Courage Dear Heart

We're going to study Joshua chapters 1 and 2, and I did give a title this week. I called it Courage, Dear Heart. We'll talk about that in a minute. I had told you this was going to be a verse-by-verse Bible study through the book of Joshua, and it is. I wrote the study guide verse-by-verse. You will study verse-by-verse, but in some of the weeks, there's no possible way I can say every single one of the verses. But we will go over the content. I always get so excited to see what the Holy Spirit wants to do in the moment. You know, I put the study guide together months ahead of time, and then in the moment, I find this something unfold for our benefit, and that's such an exhilarating experience. Last week, we covered Joshua chapter 1, verses 1 to 9. We discovered that Moses was dead, that the leadership had already been transferred to Joshua, and God gave him some instructions. He gave Joshua direction, go over this Jordan. He gave him warning, be careful to do according to all the law, and he gave him encouragement. He said, I will be with you. That is what we discussed from those verses. And God told him that he would cause Israel to inherit the land God had given him. Joshua would be the hero for Israel in this moment. Joshua, whose name is God is deliverance, would be the hero. The better Joshua, Jesus, whose name is God is deliverance, would be the hero for everyone who will follow the path of promise by faith in the future, because he will cause us to inherit the promises of God. The heroes cause us to inherit the promises of God. So with the Bible, we always remember that there's a natural history lesson, and there's a spiritual application. We want to handle them both well. And I hope that that's what we'll do in this lesson, all right? So God had told Joshua two important things, meditate. He said, meditate for success, and to us, that might mean preaching the gospel to ourselves every day. And that is one way to meditate, preach the gospel to yourself every day, plus we're also adding this layer of memorizing here in our group. And then God spoke to Joshua about courage. Before we do one more thing, I want to define and discuss courage. That is where I feel like the Lord has us this morning. So I have defined courage as the strength to move forward in the face of fear, or pain, or grief. Courage is the strength to move forward in the face of pain, or fear, or grief. Courage simply is the ability to do hard things. We all need to be able to do hard things. We all have hard things to do. Every one of us in this room has something, at least one hard thing that you're facing right now, and courage enables us to do that. The beauty is that as a Christian, we can rely on the Lord to give us the courage that we need to face those hard things. So I want to give us two quotes, one from the Apostle Paul and one from C.S. Lewis. We'll start with the easy one from the Apostle Paul, and I'll put it on the screen, 2 Corinthians 5, 6. So we are always of good courage, why? For we walk by faith, not by sight. We talked about that last week, that entering into the promises of God is life in the spirit as opposed to the flesh, walking by faith as opposed to sight. We're of good courage. Now let's take the tough one by C.S. Lewis, all right? Let's look at this. Courage is not simply one of the virtues, but the form of every virtue at the testing point, which means at the point of highest reality. He wrote that in screw tape letters. Let's unpack that a little bit. Courage isn't just a virtue, but it is the form every single virtue takes when it is tested. If you need to walk in faithfulness and you're being tested and that's hard, courage is what allows you to do that. If you need to be kind in a situation and it is hard, it is courage that allows us to do that. Long suffering. So I just like that dimension that he put on that. Our title, I said, is Courage, Dear Heart. That also was written by C.S. Lewis in one of his books in the Chronicles of Narnia, The Voyage of the Dawn Treader. I don't know if you're familiar with the Chronicles of Narnia, but Lucy, one of the characters and her fellow voyagers are in this ship and they enter into this dark, dark fog surrounding the island where dreams come true. Not good dreams like sunshine and lollipops, nightmare dreams like this is a treacherous place. And they've entered into this fog and realize they're struggling to find their way out. They're in a dark place, as we would say. And they begin to panic and everybody on board at once says, we shall never get out. Never get out. And we probably all can, that resonates with all of us. We've been in some dark place where we panic and say, this will never change. We will never get out of this situation. So I want to read from you kind of an excerpt of how the book goes at this point. Lucy calls out to her hero, Aslan, who is a type of Jesus in these books. So she calls out to her hero, Aslan, Aslan, if ever you loved us at all, send us help now. The darkness did not grow any less, but she began to feel a little, a very little better. And then she saw something right overhead was an albatross. It circled three times around the mast and then perched for an instant at the prow. It called out in a strong, sweet voice, what seemed to be words, though no one understood them. No one except Lucy knew that as it circled the mast, it had whispered to her, courage, dear heart. And the voice she felt sure was Aslan's, and with the voice, a delicious smell breathed in her face. In a few moments, the darkness turned into a grayness ahead. And then almost before they dared to begin hoping, they had shot out into the sunlight and were in the warm blue world again. Listen to this. And all at once, everybody realized that there was nothing to be afraid of and never had been. I love that part of the book. So precious. Nothing in the script, in the text, tells us that Joshua was afraid or Israel was afraid. But I don't think you tell somebody over and over again, be strong and courageous unless you believe them to be afraid. And so certainly they knew as soon as they crossed into that land, there was going to be battles. There were going to be challenges for them. And so I picture the Lord whispering to Joshua, courage, dear heart, there's nothing to be afraid of. What can separate us from the love of God, like the Apostle Paul says? Even death can't separate us. Courage. All right, we got to get into today's lesson. We're start picking it up on Joshua 1, verse 10, it says,

I always like to look at the passages in other translations as well. And in the King James, it says, prepare your victuals. I love that. I don't know what a victual is. But this summer when our family goes camping, I am going to text out, prepare your victuals for in three days. I don't know, I guess it sounds like vittles or something, but I just love it. Everyone saw the King James, just as a gem that I love. And then as the chapter ends, Joshua just turns to the Reubenites, the Gadites, and the half tribe of Manasseh, and he reminds them of this deal they made with Moses. They have asked Moses, can we just live on this side, on the east side of the Jordan River? And Moses said, okay, but you got to go and help everybody in the bowels. They said, oh, we will. So Joshua is saying, remember, you're going to do that. And they said, absolutely, we will. And the chapter ends by the people telling Joshua, only be strong and courageous. The people are telling the leader, only be strong and courageous, because we want leaders to be strong and courageous, okay? Moms, you're a leader. Your kids don't want another teenager in the house. They want you to be strong and courageous. If you are married, you want your husband to be strong and courageous. strong and courageous. We don't need another child in the house, right? This is what people want from leaders. And so if you are a leader in any way, this is a good message. Just think about the people saying to you, well, you only be strong and courageous. I'm looking to you, right? So now we're gonna go into chapter two. And this details, starts detailing the second spy mission. Only two men were sent in this time. And now remember, Joshua was part of the spy mission 38 years ago, where there was 12 men that were sent in. And as they returned, Joshua and Caleb, those two men brought a good report. And they said, God is with us. This is gonna be great. We can do this. And 10 men said, this is a terrible idea. We should never go in there. They're gonna destroy us for sure. I sort of wonder if Joshua's thinking back to that time and saying, let's skip the 10. I'll just send two. And I think it'll come back good. And you know, it kind of worked out just that way. So it all worked out for him. Verse one,

Stop, three little things about this. First of all, we pointed out that both Joshua and Rahab have something in common. Both of their names are prefaced with a portion of the name of their God. Yahoshua, his name was changed from deliver to God is deliverer by adding portion of Yahweh's name. And look at her name, Rahab. Now it really would have been pronounced Rahab, but we butcher everything in America, but I'm sticking with American language here. But Rah, okay, the son God of the Amorites, the Egyptians and all of that. And so we have these two representatives, which is interesting. The next thing is the text calls her a prostitute. That doesn't necessarily mean she was in business at the moment, because the Bible often will call someone by something that they were known by. Jesus went to dinner at the house of Simon the leper. You don't go to dinner at a leper's house. He was previously a leper, but he was known by that. We don't know if she's in business or if she had been, but she was known by that. And so she was known to be a place where people came and went. And so if that's why the spies chose her location, or if it was chosen by God, it was a good choice because they would be undercover. People were known at some point to have come and gone. Verse two, when it was told to the King of Jericho, behold, men of Israel have come here tonight to search out the land. Then he came to Rahab and he said, bring out those men that have come to you who entered your house, for they've come to search out the land. And he was spot on about that. He was right, but Rahab was a sharp cookie. And she said, yeah, it's true. The men came to me. I don't know where they came from. When the gate was about to close, they went out. I don't know where they went. So go quickly, pursue them. You might in fact overtake them. But we find out in verse six what really happened. But she had brought them up to the roof and hid them with the stocks of flax that she had laid in order on the roof. She had come up to them on the roof and said, look at verse nine, really important passage. She said, I know that the Lord in your Bible, it's capital letters. That means it's the proper name for Yahweh. I'm gonna say Jehovah. I know that Jehovah has given you the land and that the fear of you has fallen upon us and that all the inhabitants of the land melt away before you. For we have heard how Jehovah dried up the water of the Red Sea before you when you came out of Egypt and what you did to the two kings of the Amorites who were beyond the Jordan, to Sihon and Og, whom you devoted to destruction. And as soon as we heard it, our hearts melted and there was no spirit left in any man because of you. For Jehovah, your God, he is God in the heavens above and on the earth beneath. Wow, what a statement. She had gathered up some amount of faith already. She's been processing this for a while to be able to spill this all out to them. She knew about Jehovah. She knew about Yahweh. She called him by his proper name. She knew about the deliverance from Egypt. Now that had to have happened maybe before she was born, probably before she was born. It was 40 years ago. She knew about that. She knew about the current victories on the other side of the river. She knew that Jehovah promised this land to his people and she knew that he kept his promises. Wow, I think we can summarize everything that she said, like the Apostle Paul said in Romans 10, 10, that for with the heart one believes and is justified and with the mouth one confesses and is saved. Rahab believed in her heart. She confessed with her mouth. She's on the way to being saved, right? Look at verse 12. So she goes on, now then please swear to me by the Lord that as I've dealt kindly with you, you also will deal kindly with my father's house and give me a sure sign that you will save alive my father, my mother, my brothers and sisters and all who belong to them and deliver our lives from death. Isn't that sweet? That is a heart of a woman to be taking care of all the people around her, for sure. Now, before I finish this chapter, I wanna take a pause, a rather longish pause, and I wanna share a little bit of a theory that I have with you about why this is in here. I don't get to be part of every one of your discussion groups, so this is my turn to share what the Lord has shown me in scripture. So in order to do it, I need to talk about a little bit of Bible history, so hang with me, it's gonna be okay. Our English Bible, our Old Testament, is generally divided into five categories. We have the law, we have history, prophets, major and minor prophets, and we have poetry, okay? In Jesus's day, by the time the Old Testament was put together, there was three divisions. You can organize things any way you want. Same content, it was just organized differently. The law, the prophets, and the scriptures. Jesus even said on the Emmaus Road, after he had been resurrected and was talking to his disciples, he even said, everything written about me in the law of Moses, the prophets, and he called it the Psalms, must be fulfilled. Okay, so three divisions. Okay, here's my little theory. That at the beginning of each one of these divisions, that God takes time to reach out for a bride. Okay, the law of Moses, it starts with Genesis. And before the program really gets going with the people of Israel, in Genesis chapter 24, we have this long narrative, 67 verses, where God reaches out for Rebekah and brings her into the story of redemption. That's awesome. Then the next division of scripture is the prophets, which begins with the book of Joshua in the Hebrew Bible. And before we get going with the people of God being united with the promises of God, we've got this longish sort of narrative where God reaches out by divine appointment to bring a bride back, to include her in the story of redemption. Not literally back, but literally in the story of redemption because you went to Matthew 1.5, right? What did you find in Matthew 1.5? That Salmon, the father of Boaz, by Rahab, she was included in the story of redemption because even in the Old Testament, people who believed in their heart and confessed with their mouth were brought in to God's kingdom. Okay, third division of the Old Testament is the Psalms or the scriptures. It begins with the Psalms, that's the largest book, and then it goes on from there. But before you get into the Psalms, there's just this little tiny prelude or that we have this longish prelude because the very first book before the Psalms is Ruth, where we see God reach out for a bride to include her in the story of redemption. Also in that same verse in Matthew 1.5, it says that Boaz, the father of Obed, by Ruth. Now, I just think that that's kind of precious to me. We have Rebekah, Rahab, and Ruth as a preface to every division in the Old Testament where God is bringing in a bride into the story of redemption. And I think to myself, where are we on the timeline of God's story of redemption? What are we waiting for? There's only one thing left, and that is Jesus to return for his bride. And so we have this longish prelude right now that we're living in where God is collecting a bride. You, me, everyone. And the three R's of redemption here, Rebekah, Rahab, and Ruth, look at all the variety. an Amorite prostitute, Ruth the Moabitess, it's just sweet to, as a reminder, this is God's plan, this is his program. Just want to share that, we're getting right back into the story of Rahab now. Verse 14, and the man said to her, our life for years, even to death, if you do not tell this business of yours, and when the Lord gives us the land, we will deal kindly and faithfully with you. And then she let them down by a rope through the window for her house was built into the city wall so that she lived in the wall. And she said to them, go out in the hills, hide three days, and then I'm sure you'll be good to go. And so as the men were beginning to leave, they began to devise a plan to give her to distinguish her home from all the other homes. And of course, what do they know from their history of distinguishing? But the Passover night, where all the Israelite homes were distinguished by the blood of the Passover lamb over the lentils. And so they come up with something very similar to that. And they say to her, verse 18, you shall tie this scarlet cord in the window through which you let us down, and you shall gather into your house, your father, mother, brothers, and all your father's household. And if anyone goes out the doors of the house into the street, his blood is gonna be on his own head, and we shall be guiltless. She agreed to all of it, and verse 21 ends by saying, and she tied the scarlet cord in the window. And then the whole chapter ends by these spies coming back, and verse 24, they say to Joshua, truly, Jehovah has given all the land into our hands. Good spy report. And also, all the inhabitants of the land melt away because of us. So it worked just the way Joshua had hoped, a good report from them. And they came back, and they encouraged Joshua, because obviously, he needed courage. It's always, we need courage. It's always such a beautiful thing when someone will come alongside us to bring encouragement, to help bolster our courage. So I wanna show you a quote from Billy Graham, and I think that this is good on a lot of levels. He said, do not ask for fears to be removed. Ask for courage equal to the fears. Courage is contagious. When a brave man or woman takes a stand, the spines of others are often stiffened. Two things about that that are so good. First of all, we all ask for our fears to be removed. We're all guilty of that. I like that he said, no, don't ask for your fears to be removed. Ask for courage equal to your fears. That's a good new spin on it. And then the other thing is, when you see someone else have courage, it strengthens us as well. So three takeaways from this chapter. First one is this. God is into salvaging people. A little insight about Rahab, I think is for the purpose of reminding us, God is into salvaging people. The only requirement, believe in your heart and confess with your mouth. And there's salvation there. Second takeaway, God is into divine appointments. And this passage gives us such a good reminder about divine appointments that we should be prepared for. Look at all the good things that happened in this divine appointment. Well, first of all, Joshua, or I'm sorry, the spies themselves were spared. They were saved. Second of all, Rahab and all of her family were saved from destruction. The third thing, the spies got insight into the emotional climate of the town. And so they knew that they were fearful. And so then they were able to come back and fourthly, encourage Joshua. And so lots of good things happened from this divine appointment. We need to be open to divine appointments. I would prefer divine appointments like this one, where the person that I am all of a sudden in contact with just starts telling me everything they know about God. And I say, yep, you're absolutely right. Let's pray and you'll get saved. But I just think that that's so sweet in here that this divine appointment, they didn't have to evangelize. God did all the work. And for us to be watching for those areas that God is doing his work. Thirdly of all, God is into extending courage. Courage, dear heart. When God told Joshua, I will be with you wherever you go. That sounded a lot like when Jesus said to the disciples, I will not leave you as orphans, I will come to you. Sounds a lot like the writer Hebrews said, I will never leave you or forsake you. God is into encouraging us. And we have the privilege, just like Lucy, to cry out for that encouragement, to ask the Holy Spirit, if ever you loved me, I need a word of courage right now. I need to know that you're with me. I need that encouragement. And you know what? He never gets tired of us asking. We never have to say, I know I asked you, last week, or I asked you five minutes ago. He never gets tired. His response is always ready with courage, dear heart. So I just want to end with a Psalm, because I like the Psalm 27, 13, and 14.

Father, that's our prayer, that you would do a work in us where we actually let you in, where we let you encourage our hearts and build up our faith and just take courage in who you are, the fact that you are with us. Nothing can separate us from the love of God. Lord, if there's any here that are in that dark place of panic and thinking it will never change, it will never get better, I pray that there's something in this lesson that will resonate and that they will, just like Lucy, feel just a little better, even though the darkness is still there. Lord, that's what we receive from you, but we need to let our hearts take courage. So help us in that, Lord God. You are the strong one, we are the weak ones. Our desire is to walk the path of promise by faith, and we thank you that you have reached out to us, drawn us in to your story of redemption. In Jesus' name, amen. ♪ We esli swift and truely torque ♪ That love and truth and righteousness ♪ All through God's holy love ♪ All through God's holy love