Sing beforehand: Psalm 44:1, 2 REFORMED CHURCH BELLVILLE MORNING SERVICE DAY OF THE COVENANT WEDNESDAY 16 DECEMBER 2015 Our help is in the name of the LORD, who made heaven and earth. Beloved, grace be unto you, and peace, from God our Father, and from the Lord Jesus Christ. By the powerful operation of God the Holy Spirit. Song of praise: Psalm 98:1, 2. Prayer Doxology: Worship: Confession: Supplication (for pardon of sins): Thanksgiving: Intercession (for the need of the congregation, the church, authorities, sinful world and `appeal to the promises of God) General supplication: Illumination of the Holy Spirit (necessary for the ministry of the Word): Psalm 66:2, 7 Scripture reading: Joshua 24:1-28 Scripture text: Joshua 24:19, 22 19 Joshua said to the people, You can t serve Yahweh; for he is a holy God; he is a jealous God; he will not forgive your disobedience nor your sins. 22 Joshua said to the people, You are witnesses against yourselves that you have chosen you Yahweh, to serve him. They said, We are witnesses. (Joshua 24:19, 22) Theme: Never enter lightly into a covenant to the Lord Beloved congregation of our Lord Jesus Christ, today we gratefully reflect upon the 16 th December 1838 when the Lord heeded the prayer of the believers in Natal. In the light of the happenings of that day in history we listen this morning to the voice of the Lord from Joshua 24. The covenant at Blood River was indeed not the only covenant the faithful ever made to the Lord. Many of us present in this service have also, in our own history, made vows to the Lord. To make a vow to the Lord is a wonderful happening. Just remember the day when you openly to the congregation confessed your faith in God. Or think about the day, you who are married, promised to maintain your marriage to the glory of God. We can continue like this and name a lot of promises or vows we made to God. But do we always realise what it means taking a vow to the holy and jealous God? Possibly not always. Therefore, let us again listen and realise anew not to lightly make a promise to the Lord. In order of understanding what it means to promise that we will serve the Lord it is firstly necessary to see how such a promise should not be made. From the history of God with His people in Joshua 24 1
we hear that there are two ways or persuasions that must not be present to the making of a promise. The vow must not be based only upon emotions and must not be done out of your own power. Through Joshua the Lord tells the people what He has done to and for them. By means of a memory flight in the past He lets Israel reflect upon their history. Time and again the Lord stresses what He did Himself. Since the times of Abraham He did good to Israel. He removed Abraham from idolatry and made him into a child of God. The Lord had sons come from him and under the care of the Lord they became a nation in Egypt. The Lord guided His people trough the servants Moses and Aaron out of Egypt. During the difficult and trying times in the desert the Lord was with them. He also gave a great nation, the Amorites, over into their hand. And without bow and arrow He drove nations away from them. The land God promised to their fathers He gave onto them. They did not need to lift a finger because the Lord gave them cities to live in and vineyards and olive plantations to eat from. All this the Lord Himself did for them. When you brother sister and child reflect upon your road of life there are many places when you, together with Israel, can see the absolute reliability of the Lord. Not only does the Lord, our God, keep to all His promises, but you are also overwhelmed by the awe and wonder He compels. You see His power. He miraculously opens the roads of His children. What people consider as impossible is to Him just a simple possibility. For a moment reflect again upon your life. All that you have and are is thanks to God. All God s deeds of power and reliability are an appeal to us. Guided by the Holy Spirit Joshua states: 14 Now therefore fear Yahweh, and serve him in sincerity and in truth; and put away the gods which your fathers served beyond the River, and in Egypt; and serve you Yahweh. 15 If it seem evil to you to serve Yahweh, choose you this day whom you will serve; whether the gods which your fathers served that were beyond the River, or the gods of the Amorites, in whose land you dwell: but as for me and my house, we will serve Yahweh. (Joshua 24:14-15) We must carefully take note that the Lord does not have His people choose between Him and other gods. They must serve Him only. But should the not agree to this they must choose between the idols. And should they not want to serve the Lord, then they have made their choice. Should they reject the Lord, then so be it. The Lord does not stand in a line together with the numerous idols to be chosen. His deeds of reliability compel awe and wonder. He makes an appeal to mankind. Israel does not hesitate at all. After Joshua admonished them they answer: Far be it from us that we should forsake Yahweh, to serve other gods; (Joshua 24:16) And after also quoting reasons from their history they say: we also will serve Yahweh; for he is our God. (Joshua 24:18) Do you also notice this? The answer of the people onto the admonishment is indeed the expected and correct answer. Their emotions are worked up after hearing how good the Lord was towards them through the history. Why would we now serve other gods. Our Lord indeed drove the other nations serving idols from us. And this Joshua, is our Lord. Do you hear Joshua, we are going to serve the Lord also. Nevertheless Joshua is not satisfied by their promise. Not sober, but filled by emotions they said: Yes, Joshua, we will also serve the Lord. Emotions in our service to the Lord are not wrong by itself. But service built dependant only upon emotions is a problem. The people are emotionally worked up and easily say yes. But what will happen tomorrow and the day after during the days when nobody tells them about the great and powerful deeds of God in the past, when every day with its daily problems are present. What will happen then? Will they still approve of the service to the Lord? 2
When you no longer feel so emotionally worked up, not only in the presence of believers, it is easy to leave the service to the Lord and just carry on like all the other people do. It can easily happen that when our emotions are no longer so worked up we do the wrong things together with our friends. Everybody does it, why should I not also do it. I still honour the Lord by quickly reading the Bible and praying in the evening. Certainly that could satisfy the Lord. Brothers, sisters and children such an outlook on life easily takes place when we make a promise, based upon our emotions, to the Lord. When our emotions are no longer so worked up we easily forget about our promise to the Lord. We must not allow our emotions to guide us into making a promise based upon emotions only because such a promise does not keep many other matters in mind. In the state of emotion we feel ready for almost anything and you forget about your own limitations and shortcomings. Therefore, beware! Do not say too quickly: I am ready, I also am going to serve the Lord. Not every day our emotions will be at such a high point, therefore such a promise, just like our emotions, will eventually fade. The Lord also points out a second danger we must be on the lookout for when making a vow to Him. We cannot make and sustain it from our own powers. You can just see how elated the Israelites are, they are going to serve the Lord. Then it as if Joshua is pouring cold water over them when he says: 19 You can t serve Yahweh; for he is a holy God; he is a jealous God; he will not forgive your disobedience nor your sins. 20 If you forsake Yahweh, and serve foreign gods, then he will turn and do you evil, and consume you, after that he has done you good. (Joshua 24:19 20) Because Israel were filled by emotions when they made the promise they did not consider their own limitations and shortcomings. An emotional promise only wants to be sustained by human power. But this cannot happen because God is holy and demands undivided faith to Him. That God is holy means that He is completely and utterly different to us sinners. God is perfect, in Him is everything that is good. In fact, He is an abundant source of everything that is right and good. Because He is so perfect and full of love He hates all sins and wrong matters. Therefore He thus acts so perfect and justly He mercifully rewards the faith in Him, but justly punishes the sinners The people cannot serve God because He is holy and they are sinners. Due to their ignorance about their own sins and shortcomings and limitations they cannot serve the holy God. Therefore everybody who makes the promise of serving God must be aware of this truth: God is holy and He demands His servants to be also holy. When God demands His servants to be holy He is in no way unjust. He created man to His image and being holy was part of this image. But through the Fall the image of God in man became mostly lost so that they could no longer be holy by nature. Through His work of mercy God nullified the results of the truth that He is Holy. Through His work of grace in Christ Jesus, who paid for our sins, we may in the faith approach the holy God and serve Him. Because the Spirit, of God who works the faith in us, renews us, so renewed that we can also be holy. Because the Spirit makes us holy, we can again comply with the demand of God. When Joshua then says my family and I will serve the Lord he does not do it out of his own power but because God works the power in him to do so. In this way it must also happen to the people: The people must realise who and what they are. With them repentance for their sins and a true faith must come to their hearts. God does this through His Spirit and He will also enable them to serve the Lord. Further God demands undivided faith. All honour and worship, all praise and thanks may not be bestowed upon strange gods or any other creature. It is not me who will be serving the Lord out of my 3
own powers. It is not me who by my own power will supply food to my household or will reach such heights. It is the grace of God and His true love that works through His Spirit the power in me, enabling me to do everything. Let us therefore fully and totally bring all thanks to the Lord. He demands it from us. Should today God demand from us holiness and undivided faith, we could do it again. Jesus Christ arrived to die for our evilness and unfaithfulness. He also arose and ascended to heaven to grant us His Holy Spirit. His Spirit makes us willing and prepared of only serving Hod with undivided faith. From our own powers we cannot serve the Lord, but only through the power His Spirit works into us. In fact Jesus says: He who remains in me, and I in him, the same bears much fruit, for apart from me you can do nothing. (John 15:5) Somebody who believes that he could serve the Lord through his own power has a wrong impression of a promise. Such a person pigheadedly perseveres in the sin and is bound to himself and his own sinful nature. He rebels against God and stands outsides of Christ. But through the Spirit Christ is in us and we are through true faith in Christ. Therefore let us together with Israel of old realise that a covenant to the Lord cannot be made based upon emotions and also not through own power be made and maintained. Come, in closing let us listen how serious it is to make a vow to the Lord. After the people learned that a promise based upon emotions and own power has no power, they still persevered: We will serve the Lord. Upon this Joshua says: You are witnesses against yourselves that you have chosen you Yahweh, to serve him. They said, We are witnesses. (Joshua 24:22) Joshua s intention in the beginning was not to scare the people away from the Lord. In fact he wanted them to realise what serious matter it is to promise that you will serve the Lord. The people were not compelled in making the choice of serving the Lord. Therefore Joshua pointed out to them not to make an emotional choice. The people must realise that they make the choice out of themselves and therefore had to bear the responsibility for their choice. The Lord does not work with us as if we are sticks and blocks without any will of our own. We are not parrots who just repeat everything like a rhyme when the Lord addresses us. When the Lord makes us into His children, He does not remove our will and responsibilities. He in fact wants us to willingly serve Him. We must willingly submit to His authority. But this does not mean that we just decide upon everything ourselves. It is the Spirit that makes us willing to decide. When we are thus enabled by the Spirit in dying off the sin and we then do it, we willingly serve the Lord. Therefore Israel had to realise that they themselves will be witnesses to that they have chosen to serve the Lord. Should they become unfaithful and serve strange gods they are witnesses that they were only to blame should the Lord become angry and do badly onto them. They themselves would be to blame should they be punished, but God punishes justly. He is never unjust. Therefore the responsibility rests so much heavier onto Israel in sustaining this covenant. God will grant them the power to sustain it, but should they even just think about serving strange gods, they remove themselves from the grace of God. But how does one now willingly serve the Lord and comply with your responsibility? By fleeing from the idols and totally commit yourselves to the Lord. This means to dedicate yourself by your entire body and power in honouring God only. Where the housewife is busy in the kitchen or the husband is busy at work, or where the children are visiting with friends, there we must dedicate ourselves to the 4
Lord. Everything I do and say must clearly indicate to the people in my vicinity that I serve the Lord. I comply with my responsibility because I willingly subject myself to the Lord. I know what the Lord expects because this He teaches me by His Word. Therefore I also pray for the Spirit to guide me in doing it willingly. One hundred and seventy seven years ago a covenant was made to the Lord by people who were serious in their faith. But they were also sinners. Let us therefore not revere them. If the wording of the covenant then truly states that we would spend the 16 th December as a day of rest to listen to the Word of God, let us then realise our responsibilities. It the day of rest is there so that we could become quit to the face of the Lord and listen to His voice, let us then do it. But in all these matters we must keep in mind that a covenant to the Lord is not built based upon emotions. Let us not work ourselves op so emotionally in saying and doing things we cannot bear the responsibility for. Let us realise that our existence as a nation is not out of our own power, but based upon the grace of God. He allows nations to exist and He lets them also go under. May we also be protected from claiming God only for ourselves. A covenant of serving the Lord places a great responsibility upon us. A responsibility we took out of our own choice upon us. Let our service to God therefore be not only clear here in the assembly of the believers but let it everywhere in out lives always be clear to all people in our vicinity. In this way we minister the Name of our God, Father, Son and Holy Spirit, so that all people may hear about the great deeds of God and confess Him as the only God and Saviour. Amen! Closing prayer Closing Song Psalm 116:8, 9, 10 The Lord bless you and keep you; The Lord make His face shine upon you, and be gracious to you; The Lord lift up His countenance upon you, and give you peace. Rev Coen Vrey Reformed Church Bellville 16 December 2015 Scripture: New King James. Translator Fred Scheepers 5