Welcome to the Lansdale Life Church podcast.
If you're seeking a closer relationship with Jesus Christ, this podcast is for you.
Thank you for joining us today.
I'm excited to be going through this the next couple months probably and
I did want to jump into the last chapter of Deuteronomy just to cover it a bit.
This last chapter covers the death of Moses, which
You know, I mean we've been reading about Moses for probably six months now
maybe a year and so I would feel so bad to skip over his last moments because what a man of God
Honor him for his life and it really does set up Joshua
Great. So let's read chapter 34 verse 1
Then Moses went up from the plains of Moab to Mount Nebo
To the top of Pisgah, which is a cross from Jericho and the Lord showed him all the land of Gilead as far as Dan
All Naftali and all the land of Ephraim and Manasseh all the land of West Judah as far as the Western Sea
The south and the plain of the Valley of Jericho the city of palm trees as far as or the land
Then the Lord said to him. This is the land of which I swore to give Abraham
Isaac and Jacob saying I will give it to your descendants
I have caused you to see it with your eyes, but you shall not cross over there
so Moses the
Moses the servant of the Lord died there in the land of Moab according to the word of the Lord and
He that is God
God himself
Buried him in a valley in the land of Moab opposite Beth pure, but no one knows his grave to this day
Moses was 120 years old when he died his eyes were not dim nor his natural vigor diminished and
The children of Israel wept for Moses in the plains of Moab 30 days
So the days of weeping and mourning for Moses ended now Joshua the son of Nun was full of the spirit of wisdom
For Moses had laid his hands on him
So the children of Israel heated him and did as the Lord had commanded
But since then there has not arisen in Israel a prophet like Moses whom the Lord knew face to face
In all the signs and wonders which the Lord sent him to do in the land of Egypt
Before Pharaoh before all the servants and in all his land and by all the mighty power and all the great terror
Which Moses performed in the sight of all Israel?
So man, what a legacy
Moses has do you feel like a little like sad we're leaving him behind now. It's like it's over
But I think it's really cool because even though he didn't see the Promised Land
We actually read in the New Testament
Before he gets a new body. He gets to see the Promised Land at the transfiguration
Like how gracious is God that he didn't let him come in physically
But at the transfiguration on the mountain he not only saw the land of Israel
He not only saw Israelites in the future and whatever. I forget, you know 1500 years later. I think it was
1400 years like not even the Israelites but he got to see what he had been waiting for his whole life
Which was the Messiah which is who he had been prophesying about this entire time
Which the one he spoke to face to face in the cloud and the pillar of cloud
He got to see him in his full glory and he didn't die like he got to actually see
Every single thing and every promise fulfilled in the glory of Jesus on that mountain and he got to be there
It's not cool. I just I just love that and I also think it's so incredible that
God buried him. I mean what a what a funeral to have and
You know, I would love to have that could you imagine like one day and a hundred years?
I'm gonna live that long I think and people ask Bo like my son. Hey, where's your dad buried?
He's like, I don't know God buried him somewhere between 309 and 476
You know like like nobody knows where I am just out in the middle somewhere like location wise
We don't know
But I just think it's so cool like this mystery of like this man of God kind of continues and and now he's he's in
Glory with God, which is so cool
So this transition now is going from Moses to Joshua and a little bit about Joshua
He is the assistant of Moses. It says and he's not just you know, some
Random guy at the very end that Moses is like, oh, no
I need to figure out who's gonna take my place like he was with him for all the big stuff like everything
we see the first time he appears is actually in Exodus 17 and
so this is even before the Ten Commandments are givens this is early days and
Moses says to him he says choose some of the men and go out and fight with Amalek tomorrow
I will stand on the top of the hill with the rod of God in my hand and you guys remember the story
Joshua and the men are fighting the Malekites and
Moses is holding the rod up and they're having victory and as he gets tired and his hands start to sink
Then the Malekites start to overpower that Israel so then he's trying to hold it back up, but he's getting too tired
So Aaron and another guy forget his name
they hold his hands up and they defeat the Amalekites and I mean
Imagine being Joshua and seeing that like you're fighting the battle and as you see the rod of God lifted up
Which I believe is a picture of the cross and God Jesus Christ as he is lifted up God
The battle is won. I mean that is a foundation for your faith. That is a foundation to be courageous, right?
so this is where it starts and
right away, there's a
Moses builds an altar and names it
Yehovah Nisi, which is the Lord is my banner
and so what that means is like, you know a flag or a banner is used in times of battle for everyone to rally around and signal us
signal of strength and victory and protection and so the very first battle they win because of God and
He knows God is my strength. God is my protection and it sets this foundation for him all through his life and
Then he's also there at the Ten Commandments. I don't I don't know if he goes up to the mountain
I believe it's just Moses, but he goes up a certain way with Moses and then Moses goes the rest of the way up and
He sees like the whole mountain on fire. It says
In Exodus 33 it says
That oh, no, they're Exodus 24 the sight of the glory of the Lord was like a consuming fire on the top of the mountain
And in the eyes of Israel
So Moses went into the midst of the cloud and went up into the mountain and Moses saw
It was on the mountain for 40 days and 40 nights. So he saw the strength of God
He saw the power and the glory of God which instills, you know, a healthy fear of the Lord. Yeah, Frank
We're going into Joshua one now, yeah
Yeah, you're good
Then also Joshua was one of the two good spies
So remember is like there's 12 spies 10 said we can't go into the promised land
They're too strong for us and then Joshua and Caleb say no
We're gonna we have to go in and they weren't afraid of what Israel thought they weren't afraid of these
Giants in the promised land
But they had courage in the Lord because they knew the same God who gave the Ten Commandments that brought them out of Egypt all the stuff
That he has done and proven himself to be true. This is the God they serve so they don't have to be afraid and
One other thing I love which just shows the heart of Joshua
Exodus 33 it says
All the people this is Moses going into the tabernacle to meet with God
says all the people saw the pillar of cloud standing at the tabernacle tabernacle door and
All the people rose and worshipped each man in his tent door
So the Lord spoke to Moses face to face as a man speaks to his friend and he would return to the camp
But his servant Joshua the son of none a young man did not depart from the tabernacle
So he had a close
Intimate relationship with God that even when his you know
When Moses would leave and he was following him. He's like, I just want to be with God longer
I'm gonna stay here and he would stay back and we don't know how long probably a long time for it to be mentioned
But he just wanted to live in the courts of the Lord. He wanted to be as close as possible to him
so you can see why he was a super successful leader because
Look at his heart and look at what has been the foundation of his faith
He is a respect and a fear of the Lord of reverence
He has a courage and a boldness in the Lord to not be afraid of what people think and what is
Coming up against him and he is a love for God that he just wants to be with him
That is the heart of a leader right there
And I believe honestly for the believer for you and me that is a heart that we should desire and want to cultivate and how
we live our lives and that's something that the Holy Spirit can do in every single one of us, so and
So when Moses does transfer the leadership to him and at the end of Deuteronomy
I think it's so cool that
It happens in the tabernacle again with the pillar of cloud by the front door and he prays over him and says be strong
And of good courage for you shall bring the children of Israel into the land of which I swore to them and I will be with
You that's what the Lord says through Moses. So in the same place
He dwelt all those hours and days just wanting to be with God is the same place
He's commissioned to go and bring the people in the same place where he found
Honestly, the biggest mission of his life he found in the presence of God the same place he spent all those hours and days
So that says something to us, right if we want to know
Specifics of why we're here and what we're called to do
Like we find that in him
We need to have time with him to truly know what this our life
purposes and like that we could put a lot of pressure on our own our life purpose like our life purposes to follow Jesus like
We don't have to over complicate it
But every single day there's opportunities and things God was calling us to and we need to be
Alert and aware of his voice to be able to walk into them
So Joshua had a good mentor right? I mean to have a mentor like Moses. You're set up for success and
But Moses spoke of a person right he prophesied of someone to come Jesus Christ
And we have him as a mentor we have he's the one we're following his actual spirit is inside of us
So Joshua was set up for success by all the work Moses did and the spirit was on him and we actually have the spirit
Inside of us and if Joshua could do such great things
I mean imagine what a temple the Holy Spirit like you and me can do we have Jesus that we're following
So let us jump in
Joshua 1
After the death of Moses the servant of the Lord it came to pass that the Lord spoke to Joshua the son of none
Moses assistant saying
Moses my servant is dead
Just ripping off the band-aid right off the bat. He's dead
Let's move on and now therefore arise and go over this Jordan you and all this people to the land
Which I'm giving to them the children of Israel every place at the sole of your foot will tread upon
I have given you as I said to Moses from the wilderness and this
Lebanon as far as the Great River the river Euphrates all the land of the Hittites and to the great sea toward the going
Down of the Sun shall be your territory
No, man shall be able to stand before you all the days of your life as I was with Moses
So I will be with you. I will not leave you nor forsake you
Be strong and of good courage
For to this people you shall divide as an inheritance the land which I swore to their fathers to give them
Only be strong and very courageous that you may observe to do according to the law which which Moses my servant commanded you
Do not turn from it to the right hand or to the left that you may prosper
What wherever you go this book of the law shall not depart from your mouth
But you shall meditate in it day and night and you may observe to do according to all that is written in it
For then you will make your way prosperous and then you will have good success
Have I not commanded you be strong and of good courage?
Do not be afraid nor be dismayed for the Lord your God is with you wherever you go
Anybody see a theme there
Anybody here like the same?
Multiple things like five times there to be strong and courageous to not be afraid
Like I love that it is a command
And that's the title this message the command of courage like it's not a suggestion to it's not like hey
You know if you really want to do a good job
It's good to like look really brave before the people then they'll kind of file you a little better and it's not like best
Practices, you know when you're taking over
31 Kings like he's gonna do it's good to be bold. It's like it's none of that
It is a straight-up command and a command is an authoritative order
There's an authority that's telling you you have to do this
Like this is what I'm calling you to do this is what I expect and that is what is
Joshua is called to to be strong to be courageous to not be afraid and
the first time that this like a
Command appears a command to a human kind of sets a good tone of what this is like and in Genesis 2
Says the Lord commanded God or the Lord God commanded the man saying of every tree of the garden you may freely eat
But of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil you shall not eat from the day that you eat it
You shall surely die as a command and we know what happened when it wasn't followed, right?
like
All of history changed on that day, but there is a command
Here for a positive thing
Which I love I mean, honestly that should inspire us because
God doesn't command us to do something that we can't do like why would he set us up for failure?
Like do this even though it's impossible
Right where the command of God is there's also grace and empowerment to do it and that grace comes from God himself
And in Ezekiel 36 it says I will put my spirit in you and move you to follow my decrees
And be careful to keep my laws
Also, philippines 213 for it is God who works in you to will and to act in order to fulfill this good purpose
So Joshua is commanded to be courageous
Joshua is commanded to be brave and that's something that God is actually able to do in him
Um, and today honestly like all of us are called to be courageous and to be brave, right?
Like we do not have the spirit of fear, but a power and love and of sound mind
That is the spirit we have in us and Ephesians
It says to be strong in the Lord and the power of his might like we are called to be brave and to be courageous
and
The world wants to kind of like push us like Christians in a corner and make us think that you know
We have to have this false humility and this false kind of meekness like the Lord is meek and gentle
But he's also very courageous when we read Jesus in the gospels
He was not afraid to speak up
He was not afraid to go through awkward moments to share the love of God and to save sinners like
Jesus was the bravest most courageous person the world has ever seen like he
Literally went through the most excruciating pain and went to the depths of hades to free the world from sin and death
To rise again and sit at the right hand of the father so that you and I can be here right now
And alive in his spirit like that is what he did because of how brave and courageous he was that he's the son of God
and so
We too like are called to have courage and braveness and so like bravery. Sorry braveness
It's not even a word so to have courage and bravery and
What we are called to?
Is good works that he's prepared in advance, right?
He's prepared good works for you in advance that we should walk in them
There are honestly like if you look back at your life
You won't even really be able to be able to see all the things that you might have done for God
You probably won't be able to remember the impacts you've had on people
But you might be able to remember some of the impacts people have had on you, right?
Maybe someone who shared the gospel with you. Maybe someone who prayed with you when you're just like
Down in the dumps or maybe you know
Someone just came alongside of you and and and
Discipled you and your life you finally just laid hold of some of the promises of God and you started living differently like
We don't fully know the power we are
We have in other people's lives
Until we get to heaven and that's going to be amazing when you see all the people
That you can go up to and thank because I believe we're going to have
Full memory of all the good things of God that he did in our lives
And when people are coming up to you saying thank you for this the words you shared with me like
Changed my life and it's it's all Jesus, but there are eternal impacts that you are called
To do to make in the power of God and there's responsibilities that God has given you in this life
That if you're afraid to take the next step
You won't do like if i'm too afraid to take the next step that God has put in front of me
It's not going to get done by me. Like I love a quote by st
It says without God we cannot and without us. God will not
So we can't do anything apart from God, but he won't make us do anything
I love that and like he's not going to force you to take the next step. He's not going to
Like drag you kicking and screaming into doing this great thing for him
He's going to honor your free will but like God has called us and if he's called us he's equipped us
So courageous
Simple definition. We all know the word but
strong alert brave bold
Not deterred by danger or pain
So Joshua is going into this
Really strong
Seven nations actually the land of Canaan, but he's going into this area
Where there's 31 kings he's going to have to fight against
Like to even take over a few of them like the first one Jericho
impenetrable walls
This is like something that they Israelite army cannot do on their own
But he's going to have to overthrow 31 of these kings, which is insane
It talks like you need bravery to do that, right?
and
This command though
If if we read the last couple verses again, it says
Be strong and of good courage
Do not be afraid nor be dismayed for the Lord your God is with you wherever you go
This command isn't
Like set on the foundation of him
Of his own skills, right? It's not like hey, you knew moses. So, you know what to do now
Or hey, you're naturally a really good leader. You should be able to do this like be strong courageous in yourself
like there is actually a foundation here that all of this is built off of and it's those last few words
For the Lord your God is with you wherever you go
Because courage has to be built on something, right?
Like if you go into an interview and you're feeling pretty confident in it
It's because you know that you have the the um qualities that they're looking for
You know that your abilities may be technical in earning personal skills, whatever it is
You feel confident because you're like, yeah, I can do this
And if you realize you're not as good as you think you are then you suddenly don't have much courage
And you're pretty nervous and like I have had plenty of those moments in my life my life like I wrestled
I shared the story before but
I wrestled and I was pretty good at it
And then when I got to high school, I just wanted to wrestle for our smaller, um Christian school team
And there wasn't much competition. So, you know, I was like I think my record was usually around like 21 and 2 like every season
And then I won districts and I went to regionals and i'm like, okay, let's go like I got this
And I went out there and within the first I think
30 seconds I was on my back and pinned and I didn't even know what happened
Like it just looks like a whirlwind like got hit by a truck
I was on my back and pinned and then I go down to like the loser's bracket
They call you call it which feels really good to hear
And same thing so i'm in the loser's bracket getting slammed to the ground and pinned in the first period
So it's like I had a lot of confidence because I thought my skills were really good until I realized I wasn't as good as I thought
And then i'm on my back and pinned and suddenly my confidence and my courage and my bravery was like way down here
I'm like, okay, i'm i'm good. Now i'm gonna head out the back door
But like that's what happens when your confidence is
Your foundation of your confidence is yourself
You're up one moment and then you're down the next but this is saying something totally different
This isn't saying anything about him. This is saying
That his confidence is strong. Why because the Lord your God is with you wherever you go
So our confidence is built on
someone else
Not something else
Not on ourselves, but on someone else and that is the Lord Jesus Christ. We have a firm foundation
Can I get an amen to that? We have a firm foundation which cannot be moved. So if we have something
If our foundation is built on Jesus Christ, which is the same yesterday yesterday today and forever and will never change
And he's always with us and he says all his promises are yes and amen in him
What did we have to be afraid of?
Like I love that verse. It says
What like why fear man who can kill my body rather fear the Lord who can kill your body and your soul in hell
That is you know
That's it sounds like a downer but it's puts into perspective how strong God is and if God is for you
Who can be against you?
Like no one can come against what God wants to do in your life
If you are in agreement with him and you pick up your courage and your bravery and you follow the Lord
and even in
Jesus's last words
He wants to remind us of this very thing that God is with you wherever you go
And that's in matthew 28. It says
Therefore well i'll start with the verse to sets it up all authority all authority in heaven and on earth has been given to me
to Jesus
Therefore go and make disciples of all nations
baptizing them in the name of the father and of the son and of the Holy Spirit
And teaching them to obey everything. I have commanded you and surely I am with you always to the very end of the age
He wants to remind you of the same thing he reminded joshua
those
That was 1500 years earlier. I believe he wants to remind us now of the same exact thing
That we can have courage and boldness to walk in the great commission to fulfill the great commission and walk in his power
Because we are reminded he's with us currently
All his promises are yes and amen
So this this passage is not a pep talk to joshua. This is grounding him in the truth of the promises of God
So i'm going to read uh
Let's read verses 10 through 18
Then joshua commanded the officers of the people saying pass through the camp and command the people saying prepare
Provisions for yourself for within three days
You will cross over this jordan and go into possess the land which the Lord your God is giving you to possess
And to the rubenites the gadites the half tribal menassa joshua spoke saying
Remember the word which moses the servant of the Lord commanded you saying the Lord your God is giving you rest and giving
You this land your wives your little ones and your livestock shall remain in the land
Which moses gave you on this side of the jordan
But you shall pass before your brethren armed all your mighty men of valor and help them
Until the Lord has given your brethren rest as he gave you
And they also have taken possession of the land which the Lord your God is giving them
Then you shall return to the land of your possession and enjoy it
Which moses the Lord serving gave you on this side of the jordan toward the sunrise
So they answered joshua saying all that you have commanded us we will do
And wherever you send us we will go just as we heeded moses and all things which wasn't really true if you guys remember
So we will heed you only the Lord your God be with you as he was with moses
Whoever rebels against your command and does not heed your words in all that you command him shall be put to death
Only be strong and of good courage
So some things i'm pulling out of the last few verses for application one
We saw in that previous section to meditate
On the word of God day and night and do not turn from it to the left or to the right
So that thing I pulled up at the very beginning, you know the whole blanket over the mystery
If we're not in the word
We don't know that that's actually not true
And if we don't know what's true and what's right and wrong you can easily start to get swayed
By false teachers or by you know, the course of this world which is trying to conform you to itself
But we're being transformed by the renewing of our minds, right?
We need to have the word washing us and preparing us and setting our minds on things above rather than things below
And so to walk in courage
And bravery to follow the command of the Lord to do what he's called you to do
It's essential to be in the word
Like we can't even really know
God and what he's like we have the Holy Spirit if you're saved
But you need the word to actually
To help you know what he's like because you still can easily start to believe things that aren't true
You can turn to the left to the right and next thing, you know
You're not prosperous in all your ways and you're walking in sin because you're you're going like off the path
And psalm 119 it says your word is a lamp to my feet and a light to my path
His word will direct you his word will guide you
So when you wake up in the morning or at night whenever you read and you spend time with him
You're getting a clearer understanding and vision for your life. Your path will be lighting up before you
You will know what God wants you to do
And when you come up against opposition like joshua and the israelites are going to be doing for the next like, you know
Couple months we're going to be reading
They have they have confidence like has anyone struggled with insecurity or um
like worry
Everyone right. Yeah me like even yesterday
and
The only thing I knew I could do
Was to pray to the Lord to read his word and ask him to fill me with his spirit and his confidence
And then I went into that meeting and I felt great, right?
I felt awesome because I find my courage and my confidence in the Lord
And not only is it a light to your feet, but it's also
food for your soul
Matthew 4 when Jesus is tempted in the wilderness says man does not live by bread alone
But by every word that comes from the mouth of God
So when we are in the word
Like when you're eating you're hitting the gym and you're eating protein. You're getting stronger
Like we need to be in the word to be feeding our souls to be stronger inside like our actual
Personality and who we are can actually be stronger. Isn't that amazing?
You can be a stronger version of yourself than you are today just by eating from the word of God
That's what feeds you and grows you his word
And another thing that I saw was the preparation for in three days. We're going in there's there is preparation that is involved
you can't just like
suddenly wing it when an opportunity comes your way like there needs to be preparation
of
Spending time in prayer with God. I I think about
Remember when Jesus, uh, his disciples come to him and they couldn't cast out that demon and he said he cast it out like right away
Obviously, he's Jesus, but he says this one does not come out except by much prayer and fasting
And so there are things in this life that require
intentionality in in the spirit and it requires time with the Lord in prayer and in fasting and just spending time and worship with him so
Being in the word being in worship being in prayer all those things and the preparation will prepare you for the hard days
When things are easy, that's great. Keep hitting the spiritual gym
Okay, like keep getting in there getting in the word praying and you will become stronger and stronger and ready to go
and like an amazing example of that was david right do you remember when
He uh, I just watched the kids david movie like 300 times in the last month because bow and van love it
but uh
Yeah, you remember when the amalekites like when they were out of their village and the malekites came and stole
All of their family and possessions and they come back and all everyone following him wants to stone them
So now he like lost everything and everyone who's supposed to be on the side wants to kill him
And what does it say? He did he strengthened himself in the Lord
And then he goes back
And kills the malekites gets every single person and every single lost object back
But he strengthened himself in the Lord and in that moment he intentionally stepped away and prayed to God and he was strong
another thing
is
These three tribes that are on the the um east side of the jordan, which was their land
They wanted that land instead of the land on the west side. So moses said you can have it
That's fine, but you can't sit out of the war now. You have to still come and fight
So there's an aspect that we can't miss in this
An applicational aspect that we do this together like to be strong
In the Lord, you can't just do that on your own
Like you can't just be in a silo like if you're off by yourself
You might you know
You'll probably not feel very confident and strong in the Lord
And if you do that can usually be mixed with a lot of pride and arrogance, you know
Where you think everyone else is wrong and you're the only one who's right so you don't go to church
That's a bad place to be
So we have to do this together like you know
Proverbs 27 iron sharpens iron if you want to be sharp in the Lord and you want to be confident
And you want to be walking in what he's called you to do
You have to be in church and in the body of Christ. You need to be socialized
You need to be worshiping together. That's like how we really do sharpen each other and grow
Like the early church met every single day. That's
Unbelievable, I would that's pretty cool. But um, that's why we have life groups. That's why we have
You know prayer nights and this and all those things like we got to get plugged in
and be there for each other and sharpen each other but
Was that
Getting locked in. Yeah
So one other thing I mean just to make this even more practical I want to share some examples because sometimes I mean i'm sure all
of you know
areas where
you want to have more confidence and more courage and more bravery in your life and in
Things God's calling you to but I just figure i'll share a few things that happened in my life
Some of them a while ago and some more recently
Uh that was really just an example where I like had to make that step like st
Augustine said where it's like, okay
I know this isn't gonna happen unless I take that first step and God will meet me in that step
So one thing was you know, trying to live a holy life like live
for the Lord
And it was easy when I went to a Christian high school and you know
I'm in church twice a week and then I went to college
Drexel university in philly
And so immediately like within the first few hours
Everyone's inviting me to this party with a bunch of drinking and all this stuff and so
Like I know i'm not going I wasn't going to go but i'm like, how do I get out of this?
Maybe like I could I mean, I guess I could swing by for a little bit
I won't drink anything i'll dip out because I want to be weird like all this stuff is going through my head
And then so that's where those verses like do not be afraid be courageous. Those are two separate things. So
I like I was feeling afraid
And then I wasn't really afraid but I wasn't being bold and I was just trying to like avoid the the conversation
Until finally like I realized they're not going to let up
They're going to keep asking me to come so I just need to like be bold now
And I told him i'm like, hey like I don't do that. I'm a Christian
And then it opened up a ton of conversations and they now knew me as the Christian
But I was still friends with him, which is great and I invited some to church. I invited some to the campus
Ministry and some of them got saved and so all this happened from a simple
Like choice to be like i'm just
Gonna say no to this party and tell them why like that's all it was
And honestly, those were amazing monumental times in my faith
during those college years
another thing
That is
Requires courage for me is just doing this like to be totally honest
A year ago when my dad asked me to start doing this. It's actually been over a year. You're in four months now
It's unbelievable
But I remember he asked me like hey
Would you want to be on the rotation?
And I was like, oh like I don't know if I can do that
I was so I was honestly scared like my heart starts beating i'm like, I can't get up there and talk for
I won't even be able to fill up 10 minutes and here I am at 41, which is cool
You know, but I can't do it and I had like anxiety about it
Like and I start I had anxiety about speaking in front of people during that time
It was just a weird time where the enemy was attacking me
So like in all areas of my life if I had to get up in front of people my heart's pounding
I'm like forgetting what i'm gonna say and it took that step to be like
Put me on the rotation. Yeah, i'll do it because I knew God was calling me to it
I knew that doing this like it's not like I think i'm like great at it
And i'm like God's telling me like you're you're amazing. It's like no he's saying I want you to do this
That was all it was. I want you to teach. I want you to share the word and what i'm putting on your heart
So it took courage to finally be like yes. Okay, dad. Sure. Yeah, i'll do it
And then the first few honestly were pretty
I don't know if they were good and I had to like pray three times at the beginning because my mind was racing
But then the Lord just continued to make me stronger and stronger and I just realized I need to rest in him
Like he's with me here. He's with me while i'm preparing for this. So
Um, yeah, that's another example and then two weeks ago
Uh, we were on vacation and this is about sharing your faith
And I was going for a run on the beach and as i'm like going all the way up
Uh, it's like long island and it bends and then there was no houses for him about a mile and a half
so as i'm going up i'm like thinking about this bible story I told my son bow and
I would you know when peter is on the road and he goes down and he meets the ethiopian
Munich or eunuch and then he shares the gospel with him and he overtakes the chariot, which is so cool
So i'm running up there and it's like just sand and
dunes i'm like
Lord, I feel like you're saying that there might be someone way out in the middle of nowhere here too that i'm gonna have to
Talk to I was like I don't want to and i was like i'll do it though
Lord if there's someone at the very end of this island i'll do it and i'm coming up
I'm like not seeing anything. I'm like some you know, I was obedient Lord and you know, I don't have to do it
It's not going to be awkward
And then as i'm coming over this dune, I see a boat docked on the side of the beach and as i'm getting closer
There's two people it's a couple and they're laying down in the boat having like a romantic moment looking at the lighthouse
I'm like i'm gonna have to interrupt this
Are you kidding me? I'm like just ruining the mood for them
So I pass them catch my breath
And i'm like, okay Lord prepare me for this i'll go up and go up and i'm like, hey guys
I know this is really random
But I felt the Lord tell me that if there's someone up here
I should pray for them
And they hopped out of the boat shook my hand and both the guy and the girl and they're like we'll never turn down
Prayer sure. Yeah, this is great
And so they knew the Lord
But they were they were unsure about some of the things of the future together and I got to pray with them
and I was like just
Know that this is a sign that God sees you and hears your prayers and loves you and it's a plan for your life
Whether that's you guys together or not
Like he has you guys and I knew it meant a lot and so I just say that to be like
There's so many moments every single day
They don't have to be huge crazy things that he's calling us to they can be very small things
But like I said in the beginning there's good works that God has prepared for you to walk into
And they always usually seem pretty small
But we still get nervous about it like why if God's with you
What do we have to like what do I have to be afraid of right?
But he's with you and when he puts something on your heart
Just lay hold of it take that first step and you'll find as you take that first step
He fully empowers you by the Holy Spirit to continue to walk in and complete that good work. He's called you to do
Amen
So there's one thing I forgot to share way earlier
About the promises of God and it doesn't even apply anymore, but it's so cute because it's my son
um, so i'm gonna share this recording so
One thing to strengthen yourself in the Lord is to remember like I said
the uh
The promises of what God says to us to be in his word and this is something that maria thought of um
Probably like five months ago and we've done it every single night at bedtime
It's these promises of God that bow has memorized that he says so
I just love it because these promises are really like setting a foundation for him that I hope when he's
80 years old. He still has these in his heart and he knows who he is
So I just want to share here is him saying it last night. Let me turn it up
I am a child of God. Nothing can separate me from God's love
He's with me wherever I go. He makes me strong and courageous and kind
Amen
Yeah
Like you are a child of God
He is with you wherever you go like nothing can separate you from his love and he does make you strong and courageous and kind
amen
So Lord, we just thank you so much
That you called us to great amazing things Lord
And sometimes from the outside looking in they can seem so small Lord
But I believe so many people are in heaven because of such small yeses God
so many times where we just said yes to you
and people said yes to you and they just shared the gospel or shared the love of God
And people receive the good news and their eternities are forever changed
So Lord, I just pray that you would bless us tonight Lord with your spirit of wisdom
And your spirit God of courage Lord
Pray that we would see you Lord as a forerunner the one who goes before us in all things
And that we would know that you're always with us even to the end of the age. So whatever you call us to Lord
We know that you are the one who empowers us to do it and we have nothing to be afraid of
So we love you in Jesus name. Amen
Cool, so I don't have any questions for up there, but
I figure we can think of them on the spot. So
What is an example of something that you've kind of stepped out of your comfort zone to do in the Lord?
And what are areas that you would like prayer for?
To have more courage instead of fear
those two questions
so again
What are some areas that you have stepped out in faith? It could be a long time ago. It could be very recently
And and you're courageous and then what are some areas that you're struggling with some fear and you would like to overcome
And walk in more courage
Thanks for joining us at Lansdale life church as we praise God and discuss his word
Don't forget to join us for worship live Sunday mornings at 10 a.m. Eastern on YouTube
Be blessed and have a great day