LIFE LESSONS
JOSHUA
21ST ANNIVERSARY
DR. JIM DIXON
JOSHUA 1:1-6, JOSHUA 6:1-5
MARCH 9, 2003
Where is an oasis in the desert northeast of Jerusalem, and in that the oasis is the city of Jericho. It is one of the oldest cities in the world. Archaeologist have carbon dated its ruins to 8,000 BC. The city of Jericho is more than 10,000 years old. Today, Jericho is a strong hold for Yasser Arafat and the P.L.O., but it is only a shadow of its former glory. Jericho reached the zenith of its glory and of its power in the time of Joshua, 3200 years ago because in the time of Joshua, Jericho was a fortress city with a great high wall surrounding the city. Jericho had a king and it had a vast and powerful army. The children of Israel, under the leadership of Joshua, had been called into the Promised Land but first they would have to conquer the fortress city of Jericho.
Now, historians and military strategist tell us that invading armies, when seeking to conquer a fortress city, that historically invading armies have used one of four methods. First there is the method of strangulation. The attacking army will surround the fortress city. They allow no one to go in and no one to go out. They seek to cut off supplies, water, food, and then the attacking army just waits for people in the city to die or surrender. It’s the method of strangulation.
The second method attacking armies used is the method of deception or trickery. Obviously the Greeks, when attacking the city of Troy, using the Trojan horse, used this method of deception. But normally, when an attacking army was seeking to conquer a fortress city, they would have a few of their soldiers go into the city disguised as citizens and they would seek to blend in. Then at the appropriate time, they would overpower the guards at a particular gate, at a particular time, and then open the gates for the invading army to come in. Deception.
The third method invading armies or attacking armies used was the method of germ warfare. Attacking armies would sometimes, when approaching fortress cities, seek to pollute the water supply, if possible, of the fortress city. They would also take catapults, and historians tell us they would launch the carcasses of dead and diseased animals over the walls, seeking to spread disease. That was the third method, germ warfare.
The fourth method was the most common, and it was the method of direct assault. This required a vast army, and it required countless men willing to die. It required what military strategist have called war machines—catapults, battering rams, bores, scaling ladders. It required skilled archers with bows and arrows. Direct assault.
But, you see, when Joshua attacked the city of Jericho, he did not use any of these four methods. He did not use any of these for strategies. I think you will agree this was a strategy unheard of in military history. Never used before. Never used since. They blew trumpets, they marched, they shouted, and the walls came crumbling down. But, you see, it was a “God thing.” God has the power to bring down the walls, and Joshua believed God.
Now, from Joshua this morning we really have one life lesson and that one lesson is this: God wants you to believe that He can bring down walls. I want us, this morning, to take a look at two walls God wants to crumble, two walls that God wants to bring down. First is the wall that separates God and man. There’s a wall that separates got unmanned, and it is vast.
I know all of you have heard of the Great Wall of China. That wall is 2,150 miles long. When you count it’s tangents or its branches, it’s 4,000 miles long with an average height of 20 feet, built over many centuries by many rulers in by many liters. A large section of that wall, about a thousand miles of the Great Wall of China, was built 2,200 years ago by emperor Chin Shi Wang Di and he used 700,000 men over a period of 36 years. But, you see, the Great Wall of China really pale when compared to the Great Barrier Reef.
The great barrier reef off the coast of Australia was not built by man. It was built by tiny marine animals called coral polyps. Coral polyps built this wall. Coral polyps build the Great Barrier Reef. Coral polyps build skeleton-type homes out of calcium carbonate, out of limestone. They build a little skeleton-like homes. They build their homes on top of prior homes. You see, these coral polyps build their little houses upon the top of the houses of their ancestors, and the calcium carbonate just grows. Over a thousand years, scientists tell us, coral polyps can build a wall 3 feet high, but the Great Barrier Reef, according to scientists, is 500,000 years old and it has now reached the height of 200 feet, ten times taller than the Great Wall of China—200 feet high and 1,250 miles long, the Great Barrier Reef. In some ways, it is like the wall that separates God and man because the wall that separates God and man, the Bible tells us, is a wall of sin. It is a wall of sin.
The human race is fallen. Over the passing decades and centuries and millennia, we have sinned—sin upon sin—and the wall has grown, a vast wall separating men and women from a holy God. Each of us individually have sinned, sin upon sin. I have sinned. Sin upon sin. And, you see, there is this wall that separates mankind from God and it is a wall of sin.
This past Wednesday was the first day of lent, the season that leads to Easter. Of course, Wednesday was called Ash Wednesday and perhaps you saw some fellow Christians wearing ashes on therefore head. They may have been Catholics. They may have been Anglicans. They may have been Lutherans, but they went to a minister or priest and received ashes on the forehead. Those ashes worn on Ash Wednesday represent two things. First, they represent humility because we are dust and to dust we shall return. The Bible says, “Dust to dust, ashes to ashes…” But then those ashes on the forehead also represent repentance and forgiveness because the Bible tells us to repent in sackcloth and ashes.
In a sense, I wish that the whole Christian world, that all of us, would wear ashes on our forehead at least one day a year, publicly acknowledging that we are sinners in need of grace and that by God’s grace we have repented and found forgiveness. We live in a world that really doesn’t like to talk about sin. Most of us don’t take sin very seriously. We don’t think our personal sin is particularly great or significant, but the Jewish people understood the gravity of sin. Sin separates us from a holy God.
Of course, the Jews had the temple and before that, the tabernacle. With the temple and the tabernacle, there was the Holy of Holies. It was separated from the people, even from the holy place, separated by a wall, a veil, a partition, a curtain, because inside the Holy of Holies there was a special presence of God, the Shekinah, the Glory of God hovered over the Mercy Seat of the Ark of the Covenant within the Holy of Holies. No one could go in there because of this wall of sin. No one could go in there except for the High Priest on the Day of Atonement, on the day called Yom Kippur. After the 10 days of awe, there came the day called Yom Kippur, the Day of Atonement. The High Priest would make the sin offering. He would make the sin offering and he would sacrifice the animals, the bullock and the goat, he would take the blood of the sin offering into the Holy of Holies, on the other side of the wall, through the curtain, behind the veil, into the presence of God. He would go with fear and trembling with the sin offering and he would sprinkle the blood on the Mercy Seat of the Ark of the Covenant, seeking to atone for the sin of the people. The Day of Atonement.
Then the High Priest word, on the same day, take the scapegoat and he would vest the scent of the people on the scapegoat. Then, in accordance with what is written in the Talmud, he would put a scarlet cord around the head of the scapegoat and that scarlet cord represented the sins of the people and then the scapegoat would be sent into the wilderness called “ah-za-zel” which literally comes from a verb meaning “to be sent away.” It literally means, “Send him away.” Indeed, the scapegoat was sent away, taking the scent of the people with it and sent out into the wilderness. Then the High Priest sat down. The job was done, sin was atoned for.
But the word atonement does not mean forgiven. It means, “covered.” The sins of the people, by the instructions of God we’re only covered for one year. Then they had the Day of Atonement, Yom Kippur, all over again, year after year after year after year. They had to keep coming back, keep making a sin offering, keep sending a scapegoat, trying to cover their sin for one year at a time. The Talmud tells us that the scarlet cord that was tied around the scapegoat… After the scapegoat was put over the cliff out in the wilderness and had come to death, they would take the scarlet cord and they would bring it back to the temple and they would suspend it in front of the temple. Over the course of the year, that scarlet cord would turn from red to white, saying to the people, “though your skins be of scarlet, they will be washed white as snow.” Whether the scarlet cord was bleached white by the sun or whether God was doing something supernatural, we don’t know, but they would suspend the scarlet cord in front of the temple and it would change from red to white. They did this every year.
In the Talmud, there is a section which explains that 40 years before the destruction of Jerusalem by the forces of Titus in 70 A.D., before the Romans destroy Jerusalem in 70 A.D., 40 years before according to the Talmud the scarlet cord place in front of the temple ceased to turn white. It remained scarlet all year, and the people marveled. The sacrificial system was no longer working. Of course, the Talmud was not written by Christians but as Christians we can understand because 40 years before the destruction of Jerusalem was 30 A.D., and that was the time of the crucifixion. You see, with the death of Christ, the sacrificial system ceased because Jesus Christ fulfilled of the Day of Atonement. He filled Yom Kippur. He is the sin offering. He died for the sin of the world. His blood was shed for you, for me, for every human being on the planet. He died for the sin of the world. He is the sin offering. He took the sin offering into the heavenly Holy of Holies which the earthly tabernacle was a mere copy or shadow.
Of course, Jesus is the scapegoat. Our sin has all been vested upon Him. He wore the scarlet cord as the crown of thorns was placed on His head and the blood flowed around His brow. The people shouted, “Send Him away” in Hebrew “azazel.” He was fulfilling Yom Kippur. He was fulfilling the Day of Atonement. Of course, He is the Great High Priest and He sat down at the right hand of the Father. It is done. There need to be no more sin offering, no more scapegoats. The sacrifice has been made. Sins not simply covered but forgiven and eradicated for all who believe in Him. And so, you see we come to Him.
If you’re a Christian, you came to Him. You came to the foot of the cross, recognizing that He is your sin offering, that He is your scapegoat, that He is the High Priest and He has sat down at the right hand of the Father. You’ve come in repentance and confession and you received Him as Savior and Lord and your sin has been forgiven you. Though they are as scarlet, you may have been washed whiter than snow.
If you’ve committed abortion but you’ve come to Him, you’ve been washed whiter than snow. If you’ve abused your children but you’ve come to Him, you’ve been washed whiter than snow. Incomprehensible power in the cross. That doesn’t mean you don’t need counseling. It just means there’s no limit to the power of his forgiveness. God crumbles this wall that separates us from Him. When we come to Christ, the wall falls down. Believe it.
The name Joshua and the name Jesus are identical. Jesus is simply the anglicized form of the Greek word for the Hebrew name Joshua or Yashua. Joshua means, “God saves.” Jesus means, “God saves.” As Joshua was the savior of sorts, Jesus is the savior, and He offers to shatter this wall that separates us from the Father.
Secondly, God wants to destroy the wall that separates us from other people. God wants to destroy the wall that is separating you from other people. So often people are alienated from people. This wall also has to do with sin because we have sinned against other people and other people have sinned against us. Sometimes these things are corporate. An entire group or race of people may have sinned against another group or race of people, as is racism. Sometimes these sins are individual. We’ve done something to somebody, they’ve done something to us, and a wall is formed, a wall of separation, and God wants to bring that wall crashing down.
And so, we have the words of Christ that wherein we have sinned, we are to repent. We are to go to those we have sinned against and we are to confess our sin and repentance. So, we have the council of Christ that we are to be forgiving people. When people come to us asking for forgiveness, we are not to withhold it. We are to be people who forgive. This is the journey we are on in Christ. It is a journey of repentance and forgiveness, that there might always be reconciliation.
I read some time ago the really amazing story of David Fuller. David Fuller was a member of a fraternity. We all know that initiation rites for college fraternities historically have oftentimes been dangerous and even deadly. Certainly, this was true of an initiation rite that David Fuller was involved in. At his college and at his fraternity, and his frat house, the initiation ceremony for the freshman who would join was that they had to go and stand in the road. The members of the fraternity would stand along the side of the road, but the freshman who wanted to join the fraternity had to stand in the middle of the road. Then a member of the fraternity would drive a car towards him. The car would have to get up to 100 mph. When it reached a certain point, which was marked for all to see only then could the freshman dive out of the way. If he scrambled out of the way and panicked too early, he could not join.
Of course, they set this point at such a place where there was time for the freshmen to still get out of the way, though the car was moving 100 miles an hour, but where it would look so scary that it would be hard for the freshman to wait long enough.
David Fuller was already a member of the fraternity, and he was driving the car. He got it up to 100 miles an hour, and he was racing down that road in a straight line. That was his only job. He was just supposed to take the car straight on through, but the freshman sitting in the middle of the road froze. He just panicked and froze. There was no time. There was no time. He just stood there, and David Fuller just drove the car right through him. The freshman died. You might remember it from years ago. It was in the papers. A horrible story.
David Fuller was just devastated, riddled with guilt over a period of time. He was not prosecuted but he bailed out of life. He bailed out of school, dropped out of school, really dropped out of life. He was so riddled with guilt that he didn’t want to live. He did marry and have a child, but he just couldn’t function as a husband or a father. He became an alcoholic. He tried to drown his guilt and booze.
One day, 15 years after the incident, his wife was at work trying to support the family. The child was in school, and David Fuller was at home drinking. The doorbell rang. He went to the door, and a woman stood there. She was older. David Fuller thought, “I’ve seen her somewhere before.” She introduced herself and said that she was the mother of the freshman boy that he had run over in the initiation rite. She started to cry. She said she had just become a Christian. She said, “I have been so hurt, and I’ve allowed my hurt to become hate, and I’ve hated you, but the Lord has convicted me, and I’m here to forgive you. I’m here to forgive you, and also to ask you to forgive me for hating you for 15 years.”
What an amazing story. The truth is repentance and forgiveness is so powerful because, you see, David Fuller’s life radically change from that moment on. When she hugged him and they cried together, it changed his life. God changed his life. That’s the power that we have on this journey if we can learn to repent and forgive. It’s the power.
Some of you may be have seen the movie, With Honors It’s a movie that starts Joe Pesci and Brendan Fraser. And the movie, Joe Pesci plays the part of Simon Wilder, a homeless vagrant who lives in the boiler room of the Harvard University library. He is befriended by a Harvard student, played by Brendan Fraser, named Monty Kessler. As Monty befriends Simon, Simon tells Monty that he’s been homeless since he was fired from his job at the Baltimore shipyard. He was fired because he was always so sick he could no longer work. Simon explains that he had been exposed long-term to asbestos, he had lung cancer, and he is dying. It’s very obvious to Monty that Simon was dying.
Simon explains that 30 years earlier, he had married a gal, and they had a son, and he’d run away. He had abandoned his wife and his son, just abandoned him, 30 years ago. He says his whole life he’s just been riddled with guilt. He said before he died, he wanted to see his son. He wanted to say, “I’m sorry.” He wanted to see what his son looks like. He found out that his son lived on a farm in Maine.
You see, you have a choice. You can choose to forgive or you can withhold forgiveness. God wants to crumble the wall but you must choose to forgive. You can harbor your hurt that has become hate. You can hold onto what the Bible calls a root of bitterness. You can even build a wall. The choice is yours, but God has called his people, Christ has called his people, to be people who forgive, people who repent, people of reconciliation.
As we close, I want to tell you a story. I had a small part in this story. A 20-year-old girl came to me, a young woman, years ago. She came to me and she asked me if I would go with her to the home of her father and be with her as she told her father that she forgave him. Her father had been a minister. He had pastured two different churches and then he had been a teacher at a Christian high school. Her father had had an affair with a student at the high school, and the student was also the family babysitter. As a result of this, the father had left his wife, he had a crisis of faith, and I was happy to go with this 20-year-old young woman to visit him because, you see, her father had been my college roommate. He had come to me and told me of his crisis of faith, and of course, sin that is not repented of produces a crisis of faith.
Over the course of time, he had repented, and he had re-committed his life to Christ. He had written his daughter, as he’d written his other children. He begged for forgiveness with tears in his eyes, but the 20-year-old just couldn’t do it, but now Christ had worked a miracle in her heart. Her father was dying of cancer. She wanted to go to him before he died, and so I went with her. We came to the house, and we knew something was wrong as we approached the door. Just 15 minutes before we arrived, her father had died. His wife, who had been the babysitter, was on the bed screaming for him to wake up.
It was like a scene, in a sense, out of a nightmare. The daughter, with tears in her eyes, turned to walk away. We went back to the car. As we drove, I told her that God was pleased with her, as I believe with all my heart. I told her I was proud of her. I told her she had done the right thing, that she made the right choice and God and heaven knows that she was ready to forgive her dad. I told her what I believe, and I do believe, that her father, having recommitted his life to Christ is in heaven, and I believe Christ has told him that his daughter had to come to forgive him. I believe that.
You see, I think you might be harboring some root of bitterness, some hurt that has become hate, even toward someone who has died. You need, as we’re on this journey with Christ, a journey of repentance and forgiveness, to at least let go of the hate and let go of the bitterness. If possible, before Christ, forgive. You see, this is the call we have. This is the pilgrimage we’re on. It’s powerful. It’s awesome. It’s unbelievable. It may require counseling. It may require therapy. It certainly requires friends and prayer and all of these things, but it’s a journey of repentance and forgiveness and reconciliation.
So, we have these two life lessons really, all built around the fact that God is the one who has power to destroy walls. He wants to destroy the wall that separates us from Him. Jesus is the High Priest. He is a sin offering. He is the scapegoat. Come to Him. He wants to destroy the wall that separates us from each other. If you follow Him, if we follow Him, let’s be people of reconciliation. Let’s look to the Lord of the word of prayer.