We love flowers, but God wants fruit. After all, a dying world needs fruit. Flowers are necessary, but only the fruit gives LIFE. The flower of the vine is meant to last only a short time before it gives way to the fruit. Yet too often we praise the beauty of the flower, and treat the fruit as incidental. Jesus said that “every branch that beareth fruit, he cleanseth it, that it may bear more fruit” (John 15:2). God desires fruit which is a result of the branches being united with the Vine.
Unless the flower fades away, there will be no fruit. Fruit brings life. It is for the purpose of the fruit that a vine is planted. The flower is necessary, but incidental. God is the vine dresser, His Son is the vine. We are the branches. Too often we want to emphasize our flowers, our beauty. Most training of Pastors and workers is aimed at the “Flower”, the program, the organization, the promotion, the “soul of natural man”. The aim is to make us independent, confident, quick-witted, slick, organized, confident, self-assured, – beautiful to the eye of the beholder (visitors, congregation).
God is actively engaged as the Vinedresser of the bride of His Son. He has promised His Son a bride without spot or wrinkle or any such thing (Eph 5:27). As we will be a spiritual bride clothed in NEW Heavenly bodies, these spots and wrinkles are on our soul. Our Eternal Vinedresser must check and deal with these unfortunate growths and wrinkles. He is constantly cutting them off, performing “plastic surgery” on our soul and spirit-that which we will bring to the wedding.
God is actively engaging us on two fronts. First to bring us to the place where we are living by the life of His Son-the exchanged life, the abiding life, planted within us by the New Birth. Second, He is doing a direct work in our hearts to weaken the fund of our natural resources which led to Adam’s sin in the first place. For the natural man does not receive the things of the Spirit of God (1 Cor 2:14)
Everyday true Christians are learning these two lessons-a rising up of the Life of Christ as our life, and a checking and handing over to death of that natural, soulish life.
In the process, the world may view us as weak, ignorant men who confess “I do not know – but He knows, and that is enough”. After all, it is all about His Fruit, not our flower. May God deliver us from today’s “Arrogance of the Soul!”
In order to understand how the river appeared when it was thus out of its banks, let me state that the valley fourteen miles wide, lies about seventy-five feet higher than the bed of the river. As you walk across the valley toward the river, you come to a bluff, not very steep usually–in some places too steep for a horse to go down, in others a gradual slope–and you look down seventy-five feet into a river bottom, from a half mile to a mile wide. Now a river which falls as rapidly as the Jordan (falling nearly seven hundred feet in sixty miles) has a rapid current when it is low; but when it is so swollen that it leaves its crooked channel, and its waters rush in a direct line toward their resting place, we can see at once with what a terrific force it plunges along. And as that valley is full of small trees and underbrush, thick and rank of growth, you can see that as the water would be tearing its way over the brush and the tree tops, it would be a fearful sight to look at, and to think of marching across it would appear preposterous. THE RIVER JORDAN by J. W. MCGARVEY. 1894
Crossing the Jordan required a leader who did not think like normal man thinks. It required a leader in touch with God! Joshua was the Leader who saw the Invisible! He followed the dictates of an unseen God, the Creator of the Universe. God had declared that Canaan was theirs. He would cause the hearts of the Canaanites to melt before the Israelites, His Presence and Power was going to be with them, so therefore, be Strong and Very Courageous. Once again Jehovah God is about to show His awesome power to an obedient people.
God has always expected a select group of people to take responsibility for His Testimony, for His Word! He expects the same of Pastors and Preachers today! From the very first cry of Moses in 
Ever heard of the Pareto Principle? Sure you have, but probably as the 80/20 rule.
God needs people that are willing to die to what they want to see the salvation of others around them. There are to be no excuses, there is to be no complaining, there is only to be dependence upon God and His purpose. There is no room for ego, for rights. There is only room for people who want to do what God wants to claim His inheritance.
Whenever they see the priests that bear it in motion, they are to move from their places and follow it. This is a blessed truth we need to take hold of. Always keep God in sight. A blessed truth for all time was clearly shadowed forth. Follow God implicitly and unhesitatingly in every time of danger, and you are safe. Set aside the counsels of caution and worldly wisdom; find out God’s will and follow it through good report and through evil report, and you will be right.
“A span of two thousand cubits was to be left between the people and the ark.”
Set yourself apart to God. I believe God was going to do this great miracle regardless of what the people did. But there does seem to be a shortage of miracles today. Or perhaps movies have made minor miracles seem so ho hum. Regardless, I believe in order for us to see how awesome God is, we must sanctify ourselves unto Him. Otherwise we would be saying, “I’ve already heard this, I saw this when I was younger. It is no big deal!”
WHAT MONUMENTS HAVE YOU BUILT? WHAT DOES THE ROCK MEAN TO YOU? DO YOU HAVE STONES WORTH REMEMBERING?
We really aren’t big on monuments, at least erecting them in our yard. So God has led me to leave each one of my children and grandchildren, a book of my thoughts toward them, and what I want to see happen in their life. I will give it to them after I die, unless the Lord tells me otherwise.
Circumcision is a sign of separation unto God. It is an interesting and impressive thing that the new generation which had arisen in the wilderness had never been circumcised. The parents had neglected this command of God, and those parents had all died in the wilderness. This means that they had ignored the spiritual law of heart separation unto God, so what arises is this: there is no entering into the inheritance without a circumcised heart. The heart has to be wholly and utterly for the Lord. If that is not true, sooner or later there is going to be a tragedy in the Christian life.
We must realize that salvation means we are crucified with Christ. We must embrace the Cross-Life, the exchanged life, the life of Galatians 2:20. The life I am now living is not my own, but Christ is living through me!
And Joshua went to Him and said to Him, “Are You for us or for our adversaries?” So He said, “No, but as Commander of the army of the Lord I have now come.” And Joshua fell on his face to the earth and worshiped, and said to Him, “What does my Lord say to His servant?” Then the Commander of the Lord’s army said to Joshua, “Take your sandal off your foot, for the place where you stand is holy.” And Joshua did so.
Now the children of Israel camped in Gilgal, and kept the Passover on the fourteenth day of the month at twilight on the plains of Jericho. And they ate of the produce of the land on the day after the Passover, unleavened bread and parched grain, on the very same day. Then the manna ceased on the day after they had eaten the produce of the land; and the children of Israel no longer had manna, but they ate the food of the land of Canaan that year. The Veggie Tales expressed what was happening in a little song called “The Promised Land”
Canaan pictures the victorious Christian life. It means you are no longer a slave to habits and sinful thinking and ways of life. Not perfect, but in the midst of a major make over! It’s a place of joy, not necessarily happiness at all times. But walking with God and trusting Him in all things, not like some Christians who walk around looking like they were baptized in pickle juice! Sure, we all have rivers of difficulty in our way. But don’t let those rivers keep you from your land of opportunity. You know in your heart God has more for you in life, and you are right!
Are You Ready to Step Out? Ready to Join the Man of Glory? Are You Ready to Stack Stones Worth Remembering?
In Chapter 2 we find Joshua sending a couple of young men to spy out the city of Jericho. I ask, why, Joshua? Remember the last time spies were sent out? Didn’t God tell you to be Strong and of Good Courage, for you would overtake the land? This is the mystery of a life aligned with the Holy Spirit’s purpose. When you align yourself with the Holy Spirit, He will lead you do things which make no sense to a rational thinking man.
Joshua 2:1-7 (NKJV) Now Joshua the son of Nun sent out two men from Acacia Grove to spy secretly, saying, “Go, view the land, especially Jericho.” So they went, and came to the house of a harlot named Rahab, and lodged there. And it was told the king of Jericho, saying, “Behold, men have come here tonight from the children of Israel to search out the country.” So the king of Jericho sent to Rahab, saying, “Bring out the men who have come to you, who have entered your house, for they have come to search out all the country.” Then the woman took the two men and hid them. So she said, “Yes, the men came to me, but I did not know where they were from. And it happened as the gate was being shut, when it was dark, that the men went out. Where the men went I do not know; pursue them quickly, for you may overtake them.” (But she had brought them up to the roof and hidden them with the stalks of flax, which she had laid in order on the roof.) Then the men pursued them by the road to the Jordan, to the fords. And as soon as those who pursued them had gone out, they shut the gate.
Now I’m not condoning lying. God says lying lips are an abomination to Him. In her defense, she knew not God’s Laws, and was merely doing what she thought was best to spare the lives of the two young men. Does God excuse small sin to prevent a greater sin? I don’t believe so, as sin is sin. But the greatest evil that God hates is when we go our own way. Rahab was not going her own way when she lied. Something was happening in her heart, and that led her to protect the lives of the two young God-Followers.
Joshua 2:8-11 (NKJV) Now before they lay down, she came up to them on the roof, and said to the men: “I know that the Lord has given you the land, that the terror of you has fallen on us, and that all the inhabitants of the land are fainthearted because of you. For we have heard how the Lord dried up the water of the Red Sea for you when you came out of Egypt, and what you did to the two kings of the Amorites who were on the other side of the Jordan, Sihon and Og, whom you utterly destroyed. And as soon as we heard these things, our hearts melted; neither did there remain any more courage in anyone because of you, for the Lord your God, He is God in heaven above and on earth beneath.
Men do different things in response to fear. Some run away, some give up and commit suicide, some relish the fear and channel it into a fight. Rahab allowed the fear of her heart to open her eyes to see God! FEAR SHOULD OPEN OUR EYES TO SEE GOD! When Sennacherib threatened to invade Judah and King Hezekiah with his considerably larger army, Hezekiah allowed his fears to open his eyes to the power of God. Listen to his prayer in 2 Kings 19:14:
She knew that God would cause the Hebrews to prevail against the mighty city Jericho. Her fear had led her to see the Invisible and she knew He would prevail. She boldly told the young men to promise to save her and her family. She had faith that they could save her family. She had faith that God was powerful enough to protect her! This coming from a prostitute, one whom the world rejected, used and abused, yet she believed there was a God who could love her and her family.
Here was a woman with a bad reputation, with no important status in the world, and all of a sudden the future of Israel is bound up in her faith. With God, there are no special privileges because of who you are, or what you do. We all stand before God with the common ground of faith. There is a little child over there with more faith in God than a wizened old preacher. There is a young teenager with more faith than a dying saint. God does not call good people to follow Him. God does not call perfect people to Him. He calls flawed people, but the one thing we must have to come to God is FAITH! This lowly prostitute became great in the eyes of God because of her faith in Him. That is why she is listed in Hebrews 11.
Joshua 6:25 (NKJV) And Joshua spared Rahab the harlot, her father’s household, and all that she had. So she dwells in Israel to this day, because she hid the messengers whom Joshua sent to spy out Jericho.
Why A Scarlet Cord? Was it something peculiar to her profession? It was obviously something she had on hand. It became the salvation of the two young men, and it became the salvation of Rahab and her entire family. The Scarlet Cord represented the sins of her former life. Though your sins be as scarlet, they shall be white as wool. The Blood of Jesus cleanses the vilest sinner and makes them clean, set apart, and usable for Holy God’s purposes.
God’s Holy Spirit was working in the people of Jericho. He was giving them an opportunity to turn to Him. Of the several thousand inhabitants, only one woman along with her family saw a ‘GOD THING’. She is the only one who opened her heart to seek after this Almighty God. The picture of God’s Grace is such that it is able to bring beauty into the ugliest life. Those lives that the world considers most decrepit, most destroyed, most likely to be cast aside are the lives that God can make most valuable, most beautiful. This is not to minimize sin. Yet when we learn of something someone once was, we recoil, we say no way, but there is no sin that the Grace of God cannot conquer. Where sin abounds, grace much more abounds. God was bringing His people into their inheritance, a place of rest. Too many Christians are running around all worried, frustrated, angry, upset, acting as if there is no Almighty God who is working in their lives. Rahab, a sinner in the world, found rest in God because she trusted in the Scarlet Cord.
The Lord is after getting us inwardly resting in HIM. Unrest, anxiety, is ever the ground of defeat. Uncertainty about the Lord brings weakness and defeat; the Lord sets great value on BELIEVING GOD – faith in GOD. In the list of the heroes of faith in Heb. 11, the Holy Spirit records Rahab the harlot, and links her with Abraham in James; she believed God and leapt out of ungodliness into righteousness, because her fear led her to believe God and she put her faith into action. Rahab was the key to Jericho and Jericho is the key to the land. That is the kind of key He uses. He uses the Key of Restful Faith!
The Scarlet Thread runs through the Bible. It is a Memorial to our Savior and His precious blood. How are you responding to the pressures of this life? Is there a Memorial in your life, a Scarlet Cord of the Saviors Blood?
As followers of Christ we are to seek to see Jesus manifested in our flesh. This is what Paul says in 2 Cor 4:11: “
A man delivered unto death has no power over his own life. He has no power to act on his own. Adam in the garden was to be dependent upon God and all that God gave him to have power over. Adam was to have no power over the fruit of two trees in the midst of the garden-the tree of the Knowledge of Good and Evil, and the tree of Life. Adam was to depend totally upon God for life, and totally upon God for the knowledge and power to live this life. Adam was not to live independently of God. Adam was not to know about evil and good, and thereby have the power to act independently of God. 
God and the knowledge of Him was to be Adam’s life.
We say we desire to give glory to God with our lives, yet by acting under our own power, we give glory to ourselves. We fool ourselves into thinking we are living in Christ when there is very little we do that does not require His power to act. We live, eat, work and play with Jesus carefully tucked in our backpack, or tattooed on our body.
Because we are acting under our own power, we live a self-assured, yet self-possessed Christian life. In such a life, Jesus Christ cannot be revealed. Too often we have decided, acted, and had power apart from Him. The Christ we manifest is too small because in ourselves we have grown too big.
It is time to cross the Jordan River.
It is time to go through the Jordan River. The Israelites could not build a bridge. They could not go around. They had to go through the Jordan. The reason is because the Jordan River represents death. As we learned last week the entire purpose of the wilderness wanderings was to teach them that they had to put off the old man, the old flesh, and live by the power of God. Joshua in particular had to align himself with the Captain of the Hosts, He had to die to what he thought was best, and follow what God wanted to do. In that respect Joshua represents a man who has joined himself with the power of the Holy Spirit.
The challenge that God presents is that this inheritance, this rest can only be claimed by dying to the flesh, dying to what you want, and by living in the power of the Holy Spirit! The Jordan is a picture of the Cross. You always have to die by passing through Jordan to get to Canaan. The only way to be born again is to experience the Cross. When you are willing to die, then you are in the place where God raise you up and use you.
You Must Be Willing to Die to the Flesh in order for God to Raise You Up and Use You to Claim the Inheritance. 
When God presents a challenge to us, a challenge to die to what we want, and to live in His power, He always gives us the confidence of a promised victory! God provides us three-fold ammunition to assure us of victory:Promises, Presence, Past Performance
God has given 
Joshua 1:5 “I will not leave you nor forsake you.” What a promise God gave to Joshua! “As I was with Moses, so I will be with you; I will never leave you or forsake you” (Josh 1:5, NIV). God had given a similar promise to Jacob (Gen. 28:15), and Moses had repeated God’s promise to Joshua (Deut. 31:1-8). God has given this promise to His people today! The Gospel of Matthew opens with “Emmanuel…God with us” (1:23) and closes with Jesus saying, “Lo, I am with you always” (28:20 NKJV).
He relates confidence in God’s presence to lack of covetousness or fondness for money. Christians have come a long way since that moment when Joshua led the people across the Jordan. Our confidence is too often in our money our possessions. If you want God’s presence in your life, you confidence must be in Him alone. Many Christians have a real fondness for their possessions, their money. They watch it all the time. Here God was bringing Israel into a place where money was not going to do the job. It was an impossible task. God offered Joshua the promise of His presence, and in so doing, there can be no confidence in anything else!
Joshua knew the history of God’s faithfulness to his people. He had heard how God had steadfastly worked in Abraham’s, Isaac’s, Jacob’s and Joseph’s lives. He had heard the stories over and over again of God’s protection, God’s provision and God’s power on behalf of his people. As a very young man he had witnessed the miracles of the plagues in Egypt, the saving of the first-born Israelites from the angel of death, the miraculous crossing of the Red Sea, and the manna from the skies. God had proven himself faithful.
THE PROMISES ARE NOT A PILLOW BUT A PROD
OUR COVENANT RELATIONSHIP
The modern ideal is individualism, self-interest, and self-centeredness. We glory in the philosophy that says, “I will do what I want to do, when and how I want to do it, and I don’t care what anyone else thinks.” But the moment we are converted, such life must come to an end, for as Christians we are called to live in covenant relationship with God and with each other. A covenant is an agreement between two or more persons; therefore, covenant life is community life, and a covenant person will seek, not his own interest, but that of the entire community. So a husband will look after the interests of his wife; parents will look after the interests of their children; and a believer in Christ will look after the interest of the whole community of believers of which he is a part.
Each of us is on our own spiritual journey that will ultimately end in either Rest and Reward, or Punishment and Pain. I wish it were that easy. Good and Bad, Life or Death, Heaven or Hell, Black or White. But life is far from easy. In this life on earth we are usually in one of four places:
JUST LIKE LOT: many centuries before. Genesis 13:10-11 tells us that “Lot looked up and saw that the whole plain of the Jordan was well watered, like the garden of the Lord, like the land of Egypt . . . So Lot chose for himself the whole plain of the Jordan.” Lot made his choice based on one reason – he owned many cattle. Lot based his decision on sight, not on faith.
Loving the Word with the MudPreacher 