Deuteronomy 34:1 – Joshua 2:24, Luke 13:22-14:6, Psalms 79:1-13, Proverbs 12:26
Today is the 10th day of April. Welcome to the Daily Audio Bible. I’m Brian. It is great to be here with you on hump day as we move through the center of the week. And today we’ll be concluding the book of Deuteronomy, which also means we will have concluded what is known as the Torah or the Pentateuch, the first five books of the Bible. And what ground we have covered but we will be closing that particular delineation in the Bible and moving into the next era when we begin the book of Joshua and we’ll talk about the book of Joshua we get there in a few minutes. But first these are the final words of the book of Deuteronomy. Deuteronomy, chapter 34 and we are reading from the New International Version this week because.
Introduction to the book of Joshua:
Okay. So, that concludes book of Deuteronomy, which brings us to the book of Joshua, which in a lot of ways is an exhilarating book because, I mean, it’s almost from the very beginning of the Bible we’ve been hearing about this mythic promised land and we were in that land with Abraham, Isaac and Jacob and their stories unfolding but it didn’t belong to the generations. The patriarchs hadn’t proliferated enough to have large enough families for tribes and leadership and so forth. Remember the story that took them to Egypt where they did become a mighty and massive people over the course of for centuries, four and half centuries almost. And then we’ve been in the wilderness ever since. And, so, being able to actually cross the Jordan River into the promised land with these people, this is what we’ve been heading toward almost since the beginning. And now Moses has died having been able to see into the promised land but not going into it and Joshua has stepped up as a leader in Israel. And Joshua translated into English means Savior. If we go back to the original Hebrew, Joshua is Yeshua, Joshua. So, not that Joshua was Jesus. I’m just pointing out the appearance of the thread, the redemptive thread that kind of winds its way through the Scriptures. And as we step into Joshua we’ll see that that God has prepared the land for his people. And it has been promised for generations as we know from the Scriptures, but they’re not gonna just march in and take it. They’re gonna have to contend for it. They’re on a great mission with God and to accomplish the mission they’re gonna have to partner with God and that partnership’s gonna be against all odds, humanly speaking, but with God they will take the land. And we’ll notice that God asks them to do some pretty unconventional things along the way. He has no problem confounding conventional wisdom with almost bizarre instructions that sometimes wouldn’t make logical sense to the human mind, but this is still true today. This is still what it’s like to walk with and collaborate with God. And this is why we have the gift of the Holy Spirit’s guidance. And this is why we have to walk with God, to be a people intertwined in a relationship with God. Otherwise we’re just kind of like bulldozing our way through life hoping we don’t destroy something along the way and hoping that we’re building a path to somewhere when we actually have our Creator, our Father who is here Fathering us and rather than bulldozing a path to who knows where, we’re was supposed to be building His very kingdom. So, in a very real way, all these years that the children of Israel have been in the wilderness, all this time that we’ve been wandering with them and learning that they are utterly, completely dependent on God. They’ve been learning to obey, and they’ve also learned what disobedience and rebellion looks like. Now they have to go across into the promised land with the full faith in God’s going to show up because it’s against all odds and full faith in the promise that he gave their ancestors that there was a promised land. And, so, we’re gonna witness one of the most glorious moments in the Bible, one of the richest times for the children of Israel, perhaps one of the greatest, most monumental moments in ancient Israel’s existence, to cross the Jordan River. And we’ll see all of that. But that’s not the end of the story and soon enough we’ll see that they do begin to fall away, and they do begin to move back toward rebellion. But for now, we’re at the precipice and we’re about to cross over the Jordan River and that’s what brings us to Joshua chapter 1.
Prayer:
Father, we thank You for Your word and on this the 100th day of the year we acknowledge You and all that You have begun and are continuing to do in our lives because we are embracing this rhythm of allowing Your word access to our hearts every day. We thank You for bringing us all the way through the Torah, the law, bringing us into this next era. And as we cross the Jordan River with the children of Israel we cross into a new season and a new part of the story, but the story still very clearly mimics our own lives. And, so, we open our hearts to all of Your leadership and direction, for Your comfort and rebuke, for You to Father us and lead us onto the narrow path of Jesus was just speaking of as we read from the gospel of Luke. This narrow path, this is what we seek, this is what leads to life, this is what leads us on the road we were intended to walk. And we confess, sometimes it’s not clear whether what road we’re on. And yet, as long as we are are with You we are on the right road. So, as we continue this season of Lent, this time of repentance, these 40 days, to sit with the fact that our eternity came at a high cost, at a dear price and that You were willing to pay that price to rescue us. And, so, our only response can be surrender and asking that You would reorder our lives appropriately, that nothing is off limits to You and we are hiding nothing from You or from ourselves. We are asking Your Holy Spirit to invade our space and disrupt us as needed and to lead us into all truth and to comfort us as we walk the narrow path. Come Holy Spirit we pray. Thank You for bringing us these 100 days into this year. We pray these things in the name of Jesus, our Savior. Amen.
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And that is it for today. Congratulations for making it 100 days by the way. You can do this. We can do this. We will do this. And in order to do that, I love you and I am Brian and I’ll be waiting for you here tomorrow.