The Memorial Stones: Reminders of God's Faithfulness

Hello and welcome to the Middletown Baptist Church podcast, where we are proclaiming the truth to the world.

My name is Pastor Josh, and I want to thank you for listening to this podcast.

I hope that this podcast can be a blessing to you and strengthen you in the word of God.

Now come along, let's look into the Bible and see what God has for us here today.

Joshua, chapter four.

Now, to understand Joshua, chapter four, we have to know where we've come from and where we're going.

And so where we come from.

Well, in Joshua, chapter one, God gave a promise to Joshua, and by way of extension, it was a promise to the whole nation of Israel.

And that promise was that he would take them to the promised land.

And so God made a promise early on there to Joshua.

And he says, joshua, this is what I promised to you.

Don't fear, don't be dismayed, don't quit.

But he tells Joshua the hope that he has.

And the hope really was this.

Here's the promise, here's my presence.

When God makes a promise to us in our life, he doesn't just promise us the end, he promises us the end, but also that he will be with us through it, through the ups and through the downs.

And sometimes when God makes us a promise, it doesn't immediately come to pass.

Sometimes there's going to be ups and downs, difficulties, struggles, temptations.

And God could promise us a lot of different things, but he promises us his presence.

You go back to Joshua, chapter one, verse nine.

He says, have not I commanded thee?

Be strong and of a good courage.

Be not afraid, neither be thou dismayed, for the Lord thy God is with thee, whithersoever thou goest.

And oftentimes we just skim over the fact that God is with us.

And the presence of God is a real thing.

But folks, that is the greatest thing that we can take.

Solitude as a Christian is that even though I'm going through a difficulty, God is with me through this.

He's carrying me through this.

The Bible tells us in the Book of Hebrews that Jesus is our high priest, but he's also the one who knows our infirmities.

He's been there.

He's gone through all the pain and struggle that we've gone through, but he overcame that struggle, as the Bible says, yet without sin.

And because of that, we know that we have that person who is going to be with us and carry us through those struggles.

But then he doesn't just promise his presence, even though that would be enough, but he promises his power in our lives.

So as God gives us a promise, for the Israelites, it was to get to the promised land, to cross the Jordan river, to have victory over their enemies.

But when God gives that promise, he says, hey, I'm going to be with you through it.

And I'm also going to give you the power to overcome the enemy.

I'm going to give you power to overcome your fear, as brother Toby talked about here this morning.

And so even in the Great Commission, if you go back to Matthew chapter 28 and you read those last verses in Matthew chapter 28, remember what Jesus promised.

He says, okay, here's your marching orders and I'm going to be with you.

He says, lo, I am with you alway, so I'm with you always, even to the end of the world.

And then he goes on to say, it's my power that you're going to receive as you do the work of the ministry.

And so when God makes a promise to us, he's making us a promise of his presence and also the promise of his power.

And even in that, we know that it's the promise of his provisions.

He's going to give us everything that we need in the midst of the work that we're doing for Him.

And so what does that look like?

Well, that doesn't mean that God gives us everything that we want.

One commentator said it this way.

He doesn't give us our greed to give us our.

He gives us our needs.

And In Philippians, chapter 4, verse 13, I can do all things through.

Christ means this as God's called me to do something.

If he's given me a situation in my life, he's going to give me the power to.

To do the thing that he has called me to do.

So remember, the promise there for Joshua was this, you're going to go to the promised land.

But what was the issue?

The immediate obstacle to the promise was there's this big river in front of us and we've got to cross this river.

And they had to cross not just three or four people, they had to cross a whole nation across that river.

By the way, there's enemies on the other side.

And sometimes that's what's going to happen in our lives.

God's going to make a promise and we're going to be very confirmed in that promise.

We're going to.

We're gonna even believe in that promise.

We're gonna have faith, we're gonna have strength, we're gonna have his presence, we're gonna have his power.

And then we get right up to the Jordan river, and we go, wait.

I thought it was gonna be easy.

But those obstacles come.

So what do we do when the obstacles come?

Well, we see what happens.

Joshua turned his heart to the Lord, Joshua turned his eyes to the Lord, and he says, hey, we're gonna move in faith, get the ark ready.

We're gonna walk across, and God's going to split the Jordan river, and we're gonna walk across.

And that's exactly what happened.

That's what we looked at last week.

Joshua, chapter three.

The obstacle came, Joshua, and he led the people through in faith.

And they watched the ark of the covenant go before them, and they made it through.

And there was this awesome time where we see unity.

Even remember, there were three tribes that didn't need to cross the river.

They were already secure in the land that God had promised.

But because of unity and because of the fact that they wanted to help their brothers and sisters, they went across as well to fight these battles with them.

And so that's where we pick up in Joshua chapter four.

That's where we've been.

So we saw the promise.

We saw God's power in his presence.

We saw the obstacle, and we saw their trust in the Lord, and we see that miracle happen.

So the miracle for them was the Jordan river opening, and there was dry land, and millions of the Israelites walked through.

The Jews walked through.

That's a miracle.

And that's easy for us to look at and say, well, I've never seen a river part in front of me.

I've never had the Red Sea open.

I've never seen God send out manna from the sky.

But, folks, I think oftentimes we look at Old Testament miracles and even New Testament miracles, and we forget to think about the miracles that God has given us in our own lives.

And what miracle do we start with?

Well, we start with salvation, right?

Think about just what it is in salvation that God would take a wretched sinner in darkness who does not deserve salvation, who does not deserve grace, who does not deserve heaven, and give us the opportunity to go from darkness into marvelous light.

Folks, your salvation is a miracle in itself.

It's a beautiful thing.

And think about all the different things that come along with those miracles that God has blessed us with in our life.

And so oftentimes, we are willing to give God the glory in the middle of the miracle right there.

There's no doubt in my mind as the Israelites are crossing over the Jordan River.

They're.

They're.

They're.

Chanting, they're shouting, they're giving praise to God because right then, then and there, the miracle is so evident to them.

I talked a little bit about this last week when talked about when we pulled our children aside after our car accident a few years ago, and we said, guys, it's a miracle that none of you have bruises on you.

It's a miracle that we're okay.

And so in that moment when we're sitting on our living room floor, it was easy for us to perceive the power and the blessing of God.

It was so easy.

But you know what?

After that miracle, after days and months and years go along, sometimes it's tempting for us to forget the goodness of God and his miracles.

And so what chapter four is all about is them making a memorial so that they wouldn't forget about the power of God and so that the next generations would not forget about the power and the promise of God.

And so here it is, in verse number one, it says, and it came to pass when all the people were clean passed over Jordan, that the Lord spake unto Joshua saying, take you 12 men out of the people, out of every tribe of man, and command ye them saying, take you hence out of the midst of Jordan, out of the place where the priest feet stood firm, 12 stones, and you shall carry them over with you and leave them in the lodging place where ye shall lodge this night.

So what does he tell them?

Well, God tells Joshua to tell the people, I need one man from each tribe to take a large stone out of the Jordan river where it's dry now, where the water's about to crash in, and put it as a memorial for a purpose.

We're going to talk about that purpose here in a few moments.

Now, I think there's a lot that we could glean just from that verse.

Take you 12 men out of the people.

This speaks of the unity, right?

Because though they're one nation, there's 12 tribes.

And sometimes we are tempted to think that God's miraculous work is just for us, or maybe just for somebody else.

But God's work is a work for his people, meaning this.

When other people have a victory, when other people have a miracle, that's a miracle and a victory for us, right?

As a believer.

And if you're a believer, my miracle is a victory in my life.

But in extension, it's a miracle for all of us as believers.

We're a family of God, we're the body of Christ, and oftentimes we selfishly get to a place in our life.

Where we almost are in a place of covetousness against someone else who is seeing the blessing of God in their life.

I had an opportunity to speak to pastor John's new church down there, and I told someone, I said I had the freedom to kind of preach and then leave so I can say whatever I want to say and let him deal with it when I go.

So I told him, look, the reality is this.

If someone else in the church is having joy and success, celebrate that.

Because you would want them to celebrate your success.

You would want them to celebrate God's hand in your life.

And so here, I believe it's a picture of all the tribes coming together in unity as one, saying, we're all going to celebrate this.

And by the way, there were tribes that didn't need to cross the river.

Remember those three tribes, but yet it was still a memorial for them.

Why?

Because this is a work of God in all of our lives.

So as pastor Carlos mentioned here, we should celebrate God's work at Middletown Baptist Church.

Hey, when people get baptized, when people join the church, when people give a testimony of God's work, don't look at it and go, well, why didn't I get that to happen for me?

Why didn't people clap as loud for me when I got baptized?

No, it's about celebrating what God is doing in all of our lives.

And that's what we see here.

They're gonna bring together these memorial stones.

What an amazing thing this really is.

And so each tribe was to send a representative to take a stone from the dry riverbed of the river Jordan, and they're gonna do this to set up a memorial.

Verse 4.

Then Joshua called the twelve men whom he had prepared of the children of Israel out of every tribe of man and Joshua.

So, by the way, there's obedience there.

Joshua was obedient to God.

God tells him to do this.

He immediately obeys.

Verse 5.

And Joshua said unto them, pass over before the ark of the Lord your God into the midst of Jordan and take you up, every man of you a stone upon his shoulder according to the number of the tribes, of the children of Israel.

And then he's going to give the purpose, he's going to give the reason.

Because this would be a strange thing to ask.

Like, hey, guys, go grab a bunch of stones.

They could be like, joshua, we got Jericho ahead of us.

Why are you worried about these stones?

Because God has told us to do this.

There's some times in our life where we have to stop and be sensitive.

To what God has for us, even if it doesn't make sense, even if it doesn't kind of jive with the understanding of what we have before us.

There should be times and places where we just stop and praise God.

That's why we do testimonies on Sunday nights.

There's a lot of things that we could do in place of that.

I could preach longer.

Some of you were like, no, no, no, no, no.

I could just replace that and just preach longer.

We could sing more songs, which, that's fine.

But I do believe there's a time and a place for us to proclaim the goodness of God publicly.

And so we need to understand that there are things just that we need to be still and know that God is God.

Let the redeemed of the Lord say so.

And so that's what they're doing here.

They're giving a testimony to the work of God.

So he says, let's do this.

And he says in verse six, why we're doing this?

And sometimes God gives us a why.

And those are great.

Those are great moments when God gives us the why, says that this may be a sign among you.

So for them specifically, that when your children ask their fathers in time to come, saying, what mean ye by these stones?

Then ye shall answer them that the waters of Jordan were cut off before the ark of the covenant of the Lord.

When it passed over Jordan, the waters of Jordan were cut off.

And these stones shall be for a memorial unto the children of Israel forever.

So he says this.

It's to remind you, to remind your children and the next generations what God has done.

So we could stop there right now and we could say, okay, there it is.

That's really the goal for this specific story, to remember what God has done and to tell other people, specifically our families and our friends and the next generation how God has done this amazing, amazing work.

And so he says, for you to remember now, the temptation would be for us to think, how could anybody ever forget the time that they came up to the Jordan river and God opened that Jordan River?

It's the same people that forgot that the Red Sea was open and started questioning God.

It's the same people that forgot that God sent manna and they got tired of that and they wanted more.

The same people that complained, now we not.

We.

Let me not throw you under the bus.

I sometimes question, how do these people not see the hand of God working?

Come on.

I mean, if I saw God sending down food from the sky and doing all this work and opening The Red Sea and doing these things and leading us by day, by a cloud and by fire, by night.

How could I ever doubt?

I would never doubt if I was them.

Folks, I'm gonna tell you this, and you might not wanna hear this, but we would doubt.

Why?

Because we're humans.

Because God has already proven to us miracle after miracle.

And then we still struggle because that's the reality of things.

And the Bible says something very amazing in the New Testament.

The Bible says, and there's a guy named Peter.

You guys all know Peter.

Think about the things that Peter saw.

Peter saw Jesus walk on water.

Peter got to walk on water.

Peter got to be at a place called the Mount of Transfiguration.

And he saw Jesus in his glorified state.

And just.

It was an amazing experience.

You know what Peter says later on?

He says, you as the believer, have a more sure word of prophecy in the complete revealed word of God.

Now, that's hard for us to understand because we say, well, Peter saw all these great works and wonders.

And he says we have a more sure word.

Yes.

He says that because we have the Word of God before us, we have every reason to go back and see the great works of God because we've seen the whole story.

This is the complete word of God.

And so therefore, we can look at instances in our life as confirmation as we should.

But we also can look back at thousands and thousands of years of history to see that God has worked throughout history, history with his people, and he's always faithful.

So do we doubt?

Yes, we forget.

I remember big days of my life.

Some of you remember your big days.

I would say, like, a big day for me was my.

My wedding.

That was a huge day for me.

I was super nervous.

I remember getting up there and not knowing what to say.

I was worried I was gonna mess up my vows.

I was worried I was gonna lock my legs and fall over.

I had all these fears in my mind as I was going into that day.

And you know what?

I cannot remember anything that the pastor said on that day.

But I still know I'm married, right?

I was there, but I can't remember the words that were said.

Why?

Because it's hard to remember.

We're humans, we're limited in our knowledge.

But the day my children were born, I remember those days, but I don't remember every element of those days.

I don't necessarily remember everything I ate that day.

I don't remember exactly what happened on every little thing.

And so what happens is that so often we have these big radio revelatory moments with God, and we see God's hand working.

But then we're tempted to doubt, and then we're tempted to get to a place of a lack of faith.

And we're tempted to demonstrate, whether we know it or not, demonstrate to the next generation that maybe God isn't faithful.

Maybe God isn't gonna keep his word this time, and we act that way.

And that's exactly what he says here.

He's warning against.

He says, remember, remember.

And so the purpose of the memorial was so that the people of Israel could remember themselves the miracle of God and so that they could teach their children and their grandchildren and their great grandchildren the great things that God had done so that the work of God would not be forgotten in future generations.

And I think that's exactly what we need to do within our church, within our homes, within our country, to explain to the next generation that God is good, that God is faithful, and recall those things that God has done in our lives to our children who, whether they know it at that moment and the importance of it or not.

You know what some people say?

Well, you know, does Silas really understand.

Silas is not even two years old.

Does Silas really understand the Bible lesson that you're doing with him?

I don't think Silas is comprehending justification and sanctification and propitiation and all the other Asians.

Okay?

But if a child is raised in the nurture and admonition of the Lord, he or she will not know the difference.

Like, that's the truth that they're grounded in.

Not everyone got that opportunity to be that way.

But that's not an excuse for us to miss the next generation.

At Middletown Baptist Church, unapologetically, we want to display to our children, to our grandchildren, to our great grandchildren, maybe someone in here.

Great, great grandchildren, the idea of who God is and what he has done for us.

You know, there's a lot of things that we could pass along to our children.

And I'm going to be very careful when I say this, because there are things that are not necessarily biblical that we should pass along to our children.

But sometimes we spend more time on tradition than we do with the actual gospel message.

Now, by the way, I think it's great to teach children tradition of different things.

Okay?

I'm not against tradition, but when we elevate things that don't matter for eternity higher than the things that do matter, we are flipping our priorities.

I think we should.

Some of you that have children in this room, I think we should account for the things that God has done for our lives, small and big.

Tell your kids their salvation story.

Now, some of you say, I don't have kids in the home anymore.

You might have grandkids that come over or that you face time or that you spend time around.

But hey, if you don't have anyone in your home that's a child, guess what?

We've got a bunch of little children at Middletown Baptist Church that are running around here.

You know, some people, good, bad or indifferent, they're running around, okay?

And sometimes it's tempting to look at those children as inconveniences or burdens or anything.

Like, hey, they're in the way, or, hey, we gotta teach them this, or, hey, they're doing this, and they're this and this and this and okay, there's a lot of things we can think about them.

Or we could biblically see the young people, teenagers, children, the nursery, as the next generation of the Gospel of Jesus Christ in the ministry.

Who knows who's here?

Who knows?

We have a future missionary, a future pastor, a future whatever, but God is going to use the next generation.

But what we have to do is we have to display the work of God before them by what we say and by what we do.

And so we often fail in our trust in God because we forget about the great things that God has done for us.

And when we do that, our children pick up and our grandchildren, the next generation, pick up.

Weak faith, a lack of faith.

And they've never been told how great God is, or they never seen a miracle happen in their life.

And then what happens is it's not real for them.

And then we question why a young person leaves church when they turn 18.

There's a lot of factors on why a person might leave church, okay?

And I'm not saying that the only factor is that we haven't demonstrated the truth of God to them.

But what I am saying is that we need to do everything that we possibly can on the side of the church to display to the young people that are coming up authentic Christianity.

Authentic Christianity.

Not, hey, look this way, but behind the scenes, do this or be a certain way in front of certain people.

But over here, you can do what you want to do.

No, to be authentically across the board, sold out for Jesus Christ.

That's tough, especially if you have kids in the home, because they'll see you at church, but they'll also see you at home.

And my kids will look right through me if I'm a certain way at church and a certain way at home.

The reality is that that's a good reminder for us to continue on preaching the gospel not just from where we're at in our pews or from the pulpit, but in every element of our life.

Because our children and our next generation is watching.

And I'll tell you this just by way of experience.

Young people are better at reading through the falsehoods and the mask.

Sometimes they're willing to see and they're ready to see different people that are inconsistent.

Like, my kids pick up my inconsistencies all the time.

Dad, didn't you say that we shouldn't worry about this?

Didn't you say we're supposed to do this?

They know the rules.

They're on it.

And the reality is, for us, instead of getting upset with them and saying this, and maybe some of you have heard this before, well, do as I say, not as I do.

Right?

Don't do that.

It should be within the church.

The young people should look at the mature Christians and say, that's who I want to be.

I want to be Brother so and so, who looks so joyful every time he's in church.

I want to be like, Ms.

So and so, who teaches my class and is so excited every single day, even if two people show up to our Sunday school class.

You know what?

You know, one of the major reasons why I'm a pastor today, there's a lot of reasons, but one reason was my pastor looked like he was having the best time of his life.

That I'm like, that's.

I want to be that.

I want to do what he's doing now.

He didn't get up before the church and tell everybody, well, you know what?

I'm really miserable.

I mean, I'm sure maybe there were days where he was miserable, but the truth is that he loved the Lord enough to show the love of Christ to me as a young man.

And I was excited for that, and I wanted to be that way.

So what I say is this.

If children are walking around our midst, our church, our ministries, and they see people who won't, who don't have the joy of the Lord, who don't have the passion for the gospel, who aren't living, as the book of Joshua says, with courage, with boldness for the gospel, guess what the next generation is going to look like?

They're going to look exactly the way that we are.

And if we expect the next generation to carry the torch, guess what the implication for that is?

That we are carrying the torch.

We can't pass it on to anybody else if we haven't allowed ourselves to take the torch and run with it.

So what does he say here?

He says, remember, tell your next generation.

Especially in times of emptiness, especially in times of doubt, we need to remember the great things that God has done.

Like I said before, in the moment of the miracle, it's easy to understand God's greatness.

It's easy to give him praise.

It's more difficult to give him praise and glory in the midst of the drought, in the midst of the famine.

But that's all the more reason why we need to preach the truth in the midst of those difficult times.

Because the next generation, the world, needs to see that we are real about what we believe in the good, in the plenty and in the difficult and in the famine times.

And there's going to be famine times, there's going to be empty times, there's going to be the highs and the lows, the circumstantial highs and the circumstantial lows.

But what we need to do is, as Christians say this, hey, look, God is good.

God has been faithful.

And we need to tell other people about that.

So he goes on to say in verse nine, and Joshua set up the 12 stones in the midst of Jordan, in the place where the feet of the priests which bear the ark of the covenant stood, and there, and they are there unto this day.

So it's a simple lesson that we see in the first nine verses here in Joshua chapter four, is to give glory to God in the midst of the miracle, in the midst of God keeping His word.

But to remember in the times when we're tempted to doubt, that God is going to keep his word, that God has kept his word, that he is faithful.

And there's many passages that we could look at in the New Testament to cross reference this, but one that I think is applicable is in Hebrews chapter 10.

If you want to turn there with me, we can.

Hebrews chapter 10.

And I think that there's a lot to be said about trusting in the faithfulness of God, because God has called us to be faithful.

But the reality is that we will always fall short in our faithfulness.

So what do we do when we stumble?

What do we do when we're tempted to doubt?

Well, the Bible very clearly tells us what to do in this time, when we're tempted to doubt, when we're tempted to question, when we're tempted to let go.

And we'll start in Hebrews chapter 10 and let's look at verse number 19.

We'll just go right down through this to verse number 25.

This portion of Hebrews chapter 10 speaks of holding fast to the faith or being faithful to what we believe in.

And it says, having therefore, brethren, boldness to enter into the holiness holiest by the blood of Jesus, by the way, the only way that we can have access to God and access to his promises and access to his power and his provisions and his presence is through Jesus Christ.

We know that there's one way.

And I said this morning, as I was preaching to Pastor John's church, I said unapologetically, the Gospel needs to be presented in every single setting.

I believe that.

I mean, I don't care if I'm preaching the book of Joshua or the book of Genesis or any New Testament book.

The Gospel needs to be there.

Why?

Because we all need to hear the gospel.

I can't assume that someone's a believer.

And even if they are a believer, sometimes as believers, we need to be reminded of the Gospel.

We need to be reminded of what we've been saved from.

We need to be reminded how we've been saved.

And so what does it say here?

It says the only way that we can access God, the only way that we can have this confidence, the only way that we can come boldly into the throne of grace, is, as it says here, through the blood of Jesus Christ, through his sacrifice, says by a new and living way, which he in verse 20 says this, which he hath consecrated for us through the veil, that is to say, his flesh.

And having an high priest over the house of God, let us draw near with a true heart in full assurance of faith.

The Bible says that once we understand what Jesus Christ has done for us and who he is as our Savior, we can, as it says in verse number 22, draw near with a true heart, with an honest heart, with an authentic heart, and full assurance of faith.

Having our hearts sprinkled from an evil conscience and our bodies washed with pure water.

This speaks of how we can stand before God, how we can draw close to him, as the Bible tells us in James chapter four, draw near to God and what he will draw near to us.

It's speaking of that personal relationship that we can have with God.

And so I'm speaking here about those times in which we're tempted to doubt, which we're tempted to quit, which we're tempted not to have faith.

It says, draw closer to Him.

But usually what happens is our default mode is that when we're tempted to doubt.

We pull away.

Why we do that?

Well, we do that because we're fleshly flawed human beings.

And so sometimes the temptation is to.

As God is doing things in our life or allowing things to happen in our life that we don't understand.

And instead of getting closer to him and wanting to know more about who he is, we pull away.

Because we say, well, you know what?

If God loves me, he wouldn't let this happen.

And, you know, if that person did this to me, maybe God doesn't love me.

And we pull away.

But he says it's actually the opposite.

In the times of difficulty, we grow closer to him and understand that full assurance of faith.

And then he goes on to say this in verse 23, let us hold fast.

Let us hold on to the profession, our faith, without wavering.

Why?

For he is faithful that promised.

For he is faithful that promise.

So it's not about me being more faithful.

So, like, I could get here tonight and say, okay, guys, how many of you are perfectly faithful, perfectly faithful to God in every way?

Most of us would be like, well, I mess up here and there, and we would be honest, and that's okay, I mess up too.

So what do we do with that?

Well, what I sometimes grew up with, and at least I had the understanding of, is I would get up from the service and leave and think, well, guess what?

The guy told me to be more faithful and I'm gonna try harder.

But guess what?

I failed the next day.

Oh, man, I just need to try more.

I need to try more.

I need to try more.

It's not about trying to be faithful more.

It's clinging to the One who is faithful.

That's what it says here.

It says, for he is faithful that promised.

Meaning this.

I don't try to look to myself for confidence and assurance in my faith.

I look to him who is faithful.

And that's what brings me an opportunity to be faithful to Him.

And when I stumble, I turn to Him.

When I sin, I turn to Him.

When I doubt, I turn to Him.

The answer is always to turn to him and to grow in our understanding of him so that he can reveal to us the answer.

And sometimes God is not going to give us the why.

Some of us know that.

Some of us are living in that right now.

Lord, I know that you did this.

I know that you are good.

I know that you want what's best for me.

But I don't understand the why.

And sometimes we don't get the why.

And that's a struggle.

But what do we do?

We don't say, well, God, I don't love you until you give me the why, what do we do?

It says it right there to be trust in the one who is faithful and know that God is going.

And God does make all things right.

And I believe one day we will have those answers.

I believe that God is going to make everything make sense to us one day.

But until that day, we trust in the one who is faithful.

Again, in that Hebrews passage, it speaks of how that looks within the fellowship.

It says, forsake not the assembling of ourselves together.

That's always the verse that you hear preach about church attendance, which is true.

But again, church attendance doesn't equate what the Bible says there in that case, because we could all attend church.

But what does it say?

It says, and let us consider what one another, verse 24 to provoke unto love and to good works.

The reason we assemble is to provoke one another to love and good works, to stir up one another to love and good works.

That's exactly what Joshua is talking about, to stir up the next generation to follow God.

And then it goes on to say that it's not forsaking the assembling of ourselves together, as the manner of some is, but exhorting.

That word.

Exhorting is an amazing word.

It's talking about challenging and encouraging at the same time, but also walking alongside of someone in the midst of that challenge and encouragement, not just to push them, but to carry them through and to walk through with them.

And so it says, this is what we're supposed to do.

But exhorting one another.

And so much the more, as you see the day approaching, meaning this, the whole purpose in being faithful to God is to honor and glorify him and then to come together and then stir one another up to do the same thing.

So the way that the Bible teaches it is this.

My Christian life should stir others up to love him more.

My love for Christ should be contagious.

My service for God should be contagious.

And not for the simple fact of, well, I want people to follow me.

But no, as Paul says, follow me as I'm following Christ.

So the major point would be this.

I want God wants Middletown Baptist Church to be a church that is so excited for what God is doing in remembering what he has done, trusting in what he will do and resting in what he's doing right now, so that the next generation can say, that's what I want.

I want the type of faith that Mr.

So and so has, man, he's here every day and he's in his place.

I've seen that guy serving there at that place for 30 years.

I want to be Mr.

So and so.

And a lot of times the people that are in like people behind the pulpit get a lot of praise.

That's just the reality of things.

But folks, it's the people that are doing ministry that aren't always noticed that are going to make a lasting impact in certain individuals lives.

Sunday school teachers, your job, your ministry is so vital.

Children's ministry workers, your job is so vital.

Nursery workers, your job is so vital.

Why?

Because those children are looking at you.

For some, that's the only Jesus that they're getting in the week.

They're coming on a Wednesday night.

They don't go to a school that teaches them about Jesus.

Maybe their home isn't about Jesus.

And they're coming.

And that's the representation of the love of Jesus.

That's a huge responsibility, but it's an awesome opportunity to pass on the next generation the truths of Jesus Christ.

Are we going to be perfect in this?

Of course not.

But our heart needs to be this not so to be so intentional, to not allow ourselves to get into that.

What we would call a spiritual rut.

Spiritual apathy.

It's so easy to go through the motions.

That's what the book of Joshua was warning the Israelites against.

He says, don't get into that spiritual rut where you forget to tell your children what God did for you, but by getting you through the Jordan River.

And let us not get into that spiritual rut where we forget about telling other people what God has done for us.

It's easy to be bitter, it's easy to complain, it's easy just to kind of go numb.

And I'm guilty of this, and I'm guilty of stirring this up.

Because you know what?

Sometimes I stir up?

Instead of the love and good works, I stir up busyness.

Confession time sometimes for me.

I was always taught in ministry, the busier you are, the more profitable you are for the gospel.

But there's a caveat to that.

If you're busy without the Gospel, if you're busy without the leading of the Spirit, it's just busyness.

Anyone can be busy.

And so the reality is this.

I don't want to stir up busyness and burden and burnout within the church.

Burnout comes through serving without a purpose.

Now there's physical burnout that happens no matter what.

But spiritual burnout Comes from when we serve without a spiritual, eternal purpose in our life.

I'm going to tell you, if you're serving for any reason outside of the spiritual motivation that God has given us, there's going to be a point where we say, it's not worth it anymore.

I don't need to be doing this.

Tell you what.

I worked in children's ministry for a long time.

Alicia and I used to on Wednesday nights.

Remember when we were the game leaders for Patch Club?

Not Patch Club, what was it?

Truth Trackers.

We were the game people for Truth Trackers.

And those were some of the most difficult nights.

Okay.

I'd been working all day, and I got there.

Some of you guys know this.

And we get the game time right?

Kids are like begging for games, and there's kids not following the rules.

And every part of me just wanted to get them in line and yell at them and not be the love of Christ to them.

But the reality is that there were a lot of opportunities in my burnout, in my bitterness, in my apathy that I missed.

Opportunities to be spiritually investing into the next generation.

Some of you might have a ministry within the church.

It might be a children's ministry, it might not be a children's ministry.

But what I will say is this.

Understand that everything that you do for the cause of the Gospel is an investment into another person and ultimately investment into the work of Jesus Christ.

I don't know about you, but the Bible very clearly teaches that there's only a limited amount of time that we have to serve Jesus.

Our children are only going to be children for so long.

Some of you know this.

I'm preaching to the choir.

Not literally, but figuratively.

Some of you know, and you could give a better testimony than me that your children are born and then they're already 18, and then they're already 30.

They're already having kids, and then their kids are having kids.

You understand what I mean by this?

It goes so fast, and if we're not careful, we're going to miss the opportunities.

Same thing goes with our church.

Okay?

Like I said before, you.

You might not have your biological child here, you might not have your biological grandchildren here, but you have an opportunity by God's grace, to be an investment.

Whether you're immediately in the children's ministry or you're just here at the church.

You know, I'm just gonna speak.

My children know more than most people think.

And what I think, they see things.

They look around.

They witness people being in church and not being in church.

And the goal for me as a believer is that I want other people's children to see faithfulness in my life and in my service and in my marriage and in the way that I preach and the way that I serve.

And I think that's all of us.

I think all of us would want that.

But it's the intentional nature of building the stones, right?

Building those memorial stones.

And so I don't think we necessarily have to build, like, a literal memorial stone right here in the front.

But what I would say is this, and this is the lasting challenge that I'm going to leave us with is what is or what are our memorial stones that we are individually setting up in our lives for the next generation and what we're corporately doing within the church?

You say, what?

So what do you mean?

We're supposed to be building monuments?

I don't think it necessarily means a physical monument as much as that might be helpful, actually.

Like, I think it's a good thing to put up Bible verses on a wall so that your children, every morning, they walk by, they see a Bible verse, they leave the house with it, they come in with it.

That's good.

Okay, so there's certain things we can do physically that can be tangible memorial stones for our people.

That's why we put a cross up there.

Hopefully you understand why we.

It's not a fashion statement.

We put a cross up there so that we remember what Jesus did for us on the cross.

And so there's good to that.

But then I think it's a deeper thing, like, what type of spiritual memorial stones are we putting up in our life by the way that we live, by the way that we recall things, by the way that we proclaim things to other people.

What kind of legacy are we leaving for the next generation?

And let's take, like, children out of this.

Let's take it from the bigger perspective.

Let's say God tarries, and there's 100, 200 years, and Middletown Baptist Church is still a thing.

What's the next generation?

What are people in 50 years gonna say about this church?

What are people in a hundred years gonna say about this church?

Well, I don't know.

Maybe they won't remember us.

Let's live in a way that not will they remember us, but they will remember the work of God through us.

So the challenge would be this.

What's our memorial?

What's our memorial stones?

What are we willing to tell the people about?

You say, well, pastor, I really can't point to A lot of things in my life that God's done as a way of miracle.

Well, there's a big problem there.

Number one, you're not perceiving the miracle.

Or number two, you're not relying in faith that he's going to do that work.

You're trying to do the work on your own.

And a lot of times what we do is we get around God and we try to do our own thing.

We try to do it our own way.

And we don't allow these miraculous things to happen in the power of God.

And so we leave off here in Joshua chapter four, there's these memorial stones.

It's a reminder of God's great work.

One of the things that I try to do and I fail on it very often, is I try to write down answered prayers so that I can recall those to my children.

I remember days that when my wife and I first got married, I was teaching at a Christian school.

And some of you don't know what I'm about to say.

Some of you do.

They don't pay Christian school teachers anything.

Okay?

It's like you can't live on it.

It's.

It's not good.

And I remember times in our life when God would just miraculously provide.

And it was like no one could ever.

No one could ever tell me in those moments that God wasn't real, that God wasn't keeping his word.

I mean, we're talking about things.

You've heard all the stories.

We were delinquent in this much money, and that money came through.

I remember a time when I knew that God was calling me to further my education.

I said, lord, I don't have the money for it, but I'm going to do it anyway.

And money came along just at that right time in the right way.

And I'm going to tell you, it's not just about money.

There's times in our spiritual life, just transparently.

There's times in my spiritual life where I've been so broken that I didn't know if I wanted to take the next step forward.

But that's when God steps in.

That's when God's provisions are he gives us just what we need at the right time in the right way and the right place.

Those are miracles.

Some of you have seen physical healing.

That's a miracle.

Some of us haven't.

That doesn't mean that God doesn't love us.

It just means in God's timing, God discerns and decides different things in different ways for miracles.

But what I will tell you is this, let us not forget the great work of God, starting with our salvation, following along with the many works that we have, and pass that on to the next generation.

So we're going to pick up next week looking at what the result of that would be.

They pass over Jordan, the waters of Jordan start flowing, and of course, they do set up those stones and there's more to come, right?

I wish I could tell you that after this, they all go back to the memorial stones every time they go to a battle.

And they always remember.

But some of you know the rest of the story.

Some of you know that there's going to be times when they do trust God in the battles, Battle of Jericho.

There's going to be other times when they don't trust God.

And there's things that happen with that.

There's a whole book of the Bible called the Book of Judges that some of you are familiar with.

They forget what God does, and they have to be reminded in very difficult ways.

And we'll talk more about that as we go along here.

But I think the lesson to the story here this evening is this, God's going to work miracles.

That's an inevitable thing.

Number one, are we going to recognize those miracles in our life?

Number two, are we going to recall those miracles, recount those miracles with those around us?

And are we going to tell the next generation how much of a blessing it is to trust in Jesus Christ?

Paul's last words there to Timothy, if you read 2 Timothy, chapter 4, it's essentially this, stay faithful, preach the word, be ready to go.

Like, that's, that's Paul's last words.

And if anyone knows what it means to be faithful to the end, it's Paul.

So my, my encouragement to you is this, Stay faithful.

But don't forget, in the process of staying faithful, don't forget about the next generation.

You know, oftentimes we live in a defeatist mindset.

We say it this way, maybe you wouldn't say this out loud, and I'm not saying any of us would say this, but culturally speaking, we say this, well, that's the next generation.

That's not my problem.

They'll have to figure that out on their own.

No, it is our problem.

It is our problem.

That's exactly what discipleship is.

And this isn't just about old people to young people.

This is talking about, like, new Christians.

There could be a person in here that's not physically young, but young in their spiritual walk.

And there could be people that are Younger in their years, but mature in their spiritual walk.

So what do we do?

We look for opportunities, not just to pass on the gospel to young kids, even though that's vital, but we look to pass on the gospel to people who are in need.

Just babes in Christ, as the Bible says, give them the milk.

And so what I want you to do.

And again, I can never check you on this, okay?

Only God can.

Well, what my challenge for you would be is this, number one, to recognize the miracles in your life.

Maybe just, I mean, practically speaking, sit down with a notepad or a phone or an iPad or something, a laptop, and type out the miracles that you have experienced in your life, answered prayer, your salvation, testimony, maybe physical things that God has provided, material things that God has provided.

And then look to see how you can profess that to those around you, not in a prideful way, not in a selfish way, but in a way that can invest into the next generation.

And I would encourage you then from there to say this.

Who can I, As Hebrews chapter 10 said, who can I target to provoke unto love and good works?

Who do I want to take under my wing as an individual, who I can sow the truth of God into?

For some people, it might.

It might only be one person you can completely do that with.

But think about if every single person that's a believer could find someone to do that with.

That's what's called the law of multiplication.

That's eventually going to multiply.

And that's really what we're called to do.

And I know that many of us have had someone take us under their wing.

That's an awesome thing.

I look back to some of my disciplers and I'm so thankful.

I'm eternally grateful for some teaching that I received and some examples that I received.

And so I guess the challenge would be for us is to do that to others around us.

And so as we come to the end here at the end of the hour, I just want you to think about that, contemplate that, apply that to your life.

And if you want to know more about how you can actually do that within our church, by the way, that can happen organically.

Discipleship can and actually should happen organically, meaning this.

It should just be the natural outflow of what God is doing in our life.

But at the same time, because it's not the norm in our culture, there are things that we have tried to set up within the church to institute that type of discipleship for the young generation, for adults.

So if you're interested in knowing more, you say like, I really, I really want to do that.

I really want to be someone who is discipling.

Or maybe you're like, I want to be discipled.

No one has ever come alongside of me and said, hey, I walk through with you this.

I'm going to tell you there are people in our church, including myself, including others that I know that would love to walk through with you certain things of scripture, over coffee, over a meal.

And I'm going to tell you that there's opportunities for you within the church.

And so, hey, you know what?

I'll leave it there.

But what I will say is this.

Discipleship is such an important part of ministry that gets overlooked.

And discipleship happens in many different forms.

Corporately, individually, in the home, in the workplace, on the ball field, in the kitchen.

Discipleship can happen anywhere.

So I encourage you to find your place in that path of building those memorial stones for the next generation.

Thank you again for listening to the Middletown Baptist Church podcast.

I hope that this sermon has been a blessing for you.

If you would like to find out more information about our church or this sermon, you can find us at middletownbaptistchurch.org or find us on Facebook or YouTube.

You can also email me directly at Josh Massaro at middletownbaptistchurch.

Com.

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Thank you so much.

God Bless.

Have a wonderful day.