter 12. God promises
Abraham as he is passing through the land of Canaan that he is going to give
his descendants a land. And it is here at the very same place that God promised
Abraham that now Joshua gathers the people of God. And it is here that he
summons the elders, the heads, the judges, and the officers of Israel and they
present themselves before God. Now let me tell you here, presenting themselves
before God, you may not catch that very quickly but that means that they are
set up before the Ark of the Covenant. They're set up before where the Lord's
presence was physically present in the world. This is where they are. They're
in shek'em, they're before the Ark of the Covenant, and then verse 2, Joshua said
to all the people, thus says the Lord. He employs a prophetic tone. He's talking
on behalf of God. And if you just kind of glance through the rest of the verses
there between the second part of verse 2 all the way through verse 13, this is a
recounting of what we see in the Pentateuch. We see an overview of the
book of Genesis, Exodus, Leviticus, even Numbers, and then Deuteronomy. And he does
it in very short words. That doesn't mean that you can skip all the stuff before
this, but this is a summary of all that happened before. And it is after this
recounting of history that we get to verse, let's see, chapter 13, or verse 13,
sorry, 24 verse 13, I gave you a land on which you had not labored in cities that
you had not built and you dwelt in them. You eat the fruit of vineyards and
olive orchards that you did not plant. Israel has gotten a very great gift. It
is the Lord bringing them out of the bondage of slavery and into a land of
freedom. Let's see what Joshua has to say. Now therefore, now that you're here,
this is the end of my life. Look at all the Lord has done. Think about our history.
Now therefore, fear the Lord and serve Him. Wait, I really thought Joshua that the
Lord had brought us out that we might not be under oppression any longer. We left
slavery only to end up here where you're calling us to fear another master
and serve Him and not only to do that but to do that with some level of
sincerity and faithfulness. That's exactly what he's calling them to do. How does
he call them to do it? Let's continue. He says, put away the gods that your father
served beyond the river and in Egypt and serve the Lord. And then we have this
that may be on a billboard that you pass on the highway and the end of this is
something that may be on a pillow in your house. Right? And if it is able to in
your eyes to serve the Lord, choose this day whom you will serve. I've seen that
on a billboard on the highway. Whether the gods of your father served in the
region beyond the river or the gods of the Amorites in whose land you now
dwell. But as for me in my house, we will serve the Lord. I just want to point out
some interesting things here. Look at verse 15 and look very carefully. You
have an if then phrase there and if it is evil in your eyes to serve the Lord,
choose. So if it's evil to serve, it's evil in your eyes to serve the Lord,
choose. And what are they choosing between? Maybe you've never considered this
before. Look carefully at your text. Choose this day whom you will serve.
Whether the false gods that your fathers served across the river or the gods of
the Amorites in whose land you now dwell. He's saying if you don't want to serve
the Lord, if you don't want to serve this master in sincerity and faithfulness,
then you can take your pick of the burning gods that I've left in your wake.
Out of Egypt is a destruction of Egyptian gods. The tin plagues that rained fire
down on Egypt destroyed the very idea that Egypt had any gods worth
worshiping. And then as they are coming through the wilderness now to the land
that God has promised them, they encounter the Amorites and they have gods too.
And yet just like Jericho, they are burning. They're on fire. So God says if
you're not going to serve me, you can choose your pile of rebel that you want
to serve. Choose which one do you want? Which burning pile of idols appeals to
you the most? This is the question that Joshua puts to the people. Fits evil. If
you do what's right in your own eyes, if y'all are going to judges in the summer,
that will be incredibly important for you moving forward. It starts out almost
everyone and the people did what was right in their own eyes. And the Lord
bring judgment on them. So this is what Joshua says. If it is evil, if you look
at the good God and you call that evil, then you can take your pick of all of
the worldly idols that you can choose from. And so he puts this choice to them.
Which false gods are you going to serve? Verse 16, the people answer. I want you to
listen to their response. For be it from us that we should forsake the Lord to
serve other gods, for it is the Lord our God who brought us and our fathers up
from the land of Egypt out of the house of slavery and who did those great
signs in our sight and preserved us in all the way that we went and among all
the peoples through whom we passed and the Lord drove out before us all the
peoples, the Amorites who lived in the land. Therefore we also will serve the
Lord for he is our God. Hmm. That sounds like a really great Sunday school answer.
Ah, so good, right? Everything they said is true. This is what they responded to
Joshua with. I'm going to paint the picture for you. There's an old man. He's a
part of the old guard. He's been in his home and he's getting old. Maybe he's
senile. Maybe he's less respected. Maybe there are new leaders emerging in Israel
that are more favorable. Everybody likes them because they're relevant. They're
saying messages that the people really like, but you got this old guy and we
like him because he helped us conquer the land. But he's standing before us and
he's calling us to make a choice between two piles of rubbish or the one true
and living God. And what do they do? They give him exactly the answer that he
wants from them. They think that by saying all of the right things that they
are off the hook. Look at his response. This is how you know that this is true.
But Joshua said to the people, you are not able to serve the Lord. Wow. What a
what a stark contrast, right? Verse 14, serve him in sincerity and faithfulness.
And then verse 19, Joshua says to the people, you are not able to serve the
Lord. He's calling their bluff. They've said we'll serve the Lord. We'll do what
you've asked us to do. Old man. And then Joshua responds, you're not able to serve
the Lord for he and these are our problems today. For he is a holy God, a
jealous God. He will not forgive your transgressions or your sins. Think if the
gospel ended there, folks. Think about what despair we would be in if the
gospel ended there. You are not able to serve the Lord. He's a holy God. He's a
jealous God. He will not forgive your transgressions or your sins. Then he
continues in verse 20, if you forsake the Lord and serve foreign gods, then he
will turn and he'll do you harm and consume you after having done you good.
It makes me think of the parable of the tenets that Jesus says in the New
Testament. Jesus talks about a beautiful vineyard and the Lord puts
servants in charge of the vineyard and he goes away for a time and then after a
time he calls from the servants to provide him with the fruit of the land
and he sends a servant to collect it. And what do they do? They beat the
servant and they send him away and the Lord keeps sending over and over again
all of these servants. Some they beat, some they kill. And finally the master
sends his son. This is that picture right there. If, if you forsake the Lord and
serve foreign gods, he will turn and he'll do you harm and consume you after
having done you good. And so the people respond to this sharp rebuke from
Joshua and the people said to Joshua, no, but we will serve the Lord. They
double down on their promise. They double down. Then verse 22, Joshua said to the
people, you are witnesses against yourselves that you have chosen the Lord
and serve him. What's a witness? A witness is the other party that has to sign a
document that is between two people. If you are writing a will, you have to have
a witness to sign it, witness what you have done. And if it's ever called into
question, that witness will be called forward to give a testimony about what
actually happened. And Joshua says, you people are witnesses against yourselves
that you have chosen the Lord to serve him. And they say, we are witnesses.
They're not doubling down. They're tripling down. And so Joshua again, verse 23, he
said, then put away the foreign gods that are among you. He calls them on the
carpet. There's idols in your house. I know what's set up in the city center of
your little town. I know what's there. I know that you have taken the false gods
from these people that we have conquered. You have pulled from the rubble these
idols and they're in your homes. Put away the foreign gods that are among you
and incline your heart to the Lord, the God of Israel. And verse 24, the people
said to Joshua, the Lord our God, we will serve and his voice he will obey.
They're not doubling down. They're not tripling down. They are quadrupling down
on their promise. So Joshua ratifies the covenant based upon their word. Verse 25,
so Joshua made a covenant or a legal agreement with the people that day and
put in place statutes and rules for them at Shechem, this place where the Lord had
promised this land to them. And they knew at this very place that if they
forsake the Lord they would lose the land that the Lord had given them. And
Joshua wrote these words in the book of the law of God. He took a large stone and
set it there under the terabinth that was by the sanctuary of the Lord. Maybe
even the same tree is the oak from Genesis chapter 12 that God spoke to
Abraham under. When Joshua said to all the people, behold, this stone should be a
witness against us. You see the change up until this point it's been Joshua versus
the people of Israel. And now Joshua takes responsibility for what his people
have decided to do. This stone will be a witness against us. For it is heard all
of the words of the Lord that he spoke to us. Therefore, it shall be a witness
against you lest you deal falsely with your God. So Joshua sent the people away,
every man to his inheritance. This is quite a story.
There was a time, I was at youth camp speaking of youth retreat. I was at
youth camp in Daytona Beach, Florida. And I remembered the theme. It was called
Mosaic. And my youth pastor brought these little concrete molds. And one evening
he told us that he gave us all these little like shards of stained glass. It's
what it looked like. And he said, I want you to make a promise to the Lord that
you're going to change when you get back from camp this week. And so he handed
us all one of these little shards of glass. And he said, this is your reminder
that you're going to keep to the promise that you hold. And so I remember
sitting on the beach that evening with my group leader. His name was Nick. And I
remember calling out to the Lord that I was never going to do the thing that I
was currently struggling with. I remember. I remember what it was. And I remember
holding on to that piece of glass. And I remember the next night going into the
youth rally and then going up and putting my little piece of glass in the
concrete, fresh concrete. And that was it. That's like this, like, yeah, I'm not
going to do it anymore. And I got home and I think the first day I had already
broken my promise. Making promises to the Lord is a weighty, heavy thing. And
here we see Israel making a promise that they cannot surely keep. Joshua was
right. In verse 19, you cannot serve the Lord. What do we do with this? What do we
do with this story today? In the New Testament earlier, Alex read for us
Romans chapter six. And in Romans chapter six, there are two alternative
slaveries that we can submit ourselves to. One is slavery to sin, which leads to
death. And two, slavery to righteousness or slavery to Christ, which leads to
eternal life, right? For the wages of sin is death. But the free gift of God is
eternal life through Christ Jesus, our Lord. Today, a similar thing stands
before us and Joshua calls us to think about it. Choose this day whom you will
serve. Will you serve your sin, your idols, your own desires or will you serve
the true and living God who died on a cross and rose from the grave? Joshua
to presents a problem for us, though. And that is the problem that Joshua says
in verse 19, you cannot serve the Lord. Why? Because he is a holy God. He is a
jealous God. He will not forgive your sins. So what do we do with this? If you'll
hold your finger in Joshua chapter 24, but turn over to Romans chapter 12. If
you know anything about the book of Romans, the book of Romans is a building
argument all the way through and everything in Romans chapter one through
Romans chapter 11 leads up to this declaration at the beginning of Romans
chapter 12. And you probably know it well. This is how Christ has dealt with our
sin problem that separates us from God. It says, I appeal to you therefore,
brothers and sisters, by the mercies of God to present your bodies as a living
sacrifice, holy and acceptable to God, which is your spiritual worship. Do not
be conformed to this world. Don't be enslaved to this world, but be transformed
by the renewing of your mind by testing. You may discern what is the will of God,
what is good and acceptable and perfect. What does presenting your bodies as a
living sacrifice do before God? It makes you holy. The requirement that keeps us
away from God. God is holy. Do you remember Isaiah standing before the
presence of the Lord in Isaiah chapter six? He stands before and he sees the
holiness of God and he says, Whoa is me. I am undone. I don't belong here. You
see all this stuff around me. I am unclean and I dwell in the midst of a
people with uncleanness. Holiness stands between us and God. And what does
Jesus do for us? He makes us holy and acceptable. You see the bad news of
Joshua chapter 24 verse 19, he will not forgive your sins. That is undone in the
person and work of Jesus Christ because he lived perfectly on our behalf. So
that we might have the righteousness of God. So if you are not a Christian here
today, I would like to share with you that there are two things that stand
between you and God. One is that he is holy and you are not. He is holy and
you are not. Now you may not understand all that that has to do with anything,
but here's the truth. You cannot as a sinner remain in the presence of God a
sinner. You don't belong there. His holiness would burn you away. Holiness
stands between you and God and two. Your sin separates you from God utterly.
Ericasm is far too wide to be bridged by any good works. Anything that you can
do with your hands, anything that you can make promises to. And this is why
Joshua is so cautious in letting Israel make this covenant. He's not trying to
trip them up because he doesn't love them. He's trying to get them to be honest
with themselves about who they are before God. And all they're trying to do is
make a promise that they can never keep. Friend, if you are here today and you
are feeling like, man, I need to trust in Christ. The danger is far too great.
The other reality is far too bad. If I just become a Christian, everything
will be easier. That is also untrue. At the end of Hebrews chapter 11, the part
that very few people read, it says, And what more shall I say for time would
fail me to tell of Gideon, Barak, Sampson, Jephthah, David, and Samuel and
the prophets? And y'all will get to most of those in judges who through faith
conquer kingdoms and force justice, obtain promises, stop the mouths of
lions, quench the power of fire, escape the edge of the sword were made strong
out of weakness, became mighty in war, put foreign armies to flight, women
received back their dead by resurrection and then the tone changes. Some were
tortured, refusing to accept release so that they might rise again to a better
life. Others suffered, suffered mocking and flogging and even chains and
imprisonment. They were stoned, they were sawn into, they were killed with the
sword. They went about off in sheeps, skins of sheep and goats and were
destitute, afflicted, mistreated of whom the world was not worthy, wandering
about in the deserts and mountains and in the dims and caves of the earth.
Christian life is not all roses.
But following Jesus meant that you got sawn into one day.
This is no easy task to be enslaved to God.
But it is the best reality.
The reason that this is good news today and the reason that I would stand
before you to preach this sermon is because I do believe that we do not
serve a God who does not forgive sins.
There would be no reason for me to stand before you today and just declare to
you bad news.
The title of my sermon today is joyfully enslaved to the merciful God by the
merciful God.
He is merciful to sinners because of Jesus Christ.
These Israelites did not have any understanding of what God was going to
provide for them, but all of them, if they trusted by faith in the promises of
God that would one day be fulfilled by Jesus Christ would have been saved from
their sins.
These Israelites could have been saved the same way that you and I were.
The only way to be saved is trusting in the promises of God, fulfilled in the
person and work of Jesus Christ on the cross and in his resurrection.
And this is the good news that is offered to them if they would have only turned
and served the Lord if they had believed that he was merciful.
They say it with their mouths here, but as y'all will find in the book of
judges, they did not believe it.
They turned from God and they served idols and they were punished and tested.
God is merciful in the person and work of Jesus Christ alone.
He is not a vengeful master like the devil.
He does not hate you.
He loves you and he's calling you to serve him.
He is provided away through his own work and by no work that you must do to
provide away for you to serve him all the days of your life with joy.
What does it look like to serve the Lord in joy?
Two things here coming from our text, sincerity and faithfulness.
Verse 14.
What does it mean to be sincere?
To be sincere is to serve the Lord with all of you.
That word carries the sense of wholeness.
In fact, you might think back to Deuteronomy chapter 6 where the Lord says,
you will love the Lord your God with all of your heart, soul and strength.
New Testament adds mind in there in places as well.
So serve the Lord with all of you.
There is no part of you that the Lord does not want in his service.
All of you is required to serve the Lord.
He will not share any part of you with any worldly pleasure or idea ever.
Sincere.
This is the posture of the heart before the Lord.
Lord, you can have all of me.
Do you remember Isaiah in Isaiah chapter 6?
Lord says, who will go for us?
And he says, here I am, send.
Not part of me, me.
Send me all of me.
So sincerity is to serve the Lord with all of your heart, soul, mind, strength.
And then the second one is faithfulness.
Faithfulness.
What does it mean to be faithful to a spouse?
But to love them alone all the days of your life until death shall do you part.
Right?
It is the vow that I made to my wife many years ago that I would cling to her alone and no other.
Faithfulness is serving the Lord alone.
And who is Israel flirting with?
Burning piles of idols.
Things that the Lord had already defeated.
And yet these are the two requirements for serving the Lord with joy.
Serve him with all of you and be faithful to him alone.
You cannot serve two masters.
You cannot serve both your sin and the Lord Jesus Christ.
Be faithful to him alone.
Serve him alone.
Now if I went to your house today I doubt that I would find idols sitting in a little sanctuary within your home.
Our problem is not that we have little trinkets that we worship.
Our problem is that we have a priority problem.
That we put anything and everything before the Lord Jesus Christ.
If your heart is a throne then there is war happening for that seat on the throne of your heart every single day.
There is a battle going on.
And there are lots of good things in this world that would seek to be a part of sitting on the throne of your heart.
Maybe it's your spouse.
Maybe it's your family.
Maybe it's your job.
Maybe it's the wealth in your bank account.
There are many different idols that vie for the throne of your heart.
And Joshua says none of them compare.
They are all burning piles of rubbish in comparison to serving the Lord.
So does it look like to be joyful in serving the Lord?
We serve him with sincerity and faithfulness.
The last thing that I'd like for us to see this morning is this witnessing rock.
At the very end of the text.
It's kind of strange that it's thrown in there.
The witnessing rock is a reminder to Israel of the promise that they've made.
But really it's a reminder because they're so forgetful.
That rock stands as a testimony that the Lord is omniscient in those all things.
He will never forget this promise that they made him on this day.
That rock stands to remind forgetful human beings of the omniscience of Almighty God.
That stone stands there to remind them that God is going to hold them to this promise that he's made.
And he will be faithful to the covenant that he has made with them.
If you do all that I have commanded you to do, long will you live in the land.
If you fail to serve me and you go after other gods, I will remove you from your land.
I will turn on you and I will harm you.
This rock reminds us that God's omnipotence, omniscience, is not some far off idea.
But it is close to all of us.
There is nothing that you do that the Lord does not say.
That day on the beach where I promised the Lord that I was going to do something.
I'll be responsible for breaking that when I got home.
But thanks be to God that Christ stands before my sin.
I can live a joyful life and not this life ridden by guilt because God has set me free from the power of sin.
And I can joyfully serve him with all that I am because he has paid the penalty for my sin.
No longer is there guilt between me and my God, I can serve my master though imperfectly and he will rescue me from the power of sin and darkness and death.
This is what it means to joyfully serve the merciful God as a slave.
Throughout the book of Joshua there's this theme that runs of households.
In the raising of Jericho, Rahab, the Gentile prostitute and her household, they're all saved alive because of her faith.
In the initial defeat at AI everybody realized that somebody had sinned.
And there was a man who had pulled a burning idol out of the wreckage and he'd hidden it in his tent.
And he and all of his household were stoned and burned with fire.
And then we get to the end here, Joshua, the leader of Israel, old man at this point.
He says, as for me and my house, my household, we will serve the Lord.
The question today stands for you. Who will you serve?
Will you remain in your sin, trusting in your own works, trusting in these burning piles of rubbish to save you?
Or will you trust in the merciful God?
Bind yourself to him and love him with all of your heart, soul, mind and strength.
Let's pray together.