Brethren, let's turn back to
Joshua chapter 5. I've read to you our text here, Joshua
5.1 down to chapter 6 verse 5, but I want you to notice a phrase
here, men of war, men of war. I want you to look here in Joshua
5 verse 6. It says, The children of Israel walked forty years
in the wilderness, till all the people that were men of war,
which came out of Egypt, were consumed, because they obeyed
not the voice of the Lord, unto whom the Lord sware that he would
not show them the land, which the Lord sware unto their fathers
that he would give us, a land that floweth with milk and honey. And then look again down now
at Joshua 6 and look at verse 3. The Lord said, He had given
into their hand Jericho, and the king thereof, and the mighty
men of valor. And He said, verse 3, And you
shall come past the city, all ye men of war, and go round about
the city once, thus shalt thou do six days. Now, I understand
that men of war here means those 20 years old and upward. That's
what literally it means. But we have a picture here of
fleshly men of war that perished in the wilderness because of
unbelief. And then we have here a picture
of spiritual men of war that God used to conquer Jericho and
call out one elect child out of that city, Rahab, the harlot. This passage shows us the necessity,
and it is a necessity, it shows us the necessity of God delivering
His children from the wilderness death of unbelieving disobedience. into the promised land of believing
obedience. It shows the importance of God
delivering us from being men of war who war in our flesh and
making us men of war in Christ our strength. Do you get what
I'm saying? He delivers them out of the wilderness
here, out of that wilderness of sin and unbelief, into that
land of promise. And He makes them go from being
men of war in the flesh, as their fathers were, to men of war whose
strength is Christ only. That's the picture we have here.
Believers are called and we're assembled by Christ our Head. And the purpose of it is He gathers
us together, knits His body together, supplies whatever joint needs
to send us forth into this world to bear witness of Him. the preaching
of the gospel. This is why he put his people
together. This is what he said. Before he ascended, he assembled
his people and he told them, all power is given unto me in
heaven and earth. He had that power as God the
Son, as the Son of God. But here, as now, He's ascended
as the man who is God in our nature. And all power in heaven
and earth is His as the head over His church. And He says,
Go ye therefore. Go ye therefore. Because all
power is mine, go ye therefore. and teach all nations, baptizing
them in the name of the Father, the Son, and the Holy Ghost,
teaching them to observe all things whatsoever I have commanded
you. And he said, and lo, I am with
you always, even until the end of the world. Amen. Now Christ
goes forth in the midst of his people, in the midst of his church,
and he uses his people as his mouthpieces. And he speaks through
the gospel, and Christ breaks down the gates of hell and delivers
his elect out of bondage. We have it pictured here. After
Christ made his presence known, after he did a work of grace
in their hearts, he gave Joshua the order to go to Jericho. And
he said seven priests are to blow seven trumpets as they carry
that ark around Jericho. And it's a picture of the preaching
of the gospel. Blowing the gospel trumpet which
is declaring Christ our ark. That's our message. And through
that means Christ broke down the walls of Jericho. And he
called out that one elect child, that harlot named Rahab. If he's
got one child protected by the gates of hell, the gates of hell
will not prevail against his church. Christ promises that.
Not because of our power, because of his power. Because of his
power. So our text shows us something
here that's needed before God will use us for that work. This
is our focus tonight. Here's what I want you to see.
Christ makes us men of war. Spiritual men of war. And sends
us forth to call his elect out of Jericho. Wherever they are. Wherever they are. Whatever fortress
they're hidden behind. But he only does that after he's
brought us to the obedience of faith. And made us to see that
Christ is our captain. He's the captain of our warfare
and He's our only strength. He's our only strength. First
of all, God must deliver us out of the wilderness of unbelief.
God delivered the children of Israel over the Jordan River. He took them over that river
into the promised land. And when the mighty enemies on
this side of Jordan, here they are now, they're on that side
of Jordan, and on the same side of Jordan, all those mighty enemies,
verse 1 says, John 5, 1 says, I mean Joshua 5, 1, it says,
their heart melted. Neither was their spirit in them
anymore because of the children of Israel. When they heard what
God had done in drying up that river, their heart melted, their
spirit melted within them. That seems like it would be a
good time for God to send His people right then to Jericho
to overcome them. But He didn't. He didn't do that.
Why not? Because they had not been circumcised
and they had not been made to partake of Christ the Passover
and of the fruits of that Canaan, of that land. They hadn't been
made to partake of that. To send them without doing this
work, here's what it would be like. It would have been like
sending forth unregenerate, unbelieving sinners to bear witness of the
Lord Jesus Christ and of His power, of whose power they had
never experienced and whose name they did not know. That's what
it would have been like to send them forth into Jericho at that
time. Unregenerate men can't accomplish anything. They war
against one another. They war against God. They war
against His ministers and His people. And they war in the flesh. And God will not use men such
as that to accomplish His work. He's going to do it in the order
that He's pleased to do it in. We see this in their fathers
in the wilderness. Look here in verse 4. Joshua
5, 4. This is the cause why Joshua
did circumcise. The Lord told Joshua, circumcise
these children. They're men now. They're grown
men. And here's why he did it. All the people that came out
of Egypt that were males, even all the men of war, died in the
wilderness, by the way, after they came out of Egypt. There's
one kind of men of war. They died. They perished in the
wilderness. Now all the people that came out were circumcised.
Those men that came out of Egypt were circumcised. But all the
people that were born in the wilderness, by the way, as they
came forth out of Egypt, them they had not circumcised. And
here's why. For the children of Israel walked
forty years in the wilderness, till all the people that were
men of war, which came out of Egypt, were consumed, because
they obeyed not the voice of the Lord, unto whom the Lord
swore that He would not show them the land which the Lord
swore unto their fathers that He would give us, a land that
floweth with milk and honey. The Lord promised them, you will
not enter into the land of Canaan. He promised them that. And so
they didn't circumcise their children. Look at this. Their
children, verse 7, whom he raised up in their stead, them Joshua
circumcised. For they were uncircumcised because
they had not circumcised them by the way. Their fathers are
an example of unregenerate sinners with a form of godliness. Look at Romans chapter 2. You
know what circumcision physical outward circumcision. Do you
know what spiritually it pictured? Do you know what it typified?
It typified, one, the work of Christ that He did on the cross.
I'm going to show you that a little later in Colossians 2. But it
also pictured the work of the Holy Spirit in the heart. Now
look here in Romans 2 verse 28. He is not a Jew which is one
outwardly. Neither is that circumcision
which is outward in the flesh. But he is a Jew which is one
inwardly, and circumcision is that of the heart. It's the circumcision
of the heart. In the spirit, not in the letter,
whose praise is not of men but of God. Abraham was the first
person given circumcision and that's what Abraham's circumcision
pictured. Romans 4 says it pictured what
God had done in his heart when as yet he was not circumcised.
God had given him life in his heart and made him a partaker
with Christ making that everlasting covenant of grace in his heart.
Alright? But the fathers are an example
of unregenerate sinners who had a form of godliness only. Physically,
God delivered them out of Egypt. He brought them all out of Egypt.
But God did not deliver them all spiritually. He didn't deliver
them all spiritually. The rebellious fathers, those
who came out and were circumcised, they're like unregenerate sinners.
who God brings out of a place where they don't have the gospel
and brings them into a place where they do have the gospel.
But as of yet, they haven't been regenerated in their heart. They
haven't been circumcised in their heart and brought to faith in
Christ yet. That's what these fathers typified. Indeed, they had been circumcised
outwardly in their flesh. They had a form of godliness,
but they had not been circumcised in their heart. Many have a form
of godliness. It's not hard to find. That's
what we looked at Sunday. Paul said in these last days
that everybody's going to have a form of godliness. But they
deny the power thereof. We saw the power is God. The
power is Christ himself who does the work. They never experienced
the power of God in their heart. Believing in sound doctrine,
that doesn't mean one's been circumcised in the heart. It
doesn't. It doesn't. Neither does baptism. Neither does joining a church.
Neither does faithfully attending a church. Switching from false
doctrine to true doctrine is not repentance or faith in Christ. It's not at all. When circumcised
in the heart, Christ becomes all. He becomes everything. And
the believer becomes nothing. We renounce all our former confidence,
all of it, when we behold the truth. And our confidence that
we held to becomes as nothing. It becomes as dung, as Paul told
us in Philippians 3. And we don't do this in word
only, but we do it in deed. We do it indeed. The believer
becomes one with God in Christ, and he becomes one with his brethren.
We become one. The Spirit of Christ in the inward
man makes us hate warring in our flesh. We hate the warring. We don't want to be men of war
in our flesh anymore. Paul said, we don't regard men
after the flesh anymore. We've known Christ after the
flesh. We know Him no longer after the flesh anymore. We've
been made spiritual men and we don't regard the flesh. We don't
pay attention to the outward. We know, as Paul said, it's not
outward circumcision or outward uncircumcision that avails anything.
It's a new creature. It's been made new in the heart.
And this is where the believers brought to. And we behold now
Christ is our only strength. He's our only power and we want
for Him to have all the glory. And so we do not want for men
to stand in the power of our fleshly strength. We don't want
men to stand by what we've done in our flesh. We want them to
stand by the power of God. This is what God works in the
heart. These are the works that Paul was speaking of when he
said in Titus they profess that they know God but in works they
deny Him. They turn from the means that God has used. They
won't declare just Christ and Him crucified. They use programs
and shows and all kind of junk that God's to try to get men
to come into the church by entertainment. We just preach Christ and Him
crucified. That's all. And we see what it is to be fleshly
men of war by looking at those fathers in the wilderness. We
see why God won't send us forth to Jericho to sound the gospel
trumpet until He's made us men of war in the Spirit. Those rebellious
fathers warred against God constantly while they walked in the wilderness.
They warred against him, they warred against his servants,
and against his people. They were constantly, forever
bringing up accusations against them, and accusing them, and
every time Moses and Aaron said, do it this way, they said, no,
we think we're going to do it the other way. Every time, that's
what they would do. They constantly brought accusations
against Moses. They constantly, they exalted
themselves over Moses and Aaron. They said, you take too much
on you, seeing all the congregation are holy, every one of them,
and the Lord's among them, wherefore then lift ye up yourselves above
the congregation of the Lord. Such fleshly men of war will
never be used by God. He won't ever use a man when
he's like that. This is a holy war. And we have
to have Christ as our strength. And so he's going to make himself
our strength. Because until God has done that,
this is what men will do. When they got to the borders
of Canaan, this is what they did. They refused to enter themselves. But that wasn't enough. to these
men. You know what they did? They
brought back an evil report and they discouraged others from
believing God and entering in. You know what the Lord told the
Pharisees? He said, Woe unto you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites,
because you won't enter in yourselves and those that are trying to
enter in, you stop them from entering in by not bowing to
Christ alone. All of their rebellion though,
all of that rebellion was against God. It was against God's authority. It was against God's power. It
was against God having all the glory in the salvation of His
people. That's all it was. Just like
it is in our day. It was God who put Moses and
Aaron over them. Moses and Aaron did... We saw
that Moses didn't even... He didn't even want that. He
didn't want that. He didn't want to have to lead
those people. God said, no you're going to. God put him there. And God commanded Moses what
to preach to them. He gave them the words to preach.
And every detail that they were instructed by Moses, He was telling
them what was best for them. Not only for their personal good,
but for the good of the whole congregation. But men of flesh,
they wanted only what was best, what they saw as best for themselves. That's what they wanted. That's
what they wanted. So fleshly men of war, that's what they
want. And so God must regenerate his people and Christ must reign
over them because until then, what they were saying was, we
won't have this man reign over us. We won't have it. We won't
have... And when men say that, they think
they're just talking about a man. They're talking about Christ.
They're talking about Christ. That's the case with you and
I, brethren. That's what we were. We were
men of flesh. That's exactly what we were.
And we are still flesh in our old man. And that old fleshly
spirit is still with us. And we need to be aware of that
constantly. Constantly. Whenever... I'm not
infallible. Moses was not. But try to understand
this, that in the pulpit, as well as out of the pulpit, if
what's going on doesn't appear to me that's going to be an offense
or raise an offense, you know, and cause somebody to want to
leave hearing the gospel, I don't say a thing. But if you hear
me say, you know, we might ought to do it this way, it's because
I see something, maybe you don't see it, and I'm not looking out
I'm looking out for the good of the whole congregation. That's
my responsibility. And whatever's good for the whole
congregation is always good for you personally. It's always is.
You see, that's what Moses was doing the whole time. You see,
this is what I'm saying. If sinners take offense, we want
them to take offense of the gospel and not us. We don't want to
give them something to make them offended. And we could make them
offended a lot. And I understand we're not going
to be able to prevent that completely. But it's my responsibility to
lead this congregation in a way that will not make something
else the offense. Let it be the gospel. Let it
be the gospel. That's what Moses was doing.
Thankfully though, God's delivered us from that warring in our flesh. And he subdued that old man and
he's made us hate that warring in our flesh. And you know what
happens, haven't you found this to be so, whenever we do get
to walking in unbelief, and we do get to warring in our flesh.
Something rebukes us, you know, and we get offended, and we start
trying to war in our flesh. We always say, I'm going to worship
like I want to worship. I'm going to do it like I want
to do it. I don't care what anybody says to me. And you know what
happens? We miss so many spiritual blessings. Because all of God's
blessings are given to us through faith in His Son. And we miss
those blessings. Those children of those rebellious
fathers in the wilderness, as far as I can tell from the scripture,
they observed the Passover one time in the wilderness. One time. They did it at Mount Sinai. And
the further and further they went into rebellion, they didn't
do it anymore. And that's what happens to us,
brethren, when we turn to our flesh, lean to our understanding,
lean to our wisdom, we miss out on Christ our Passover. We stop
feeding on Christ our Passover. And also, while in the wilderness,
they didn't circumcise any of their children. And so, God promised
to cut them off, and so they just quit pretending like they
was even trying to worship God. Outward circumcision, because
it's a picture of God working that work of grace in the heart,
of what He does in the heart, we can see by them not circumcising
their children, we can see that as a picture of God not giving
them any conversions amongst them while as yet they were rebelling
against God. And see, what I'm saying, we
miss out on the blessing. God, to use His people, God is
going to do it He's going to make us obedient to Him if He
uses us. And we're going to have to be
made to partake of Christ. That's why God regenerates His
people. That's why He delivers us from
being men of war after the flesh. It causes us to miss out on the
blessings that are in Christ through faith. Unbelief causes
us to war after the flesh against God, against our brethren. So
before He's going to use us, He's going to bring us to submit
to Him. He's going to bring us to believe on Him by our work
done in the heart. He's got to take us out of that
wilderness of sin and unbelief and make us Christ's men of war.
Alright? Here's the second thing. We see
that our unbelief doesn't hinder God from doing His work. We cannot
believe God and rebel against Him. It won't stop God from doing
this work in the heart of His children. After consuming those
fleshly men in the wilderness, after consuming them, God delivered
their children through the river of Jordan by sending the priest
who held up the ark and stood in that Jordan. That's how He
delivered them. You see, They wouldn't believe God. God cut
them off. He just cut them off. But it
didn't stop God from raising up their children in their stead.
That's what He did. You see, God's election of grace
doesn't run in bloodlines. It's not based on race. It's
not based on political affiliation. It's based on His grace. Neither
because they are the seed of Abraham are they all children.
But in Isaac shall thy seed be called. They shall be called.
It's not going to stop God from calling them. But it's in Isaac,
that promised son, that one who's a picture of Christ. It's in
him. They which are the children of the flesh just born the first
time, no matter how good their form of godliness outwardly,
no matter what nation they're in, these are not the children
of the promise, the children of, or the children of God, the
children of the promise accounted for the seed, the children of
God's elect, those are the seed, that's the seed. God sent forth
his son, he sent forth Christ Jesus who is our great high priest
and he's our ark. And when the Lord laid on him,
the iniquity of all his elect, he stood in the Jordan of death,
in the river of death on behalf of his people, and he dried up
that river dry. And he did that for his elect
only. There's not some sense in which
Christ died for everybody in the world. Christ died for his
elect. And here's how we know that. Because He dried that river
dry. He dried up that river of death
and delivered His people to the other side in Him. Not by the
blood of bulls and goats, but by His own blood. He entered
in once into the holy place, having obtained eternal redemption
for us. Ephesians 2 says, when God raised
Him, He raised His people in Him so that He took us on the
other side. He took us into that promised
land. And there's no way that one of
those for whom he died is going to be lost, because he's dried
up that river for them. He's completely dried it up.
Therefore, for the sake of Christ, he's going to send forth, he's
going to deliver his redeemed out of the wilderness, just like
he told Joshua here, circumcise those children. Joshua brought
each of these children through that river of death. Joshua means
Savior. He brought them each through
that river of death personally. And Christ, our Savior, does
the same for each of His children personally. And this is a must,
according to Christ. Look at John chapter 3. John
chapter 3. Nicodemus is one of those men
who had that form of godliness, and later he'll have true godliness.
But right now, he doesn't. He come to the Lord by night
and he said, verse 2, Rabbi, we know that thou art a teacher
come from God. No man can do these miracles
that thou doest, except God be with him. And Jesus answered
and said unto him, Verily, verily, I say unto thee, Except a man
be born again, he cannot see the kingdom of God. He said to
Nicodemus, Nicodemus, you don't have a clue who I am, because
I haven't given you life. You have not been born again.
And except a man be born again, he cannot see the kingdom of
God. Nicodemus said unto him, How can a man be born when he
is old? Can he enter the second time into his mother's womb and
be born? Jesus answered, Verily, verily, I say unto thee, Except
a man be born of water and of the Spirit, he cannot enter into
the kingdom of God. That which is born of the flesh
is flesh, and that which is born of the spirit is spirit. Marvel
not that I said unto thee, You must be born again. You see, God is spirit, and those
that worship Him must worship Him in spirit and in truth. Our
flesh is corrupt, and we can't worship Him in our flesh. We
can't enter into His presence in our flesh. We've got to be
made new. We've got to be born again. And likewise, God's Word
is spiritual. And we're carnal, sold under
sin in our flesh, and we cannot understand the Word of God until
we've been made spiritual and given spiritual discernment.
For the natural man receives not the things of the Spirit
of God, he'll receive the things of men, but he can't receive
the things of the Spirit of God. He cannot, because they're foolishness
unto him. Neither can he know them, because
they're spiritually discerned. But he that is spiritual, He
judgeth all things. He discerns all things, but He's
not discerned of any man. You cannot explain why you're
doing what you're doing for the good of a lost, dead sinner. They won't get it. They just
won't get it. They think that they'll accuse you of everything
under the sun. They can't get it. But if you're
not in the flesh, but in the Spirit, if so, be the Spirit
of God dwell in you. That's what Romans 8 said. But,
it says, if any man have not the Spirit of Christ, he's none
of His. This work of the Holy Spirit is a must. It's a must,
Christ said. Accept ye. Accept ye, He said. You must be born again. Marvel
not. Don't be confused. Don't scratch
your head. Don't say, you know, this is not how my masters in
my land taught me. He said, you are a master in
Israel and you don't know these things? Listen now, and this
work is irresistible. He told Nicodemus, the wind blows
where it listeth, and you hear the sound and you can't tell
whence it cometh and where it goes. So is everyone that's born
of the Spirit. If God purposed it, God's going
to bring it to pass. If it pleases God, Isaiah 53
says, the pleasure of the Lord shall prosper in the hand of
the Lord Jesus Christ. He's the head of the church with
all power in heaven and earth and he says now go forth therefore
and preach this gospel because it pleased God by the foolishness
of preaching to save them that believe and without faith it's
impossible to please God. Now that's what pleases God and
the pleasure that which pleases God is going to prosper in Christ's
hand. Now if I say no that's not how he's going to do it,
I'm saying the pleasure of the Lord is not going to prosper
in Christ's hand. You can choose that side if you want to. I'm
not. I'm not. I'm going to take sides with
God on this. Now infants that God takes home, that's an exception. David said, I can't bring him
back here, but I can go where he is. But you know, we don't
even know what God's able to do there because whenever they
came in and told about Christ, John leaped in Elizabeth's womb
at the hearing of the gospel. But the secret things belong
to God. But we don't build our doctrine on exceptions, we build
our doctrine on Christ except ye. That's what we build our
doctrine on. Alright, those children who have been born in that wilderness,
they were uncircumcised. So God told Joshua, circumcise
them. And you see there in that first
verse, it says all those enemies on that side, their hearts were
melted in them and they weren't doing a thing. They wouldn't
do a thing. That's what Christ does. He binds
the strong man. That's what he said. You can't
enter in and spoil a man's goods. And Satan has lawfully taken
Christ's people captive. And he can't enter in and take
his goods until he binds the strong man. And he binds the
strong man when he comes in. And it has to be done because
Ephesians 2 says we're under the power of the prince of the
spirit of the air until he does it. Until he does that work.
Joshua made knives. Christ sends forth the Word of
the Gospel and a sharp knife of His Word circumcises our hearts. He's not a Jew outwardly. He's
a Jew inwardly. If you're of faith, Paul said,
then are you Abraham, see? Then are you Jews? Then are you
true Israel? From that day forward, we're
made new creatures. Look at Joshua 5.8. Joshua 5.8. They abode in their places in
the camp till they were whole. Now we understand literally what
that means. They were circumcised, grown men. So they stayed in
the camp till they were whole. And the Lord said unto Joshua,
This day have I rolled away the approach of Egypt from off you.
But you know what happens when God circumcises us in the heart?
He makes us to abide in our place. And you know where our place
is? It's Christ. And He makes us abide there until
we're whole. We're perfectly whole in Him
for the Scripture says you're complete in Him. But one day
we're going to be perfectly whole in ourselves when we see Him
face to face. And we abide there. And in Christ,
by bringing us into Christ, He's rolled the reproach of this sin
curse off of us, off of Egypt. He says, therefore, there is
now no condemnation to them which are in Christ Jesus, to them
who walk not after the flesh, but after the Spirit. They've
been born of God. They've been born of God. Until
then, the wrath of God abides on them. Look here then. Then we begin enjoying the fruits
of Christ's righteousness. Look at verse 10. And the children
of Israel encamped in Gilgal. That's where we camp out. We
camp out in that one where the rolling away has been in Christ. And they kept the Passover on
the fourteenth day of the month at even in the plains of Jericho.
This is the first time, Cheryl, they kept the Passover since
they were back there under the dominion of their rebellious
fathers at Mount Sinai. This is the first time. They
kept the Passover as God commanded. And likewise, when God's done
His work in our hearts, through faith, the believer begins to
partake of Christ our Passover. We begin to partake of Him, our
Passover. And look, Christ and His Gospel
becomes entirely new to us. Look at verse 11. And they did
eat of the old corn of the land on the morrow after the Passover,
unleavened cakes and parched corn in the wilderness. Parched corn in the selfsame
day. The day after they partook of the Passover, they began eating
the old corn of the land, meaning corn of the promised land, that
milk and honey God promised. They began eating that. They
hadn't planted it, they hadn't worked it, they hadn't labored
in it, they hadn't harvested it. And when God does this work
in our heart, you know what we begin to do? We begin to partake
of the fruits of Christ's labor for which we did not work and
did not labor ourselves. That's what happens. Do you want
to see Christ in this or do you just want to look at this and
say, well some men got circumcised by a river one day? Which one
is going to benefit you? Huh? I want to see Christ, don't
you? This is what he's doing. Verse
12. Now look at this. And the manna ceased on the mora
after they had eaten of the old corn of the land. Neither had
the children of Israel manna anymore, but they did eat of
the fruit of the land of Canaan that year. They didn't have manna anymore.
I thought Christ said when we partake of Him, we're going to
have Him forever. Well, we do. But now, do you remember what
the manna was given for? When God gave the manna, He said,
I've given this manna to prove whether you'll obey me or not.
That's what He said. And they didn't obey Him. They
partook of that manna the way they wanted to, in the manna
they wanted to, to satisfy their bellies. That's why. They did
not obey Him. They did not obey Him. Now Christ
told us in John 6 that manna was a picture of Him. He said,
I'm the true manna. And He told them there, the same
people that were following Him, just like those rebellious fathers,
He said, you're not following Me because you believe on Me.
You're following Me because it suits your belly. You're looking
for earthly things, earthly blessings, carnal blessings, your belly.
That's what you want satisfied. But now, when God circumcises
the heart and he brings us to lay all our confidence in Christ
and behold that he is our life, the gospel ceases to be manner
whereby we're proved disobedient. And then Christ becomes our life. And the words of the gospel become
words we have to have because it's life. We begin to say as
Peter did that day in John 6, He told them that. The Lord told
them, this is a spiritual thing. And except you eat my flesh and
drink my blood, you'll perish. This is not about your belly,
He said. And from that day forward, they said, this is a hard sin.
We can't hear Him anymore. And they went back and walked
no more with Him. But those He circumcised in the heart, they
said, Lord, to whom shall we go? You've got the words of eternal
life. And we believe, we're sure, You're
that Christ. We've got to have You. We've
got to hear the words coming from Your mouth. And that's what
He does right here. We don't have that manner to
prove us disobedient anymore. Now we got the fruit of Canaan. We got the fruit of heavenly
Canaan. All those spiritual blessings
God gave to his elect when he chose us in Christ before the
foundation of the world. Now we're partaking of those
blessings. Alright? Let's look here now. I'm going
to show you Colossians 2.9. I just want to read this to you
and then I'm going to close. Colossians 2.9. This puts this all together for
us here in Colossians 2.9. Look here. In him, in Christ
there, he's saying of Christ, dwelleth all the fullness of
the Godhead bodily, and you're complete in him, which is the
head of all principality and power, in whom also you're circumcised. with the circumcision made without
hands and putting off the body of the sins of the flesh by the
circumcision of Christ. That's what it pictured. Christ
did it. Christ did it. He put off the
body of our sins, that polluted flesh of our sins. He put off
that body by the circumcision of Christ. We bared with Him
in baptism, not water baptism, baptism when He was immersed
in the judgment of God on Calvary's tree. Wherein also you're risen
with Him through the faith of the operation of God who raised
Him from the dead. When He came out of the grave
at Calvary, we came out with Him. That's when we were circumcised.
That's when our sins were put away by Him. And you, there's
another circumcision picture. Look at verse 13. And you being
dead in your sins, in the uncircumcision of your flesh, hath He quickened
together with Him, having forgiven you all trespasses. This is when
He comes to us and does this work in our heart. blotting out
the handwriting of ordinances that was against us, which is
contrary to us, and took it out of the way and nailed it to his
cross. Now drop down to verse 19, Colossians 2.19. This is
our last point. When he's done this, through
faith we behold Christ our head, who's present with us, from whom
we get all power and all nourishment. He speaks there of those who
were not beholding the head. But when he does this for us,
verse 19 says, We behold the head, from which all the body,
by joints and bands, having nourishment ministered, and knit together,
increaseth with the increase of God. Now look back at our
text. Back at our text, Joshua 5. Lord willing, I'm going to
preach on this on Sunday, this passage right here. But now let
me just show you this. This is our last point. When
the Lord's worked this work of grace in the heart, He worked
His work of grace. He makes our God-man mediator,
His presence to become real in our hearts. Look here, verse
13, Joshua 5, 13. And it came to pass when Joshua
was by Jericho, that he lifted up his eyes, and he looked, and
behold, there stood a man over against him with his sword drawn
in his hand. And Joshua went unto him and
said unto him, Art thou for us or for our adversaries? And he
said, Nay, but as captain of the host of the Lord am I now
come. When God works His work, when
He reveals Christ's presence in our hearts, He makes Christ
to be our strength. Look at this. Joshua saw Christ
with his sword in his hand, the powers of God, and it's not of
us. We can stop warring because we know Christ is the power of
God. Then Joshua heard Christ declare
himself to be captain of the host of the Lord, prince of the
host of the Lord. He's the captain of our warfare.
He's the captain of our warfare. He's the one we follow. And then
look, this is the sure effect of all this work. Joshua 5.14,
And Joshua fell on his face to the earth and did worship, and
said unto him, What saith my Lord unto his servant? You see
whose bidding he wants to do now? I'm your servant, what saith
my Lord to his servant? And look, and the captain of
the Lord's host said unto Joshua, Loose thy shoe from off thy foot,
for the place whereon thou standest is holy. And Joshua did so. He did what God told him. None
of us, none of us is one with Christ and his people as long
as we are fleshly men of war in our fleshly strength. For
then we will wage war on one another. We'll accuse God, we'll
accuse God's people, we'll accuse everybody but ourselves. If we
would judge ourselves, we wouldn't be judged of God. Then we will,
when He works this work. We'll stop separating ourselves
to wander in the wilderness. We'll stop discouraging God's
people from believing only on Christ. But after God circumcises
the heart, and after He brings us to this obedience of faith,
after He manifests Himself in our presence, it's the Lord who
worketh in you both the will and do of His good pleasure.
When He manifests this in our heart, after He makes us know
He's our strength, the captain of our salvation, we hit our
face and worship Him. And we seek His will. Lord, what
will you have me to do? And we do it. And we do it. That's right. Now, that's how
Christ makes his people his spiritual men of war. And when he's brought
us there, and he's made us behold our strength is Christ in our
midst, the captain of the hosts of the Lord. This is how he brings
us to be of one mind, and of one spirit, and of one body through
faith. And this is when he sends us
forth to Jericho with this promise. Look at Joshua 6, 2. And the
Lord said unto Joshua, See, I have given into thine hand Jericho,
and the king thereof, and the mighty men of valor, and you
shall compass the city, all you men of war. But he didn't do
that until he worked his work. And then he made those walls
fall flat by the gospel and he called out an elect child of
grace. You see, when God works His work
in our hearts, something becomes more important than me, myself
and I. And it becomes Christ and His
brethren. Christ and His people. Christ
and my brethren. Christ and Him calling out His
sheep. A man really learns to deny himself for the sake of
Christ and His gospel. Amen.