Jesus Christ is the same yesterday,
today, and forever. And so is His gospel. Our message,
the gospel, is always the same. It's the same message. It never
changes. This is how God saves sinners. Joshua 12, look at verse one
with me. Now these are the kings of the
land which the children of Israel smoke and possess their land
on the other side of Jordan towards the rising of the sun from the
river Arnon and to Mount Hermon and all the plain on the east. And here in the 12th chapter
of Josh, we have a list of all the defeated kings of Canaan.
First six verses list the defeated foes of Moses on the other side
of Jordan before they passed over. And then the remainder
of the chapter gives us the names of the kings who Joshua smote
after they crossed the river Jordan. And as we've often said,
this is given to teach us to teach us of the complete victory,
the accomplished salvation that Christ had over all our enemies. And we won't take the time to
read all these names or go through this chapter verse by verse,
but I want you to see that this chapter is a memorial to all
that God had done through Joshua. And I said it that way on purpose.
This was all that God had done. through Joshua. Even though Moses
was in charge in the victories over the king, Sihon and Og,
and it was Joshua who was the captain of the host that led
Israel's army. And it was Joshua who fought,
not Moses. Moses, who represents the law,
can never fight for us and defeat our enemies. That's what Paul
meant in Romans chapter eight, verse three, when he wrote, for
we know for what the law could not do in that it was weak through
the flesh, that being our flesh, God sending his own son in the
likeness of sinful flesh, and for sin, condemned sin in the
flesh. Only our Joshua, the Lord Jesus
Christ, can defeat our enemy of sin. And only Christ can put
away our sin by the sacrifice of himself. God, in the flesh,
died. for his people. That's why he
came in the flesh. And in this chapter, we have
a tally of 31 kings that failed, but as we've seen time and time
again in the study of Joshua, it was the Lord Jehovah that
did Israel's fighting and won Israel's battle. And it's the
same today. And that's where we can find
such rest and such comfort and such assurance. We're not fighting
the bat, The Lord is, the Lord has, and the Lord has been victorious. Hold your place here in Joshua
12. Turn with me over to Psalm 44, if you would, please. Psalm
44, verse one. Here the psalmist speaks of what
we're looking at here in Joshua 12. The psalmist writes, we've
heard with our ears, oh God, our fathers have told us, What
work thou didst in their days in the times of old? How thou,
speaking of God, didst drive out the heathen with thy hand
and plantest them, and that's speaking of Israel. God, like
a vine, like a plant, a tree, removed Israel from Egypt and
planted them in Canaan. And that's what the psalmist
is saying. How thou didst afflict the people, speaking of these
31 kings and their kingdoms, and cast them out. God did that. It was the Lord who afflicted
Egypt. It was the Lord that sent those
plagues. It was the Lord who afflicted these Canaanite nations,
and it was the Lord that cast them out of their own country.
Why, it was His. He can do what He will with what
belongs to Him. And the Egyptians knew this,
and so did the Canaanites. And the people of Jericho and
the Gibeonites both said, we heard what your God did. We've
heard about your God. We heard what He did in Egypt.
what he did at the Red Sea, what he did to old King Sihon and
Og, we've heard. And our hearts didn't melt because
of Mew, meaning what your God did for you. And in the book
of Deuteronomy, before Israel ever entered into the land of
promise, the Lord told Moses, he said, I've given you cities
that you did not build. And he said, I filled your houses
with good things. You didn't fill them. And He
said, I gave you wells that you did not dig, and I gave you vineyards
that you didn't plant. Sounds to me like salvations
of the Lord. What do any of us have to do
With our salvation, what do any of us have that we did not receive? That's what Paul asked in 1 Corinthians
4, verse seven, who maketh thee to differ? What do you have that
you haven't received? And if you received it, why do
you glory as if you didn't receive it? We have nothing to glory
in. The Lord's done it all for us. Now we have plenty to be
thankful for, but we have nothing to glory in. And look at what
the psalmist writes here in verse three. For they, Israel, got
not the land in possession by their own sword, neither did
their own arm save them, but thy right hand, and thine arm,
and the light of thy countenance, because thou hast a favor unto
them." Unmerited favor. That's what grace is. undeserved,
unmerited. And this applies to you and me.
Why did God do these things? It was because God took delight
in them. Because God chose them to be
a special people unto Himself. Not because they were more in
number, not because they were more in value or more in anything,
just simply because the Lord loved them. Because he would keep his oath,
the oath that he made with Abraham over 400 years before. Would
we ever learn that God is faithful that promised? Oh, I love that
thought. God is faithful that promised. We can be assured that what he
promised will come to pass. As God thinks, so shall it come
to pass. As he purposes, so shall it stand. If God be for you, who can be
against you? Men promise things that they
can't fulfill, but not God. In Christ, the promises of God
are always, always, yea and amen. God has made many promises to
his people. Every promise that he makes is
in Christ. That's key. He fulfills every
promise he makes to them, and this is why. It's for Christ's
sake. Why has God forgiven you? For
Christ's sake. Why does God love you? For Christ's
sake. Why does God show mercy to you?
For Christ's sake. It's all for Christ's sake. And
these promises are yes and amen, so be it. So be it. I say, so
be it. So be it. It's for Christ's sake
and for God's glory. To the praise of the glory of
His grace wherein He, hath made us accepted in the Beloved, everyone
in Christ has already been accepted of God." Accepted of God, what
a glorious thought. That we should be to the praise
of His glory who first trusted in Christ, Ephesians 1 verse
6. Someone says, well, I don't believe
that. Well, for what if some don't
believe? Shall their unbelief make the
faith or the faithfulness of God without effect? God forbid,
God forbid. Not in the least, it's not possible.
Let God be true and every man a liar. Why would anyone who
knows anything about the sovereign character of God not believe
him? That's exactly what Paul said.
He said, in hope of eternal life, which God, that cannot lie, promised
before the world began, but hath in due times manifested His word
through preaching, which is committed unto me according to the commandment
of God our Savior. When did God promise these things?
Before the foundation of the world. Who did He promise them
to? The Lord Jesus and all who are
found in Him. And how do sinners discover these
promises? They're manifested through preaching.
That's why we're meeting together tonight. This is not a social
club. We love one another, we enjoy
seeing one another, and there's no place I'd rather be. But we're
here to hear about God and what God has done for sinners. And
if that's of any interest to you, you'll want to be here,
and you'll be glad that you are here. Now before turning back
to Joshua chapter 12, I want you to look at Genesis chapter
15. Genesis chapter 15, verse 13. And while you're turning,
let me say, hundreds of years before Joshua and Israel possessed
this promised land that we're reading about, I want you to see here what God
said. Genesis 15 verse 13. And he, speaking of God, said
unto Abram, know of a surety. You know, we can know with a
surety. He said, know of a surety that
thy seed shall be a stranger in a land that is not theirs. and shall serve them, and they
shall afflict them for 400 years. And also that nation whom they
shall serve, and that's speaking of Egypt, will I judge, and afterwards
shall they come out with great substance. and thou shalt go
to thy fathers in peace, and thou shalt be buried in a good
old age. But in the fourth generation,
they shall come hither again, for the iniquity of the Amorites
is not yet full." Now, the descendants of Abram, speaking mainly of
Jacob, his grandson, and his sons were in the land of Canaan. That's where they dwelt when
Joseph was sold into slavery down in Egypt. And you know that
story very well. He was sold as a servant in Potiphar's
house. Potiphar's wife accused him of
something that he didn't do. He was thrown into prison. He
interpreted the dreams. Pharaoh heard about him. He interpreted
Pharaoh's dreams. And what a lucky man Joseph was. He wound up on the throne of
Egypt. Didn't have anything to do with
luck, did it? God was with him in the pit, God was with him
in Potiphar's house, and God was with him in the prison, and
now God's with him on the throne of Egypt. And as you know, he
sent for his father and his brothers, and they came, and what they
meant for evil, God meant for good. That's always the case
with God's people. What some might mean, is evil
against you, God means it for good. He worked all things together
for good. Everything, everything. Sickness,
disease, hardship, it's God working it together for your good. God was giving Israel what he
promised them, and there's no way that they won't receive it.
And here in Genesis 15, it was prophesied and promised by God
that they'd return to that land in which they once dwelt, that
being Canaan. And speaking of the Amorites,
the ungodly in the land of Canaan, God says, for their iniquity
was not yet full. But now it is, and God destroyed
them. Why? It's always the same answer,
Adel, because he is faithful at promise. He promised that
he would, and that's what he did. He always does what he says
he will. And it was the Lord that defeated
the enemies of Israel. And it's the same Lord that defeats
all of ours. The first words recorded of our
Lord, where I must be about my father's business. And then the
last words he spoke were, it's finished. And everything in between
was just that. It was him working out that perfect
righteousness. That was his father's business
for his people. Christ finished all that he came
to do in the salvation of God's elect. That was his father's
business. And that's what the Lord himself
said. He said, I've glorified thee on earth. I've finished
the work which thou gavest me to do. And he did. And he did. And that's what we
see in these chapters. 400 years before God had promised
Abraham and his seed a great inheritance, a land that flowed
with milk and honey, God, through Joshua, furnished it for them. Speaking of the Lord Jesus Christ,
Paul wrote in Ephesians 1, verse 11, in whom, speaking of Christ,
also we have obtained an inheritance being predestinated according
to the purpose of him who worketh all things. after the counsel
of his own will. And time and time again, in the
book of Joshua, we see how God utterly destroyed the Canaanites. God promised that he would. Why
should we be surprised? All our enemies are gonna be
put under his feet. Why? Because he promised. He's
faithful that promised. You know, there's a great lesson
to be learned here. Live in a religious world, you
know that, that perceives God's only attribute is love. All my
life, that's all I heard, God is love. God loves everybody.
God loves everyone so much that he wouldn't do such things as
show wrath and demand judgment and exercise justice and condemn
the guilty. God's just too good to do that.
Believe me when I tell you that God's chief attribute is holiness. Holiness. God is too holy to
clear the guilty. The soul that sins, it must die.
God's justice demands it. The soul that sinneth, it shall
die. God is the same as he was in the days of Joshua. He's the
Lord. He changes not. Today, multitudes
of people continue to believe that God has nothing to do with
calamities and disasters and adversity and affliction. And
he certainly doesn't send people to hell. Why then is there hell? Men believe that God loves the
world too much to be involved with such things. And these skeptics
believe such things were caused by nature and fate and bad luck
and the devil. But it's the Lord God who sovereignly
presides over the world's affairs. He regulates all events. If not
so, then He's not God. God is a failure and nothing
is certain in this world if that be true. And it's that blessed
truth that gives the believer hope and assurance and confidence,
not in what they do, but what in the Lord has done and is doing. If there was one square inch,
I've said this often, I've thought about it a lot and I mean it.
If there was one square inch, not square foot, not one square
mile, one square inch in this vast universe that God wasn't
in control of and in sovereign over, I would constantly fear
that that is where I was standing. God is not in control, then I
could have no confidence in the future. Everything would be left
up to chance and life would be utterly hopeless. And that's
why I feel so for those that are yet without Christ that don't
know these things. What misery that must be to face
this world in which we live and what a mess it's in, but it's
God's mess. to face the things of this world
without knowing that He is sovereign and in control of all things. If things are left to chance,
then our life would be hopeless, and there'd be nothing but fear,
and I'd always fear what tomorrow might bring. The beloved God
is ruling and reigning all things. He works all things after the
counsel of His own will. That's what God's Word says.
Are we gonna believe God's Word? He works all things together
for the believer's good. That's what God said. Are we
gonna believe God? Nothing comes to pass that He
didn't ordain, that He didn't purpose, that He didn't cause.
And I haven't arrived, no sir. I still have a shameful amount
of unbelief in my life and in my heart. I still doubt and fear
way too much. But Lord, help thou my unbelief.
But everything, and I mean everything, all things happen according to
divine providence, God working in time what he purposed in eternity. And he is faithful that promised. Now, why the destruction of these
31 kings mentioned and numbered in these couple of chapters in
the book of Joshua? Well, I believe Paul shed a great
deal of light and insight on the subject in Romans chapter
11. I won't turn you there, but in
Romans 11 verse 22, Paul writes, behold, therefore, the goodness
and severity of God on them which fail, severity, but toward thee,
goodness. If thou continue in his goodness
otherwise, thou also shall be cut off." Now, how do we continue
in his goodness? By simply continuing to trust
in Christ for everything, for everything. Now, though Paul
here in Romans 11 is comparing the Jews who stumbled and the
Gentiles who believed the gospel, the same principle applies. In
Joshua 12, we see very clearly both the goodness and the severity
of God. The severity of God is seen in
the destruction of the unbelieving Canaanites. And let me add, they
deserved this destruction. They deserved it. And then the
goodness of God is seen in God not giving his people what they
deserved. He promised to do them good in
spite of what they were. Isn't that a glorious thought?
I smile every time I think because I know what I deserve. And mercy
and grace is God not giving me what I deserve. And I'm so thankful
for that, but it's for Christ's sake. It's for Christ's sake. What do you say about these things?
Well, many say God's not fair. God's not fair, that's not fair.
Some believe that God is holy and yet merciful, and it's God's
glory to show mercy to some, and it's God's glory to condemn
others. Therefore, he hath mercy on whom he will have mercy, and
whom he will, he hardeneth. How does God harden people? Just
leave them to themselves. I would have remained hardened
until death if God had not intervened, if God hadn't interfered in my
life. He has mercy on whom he'll have mercy and whom he will,
he hardened it. But God never condemns without reason. No,
His holy justice will not allow that either. Now the Canaanites
were a wicked and idolatrous nation. And as I said, they deserve
God's wrath and God's judgment. And what makes the gospel so
glorious and so amazing is this, Israel, God's chosen nation was
no different, no different. They were a stiff-necked and
rebellious people. They murmured and they complained
from the time they left Egypt, from the time God delivered them
miraculously out of Egypt until they got into the land of promise. Were they thankful? No, no. They cried, has God delivered
us out of Egypt to let us die here in the wilderness? They
said they had more than one occasion. God gave them bread from heaven,
and God gave them fresh water, cool, refreshing water from a
rock, and they loathed God's provision, and they said, for
there's no bread, neither is there any water, and our soul
loatheth this like bread. What about you? Do you love Christ
or loathe Him? Christ is the rock from which
flows rivers of living water. Christ is the bread that came
down from heaven. What do you think of Christ?
That is the issue. That is the subject, always the
subject. What do you think of Christ?
Most of the time we act as though we love him, not love him. And the only difference between
one who believes and trusts Christ and one who doesn't is the difference
that God makes. We're right back today. God makes
the difference. No difference in any of us, but
the difference that God makes. When God delivered Israel, Egypt's
citizens handed them their gold. Just walked up to them and said,
here, take this with you. And later, Israel melted it all
down and made a golden calf to worship. Even worse, they attributed
their deliverance out of Egypt to that golden calf and said,
this be the God that delivered us out of Egypt. Now there's
a picture of what's in your heart and in mine. They said, this
be the God. He was no God at all. They made
him with their own hands, and that's what we have today. People
making a God in their own mind, in their own imagination, a God
of their imagination. And God justly reserved the kings
and the nations of Canaan to severe judgment from the foundation
of the world, and in the providence of time, God carried it out. And they deserved all that they
got. And then on the other hand, God
reserved his chosen nation to goodness, not due to anything
in them. It's God that makes the difference.
As God's children, what do we have that we didn't receive?
The ungodly deserves God's wrath and judgment and condemnation,
severity. So do we who are yet without
strength, but Christ died for his ungodly people, and they
receive his goodness. Men and women by nature want
a God that's altogether like them. They want a God who's an
extension of their own mind, a God of their imagination. They want a God of love, but
not a God of justice. They want a God to send folks
to heaven. Not a God who wages for sin is death, eternal death.
They want a God that they can control and manipulate, not a
sovereign God who rules and reigns and does as he pleases in the
armies of heaven and among the inhabitants of the earth as our
God does. To make a God of your imagination
is no different than to make an idol out of wood, stone, or
gold. No different. No different. Idolaters
worship an extension of themselves. They make their idol what they
want it to be. So let me say again what you
already know. Salvation is all of grace. Israel
was just as guilty as the Amorites. They were just as deserving of
God's wrath and judgment. 31 kings perished because of
their wickedness and idolatry, and God made Israel to differ. There was nothing about Israel
that was different but that which God made to be different. Now,
I want to quickly show you again that there's no perfect type
of Christ in the Old Testament Scriptures. We have some good
ones. Joshua is certainly that. No perfect type of Christ, because
nothing or no one who is imperfect can be a perfect type of one
who's perfect. Look at chapter 13 here, verse
one. And though Joshua in so many
ways pictures the Lord Jesus, here we see how Joshua differs
from him. Verse one, now Joshua was old
and stricken in years. And the Lord said unto him, thou
art old and stricken in years, and there remaineth yet very
much land to be possessed. Joshua could not finish his work. And neither can we. But the Lord Jesus certainly
did. Joshua was old and stricken in
years, and there remained much land to be possessed, we're told.
There was a great deal of the land that God had promised Abraham
that remained unconquered by Joshua, according to verses two
through six here. Joshua was now old, he couldn't
finish the task. but Christ was successful as
a substitute of his people. And you know, I suppose one of
the most blasphemous statements that I've ever heard and continue
to hear is that Christ made salvation possible. You know, at first it seems a
little innocent and just ignorant, but it's blasphemous. That's
exactly what preachers today preach. You see, if you have
something to do with you being saved, then Christ only made
salvation possible, and the rest is up to you. You've got to finish
that work. That's what that is saying. But
see, we're like Joshua. We can't finish the work. And
here we clearly see that. Joshua couldn't finish the work,
and the Lord had to finish it for him. Every time God looks
at our pathetic attempt of performing some kind of acceptable righteousness,
He says, there remaineth yet. That's what He says right here.
There remaineth yet very much. We've all come short of the glory
of God. There remains yet very much to
be possessed. How are we gonna possess it?
It's gonna have to be given to us by our great Joshua, the Lord
Jesus Christ. If he didn't finish the work,
there's no hope for us. Well, brother, you sure harp
a whole lot on the finished work of Christ. That's the gospel.
That's the confidence, the assurance that believers have. It is finished,
Christ said. What? The salvation of my people. I've provided everything that
my God requires. I've crossed every I, or every
T. I've dotted every I. And the
way I write, I actually do that. But my, my, what a wondrous thought. Now in the last part of verse
six here in chapter 13, the Lord said to Joshua, he said to them,
will I drive out. Them will I drive out from before
the children of Israel. The Lord Jesus must finish the
work for Joshua. And beloved, he must finish the
work for us. He said, I'll drive them out.
And you know what? He drove them out. It was the
Lord who delivered those 31 kings into Joshua's hands. Israel's
inheritance and ours is accomplished and finished by the work that
Christ came to do. Our Lord left nothing undone.
Aren't you so thankful for that? If God only made redemption possible,
then you and I are in a heap of trouble. Why? Because by nature we love darkness
rather than light. We cannot and we will not come
to Christ that we might have light. Why? Because our deeds
are evil, and this is our condemnation. This is the condemnation. Light's
coming to the world, and we'd rather be in darkness than to
be in light. Why, to even say that Christ made salvation possible
is to say that he did all that he could, but came up short. You see that? That's exactly
what it's saying. It is today, well, it's no small matter. I'll just
say it that way. You cannot preach the true Christ
of the Bible and proclaim that he wound up doing less than what
God sent him to do. Did Christ save all that the
father gave him? You better believe he did. Will
all whom the Father gave to Christ come to him? You better believe
they will. That's what he himself said in
John 6, 37. All that the Father giveth me
shall come to me, and him that cometh to me I'll no wise cast
out. And this is the Father's will
which has sent me, that all which he hath given me I should lose
nothing. I've glorified thee on earth,
I've finished the work which thou gavest me to do." Our salvation
has nothing to do with what we do. And folks say, well, we have
to believe. But none will ever believe unless
God gives them the faith to do so. For by grace are you saved
through faith, and that is not of yourselves. Do we just read
over that part? It's the gift of God. Salvation
is not by works, lest any man should boast. And you know what?
Men will boast. For we are His workmanship, created
in Christ Jesus. Christ came to the world to save
sinners. Christ came to seek and to save that which was lost. Are you lost? He didn't come
to make salvation possible. He came to make salvation certain. God is appeased. He's satisfied
with those whom Christ died for. Why? Because when He died for
them, He fulfilled, He finished, He completed the perfect obedience
to the holy law of God for them. And that obedience and that righteousness
that God required of them is finished. And Christ provided what we could
not. He didn't make it possible for
us to keep. He died the just for the unjust.
That's why we couldn't keep the law. You see, only a just person
could keep the law, and we are unjust. This is how we're brought
to God. Now in closing, I want you to
turn with me one other place, Colossians chapter one. Verse 19, Colossians 1, verse
19. I was talking to a dear brother
on the phone yesterday, a preacher of the gospel. He said, the Bible just keeps
getting bigger, doesn't it? I knew what he meant, it does.
More glorious every day. Everywhere we look in the scriptures,
we see the finished work of the Lord Jesus Christ, what he's
done for us, that which we couldn't do for ourselves. Colossians
1 verse 19, for it pleased the Father that in him, in Christ,
should all fullness dwell. He didn't say that in him should
all possibility dwell. all fullness. And having made,
made peace through the blood of His cross by Him to reconcile
all things unto Himself. Not to make it possible. To reconcile
all things unto Himself. By Him, I say whether they be
things in earth or things in heaven, and you, that were sometime
alienated and enemies in your mind by wicked works, yet, now
look at this, now hath he reconciled. Paul said in him and through
his blood, you'll have peace. Peace is made, not possible,
but made. Having made peace through His
blood. It's already made, nothing for us to do. We have peace with
God. It's a peace that passes all
understanding. We can't understand it. Do you
have peace? I do. Can you explain it? No.
It passes all understanding. To say that we have to add something
to Christ's blood is absolutely blasphemous. This is much more
than just a doctrinal issue, I'll tell you that much. It's
to deny the efficacy of Christ's blood. It's to say that Christ
shed His blood in vain and that it didn't save anybody. If it
just makes it possible and the rest is left up to me, then it's
not effectuous at all. It won't profit you a thing. Verse 22, in the body of His
flesh through death presents you, now look at this, holy,
me, me holy? Not only holy, but unblameable
and unreprovable in God's sight. Oh, the certainty of our salvation
in Christ. In the body of this flesh in
which I dwell, God presents me, you, all who trust in Christ,
holy, unblameable, and unreprovable in His sight. He doesn't make
it possible for them to be. He makes them holy, unblameable,
and unreprovable. Certainly, definitely, absolutely
holy, absolutely unblameable, absolutely unreprovable. How
could anyone be comforted in the thought that God intended
to save all His elect but fell short? Christ fully accomplished the
redemption of all God's elect. Galatians 3.13 says this, Christ
hath, past tense, he's already redeemed us. It's for certain. He has redeemed us from the curse
of the law. How'd he do it? By being made
a curse for it. where it's written, cursed is
everyone that hangeth on a tree. And friends, that's where a sinner
is gonna rest, right there. He really did die on the cross
and he really did put his people's sin away. And salvation is accomplished,
the work's finished, nothing for us to do. Is that where you're
resting? Jesus, I am resting. Resting
in the joy of what thou art. What is Christ? Well, as we sung
tonight, he's our resting place. He's our solid rock. And he really
did pay it all, every bit of it. May God enable us to rest
in Christ for the glory of God, for our good and for Christ's
sake.