Now turn in your Bibles with
me to Hebrews chapter 11. Hebrews chapter 11. I want to
go back to verse 30. I preached on this last week
concerning the subject of pulling down strongholds. And this message
is a continuation of that and a conclusion of that. Talking
about the walls of Jericho, verse 30, by faith the walls of Jericho,
Hebrews 1130, by faith the walls of Jericho fell down. They weren't
torn down by man, they fell down by the power of God. After they
were compassed, surrounded about seven days. And I want to look
at that. This message, if you haven't
heard, if you weren't here last week, get a copy of last week's
message to go along with, but this message stands on its own.
Because what it's talking about is in the book of Joshua, we
read about it in chapter 6, we'll be going there, of how God in
His power, according to His promise, gave these people, the Hebrew
children, as led by Joshua, Joshua who was a type of the Lord Jesus
Christ. That's the main issue of this,
the spiritual lesson, how God brought them into the promised
land, the land of promise. That's what he's talking about.
And this city, Jericho, with its mighty walls, was represented
everything that hindered them from entering into that land
and taking possession of it. And of course it took the power
of God to bring it down. Joshua, you know I mentioned
last week they sing that old song, Joshua fit the battle of
Jericho. Actually Joshua didn't fit the
battle of anything. It was God who did it. Now I
know Joshua was an instrument. The people of, the Hebrew people
were instruments. After God tore those walls down
according to His will and His way and His promise, they went
in and they enacted the justice of God upon that wicked nation. That's what it was. It wasn't
just God being cruel or throwing a temper tantrum. It was God's
justice against the people of Jericho, which represent the
sinfulness and the evil and the idolatry and the unbelief of
this world. of which we are all naturally
a part but God has saved his people by his grace brought us
out of the world and that's an amazing thing well the land of
promise the land flowing with milk and honey and what I want
to show mainly here if you look back at second Corinthians this
battle of Jericho as they call it This work of God is a picture
of the spiritual warfare, the spiritual battle that God wages
through His Son, the Lord Jesus Christ, who is the conqueror,
the mighty conqueror, he's called, the victor, who conquers all
of our spiritual Jerichos, our sin. in several ways, and I want
to bring that out today. And what I want to emphasize,
and this is one of the reasons I had Brother Mark read that
Isaiah 55 passage. I want to emphasize that salvation,
the salvation of a sinner, is God accomplishing what is impossible
for man to do. Just like Jericho. That's what
was happening there. God accomplished what the Hebrew
children, even Joshua himself, It was impossible for them to
do. And so look here in 2 Corinthians chapter 10, where Paul in verse
3 is talking about the warfare of the ministry. And he says
in verse 3, for though we walk in the flesh, physical, that's
what he's talking about there, is the physical body. That word
flesh, you understand that it has to be defined according to
its context. For example, flesh, a lot of
times in the Bible, is a metaphor or symbol for sin. Paul spoke
of that in Romans 8. And he said, if we're saved by
the grace of God in Christ, justified by his righteousness imputed,
washed in his blood, we're not in the flesh, we're in the spirit. And that's what he's talking
about in Romans 8. Here he's just talking about we're in a
physical world. We have to deal with things in
a physical way. Even if we're saved by grace,
we're spiritual people. We have a new heart. We've been
born again by the Spirit, but we still walk in this world in
physical bodies, dying bodies. This body is death, you see.
So he's saying here in verse three of 2 Corinthians 10, for
though we walk in the flesh, we don't war after the flesh.
Our warfare against the world, against the flesh, against the
devil, against sin, against the devil, is not a physical warfare.
And here's what I'll emphasize this here. There is not one mandate
or excuse in the Bible for any true Christian using physical
weapons to bring about conversions. That doesn't work. It is the
Holy Spirit through the Word who brings about conversion.
That's it. And verse 4, he explains it.
For the weapons of our warfare are not carnal, but mighty through
God to the pulling down of strongholds. Now, you remember what the weapons
that Joshua and the Hebrew children used when they marched around
Jericho, banging on pipe hands and blowing trumpets. They had
the Ark of the Lord. We'll see that in just a moment.
Nor as they didn't use spears and swords to pull down those
strongholds. It was the power of God. Well,
in our warfare, the ministry, we're not to use physical weapons
because our weapons are not carnal. But he says in verse 5, casting
down imaginations. If you have a concordance in
your Bible, the word imaginations, there's reasonings. Now, man
reasons wrongly when it comes to having a right relationship
with God. By nature, man reasons wrongly when it comes to salvation,
who God is and how God saves sinners. But God is the only
reasonable one in this whole thing of salvation. That's why
he says in Isaiah 118, come let us reason together. That's God's
reasoning. And so we're trying to tear down
the natural reasonings of the natural man with the word of
God. And he says, and every high thing
that exalteth itself against the knowledge of God, the knowledge
that God reveals, and bringing into captivity every thought
to the obedience of Christ. Spiritually speaking, that's
like fighting the battle of Jericho. Only with the sword of the Spirit,
the sword of the Word of God in the power of the Spirit. And
that's what we do. We preach. We witness. We tell the old, old story. That's
what we do. And God is the one who tears
the walls down. Now, if you look back at Joshua
chapter 6, let's go back there. Now one of the things that I
wanted to emphasize last week that I'll emphasize today is
this. Here they are getting ready to go over to the land of promise
after 40 years of wandering in the wilderness. And the reason the first generation
that came out of Egypt could not go in is because of their
unbelief. You can read about that in Hebrews
chapter 3. They could not enter in because
of unbelief. It is God who does the work.
It is God who gives the gifts, but He uses means which He provides. And what was it? It was faith.
Believing God. Now, the faith in Hebrews 11,
by faith they enter in, that refers to the revelation of God. That refers to the knowledge
that God gave them that they were going to get that land. And it was a gift. In fact, The
land of promise, the land flowing with milk and honey, was a complete,
unearned, and undeserved gift of God to these people. Now look
at Joshua chapter 6, in verse 1. He says, Now Jericho was straightly
shut up because of the children of Israel. None went out, none
came in. Now we're going to read a little
bit more about that Next week, when we get into the next verse
in Hebrews, which refers to Rahab the harlot. How the king and
the people of Jericho, they'd heard about these Hebrew children
in the wilderness in all those 40 years, and how God protected
them, and how God defeated their enemies. So when they heard of
these folks coming, they shut the walls, they shut everybody
in. That's a picture of us in sin by nature. We're shut up
to sin. We can't go in and out. We're
shut up to sin. Why is the Gospel the revelation
of the righteousness of God? You know why? Because we're so
shut up to sin, we don't have by nature a righteousness and
we can't work one. It is righteousness that gets
us to God. We're shut up to sin. There's
none righteous, no not one. We're ignorant of God's righteousness
and when we hear about it, we don't want it. That's how we're
shut up to sin. And so God does that which is
impossible for us to do. This reminds me of the event,
historical event, where the Lord encountered what is known as
a rich young man in Matthew 19, who asked the Lord, he said,
good master, what good thing must I do to inherit eternal
life? The young man, not looking at
Christ, Jesus of Nazareth as God, the Lord answered him on
those terms and said, why do you call me good? Only God is
good. There's no good man in God's
sight. And you say, well, why would
he say it that way? Well, this fellow was talking about how
do you get to eternal life? How do you have a right relationship
with God? He's talking about salvation. I mean, you look at
people around this community, you know people who are criminals
and you know people whom we call good, but when it comes to salvation
and a right relationship with God, there's none good, no, not
one. Am I right? So he said, why do you call me
good? If you don't think I'm God, why do you call me good?
There's nothing good but God. But Christ answered him. He said,
well, keep the law. And the fellow said, I've done
that from my youth up. And of course, Christ exposed
him by hitting him with probably what some call the heart of the
law, which is love God perfectly and love your neighbors, yourself.
And the man went away sorrowful because he knew that he could
not do what the Lord commanded. went away sorrowful. Remember
the question the disciples asked when the man went away? They
said, well, if that fellow's not saved, who can be? The Lord's
answer was, that which is impossible with men is possible with God. Now what he's saying there, the
construct of that language is not God is making salvation a
mere possibility. Here's what he's saying. What
men cannot do, only God can do. That's it. Like the walls of
Jericho. There was absolutely no way that
these Hebrew vagabonds could have toppled that stronghold,
the wall of Jericho. Had they tried, but with human
means, and you know how armies did back then, they would have
been defeated. They would have died. But look
at verse 1 and 2 of Joshua 6. Or verse 2. Here they are. And the Lord said
unto Joshua, See, behold, I have given into thine hand Jericho. It's already yours. And the king thereof and the
mighty men of valor, even their king and their strongest warriors,
They're yours. It's a gift. I've already given
it to you. You didn't earn it, and you don't
deserve it, but it's yours. Why is it ours, God? Because
I made a promise to Abraham 500 years before, and I've got a
purpose in giving you all this and keeping you together, and
that's to do what? That's to bring a Messiah, the
Lord Jesus Christ, through that nation. To do what? What men
cannot do. work righteousness that will
get you to God. Isn't that it? That's why the gospel is the
revelation of the righteousness of God. It cannot be the revelation
of the righteousness of men, for that's an impossibility.
There's no such thing as the righteousness of men in God's
sight. The only righteousness that will
get a sinner to God is the imputed righteousness of Christ. Nothing
else will do it. And only God can work that. Only
God can bring down the stronghold of the law that curses us based
upon our best efforts. That's like Jericho. You can't
do that. Only God can satisfy the justice
of the law against my sins. And only God can bring down the
Jericho of my hard unregenerate heart. and give me a new heart
and bring me to Christ." Now that's what this is all about.
That's the significance of this whole thing. All of it, he said. And our salvation
is only that which God can accomplish. So here they are, after wandering
40 years in the wilderness because of their sin and unbelief, Here
they are taking possession of the land as led by Joshua. Joshua, the type of Christ. I
think we talked about a couple weeks ago, didn't we, Don, about
asking why couldn't Moses go in? You know, Moses was the leader.
Well, you know the story. You can read about this in Numbers
chapter 20. We won't turn there for the sake
of time. Remember the rock from which
God gave them water, which was a type of Christ, the water of
life? Moses was commanded initially
to strike that rock with his rod one time. Moses represented
the law. That rock represented Christ.
What happened to Christ on the cross based upon the sins of
God's people imputed, charged, accounted to him? The law struck
him. one time by one offering he hath
perfected forever them that are sanctified he didn't die twice
he died once and that's all it took because he's God in human
flesh you understand that because of who he is that's that's what
gave the merit to what he did and the law struck him once and
Moses struck the rock And water came forth, that's the water
of life. Christ was struck once under the law for our sins, and
from him comes righteousness, which equals life. We remember
later on when the Hebrew children started complaining, Moses lost
his temper. This is in Numbers 20. And he
struck the rock again, twice. And he was angry. Well, Moses
was a sinner saved by grace. But what he did in doing that
is he misrepresented Christ, the way of salvation. That rock,
one time, by one day. One person, by one day. And so
God said you cannot enter the Promised Land. But there's a
spiritual significance to all of this too. As we said, obviously,
Christ is represented in that rock. Moses represents the law.
But why couldn't Moses lead them in? Well, Moses represents the
law. And the bare law cannot get you
into the promised land to God. The law, the only thing the bare
law can do for a sinner is condemning. It takes Jesus Christ to bring
a sinner into the promised land, to bring a sinner to salvation.
Moses represents the law, Joshua represents Christ. What a lesson
that is. John 1 17 says, The law came
by Moses, but grace and truth come by Jesus Christ. Salvations
of the Lord. Christ kept the law. He satisfied
the justice of the law. The gospel is the revelation
of the righteousness of God, which brings down all the Jericho's
that stand in opposition to us entering the promised land. Legally,
Because in Christ our sins are put away, justice is satisfied,
righteousness is established, and spiritually the old Jericho
of our hard hearts is brought down by the Holy Spirit from
Christ. And it's a gift. It's a gift.
So consider here, as he said in Hebrews 11, by faith the walls
of Jericho fell down after they were compassed about seven days.
You know, God never does anything arbitrarily. He never does anything
on a whim. It's always with a purpose in
mind. The walls of Jericho falling certainly demonstrates his miraculous
power. But again, think about it. All that's happening here in
Joshua 6 is based upon a covenant promise that he made to Abraham
500 years earlier. Well, isn't that the same as
our salvation? Our salvation is based upon an
unconditional promise the Father made to the Son before this world
was created. Paul wrote of it in 2 Timothy
chapter 1. He said it was a salvation given
us in Christ Jesus before the world began. None of these people
who are entering in were even born or named by their parents
when God made that promise to Abraham. But here it is. And it's clear that they didn't
enter in because of any foreseen goodness or faithfulness, for
they are a stiff-necked people. We read last week in the book
of Deuteronomy how God said, I'm not doing this because of
your righteousness, for you have none. Think about it. God made a promise. And you know the Bible tells
us in Hebrews chapter 6 that God engaged Himself behind that
promise. His reputation was on the line.
You know, whenever the Bible says that God swore an oath,
that's what that means? That's in Hebrews chapter 6.
You know, it says this, it says, when men swear an oath, they
swear by something greater than themselves. Well, how can God
swear an oath then? There's nothing greater than
God. He put Himself on the line. He put His reputation. Let me
tell you something. If God failed to save even one
person whom He chose, justified, and redeemed by the blood of
Christ, He would lose His glory. That's what this Bible teaches. His good name is on the line,
and He will not fail. It's all of grace. As I said,
this is God doing what is impossible for us to do. Just like the Hebrew
people. You see, look here at verse 2
again of Joshua 6. The Lord said unto Joshua, See,
I have given unto thine hand Jericho, and the king thereof,
and the mighty men of valor. and you shall compass or surround
the city, all ye men of Ur, and go round about the city once,
thus shalt thou do six days." Six days. Remember it took the
Lord six days to create the world. And then verse four, seven priests
shall bear before the ark seven trumpets of ram's horns, In the
seventh day you shall compass the city seven times, and the
priests shall blow with the trumpets." All of that is such beautiful
symbolic language, isn't it? Six days, there's a work to be
done. Joshua leading the people. Six
days. Like Christ representing His
people did His great work. symbolized by the six days here,
just like God did the work in six days of creation. Now we
know that Christ existed upon this world as God in human flesh
for 33 and a half years. But the symbolism still stands.
He had a work to do to obey the law unto death. And then on the
last day, you might say, The day of His cross, He finished
the work. That's what seven represents.
In other words, what God is teaching the children of Israel, I've
given you this land that you don't deserve and have not earned,
and it's all based upon a finished work that only God can accomplish. Well, where's all that? Well,
the seven days. Here's the priest. That's the
people of God. Joshua's the leader. Christ is
the head. We're the body. He's the representative. We're the ones being represented.
Christ is the surety. Our sins were laid upon Him,
imputed to Him. His righteousness imputed to
us. Alright? He's the surety. He's
the substitute. He went under the law for us. Here's the ark. See here in verse
4, the ark. What is that? That's the ark
of the covenant. What does the ark of the covenant mean? Well,
read about it in Exodus 25. That's where God meets with His
people. Based on the what? The blood. How do you get a ram's horn?
You kill the ram. You shed the blood. Don't try
to blow on a ram's horn when the ram's still alive. You've got to kill the animal.
Here's the ark. Here's the dead ram. Here's the
blood, you see. That's where God meets with His
people. That's all Christ. And why are they blowing the
horn? Because they're telling out the work of God. They're
telling out. It's what we do when we fight
the battle in the ministry. The weapons of our warfare are
not carnal. We preach the word of God. We
tell sinners the gospel. We tell them who God is. How
holy He is. How just He is. How righteous
He is. And yes, He is a merciful God.
Yes, He is a loving and gracious God. But justice must be satisfied. Else there's no love. There's
no mercy. There's no grace. That's the
biblical truth. That's what the gospel is all
about. Somebody says, well, it's all
about the love of God. Not without the righteousness
of God. Not without His justice. Any
love that denies, ignores, or confuses His justice, His righteousness,
is empty. It is not going to pull down
any stronghold. It may make you cry. It may make
you walk an aisle. It may get you into the baptistry,
but it will not save your soul. It just will not do it. This is a finished work, he says.
Verse five, he says, it shall come to pass that when they make
a long blast with the ram's horn, and when you hear the sound of
the trumpet, all the people shall shout with a great shout. You
know, up until that time, they were to be quiet. Just the ram's
horn. It reminds me of when Moses,
you know, we talked about this over in Exodus 14, when he says,
stand still and see the salvation of the Lord. For the Lord shall
fight for you this day, and you shall what? Hold your peace. It's kind of like he's saying
shut up until you've got something to say. And until you hear and
believe the gospel concerning salvation and the right relationship
with God, you don't have anything to say. Worth hearing. Isn't
that right? This is it. A great shout, and
the wall of the city shall fall down flat, and the people shall
ascend up, every man straight before him." God doing the impossible. Mark read there in Isaiah 55,
he said, Hold ye the thirst, come, buy, purchase milk and
bread without money, without price. How do you do that? How do you buy milk and bread
without money? Now, if somebody just says, here's
milk and here's bread, you don't owe me a thing, that's giving
and taking. But he says, buy it without money. That sounds impossible to me.
Well, you know, later on there in Isaiah 55, he made this statement. He said, God said, well, you
need to understand something. When it comes to thinking and
working these things out, my thoughts aren't your thoughts
and my ways aren't your ways. In fact, he said, my thoughts
and my ways are so high above you, you cannot attain to them. The only way you're going to
know God's thoughts and God's ways is if he reaches down and
lifts the beggar off the dung heap and reveals himself. That right? I'll tell you how you buy milk
and bread without money, without price. You come to God as a sinner
and beg for mercy, and you find out the money's already been
made and given by another in your place, the Lord Jesus Christ. In other words, here's what you
find out when God pulls down the stronghold, the Jericho of
that hard heart and gives you a new heart. You've already been
bought and paid for. You've already been given an
eternal inheritance and blessings which you cannot even imagine
or count all spiritual blessings in heavenly places in Christ.
You don't have to buy a thing. You don't have to work for it.
It's there. It's yours. You'll take possession
of it by God-given faith. God will even pull down the stronghold,
the Jericho, of our unbelief, won't he? Isn't that something? You know, the strategy for conquering
this impregnable city was laid out strictly by God. And I'm
sure when you think about warriors, and armies and generals and battle
plans. This may have seemed like a foolish
plan to most people. But it's like the gospel. The
preaching of the cross is foolishness to them that are perishing. But
do you know when God pulls down that Jericho of our hard hearts
by the Holy Spirit in the new birth? Then we find out that
the preaching of the cross is the power and the wisdom of God
in Christ. It's the only way it could have
been done. No other way. Somebody says, surely God requires
us to do something to earn this thing, or at least to make it
go. No. There's a vast difference
between God's way and man's way. Joshua followed God's instructions
to the letter. And when the people did finally
shout, those massive walls came down instantly, and Israel won
an easy victory. In fact, God had given the city
of Israel to them before they began to march around. Well,
our Joshua, the Lord Jesus Christ, he followed the law perfectly. We're going to talk about that
next week in the Sermon on the Mount. Christ said, I didn't
come to break the law, I came to keep it. He fulfilled the
law perfectly, every jot and every tittle of it. Followed it, finished the work
with his death, and the walls of sin came tumbling down. That's
it, isn't it? Christ is the only way to God.
He's the only way of righteousness, by God's sovereign grace and
sovereign power. Well, all the Hebrew children
were instructed to do, all that they were instructed
to do symbolized for us in spiritual terms, faith in the Lord Jesus
Christ and repentance of our dead works, looking to Christ,
the author and finisher of our faith. And this is the gift of
God. This is the issue of salvation.