Joshua – Lesson 23

Self Nature Not Renovated

The Red Sea typifies God’s judgment on sin, but the crossing of the Jordan typifies God’s judgment on self. The old self-life of the sinner is not renovated as a result of salvation. God does not make it over as a result of salvation. It’s not like taking a car engine in and having new parts put in. The old self is to be crucified.

· Galatians 2:20, I have been crucified with Christ and I no longer live, but Christ lives in me. The life I live in the body, I live by faith in the Son of God, who loved me and gave himself for me.

· Romans 6:6, For we know that our old self was crucified with him so that the body of sin might be done away with, that we should no longer be slaves to sin-

These passages leave us with a problem of understanding. Some would think that this means that we are not to ever sin again and that is what it sounds like. But remember that we are talking about goals. Our goal is to live an ever increasingly sinless life.

This matter is cleared up by Paul.

· Galatians 2:20, I am crucified with Christ: nevertheless I live; yet not I, but Christ liveth in me: and the life which I now live in the flesh I live by the faith of the Son of God,(KJV)

This is the King James wording which I think is useful to our understanding.

When believers come to see themselves in this way, as having died and not yet arrived at the completion of our Christian experience, we begin our spiritual growth. Some may say that we are not dead to sin because we still sin. This is the way we look at it, but this is not the way God looks at us.

Here is an illustration that may be helpful. Consider a man on death row. He is condemned and awaiting execution. The time for his execution may be just a day or several weeks away. Every appeal has been exhausted so he is to be executed. Legally he is as good as dead though physically he is not dead. He has lost all his liberties and his rights to any existence in the society.

Jesus has condemned the sinful life to death. It no longer has any rights with regard to us. All its privileges and liberties have been taken away. The moment we accepted Jesus as Savior this became a fact to us. We do not always act on the basis of this fact, but it is something we should constantly claim. It is the role of the Holy Spirit to make this effective and a reality in our lives as we trust Him.

We need to understand that our old nature is still with us and that is the reason that we still sin. The sin nature is not dead but our new nature is dead to sin. A very important verse in this connection is:

· Luke 9:23, Then he said to them all: "If anyone would come after me, he must deny himself and take up his cross daily and follow me.”

For a person to “take up his cross” in this sense means to recognize daily that he has died to sin. We are to constantly affirm that we have died to sin and the more that we affirm this new truth about ourselves the more it becomes a reality in our everyday lives. This needs to become a constant attitude throughout the day. Then the Holy Spirit does His work in us.

There was a third command given to Israel as they prepared to cross the Jordan.

· Joshua 3:5, Joshua told the people, "Consecrate yourselves, for tomorrow the LORD will do amazing things among you."

Here Joshua is instructing the people to set themselves apart for what God was going to do for them. They needed to be prepared morally and spiritually for the coming events.

There was a definite purpose to these instructions. As was the case in:

· Ezra 7:10, For Ezra had devoted himself to the study and observance of the Law of the LORD, and to teaching its decrees and laws in Israel.

To say that Ezra devoted himself clearly indicates that he prepared himself to teach. So the Israelites were to prepare themselves. For the heart to be prepared it must put away the self and depend on the Word of God.

Isaiah had an interesting word on this matter.

· Isaiah 59:1-2, Surely the arm of the LORD is not too short to save, nor his ear too dull to hear. 2 But your iniquities have separated you from your God; your sins have hidden his face from you, so that he will not hear.

God does not direct us and perform wonders for us unless we set ourselves apart to Him. Colossians 3 makes this clear:

· Colossians 3:1-2 Since, then, you have been raised with Christ, set your hearts on things above, where Christ is seated at the right hand of God. 2 Set your minds on things above, not on earthly things.

This is an act of faith on our part and faith requires a yielded spirit.

The Place of the Bible in Victory

By now you should understand that we are involved in spiritual warfare. But we cannot effectively be a combatant until we make a definite decision to do so.

We are going to get involved in some language that is important for us to assimilate before we fully understand this warfare. First there is the matter of taking by faith the fact that we have died with Jesus to sin and to self and to the world and have been raise again with Him to live in the place of victory.

I think we need to deal with the spiritual concept of being crucified with Jesus. Do you remember our discussion of what it means to be in Christ? Of course we are not speaking literally, but figuratively. Part of our spiritual growth is that we come to the point where we consider ourselves dead to sin because we have been crucified with Jesus. If we truly accept Him as having done that which freed us from the slavery of our sinful nature, then we must consider ourselves to have been crucified with Him.

But that is just the beginning. If we have been crucified, we must also be raised as He was and following that we must be spiritually ascended with Him. And where do we ascend to? To the heavenly realms, not to heaven, but to the heavenly realms. And the heavenly realms are where the spiritual warfare is going on.

You see, we don’t even get involved in spiritual warfare if we have not been crucified with Jesus, raised with Him, and ascended with Him. Satan leaves us alone for the most part until he sees us get serious with God.

In all of this, it is in the Bible that we learn of the direction we should go. There we find principles that guide us and our behavior.

· Joshua 3:6, Joshua said to the priests, "Take up the ark of the covenant and pass on ahead of the people." So they took it up and went ahead of them.

The priests were to take the Ark of the Covenant and go ahead of the people, not to cross the Jordan but to go into the water first. Now remember that the Ark is a symbol of Jesus. So the Ark goes ahead of the nation just as Jesus is to go before and lead His people. But just as the Ark must go ahead, the people had to follow.

Do you remember that at the Red Sea God promised the people that they would see great wonders? The same thing is true at the Jordan River. Well, we need to understand that the same promise exists for us today, if we are obedient followers of Jesus!!

But then the matter of obedience is easier to say than to do. Without the Holy Spirit in our lives, it would be impossible. He is the One who enables us to be obedient, if that is our desire. He is the One who empowers us.

· 1 John 5:3-5, This is love for God: to obey his commands. And his commands are not burdensome, 4 for everyone born of God overcomes the world. This is the victory that has overcome the world, even our faith. 5 Who is it that overcomes the world? Only he who believes that Jesus is the Son of God.

In other words, if we say that we believe Jesus is the Son of God and that we have accepted Him as our Savior, He then indwells us. If He indwells us, then we should be able to give proof that we are following Him and that He is doing wonders for us.

In fact, He will change our lives completely. This is His guarantee: Once we recognize that we have died with Him and are buried with Him and have been raised with Him and keep looking to Him, our lives will be different. Then we will be overcomers. This is what Joshua meant when he said,

· Joshua 3:10, This is how you will know that the living God is among you and that he will certainly drive out before you the Canaanites, Hittites, Hivites, Perizzites, Girgashites, Amorites and Jebusites.

The proof that God controls us is in evidence when we follow Him completely. There are people around us watching to see if we have the real thing.

Jesus asked a question.

· Luke 6:46, "Why do you call me, 'Lord, Lord,' and do not do what I say?

The word “Lord” is used here to mean one who is in complete control of another. It goes beyond addressing Jesus as Savior. The word “Jesus” means Savior. The word “Christ” means the Anointed One. It speaks of the Holy One indwelling us and the One who is coming again. But the word “Lord”means He is Master. He is the One in complete control of our lives.

· 1 Corinthians 12:3, Therefore I tell you that no one who is speaking by the Spirit of God says, "Jesus be cursed," and no one can say, "Jesus is Lord," except by the Holy Spirit.

We cannot honestly say that Jesus is Lord of our lives until the Holy Spirit controls our lives. This is what is illustrated by the crossing of the Jordan.

The priests were to precede the people into the Jordan River. Now listen carefully,

· Joshua 3:13-16, And as soon as the priests who carry the ark of the LORD-the Lord of all the earth-set foot in the Jordan, its waters flowing downstream will be cut off and stand up in a heap." 14 So when the people broke camp to cross the Jordan, the priests carrying the ark of the covenant went ahead of them. 15 Now the Jordan is at flood stage all during harvest. Yet as soon as the priests who carried the ark reached the Jordan and their feet touched the water's edge, 16 the water from upstream stopped flowing. It piled up in a heap a great distance away, at a town called Adam in the vicinity of Zarethan, while the water flowing down to the Sea of the Arabah (the Salt Sea) was completely cut off. So the people crossed over opposite Jericho.

One thing stands out here: We must get our feet wet if we are to mature spiritually. We cannot stand at the edge of the water and wait for the waters to part. We need to step out.

At the Red Sea the people had to wait until Moses stretched out his staff and the waters parted. But that had to do with another phase of redemption. Here the subject is the Christian walk and in this we are instructed to step in, move forward, believe God, and then step out on the other side. We have died to self and are now alive in Jesus. This is true with respect to our position before God and our responsibility is to make it a reality in our actions.

So we have seen four steps here: First, faith depends on God’s ability to do anything He chooses. Second, faith desires, and therefore it asks. Third, faith expects something to happen. and fourth, faith accepts the answer and acts on the Word of God.

All of this is never done alone but by the power of the Holy Spirit.