As our heavenly Father’s own adopted Kings kids, we are all privileged to bear the name of Christ, and to represent the House of God as His servants. Jesus gave us His name so that we could represent the House of God, His Kingdom, His Way, His purpose, His Church, for His glory. Ephesians 1:14 “When you BELIEVED, you were MARKED in HIM with a SEAL, the promised HOLY SPIRIT, who is a deposit guaranteeing our INHERITANCE until the redemption of those who are God’s possession—to the praise of HIS glory.” We walk by faith and trustbGod at His Word. Galatians 4:4-5 “But when the set time had fully come, God sent His Son, born of a woman, born under the law, to redeem those under the law, that we might receive ADOPTION to SONSHIP.”

Joshua led the people of God with an unfaltering faith in His power. Under God’s command, victory after victory occured until the troops felt “We got this!” The battle at AI was their only defeat. Why? Because there was sin in the camp. At Jericho, according to God’s will and command, “Don’t make an alliance with these people.” Avoid being contaminated by their unholy ways and traditions. At Jericho, Joshua’s troops obeyed God’s full command. There were zero survivors except Rahab and family. Who made the surrendered hearts of Joshua and Caleb stand strong? 2 Corinthians 1:21-22 “GOD MAKES us STAND firm in Christ. HE anointed us, set HIS seal of ownership on us, and put HIS Spirit in our hearts as a deposit, guaranteeing what is to come.”

Isaiah 55:8-9 “For My thoughts are not your thoughts, neither are your ways My ways,” declares the Lord. “As the heavens are higher than the earth, so are My ways higher than your ways and My thoughts than your thoughts.” At the end of Joshua’s life we learn the impact of disobedience. Joshua 18:2 “There were still 7 Israelite tribes who had not yet received their inheritance.” Why?  Read Joshua 21:43,45 The Lord gave Israel all the land He had sworn to give their ancestors, and they took possession of it and settled there. Not one of all the Lord’s good promises to Israel failed; every one was fulfilled. Joshua 22:5 “Be very careful to keep the commandment and the law that Moses the servant of the Lord gave you: to love the Lord your God, to walk in obedience to Him, to keep His commands, to hold fast to Him and to serve Him with all your heart and with all your soul.”

Romans 8:15 “The Spirit you received does not make you slaves, so that you live in fear again; rather, the Spirit you received brought about your adoption to sonship. And by HIM we cry, Abba, Father.”  Do our personal choices echo our dependence on the Holy Spirit’s guidance, or on our prideful independence? How has faith in the Word of God played a crucial role in enduring personal trials? Did I stand strong, or fold under peer pressure? Do my daily actions and choices actually mentor others to follow Jesus? Do I exhibit daily dependence on God, or  do I rely on my own clever manipulations? Do I submit to abide in Christ? Do I trust the Holy Spirit and listen to what the Spirit of God is saying, or do I listen to world news and tremble? guidance? Joshua 23:1-16 After a long time had passed and the Lord had given Israel rest from all their enemies around them, Joshua, by then a very old man, he summoned all Israel—their elders, leaders, judges and officials—and said to them: “I am very old. You yourselves have seen everything the Lord your God has done to all these nations for your sake; it was the Lord your God who FOUGHT for you. “Be very strong; be careful to OBEY all that is written in the Book of the Law of Moses, without turning aside to the right or to the left. Do NOT ASSOCIATE with these nations that remain among you; do NOT invoke the names of their gods or swear by them. You must NOT serve them or bow down to them. But you are to HOLD FAST to the Lord your God, as you have until now. So be very careful to love the Lord your God. If you VIOLATE the COVENANT of the LORD your God, which HE commanded you, and go and serve other gods and bow down to them, the Lord’s ANGER will burn against you, and you will quickly perish from the good land HE has given you.”

1 Samuel 15:22 “Does the Lord delight in burnt offerings and sacrifices as much as in obeying the Lord?” To OBEY is BETTER than sacrifice, and to HEED is better than to disobey.

John 14:15 “If you love ME, keep MY commands.”

James 1:22 “Do not merely listen to the word, and so deceive yourselves. Do what it says.”

Matthew 7:21 “Not everyone who says to ME, ‘Lord, Lord,’ will enter the kingdom of heaven, but only the one who does the will of MY Father who is in heaven.” What is God’s will?

Deuteronomy 5:33  “Walk in obedience to all that the Lord your God has commanded you, so that you may LIVE and prosper and PROLONG your days in the land that you will possess.” Scripture emphasizes the importance of obedience to God’s commands, it also teaches that obedience should be motivated by love and a desire for a relationship with God rather than merely a checklist of rules.

Joshua 24:13-20 God gave you a land on which you did not toil and cities you did not build; and you live in them and eat from vineyards and olive groves that you did not plant.’ “Now fear the Lord and serve Him with all faithfulness. Throw away the gods your ancestors worshiped, and serve the Lord. But IF serving the Lord seems UNDESIRABLE to you, then choose for yourselves this day whom you will serve, whether the gods your ancestors served — or the god of more, or of any world order. “But as for me and my household, we will serve the Lord.” Then the people answered, “Far be it from us to forsake the Lord to serve other gods!Joshua said to the people, “You are not able to SERVE the Lord. He is a HOLY God; HE is a JEALOUS God. He will not forgive your rebellion and your sins. IF you FORSAKE the Lord and serve FOREIGN gods, HE will turn and bring disaster on you and make an end of you, after HE has been good to you.” After these things, Joshua son of Nun, the servant of the Lord, died at the age of 110 years.

Judges 1:1-33 After the death of Joshua, the Israelites asked the Lord, “Who of us is to go up first to fight against the Canaanites?” The Benjamites DID NOT DRIVE OUT the Jebusites, who were living in Jerusalem; Manasseh DID NOT drive out the people of Beth Shan; Ephraim DID NOT drive out the Canaanites living in Gezer;
Zebulun DID NOT drive out the Canaanites but Zebulun CHOSE HIS OWN WAY to keep them as forced labor; Asher DID NOT drive out those living in Akko, Sidon or Ahlab or Akzib; Naphtali DID NOT drive out those living in Beth Shemesh or Beth Anath; but CHOSE TO KEEP the captives as forced laborers for them. New Covenant truth. “Every good and perfect gift is from above, coming down from the Father of the heavenly lights, who does not change like shifting shadows. He chose to give us NEW LIFE, a birth through the WORD of TRUTH, that we might be a kind of firstfruits of all HE created.” James 1:17

Judges 2 “The angel of the Lord went up from Gilgal to Bokim and said, “I brought you up out of Egypt and led you into the land I swore to give to your ancestors. I said, ‘I will never break my covenant with you, and you shall not make a covenant with the people of this land, but you shall break down their altars.’ Yet you have disobeyed me. Why have you done this? And I have also said, ‘I will not drive them out before you; they will become traps for you, and their gods will become snares to you.’ When the angel of the Lord had spoken these things to all the Israelites, the people wept aloud, after that whole generation had been gathered to their ancestors, another generation grew up who knew neither the Lord nor what he had done for Israel. They forsook the Lord, the God of their ancestors, who had brought them out of Egypt. They followed and worshiped various gods of the peoples around them. They aroused the Lord’s anger. In His anger against Israel the Lord gave them into the hands of raiders who plundered them. He sold them into the hands of their enemies all around, whom they were no longer able to resist.”

The glaring lesson is the wisdom in dying to our ways to obey God, always.  Do not associate with those who mock God. Do not mix your faith in Jesus with faith in your successes. We each leave a legacy every time we humbly reflect the fruit of the Spirit, or if we choose to hate, not love. Or suppress joy by being unkind. We each influence others by our confidence in what Jesus has done and continues to do, or we seek to impress others by what we have done. The legacy we leave behind is either our faith in God, or our pride in our own efforts. We either walk by faith in His goodness and mercy, or by the age old belief; “I got this.” Do we inspire others by the Spirit of God in us? Or, does our meekness roar? Do we quietly persevere in prayer and trust? Do we endure without grumbling in sickness or during heartbreak? In 2 Timothy 4, the need to “fight the good fight” and “finish the race.” is highly emphasized.

Do our personal choices echo our dependence on God, or ourselves? How has faith in the Word of God played a crucial role in enduring personal trials? Did I stand strong, or fold under peer pressure? Do my daily actions and choices actually mentor others? Did I exhibit dependence, or my own independence? Do we abide in Christ? Do we rely on the Holy Spirit for daily guidance?

1 Corinthians 10:1-6 “For I do not want you to be ignorant of the fact, brothers and sisters, that our ancestors were all under the cloud and that they all passed through the sea. They were all baptized into Moses in the cloud and in the sea. They all ate the same spiritual food and drank the same spiritual drink; for they drank from the spiritual rock that accompanied them, and that rock was Christ. Nevertheless, God was NOT pleased with most of them; their bodies were scattered in the wilderness. Now these things occurred as examples to keep us from setting our hearts on evil things as they did.

2 Corinthians 10:4-17 “The weapons we fight with are not the weapons of the world. On the contrary, they have divine power to demolish strongholds. We demolish arguments and every pretension that sets itself up against the knowledge of God, and we take captive every thought to make it obedient to Christ. And we will be ready to punish every act of disobedience, once your obedience is complete. You are judging by appearances. If anyone is confident that they belong to Christ, they should consider again that we belong to Christ just as much as they do. So even if I boast somewhat freely about the authority the Lord gave us for building you up rather than tearing you down, I will not be ashamed of it. I do not want to seem to be trying to frighten you with my letters. For some say, “His letters are weighty and forceful, but in person he is unimpressive and his speaking amounts to nothing.” Such people should realize that what we are in our letters when we are absent, we will be in our actions when we are present.

We do not dare to classify or compare ourselves with some who commend themselves. When they measure themselves by themselves and compare themselves with themselves, they are not wise. We, however, will not boast beyond proper limits, but will confine our boasting to the sphere of service God himself has assigned to us, a sphere that also includes you. We are not going too far in our boasting, as would be the case if we had not come to you, for we did get as far as you with the gospel of Christ. Neither do we go beyond our limits by boasting of work done by others. Our hope is that, as your faith continues to grow, our sphere of activity among you will greatly expand, so that we can preach the gospel in the regions beyond you. For we do not want to boast about work already done in someone else’s territory. But, “Let the one who boasts boast in the Lord.”