The NXR Podcast - SUNDAY SERMON - Christian Nationalism & Baptist Covenant Theology

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00:00:23.480 five-star review on your favorite podcast platform. Thanks. Amen. All right. If you were

00:00:30.460 with us last week, I spent about 50 minutes of the sermon talking about fallen angels, giants.

00:00:37.340 It was fun. And then about 10 minutes after building out that framework of fallen angels

00:00:44.000 or watchers and Nephilim and giants and how that particularly applies to the conquest of Joshua

00:00:53.120 and Israel in the land of Canaan, driving out these wicked people, I then pulled out for us

00:01:00.480 the primary principles of our text. Today, we're now finishing Joshua chapter 8 with the final

00:01:06.880 five verses or six verses. This is going to be Joshua chapter 8 verses 30 through 35. Let's go

00:01:15.680 ahead at this point and stand, if you will, for the reading of God's Word to show reverence and

00:01:20.940 honor. I'll read our text in its entirety. When I finish reading these verses, I'll say, this is the

00:01:27.060 word of the Lord, at which point I would appreciate very much if you would respond by saying, thanks

00:01:31.880 be to God. Our text for today is Joshua chapter 8, verses 30 through 35. The Bible says this,

00:01:39.580 at that time, Joshua built an altar to the Lord, the God of Israel on Mount Ebal. Just as Moses,

00:01:46.680 the servant of the Lord had commanded the people of Israel, as it is written in the book of the

00:01:51.700 law of Moses, an altar of uncut stones upon which no man has wielded an iron tool. And they offered

00:01:59.420 on it burnt offerings to the Lord and sacrificed peace offerings. And there, in the presence of

00:02:05.360 the people of Israel, he wrote on the stones a copy of the law of Moses, which he had written.

00:02:11.100 And all Israel, sojourner as well as native-born, with their elders and officers and their judges,

00:02:18.340 stood on opposite sides of the ark before the Levitical priest who carried the ark of the

00:02:23.860 covenant of the Lord, half of them in front of Mount Gerizim and half of them in front of Mount

00:02:30.800 Eba, just as Moses the servant of the Lord had commanded at the first to bless the people of

00:02:37.420 Israel. And afterward, he read all the words of the law, the blessing and the curse. According

00:02:44.160 to all that is written in the book of the law, there was not a word of all that Moses commanded

00:02:49.580 that Joshua did not read before all the assembly and the women and the little ones and the sojourners

00:02:56.740 who lived among them. This is the word of the Lord. All right, please be seated. Let's go ahead

00:03:03.860 and dive right in, dealing at first with verses 30, 31, 32, and 33. Cross-referencing from these

00:03:13.020 verses to Deuteronomy chapter 27, verses 4 through 8. This is where Joshua and Israel received this

00:03:20.980 particular command to build this altar, to build it in this precise place, location, and to write

00:03:28.260 upon the altar the law of the Lord. This command was given from the Lord through Moses earlier on.

00:03:35.700 We find it in Deuteronomy chapter 27 verses 4 through 8, which says this, And when you have

00:03:41.680 crossed over the Jordan, you shall set up these stones concerning which I command you today

00:03:47.160 on Mount Ebal, and you shall plaster them with plaster. And there you shall build an altar to

00:03:53.680 the Lord your God an altar of stones. You shall wield no iron tool on them. You shall build an

00:04:00.820 altar to the Lord your God of uncut stones, and you shall offer burnt offerings on it to the Lord

00:04:07.300 your God, and you shall sacrifice peace offerings and shall eat there, and you shall rejoice before

00:04:14.140 the Lord your God, and you shall write on the stones all the words of this law very plainly.

00:04:21.060 Matthew Henry, the late great Puritan and commentating on the first few verses of our

00:04:26.060 text today says the following, as soon as Joshua got to the mountains Ebal and Gerizim,

00:04:33.020 without delay and without caring for the unsettled state of Israel or their enemies,

00:04:39.280 he confirmed the covenant of the Lord with his people as appointed. This is what Joshua did

00:04:45.680 as soon as he was able to do it. The command was given from the Lord through Moses. When you enter

00:04:51.560 into Canaan, one of the first things that you need to do is you need to renew the covenant

00:04:58.280 between the Lord and the people. You need to offer a sweet fragrance to the Lord. Build an altar,

00:05:05.580 make sacrifice, and renew the covenant by reminding the people of all my commands.

00:05:11.120 reminding them of the words of the covenant, the stipulations of the covenant, the promises

00:05:16.380 of the covenant, both its blessings and its curses. And what we see is that Joshua is very

00:05:23.160 expedient about bringing this to pass. However, the chronological order of what we've seen thus

00:05:30.440 far throughout the book of Joshua is that he was not able to do this immediately upon crossing the

00:05:36.160 Jordan, but they had to traverse from the point in which they crossed the Jordan over to Mount

00:05:41.480 Ebal. And it took a little while, and a couple significant things happened in between crossing

00:05:46.840 the Jordan and making this altar and fulfilling the command of the Lord given through Moses,

00:05:52.380 which we just saw in Deuteronomy 27. The two things that happened are as follows,

00:05:57.120 the conquering of Jericho and the conquering, as we saw the last few weeks, of Ai. Jericho was

00:06:04.540 a formidable opponent, and they had to rely, that is, Israel had to rely on the supernatural 0.66

00:06:11.320 strength and power of the Lord in order to conquer them. By marching around the city for seven days, 0.56

00:06:17.240 one time in silence for six days, and then seven times on the seventh day after marching around

00:06:24.500 the city, the final time on the final day, then giving a great shout to the Lord, the earth, it

00:06:30.220 seems the earth opened up and swallowed the walls of Jericho, all but one portion of the wall, that

00:06:37.440 is where Rahab, the prostitute, where her house was located in the wall because she saved the spies

00:06:44.560 from her people and she was promised by them that her and her household would be spared. Everything

00:06:50.940 else was ultimately swallowed up into the earth, that is all the perimeter, the walls of Jericho,

00:06:57.060 then the people of Israel, they run down the enemy. They celebrate that God has brought about

00:07:02.660 this initial victory of bringing down the defensive walls of Jericho, but then they follow

00:07:07.740 through. They pursue the enemy and they put everyone in Jericho to death. After coming off

00:07:13.020 of that great victory, perhaps on an emotional high, they then send approximately 3,000 armed

00:07:20.320 men to go and conquer Ai. Now they think, you know, we need everything we've got when it comes

00:07:25.960 to Jericho because Jericho, again, was a formidable opponent, a juggernaut there in Canaan. They

00:07:32.360 thought maybe we can get away with a lot less in conquering AI because it was a much smaller

00:07:36.880 tribe. The Bible says that there were approximately 12,000 total. That would include the women and

00:07:43.200 the children in AI. So perhaps 5,000, give or take, able-bodied fighting men. And they thought

00:07:50.140 with 3,000, especially if we surprise them, we'll be able to take AI out. Instead, they are swiftly

00:07:57.420 defeated. God is merciful, even in their presumptuous attack, their arrogant attack of AI,

00:08:04.040 even in their defeat, they are sent fleeing, running, but only, I believe, off memory, I think

00:08:09.660 it's only 37 Israelites are actually killed in this battle. Joshua then, next in the story,

00:08:16.960 is he falls on his face before the Lord, and he is grieving. He's mourning, asking the Lord,

00:08:24.040 what's going on? And the Lord, in his mercy, he doesn't let him grieve for grief's sake. Grief

00:08:30.120 that comes from the Lord, not worldly grief, but godly grief that is actually granted as a gift

00:08:35.060 from the Lord. It's always a means towards a certain end. God does not grant grief to his

00:08:40.640 people simply so that we might wallow in a puddle of our own tears. God is not causing us to grieve

00:08:47.960 simply so that we would maintain in a perpetual state of depression. Rather, God grants grief as

00:08:55.500 a means towards a particular end, and the end is repentance. And so God quickly comes to Joshua as

00:09:02.640 he's grieving after this defeat by Ai, and he comes to Joshua and he says that you don't need

00:09:09.920 to grieve anymore, there's a simple solution. The solution is that you need to mortify sin

00:09:16.220 within the camp of Israel. There's sin in the camp. Put the sin to death, and then you'll be 0.80

00:09:22.480 able to put to death the inhabitants of Ai. And so Joshua goes to the people, and he numbers them. 0.98

00:09:28.540 It goes tribe by tribe, and then clan by clan, then household by household, man by man. And

00:09:35.120 eventually the Lord reveals that it is a man named Achan who has sinned against God and against his 0.97

00:09:40.980 people Israel by taking some of the devoted things that were supposed to be either destroyed or put 0.83

00:09:47.080 into the treasury of the Lord after Israel's defeat of Jericho. And so Achan and his whole 0.51

00:09:53.880 household is put to death. Very likely his household was complicit, aiding and abetting 1.00

00:10:00.840 their father in this sin. We know from the scripture that God does not punish, he does not

00:10:05.520 put to death the sons for the sin of the father. And we know that this is God's written word that

00:10:11.900 you and I are meant to follow. However, God is not bound. He is able to offer a divine decree

00:10:18.740 if he sees fit to do otherwise. And yet, it's very likely that in this instance, the children

00:10:26.400 are being put to death because they are likely grown children who again participated in their 0.64

00:10:31.380 father Achan's sin. So the whole household is not just guilty in a federal sense by the father, 0.51

00:10:37.580 but the whole household was actually involved in this cover-up of taking the devoted things of

00:10:42.400 Jericho and hiding them under the tent. After having put them to death, it's not only that

00:10:48.540 they rid Israel of the sin and now they're able to go back with 3,000 men as they did in their 0.98

00:10:54.600 first attempt to AI and be granted success. It's not only dealing with sin, but it's also in 0.89

00:11:02.460 dealing with sin, there's a newfound humility in Israel. And so in the same way that Israel took 0.71

00:11:08.900 everyone up against Jericho, fully relying on the supernatural power of God, they now gain this same

00:11:16.380 posture of heart, this same approach in dealing with AI. And the big principle that I drew out

00:11:22.020 in the last 10 minutes of the sermon last week, after 50 minutes of talking about giants,

00:11:26.680 the big point was this. You got a formidable opponent. You need God. You've got a small

00:11:35.220 opponent. You need God. That's the big principle. You're going up against Jericho. They have walls

00:11:42.120 that stretch to the heavens. You've seen that the Nephilim are among them, that there are giants

00:11:48.740 in the land, you're not going to be able to win unless the Lord is with you. And yet in the very

00:11:55.540 same breath, we can also say, now you're going up against AI. The whole tribe is only comprised

00:12:02.660 of 12,000 people, perhaps four or five, maybe 6,000 fighting able-bodied men. Same thing.

00:12:11.060 You need the Lord. One of the things that we see from the battle with Jericho all the way to the

00:12:17.560 battle with AI and its first attempt and it being failed and then finding, scouting out the sin in 0.77

00:12:23.820 Israel with Achan and then going the second time and bringing now 30,000 fighting men against a 0.68

00:12:29.500 whole tribe that's only comprised of 12,000. What we see is this, that human pragmatism

00:12:37.880 is never going to be successful. Instead, what we need is to follow the script. In our case,

00:12:45.920 that is to follow the scripture, to follow God's word. Joshua learned very quickly that he needed

00:12:53.880 to be utterly dependent on the word of the Lord. So when they deal with sin in Israel with Achan, 0.95

00:12:59.420 and now they're going for a second attempt with Ai to conquer them, Joshua is meticulously

00:13:04.820 following the word of the Lord that God is divinely revealing to him. And one of the things

00:13:11.200 that happens is that Joshua actually holds out his spear pointed towards the city of Ai, and he

00:13:18.020 keeps that posture of holding out the spear until all of Ai is conquered. And this is signifying

00:13:24.100 that there is a supernatural power of the Lord at work, that even when by human standards the enemy

00:13:32.220 is far outnumbered, there is still ultimately within the hearts of the people of God, there

00:13:37.420 should be a posture of a reliance upon the Lord, that we cannot do anything great or small unless

00:13:43.900 the Lord is with us. Pragmatism is not the need of the hour, but humble submission and obedience

00:13:51.760 to what God has written in his word, following his orders and commands to the T, is ultimately

00:13:58.900 what brings about success. Obedience brings blessing. Obedience brings blessing. And so this

00:14:06.400 is what Israel does, and they are granted a victory. And now that Jericho and Ai have been 0.97

00:14:14.760 conquered, now they're able to move from the point at which they cross the Jordan River over to Mount 0.83

00:14:20.800 Ebal and Gerizim in order to quickly fulfill, as quickly as they can, the command that was granted

00:14:27.800 by the Lord through Moses in Deuteronomy 27. And again, that is to set up an altar, to offer burnt 0.89

00:14:34.640 sacrifices, but to also write upon stones, to interlay them with plaster, and then to write

00:14:42.440 upon the stones the covenantal words, the words of the law that God granted through Moses, to renew

00:14:49.720 the covenant between God and his people now that they are in the land which God had promised to

00:14:56.240 them all along. And in this covenant, there are blessings and curses. There's law, commands,

00:15:05.080 and then there are blessings for obedience to those commands, and there are also curses. And

00:15:11.040 this is what Joshua is expedient to do, again, as soon as he is able to. So again, quoting Matthew

00:15:17.640 Henry now, as soon as Joshua got to the mountains of Abol and Gerizim, he was not delaying, he was

00:15:23.820 not procrastinating. They needed to defeat Jericho. They needed to defeat Ai, or they would not be

00:15:29.040 able to come to this geographic location where the command through Moses was given to be carried out. 0.88

00:15:35.300 So as soon as he arrived there with Israel, the mountains of Baal and Gerizim, without delay and 0.56

00:15:41.280 without caring for the unsettled state of Israel, they've just finished two battles. I'm sure 0.96

00:15:46.680 practically speaking, there were many things that they could do to recover, to rejuvenate,

00:15:51.880 to reunite. And yet the first thing they do is not dealing with their practical affairs

00:15:58.220 or strengthening their defenses against new foes and enemies, but rather Joshua confirmed

00:16:06.060 the covenant of the Lord with his people as appointed. That is, as commanded by God through

00:16:11.800 Moses earlier on when they were still in the wilderness, namely Deuteronomy chapter 27 verses

00:16:17.540 four through eight. One of the verses that comes to mind, I think, that draws out this principle

00:16:23.560 that we're seeing in the first few verses of our text even further is Matthew chapter six, verse

00:16:28.460 33, a verse that probably most of you, if not all of you, have memorized. But seek ye first the

00:16:35.020 kingdom of God and his righteousness, and all these things shall be added unto you. This is

00:16:42.440 the pattern that we see again and again with Joshua and Israel throughout this letter,

00:16:49.980 throughout this book of Joshua, as they enter into the promised land. There are first things

00:16:55.140 that belong to the Lord, that when they enter and defeat Jericho, that all the devoted things

00:17:03.680 are to be taken. That is all the things that were probably used in idol worship in Jericho,

00:17:08.900 to false gods that were made of silver and bronze and gold, precious artifacts, precious materials.

00:17:15.600 These things were to be taken into the treasury of the Lord. They would be melted down and used

00:17:19.660 for other purposes. They were valuable things. Everything else, apart from precious stones and

00:17:25.820 devoted things, was to be put to death. And that is the people, and that is also the livestock.

00:17:32.380 There was nothing to be gained from the first battle that they won in the promised land.

00:17:38.300 they just crossed over the Jordan River. They just came into the promised land after 40 years

00:17:43.740 of waiting and wandering in the desert. This is their first enemy. God grants them supernatural

00:17:49.340 success. They've been wandering around with the same pairs of clothes, God supernaturally allowing

00:17:55.960 their sandals not to wear thin, their clothes not to wear out. They probably saw, hey, here's some

00:18:01.680 new stuff, it would be nice to have some new stuff after 40 years. And Achan gave into that

00:18:08.700 temptation, the lust of the eyes. It says, I saw them and I took them. But what God had determined 0.70

00:18:15.440 is that the first fruits of the land of promise that he, by his power, brought his people into,

00:18:21.920 that those first fruits would be given back to him. Now, notice what's ironic and tragic

00:18:29.160 is that after defeating the second tribe in Canaan,

00:18:33.660 just a short time afterwards, namely Ai,

00:18:36.460 Israel is permitted to take the spoil. 0.95

00:18:40.500 They're permitted to plunder all the resources of Ai. 0.97

00:18:44.260 If Achan had just been patient for a very little while, 1.00

00:18:48.280 he would have been able to get all the things

00:18:51.220 that his heart was desiring.

00:18:53.060 And so once again, the principle

00:18:54.300 that seems to jump off the text is this,

00:18:57.080 but seek ye first the kingdom of God and his righteousness and all these things shall be added

00:19:03.340 unto you. So whether it's giving the first fruits of the harvest back to the Lord, in the case of

00:19:09.580 Jericho, taking the devoted things into the treasury of the Lord rather than taking them

00:19:13.940 for yourself, or another example, as we find explicitly in our text for today, or whether

00:19:20.420 it's setting up a monument and an altar and renewing the covenant with the Lord, saying that

00:19:27.320 this land, we're only going to be blessed in it so long as we are faithful to the Lord who has given

00:19:33.800 us victory and success, the Lord who brought us into the land. We can't say that, well, the Lord

00:19:40.040 brought us here and these border tribes, border cities have now been destroyed by the Lord's

00:19:48.120 providence and his supernatural power. But now that the Lord has brought us into the land,

00:19:53.000 he supernaturally allowed us to cross on dry land across the Jordan. He gave us victory over Jericho

00:19:58.980 and victory over Ai. Now we don't need God anymore. Now that dog won't hunt. That's not

00:20:05.660 going to work. And so instead, what Joshua does as a good leader is he says, we're going to,

00:20:11.440 we had to rely upon the Lord to get in, and the same way in is the way on. The way in is the way

00:20:19.240 on. The same reliance upon God, his mercy, his grace, his provision, the same reliance that we

00:20:25.820 had to have on God in the wilderness to provide food every single day, manna from the sky,

00:20:31.580 that's the same reliance that we're going to have to have in the land of promise. Obedience to his

00:20:37.140 commands, will bring blessing. And if not, if we are disobedient, there are curses in this covenant

00:20:43.940 between Israel and God. And some of those curses that we find in the Old Testament, we don't have

00:20:49.580 time to read every single passage that deals with this, but some of those curses is that you will be

00:20:54.440 defeated by the sword, by opponents, by enemies. Also, that you will be devoured by wild animals.

00:21:01.960 also that the land itself will spew you out. That there's something significant. This is not,

00:21:10.160 I'm convinced, unique to only the old covenant before the time of Christ in the Old Testament.

00:21:17.580 There is something unique to living in obedience to God in the land. And I'm talking about literal,

00:21:25.240 physical land. This is the origin of our own country. The founders, the covenanters, the

00:21:34.660 Puritans, there was much devotion to being obedient to the Lord. And there's story after

00:21:42.040 story after story of divine and supernatural providence that comes about. A harsh winters

00:21:48.980 that could have taken out all the European founders that came to America. And yet in the

00:21:56.340 bottom of the ninth, in the very last moment, God would bring some kind of supernatural provision

00:22:01.820 and the pilgrims would be saved and they would be able to live another year. And there was this

00:22:07.660 meticulous devotion, especially among the Puritans, to practical obedience to the Lord,

00:22:14.680 not just doctrinal accuracy in the realm of theory, but practical obedience to the Lord

00:22:22.420 and everyday life on a Tuesday afternoon. When you read the Puritans, it's almost overwhelming.

00:22:30.080 And this is one of the biggest criticisms of the Puritans. But the Puritans, you would see,

00:22:35.040 all right, here's the text, revelation, interpretation, application. Revelation.

00:22:39.180 The revelation is not the man saying, I have a dream. I have an idea. I have a strategy. It's,

00:22:44.360 I have a text. And so the revelation would be the text from God, a text of Scripture. Next would be

00:22:50.580 interpretation. That is, I have a faithful exegesis of the text. This is what God means

00:22:56.400 by the text. Now, real quick, quick pause here. That's very different than a lot of modern

00:23:02.280 evangelical Bible studies. Because what do you do in a modern evangelical Bible study? You sit in a

00:23:07.640 circle, and you might have a text from Scripture. That's a good start. And then what you often will

00:23:13.720 hear is you go around, take turns and say, what does it mean to you? At which point the response

00:23:19.380 should be, it doesn't matter. I don't care what it means to you. Oh, it means that to you? Great.

00:23:28.860 And I think that's a good pastoral candor to have. You know, I think that

00:23:32.920 that is love for the sheep. Sometimes the sheep need to hear.

00:23:38.000 No, it doesn't matter what it means to you. The late great R.C. Sproul, he said this,

00:23:41.500 and I think it's profound and true and well said. He said that any given text of scripture only ever

00:23:47.760 has one true interpretation. Now here's the next part. And yet that same passage of scripture with

00:23:56.900 only one true interpretation does in fact have virtually limitless applications. And this is

00:24:04.840 what you would see of the Puritans. The Puritans would say in their preaching and their writing

00:24:09.620 and everything that they did in their public ministry,

00:24:13.280 they would say, revelation, text.

00:24:16.120 Interpretation, the one faithful exegesis of the text.

00:24:19.280 That is what God intends to say

00:24:21.500 through this particular passage of scripture.

00:24:23.580 Then application, and it would always be plural,

00:24:26.280 applications.

00:24:27.180 You read, for instance, you read Thomas Watson.

00:24:31.840 I read some of his old sermons

00:24:33.260 and you'll see if it's 50 pages long,

00:24:36.420 it'll be text half a page interpretation 20 pages and then applications 30 pages and he would say

00:24:46.860 i mean charles spurgeon is another example a sower went out to sow one of his famous sermons

00:24:52.440 where he's dealing with the four soils and he doesn't even get past that phrase a sower went

00:24:57.240 out to sow okay what are the different soils and what does jesus say is that you know he doesn't

00:25:02.340 even get there. It's just a sower went out to sow, and it's a whole sermon just on that phrase.

00:25:07.480 And what does it mean to go out? And what is a sower? And what is it to sow? And it's not just

00:25:15.380 interpretation. It's application, application, application, practical, practical, practical,

00:25:20.680 and this is where you get the term puritanical. Puritan was a pejorative. Christian was a

00:25:31.240 pejorative in the first century oh you're just little you're just little clones of jesus

00:25:37.420 hey i like that we're saying we look like jesus little christ we can work with that okay christians

00:25:47.280 yeah that's what we are we're christians you're puritanical you're meticulously devoted to obeying

00:25:53.760 god in every aspect of life i'm sorry what was that a criticism uh okay puritans yeah we can

00:26:02.340 work with that you want nations and even civil rulers to honor god you're a christian nationalist

00:26:09.240 what was that yeah uh-huh yeah i am a christian nationalist i can work with that the next label

00:26:16.280 you throw at me i may not be able to work with but i can work with that one so i'll use it but

00:26:21.400 tale as old as time. 2,000 years of people who hate God, throwing a pejorative on the people of

00:26:27.200 God. The people of God, if they can work with it, if it is at least fundamentally true, then they name

00:26:34.080 it. They say, that's it. Uh-huh. We believe the nation should be Christian. Uh-huh. Yeah, we are

00:26:41.940 Puritans. Uh-huh. We are little Christ, little images of Christ. We are Christians.

00:26:46.480 the land when there is disobedience in the land before the cross and i believe on this side also

00:26:57.540 the land will spew you out

00:27:00.240 in a nutshell i've said it before i'll say it again my contention with my presbyterian brothers

00:27:10.160 and sisters is that I think they take the new covenant and stretch it too far as a one-size-fits-all

00:27:17.620 to encompass multiple different aspects of what may be going on in the life of the Christian

00:27:23.760 and in societal life in a corporate sense as well. My contention with the Baptist is that although I

00:27:32.740 think they're right about the parameters of the new covenant, my contention with the Baptist is

00:27:38.380 that they behave and pretend as though the new covenant is the only covenant there is. 0.80

00:27:45.460 God makes covenants. If you're married, you're in a covenant. And if you're a Christian and

00:27:54.660 you're married, then it should be a Christian covenant. It's not the new covenant,

00:28:00.900 but it is a Christian covenant. We know it's not the new covenant. We know it's not eternal 0.89

00:28:09.340 because Jesus specifically, explicitly says that we are neither in marriage nor given in marriage

00:28:16.920 in the age to come. When the Sadducees came to trap him, the Sadducees differed from the Pharisees

00:28:24.820 in the sense that they did not believe in the resurrection.

00:28:28.120 And they come to give a gotcha question to Jesus

00:28:31.780 pertaining to the resurrection.

00:28:34.060 They don't actually believe it's even going to happen,

00:28:36.160 but they say, if there is a resurrection,

00:28:38.180 what happens if there's a woman who's married

00:28:40.240 and her husband dies and yet she had no offspring?

00:28:44.240 Moses in his law says that it becomes the obligation

00:28:46.940 of her brother, the nearest kinsman redeemer,

00:28:50.380 to further his late brother's line, his lineage,

00:28:53.580 by marrying her and giving to her offspring.

00:28:57.280 Well, in this hypothetical scenario, Jesus,

00:29:00.060 the next brother dies and the next one dies

00:29:02.600 and the next one dies, and she has seven brothers,

00:29:05.520 none of them producing offspring for her,

00:29:07.820 and then she, last of all, dies also.

00:29:10.700 To which brother will she be married to in eternity,

00:29:14.860 at the resurrection?

00:29:16.980 And Jesus says, neither.

00:29:20.720 None of them.

00:29:21.560 so marriage according to jesus is not eternal we will be married to christ corporately as his bride

00:29:32.580 the church eternally with christ as the groom but marriage as we know it human marriage in this life

00:29:38.460 is not eternal and yet it's still a covenant and if you're a christian it's a christian covenant

00:29:46.180 Let me go one step further. It doesn't even have to work within the confines of federal

00:29:53.320 headship, according to the scripture, to be a Christian covenant. That you don't even have to

00:29:58.980 be the husband who is, according to the scripture, the head of his wife. You could actually be a

00:30:03.860 Christian wife with an unbelieving husband. According to 1 Corinthians chapter 7, the apostle 0.95

00:30:10.960 Paul, inspired by the Holy Spirit, and you would still have a Christian marriage.

00:30:18.420 And it would be a Christian marriage in the sense that the children would be holy. That the faith

00:30:24.640 of the wife, who is not even head of the covenant, her federal head is her husband. In this scenario,

00:30:31.680 Paul paints a picture of an unbelieving husband. And even with the head of the covenant, the husband 0.94

00:30:36.980 being unbelieving, but the wife being believing, her faith, even as subordinate in the covenant

00:30:43.060 with her husband, her faith is still enough for the children in the sight of God to be considered

00:30:48.240 holy. And whatever you do with holy, however you define it in that sense, you got to do something

00:30:54.360 with the word. So my point is this, we have covenants, even today, even in New Testament

00:31:03.820 times, 2,000 years, on this side of the cross, and we have covenants that are Christian covenants,

00:31:10.980 covenants with the Lord, that are separate or distinct from the new covenant.

00:31:18.700 So can a people corporately, living in a particular place, a particular people in a particular place,

00:31:27.680 can they order themselves as a body politic as a nation or a unified constitutional republic

00:31:37.760 and can they behave in such a way in their laws and legislation and practice that says we are

00:31:47.020 christian and if they do so will the lord see that not being israel the nation state in the

00:31:56.260 Old Testament, but a Gentile nation in the New Testament time. Would the Lord see that and say,

00:32:04.240 I like that, and I'll bless that? Well, I think that that's begging a question that has already

00:32:14.560 been answered time and time again for the past 2,000 years of church history, that the Lord does

00:32:21.780 recognize that, and he does bless that. And that's not to say that it's the same. Again, I've given

00:32:27.320 all the theological disclaimers. I'm not saying that a nation today can have a covenant with the

00:32:32.920 Lord that is saving, eternally saving, justifying for every individual person in that nation.

00:32:41.160 There's one saving covenant. That is the new covenant. And there's only one entrance into

00:32:47.760 the new covenant, that is faith in the Lord Jesus Christ. The replacement, if there is any, and I

00:32:54.780 don't prefer that term, but I would say the fulfillment of the nation state of Israel under

00:33:00.420 the old covenant in the Old Testament is not America, but the church. The church is the

00:33:07.300 replacement for Israel. And so the church is now a holy nation in the new covenantal sense, 0.93

00:33:15.020 in the salvific eternal sense, but that's not to say that your marriage, which Jesus explicitly

00:33:21.540 says is not eternal. It is distinct. It is a covenant, but it is not the new covenant. That's

00:33:27.460 not to say, well, my marriage, because it's not the new covenant, there is nothing Christian about

00:33:31.960 my marriage at all, or there is nothing covenantal about my marriage at all. 0.78

00:33:37.260 so for my baptist brothers and sisters cut it out that is so silly that is such a truncated view

00:33:46.300 of covenant theology there's a new covenant it's the only saving covenant yes and amen a thousand

00:33:53.300 times the church not america but the church replaces israel only the church it's a holy

00:34:00.380 nation? Entrance into this covenant is faith alone? Yes and amen a thousand times. And are

00:34:07.180 there other covenants? Yes. Can you start a business and even in your bylaws with the

00:34:13.460 business have Christian language, even quoting scripture, this business exists for the glory of

00:34:20.040 God? And start each day with your employees with a word and prayer and practice Christian principles

00:34:28.880 of integrity and say, this exists to the glory of God. And will God recognize that? Will God bless

00:34:37.340 that? Yeah, I think so. Ordinarily, as a guarantee, no. But ordinarily, as a general principle that

00:34:45.220 more often than not rings true, yes. Let me give you a couple other examples. I'm laboring this

00:34:50.660 point because we are anemic on this theological area. Another example would be children. The

00:34:59.200 apostle Paul in Ephesians 6, he restates the command and he restates without equivocation

00:35:05.140 the promise. And he behaves, now remember the timeline, this is after the life, death, burial,

00:35:12.180 resurrection, and ascension of the Lord Jesus Christ. And the apostle Paul behaves, he assumes

00:35:19.020 as though both the commandment and its promise regarding children is just as good as it was in

00:35:25.660 the Old Testament, the command that he's actually quoting. In the Old Testament, in the Decalogue,

00:35:32.260 Exodus chapter 20, the fifth commandment is that children should honor their father and mother,

00:35:37.140 and this is the first commandment with a promise that it may go well with them if they would live

00:35:40.880 a long life in the land. Then in Ephesians 6, Paul restates the commandment, children obey your

00:35:48.200 parents in the Lord for this is right. And then, of course, he qualifies and disclaims and says,

00:35:55.220 but the promise isn't good anymore because this is the New Testament and now we're Gnostics and

00:35:59.280 everything physical and tangible and temporal is of no account to God whatsoever. The only thing

00:36:03.600 that matters is faith. And so if you have faith in Jesus Christ, personally, you will be saved.

00:36:07.600 If you obey your children, you'll probably die. Or obey your parents, you'll probably die. No,

00:36:12.120 that's not what he says. All right, I'm being facetious. What he actually says is, children,

00:36:16.020 and obey your parents in the Lord for this is right.

00:36:18.000 And it is the first commandment with a promise,

00:36:20.400 assuming the promise is still good,

00:36:21.920 that you may live a long life in the earth.

00:36:24.200 Again, not a 100% guarantee,

00:36:27.320 but it is a general principle.

00:36:29.620 More often than not, it comes to pass.

00:36:32.960 And it doesn't actually have to do with the new covenant.

00:36:35.760 This is separate.

00:36:37.640 It's separate. 0.59

00:36:38.700 The new covenant, the only entrance is faith,

00:36:41.040 saving faith in Jesus.

00:36:43.200 And the blessing is eternal life.

00:36:46.020 But in the instance of children obeying parents, a child can be obedient to their parents without actually being regenerate, without actually being saved.

00:36:56.500 And an obedient child, even an unbelieving obedient child, who is obedient to their parents, ordinarily will do better in life and live a longer life than their rebellious peers.

00:37:09.060 if you have two children and one is rebellious to their parents the first human authority given to

00:37:15.820 them in their life and out of that they become rebellious to all other authorities their life

00:37:23.040 is going to be challenging their life is generally going to be difficult and if they're

00:37:30.940 extremely rebellious their life may literally in a physical sense be cut short

00:37:36.240 because of their rebellion.

00:37:40.120 They could commit some kind of crime,

00:37:42.880 be arrested.

00:37:44.820 It may be a crime that merits the death penalty,

00:37:47.280 or it could just be in their rebellion.

00:37:49.460 They give themselves over to substance abuse

00:37:52.380 and drugs and alcohol and these kinds of things

00:37:54.520 and get behind, God forbid,

00:37:56.280 the wheel of a car and end their life.

00:38:00.620 So in general, this promise is still true.

00:38:03.500 again my point is this in the new testament you still have covenants besides merely the new

00:38:12.160 covenant new covenant is superior new covenant is unique new covenant is eternal entrance to

00:38:18.920 the new covenant is exclusively faith the new covenant is the exclusive covenant that is

00:38:24.520 eternally saving all those things being said there are still other covenants in life marriage

00:38:32.200 being but one example. And for a Christian, whatever covenant we engage in, I'm simply

00:38:39.060 advocating that if a Christian has a covenant, it should be a Christian covenant. And by being

00:38:45.940 a Christian covenant and upholding Christian principles and explicit acknowledgement to the

00:38:51.680 Christian triune God and being obedient to his commands, I believe that there will be, again,

00:38:58.000 not 100% guarantee, but ordinarily as a general principle, there will be not eternal salvation

00:39:04.160 blessings, but temporal earthly blessings that follow. And children obeying their parents and

00:39:10.100 the Lord and living a long life on the earth is an example. It is an example. And so this is what

00:39:17.440 we see Joshua doing. Joshua and Israel are saying, God brought us into the land. God got us here.

00:39:24.760 and all the inhabitants of the land are wicked and idolaters, and God is using us as his tool

00:39:32.280 to bring his just wrath to bear on these wicked nations that have rebelled against him for

00:39:37.860 centuries, for their iniquity, the fullness of their iniquity, has come to fruition.

00:39:44.640 But in the same way that we're being used by God as his instrument to bring retribution and

00:39:50.500 justice to these wicked nations, if we engage in wickedness, if our hearts turn from the Lord,

00:39:57.520 if we rebel against him, we too will be driven out of the land. We too, the land will spew us out.

00:40:05.480 We too will experience curses. That there are blessings in the covenant that we have with God,

00:40:12.940 but also curses. Now, all that being said, a little bit more heavy lifting theologically.

00:40:20.500 I am a Baptist. I am a 1689 Second London Confession Baptist. And so, speaking again of

00:40:30.660 the new covenant, that is between Christ and the church, the only entrance being faith and the

00:40:39.740 reward being eternal life. Of this new covenant, I believe that one of the things that makes it

00:40:46.800 better is that there are no curses. It's the only covenant that God has ever made that does not

00:40:56.100 contain within it curses. And the reason it does not contain curses is because Jesus took all of

00:41:05.480 God's wrath for those curses. He was accursed so that you would not be cursed. And so for those

00:41:15.680 who are members of the new covenant by grace alone, not by works, through faith alone, in Christ

00:41:21.440 alone, the only saving object of our faith, Jesus Christ, his person and his finished work. For those

00:41:28.520 who are members of this new covenant, all God's promises for you as a new covenant member are yes

00:41:35.120 and amen. There are no curses because Jesus was accursed so that you might be blessed.

00:41:45.680 But again, the problem is the Presbyterian stretches the covenant too far and the Baptist

00:41:54.560 behaves as though this covenant is the only one that exists. We need to speak of the New Covenant

00:42:00.860 carefully in New Covenant explicit terms as it pertains to the church and as it pertains to faith

00:42:09.500 and as it pertains to eternal salvation. Outside of that, we need to be able to speak of other

00:42:16.300 covenants. This side of Calvary, we need to be able to say that these other covenants, if we're

00:42:22.680 Christians, should explicitly be Christian covenants. And because they're not the new covenant,

00:42:27.560 we should recognize that these other temporal earthly covenants, they do contain both blessings

00:42:33.800 and curses. So a national covenant, if the nation is rebellious, the nation will receive

00:42:43.280 consequences. In a familial covenant, Jesus gives, he gives a condition for divorce.

00:42:56.020 Jesus doesn't say, hey, it's a Christian marriage, and therefore you can't divorce ever because it's

00:43:02.760 all grace, there are no curses in this covenant, no consequences in this covenant.

00:43:07.180 No, Jesus actually says, although it's narrow, he gives two criteria.

00:43:14.080 The one that Jesus provides is adultery.

00:43:18.940 The second that Jesus gives through the apostle Paul in his writings is abandonment.

00:43:26.380 And theologically, I and others that I trust would hold that these are really

00:43:30.980 just two sides of one coin. It's really one criteria. Abandonment always, in all my experiences

00:43:39.500 pastorally, abandonment always results in adultery. And adultery always results in abandonment.

00:43:47.020 Unless there is quick, deep, spirit-wrought repentance. You abandon your spouse, you become

00:43:53.840 an adulterer. You commit adultery, without repentance, you eventually abandon your spouse.

00:44:00.980 but the point is this you can have a christian marriage

00:44:07.000 and you can break that covenant it is a covenant marriage is a covenant and it's a covenant that

00:44:15.180 can be broken the new covenant cannot it is an unbreakable covenant because it is founded upon

00:44:22.340 better promises. It includes blessings without curses. Every promise is yes and amen. An

00:44:30.460 unbreakable, eternal, saving covenant that God has established through the federal head of Christ

00:44:37.040 Jesus, the second and better Adam. And it is received not by works. It is a covenant of grace,

00:44:44.500 not a covenant of works, to be received by faith alone. And yet other covenants, such as familial

00:44:52.320 covenants, particularly displayed in marriage, do actually have criteria to where, even permissible

00:45:00.020 by the Son of God himself, namely Jesus Christ, the covenant can be broken because of disobedience.

00:45:07.880 So whether it's a familial covenant or a national covenant, these covenants do exist in the New

00:45:16.160 Testament age. They should be Christian covenants if we ourselves profess to be Christians.

00:45:22.320 And they are covenants that include not only blessing, as the new covenant does, but also 0.72

00:45:28.460 curses. They are covenants that can be broken. And that's right where our nation is, in my

00:45:35.060 assessment. It is not as though America is not a Christian nation. America was a Christian nation

00:45:40.880 with a Christian covenant, and we are currently in the process of apostasy and breaking that covenant.

00:45:47.260 and the judgments will be swift and severe.

00:45:53.780 That's where we are.

00:45:55.860 That's a little bit of covenant theology for you

00:45:58.160 from a Baptist perspective,

00:46:00.780 but hopefully not a truncated,

00:46:03.160 oversimplified Baptist perspective.

00:46:06.040 So the first thing that Joshua does 0.82

00:46:08.280 is a thing that I believe nations still should do today.

00:46:11.900 That is, the Lord has brought prosperity and blessing

00:46:16.400 Let's immediately acknowledge

00:46:19.560 That it comes from the Lord

00:46:20.920 This is not by our own doing

00:46:23.480 Let's renew a covenant

00:46:25.460 With the Lord and the people

00:46:27.420 And let's write out

00:46:29.740 All of his commands

00:46:32.040 And remind the people

00:46:34.500 That God's blessing

00:46:36.160 Is not unconditional

00:46:38.000 Not as it pertains to nations

00:46:40.840 This is not the new covenant

00:46:44.560 At C point A

00:46:45.540 everything I talked about for the last 25 minutes, all that stuff, there is a condition.

00:46:51.940 If we are faithful as a people, a body politic in this place, in this time, this land,

00:46:59.400 we will be blessed. Ordinarily, we will be blessed. If we are faithless, if we forget the

00:47:06.480 commands of the Lord, our God, if we transgress his commands and we live in open, prideful,

00:47:13.620 blatant rebellion, the land itself, which honors Christ, will turn against us and spew us out.

00:47:25.520 The land will be your enemy. Jesus said, if you don't praise me, even the rocks will cry out.

00:47:34.480 The land, brothers and sisters, remember this, the created cosmos, it knows who its creator is.

00:47:40.080 rocks know who their lord is the dirt has an allegiance

00:47:47.640 it is not to the nation that has been there for so and so many hundreds of years

00:47:54.040 it's allegiance the mountains the trees the rivers the rocks their allegiance is to the

00:47:59.420 lord jesus christ the one who made them and when we turn on jesus the only created being

00:48:09.060 and all the earthly cosmos that has ever rebelled against Jesus,

00:48:14.140 when we rebel against Jesus,

00:48:16.400 those who are in allegiance with him, namely the land,

00:48:20.440 the worldly cosmos becomes our enemy.

00:48:27.200 And it will spew us out.

00:48:30.500 These are things that for modern, Darwinistic, materialistic,

00:48:36.480 Western 21st century people

00:48:40.040 we think are too spiritual

00:48:42.080 and too wacky.

00:48:44.700 No, these things are true.

00:48:46.460 God made a magical world

00:48:48.080 and this magical world

00:48:50.160 is on his side.

00:48:55.440 When people rebel against him,

00:48:58.260 there are disease,

00:49:00.400 pestilence.

00:49:02.920 When people believe

00:49:04.800 and trust in the Lord,

00:49:05.920 Again, not a 100% guarantee, but ordinarily, there is blessing.

00:49:12.120 It is not a coincidence.

00:49:14.620 It's not a coincidence.

00:49:18.620 The West has been blessed because of its obedience to Jesus Christ.

00:49:24.080 That has not been a perfect obedience.

00:49:26.740 There are features and there are bugs.

00:49:29.100 now there are some who hate christ and therefore hate any christian society or even a society with

00:49:37.440 a christian history and therefore want to paint the west as though it's the worst society that

00:49:43.420 has ever lived which is easy to do do you know why because it's true because the west is worse

00:49:51.800 and the rest of the...

00:49:52.480 No.

00:49:53.800 Because the West kept records.

00:49:58.500 It's hard to prove the sin of societies

00:50:01.100 300 years ago 1.00

00:50:02.500 that were oral traditions

00:50:04.480 and didn't know how to write.

00:50:08.780 It's a lot easier

00:50:10.180 when you have a society

00:50:12.760 that keeps records

00:50:13.880 and even unflattering records

00:50:15.800 because of their devotion

00:50:17.040 to the intellect and integrity.

00:50:21.800 there's also no other nation that is willing to be no other society civilization i should say 0.96

00:50:30.920 that's willing to be introspective and actually point out their own flaws you don't see china

00:50:37.760 doing that you don't see china looking over the last 500 years where did we fail or where could

00:50:43.920 we grow right you don't see north korea saying you know i feel like in some ways we've been

00:50:49.100 oppressive and and we've been prejudiced and i think right the west is the worst society that's

00:50:55.900 ever lived no it's the only society that's ever lived that was willing to admit it had problems 0.69

00:51:00.680 it's the best not the worst and the point is it's not the best because of skin pigment

00:51:07.880 it's the best because of the lord jesus christ and in his sovereign grace he did immense wonderful

00:51:16.000 things among western society over the last 500 years at least since the reformation and arguably

00:51:24.020 1500 years if we stretch back all the way to constantine and certainly a thousand years if

00:51:30.380 we stretch back to king alfred and the origination of common law directly from deuteronomy so all of

00:51:37.940 this being said in a nutshell the principles of sowing and reaping are still at play

00:51:44.600 We live in God's world

00:51:47.440 And the Father who made the world in which we live

00:51:51.520 He has rules for living in His world

00:51:54.920 And when these rules are followed

00:51:59.680 There are, again, ordinarily

00:52:02.380 Blessings, benefits

00:52:05.660 When these rules are broken

00:52:08.020 There are consequences

00:52:10.440 We may call them curses

00:52:13.080 there are principles rules built into the fabric of the world that god made nature is one of those

00:52:23.260 rules there's a certain point where where man is actually called within the dominion mandate

00:52:31.900 renewed after the fall post-lapsarian and further renewed and redeemed even in christ in the great

00:52:39.120 commission, there is a sense in which we are called to push back, not on nature, notice this

00:52:45.240 difference, but on the curse, which is upon nature. So when man invents certain technology, for

00:52:52.040 instance, to bring about a massive harvest with tractors, instead of just pulling something with

00:52:57.800 an ox, that's a good thing. That's fulfilling dominion. That's pulling back on the curse

00:53:02.880 on nature. But when man attempts to somehow upload his consciousness to the cloud and

00:53:09.520 attain eternal life, that's not pushing back on the curse upon nature. That's pushing back

00:53:15.640 on nature itself. That's like Babel. And when man does that, not pushing back on the curse 0.99

00:53:24.300 within his given state as man, what he's called to do, but he actually tries to usurp God and be

00:53:31.040 a God himself, then the full force of God through nature will wipe him out.

00:53:39.780 Classic example, every horror movie ever made.

00:53:47.000 That's the plot. Spoiler alert, every horror movie has now been ruined. I'm giving you the

00:53:51.560 plot of all of them. The plot is arrogant people try to be God, use technology, try to do something

00:54:00.040 that's not pushing back on the curse on nature,

00:54:02.120 which is good,

00:54:02.940 but push back on nature itself.

00:54:06.480 Oh, male and female. 0.76

00:54:08.580 That's just a social construct.

00:54:11.920 Oh, dinosaurs. 0.97

00:54:13.160 Let's bring them back.

00:54:14.920 Right?

00:54:15.200 We can control it.

00:54:16.300 Nature finds a way.

00:54:18.200 All of a sudden,

00:54:19.360 the lesson you learn

00:54:20.520 is you get eaten by a T-Rex.

00:54:25.420 So these things are still true.

00:54:28.800 Sowing and reaping.

00:54:29.820 a man who casts his bread seven times upon the water stands, that's diversification of investments,

00:54:36.120 biblical principle, ordinarily, not 100% guarantee, but ordinarily, general principle, better return.

00:54:43.480 So reap. If you will not work, you don't eat. The nation that fears the Lord will be exalted.

00:54:51.700 it. That's what the Bible says. And it doesn't just say that about Israel. It's a general rule

00:54:58.800 for any nation that would fear the Lord. So Joshua says, the Lord brought us here and only the Lord

00:55:06.880 is able to keep us here. The way in is the way on. Obedience in and obedience is required to stay.

00:55:17.020 Let's remind the people of the covenant.

00:55:20.160 This covenant is not the new covenant, the eternal saving covenant.

00:55:24.120 Therefore, this covenant does include both blessings and curses.

00:55:29.200 If we're obedient to the Lord, there will be tangible, temporal, earthly blessings in the land.

00:55:35.940 The land will work with us and not against us.

00:55:39.000 If there is disobedience, the same way the wicked inhabitants in the land right now are being driven out,

00:55:44.860 so too the land will spew us out also.

00:55:49.340 That was true in Joshua's time.

00:55:51.580 It's true in our time.

00:55:54.040 Covenants include these principles.

00:55:56.480 There are covenants.

00:55:57.840 They don't all have to be the new covenant.

00:56:00.180 It's not crazy.

00:56:02.400 Evangelicals need work. 0.98

00:56:04.040 All right, let's finish now. 1.00

00:56:07.440 Afterward, he read all the words of the law,

00:56:10.240 the blessing and the curse,

00:56:11.880 according to all that is written in the book of the law,

00:56:14.860 There was not a word of all that Moses commanded

00:56:17.860 that Joshua did not read before all the assembly.

00:56:22.740 So we've got some family integrated worship

00:56:24.960 going on in our text today.

00:56:26.700 Before all the assembly, the women,

00:56:29.760 the little ones, and the sojourners who lived among them.

00:56:34.340 Well, I'm not Israel by birth.

00:56:36.800 I'm not native.

00:56:39.180 Do you live here?

00:56:40.400 Are you in this land?

00:56:42.660 Then the Lord is your God.

00:56:44.860 If not, leave.

00:56:48.160 The stipulation is that God will be your God.

00:56:52.080 Our God will be your God.

00:56:53.400 Our people will be your people. 0.82

00:56:55.260 You don't get to live in Israel and be an idolater.

00:56:59.700 If you're going to live in Israel, Israel will be your people and Yahweh will be your God.

00:57:06.340 And so Joshua includes the alien and the sojourner who are not illegal immigrants, 0.80

00:57:11.040 but those who were welcomed into Israel and permitted, given permission to stay.

00:57:17.080 They were not native Israel.

00:57:19.180 They are immigrants, but legal. 0.98

00:57:21.140 They should be viewed as legal immigrants and not legal immigrants to come into Israel 1.00

00:57:26.100 and set up a little Moabite colony. 0.96

00:57:29.960 No, to come into Israel and behave and worship as Israel. 0.94

00:57:35.060 You want to be in America? 0.87

00:57:36.660 Do it legally.

00:57:38.640 You want to be in America?

00:57:40.020 be American. And the biggest part of that is not the type of food that your culture celebrates.

00:57:49.640 The biggest part of that is culture comes from the Latin word cultus, which means worship.

00:57:56.180 Nations have gods. There is such a thing. Nobody believes there's such a thing as a Christian

00:58:01.640 nation in 2023, but we sure as heck believe there's such a thing as Muslim nations. 1.00

00:58:05.840 we know that's a thing

00:58:08.540 it's not whether but which

00:58:12.900 if you will not have Christ

00:58:15.340 you will have a God 0.98

00:58:16.840 it will still be a theocracy 0.54

00:58:18.640 the question is which God 0.86

00:58:20.040 it will either be the triune God

00:58:21.900 or it will be some other God 0.61

00:58:23.580 well America's neutral

00:58:25.820 not for long

00:58:26.680 that is a luxury of Christendom past

00:58:29.780 but as we continue to turn further and further 0.85

00:58:33.180 from our Christian past

00:58:34.640 all of a sudden

00:58:35.760 the myth of neutrality will prove to be the myth that it is and you'll have cities like we have

00:58:42.000 right now in america with five times a day city-wide prayer calls to worship allah

00:58:48.220 you can be a christian nation or you can be a pagan nation secularism was always a joke

00:58:58.380 it was always a joke because it's very hard to sell a christian nation on worshiping

00:59:09.420 pagan gods so what do you tell them instead nobody's going to go for that it's too on the

00:59:15.340 nose what you tell them instead is you say everyone can privately worship a christian god

00:59:21.220 But we just want a neutral public square that allows for victims not to be victimized.

00:59:29.380 Don't you want to be empathetic?

00:59:31.720 And you throw a little bit of the 19th Amendment in there.

00:59:35.280 And you got a lot of people who want to be empathetic.

00:59:41.640 And here we are.

00:59:44.520 So, honor the Lord.

00:59:47.780 the law of God both its blessings and its curses have been issued to all people not just God's

00:59:55.280 people it's for men women and children not merely heads of households it is for the sojourner as

01:00:02.760 well as the native by blood and in God's law is contained both blessings and curses that's the way

01:00:10.480 it was that's the way it is this is the law of sowing and reaping you can no more change this

01:00:17.640 law, then a gnat can be successful in flying through Niagara Falls. It doesn't work. Let's

01:00:25.840 pray. Father, we thank you for your word. We pray that we would believe it. We pray that we would

01:00:31.640 be faithful first locally, starting with our marriages, our children, our homes. But beyond

01:00:38.620 that, that we would be faithful in our vocation, in our political and civil involvement in our 0.86

01:00:46.320 city, our town, and our county, and our state, and that God by Christians scattered, sprinkled

01:00:53.460 as the salt of the earth all over our republic, that by your grace that you might bring about

01:00:59.480 revival and reformation, that you would turn the hearts of the people back to you, that we would

01:01:07.680 cry out and call upon you, and that you might relent in sending the disaster which we by our

01:01:15.740 wickedness most certainly deserve. We thank you that you are a long-suffering, God, slow to anger

01:01:22.320 and abundant in mercy and grace. We pray for conversion, salvation for millions in our nation.

01:01:33.100 And we pray, Lord, not only for converted hearts, but for those who are converted to be discipled

01:01:39.520 as the Great Commission stipulates

01:01:42.900 that they would be taught to obey all Christ's commands.

01:01:47.740 That part of the Great Commission

01:01:48.860 is not just preaching the gospel

01:01:50.700 and you bringing about conversion through faith

01:01:54.500 and baptism into the name of the triune God,

01:01:57.360 but then discipling nations to obedience.

01:02:02.440 Help us to be obedient.

01:02:05.260 Not to earn salvation,

01:02:06.920 which is only earned by Christ's obedience,

01:02:09.520 and received by us by grace through faith in him.

01:02:14.640 But obedience that comes about as a response of gratitude

01:02:18.000 for the free grace we have already received.

01:02:21.440 We pray this for your glory and for our good

01:02:24.460 and for the good of nations.

01:02:26.960 They are your inheritance.

01:02:29.320 We know that you will garnish the nations to yourself.

01:02:34.040 They have been promised to you by your Father.

01:02:36.860 we pray that in our lifetime

01:02:38.760 if you would be so kind

01:02:40.100 that you might use us

01:02:41.420 and our lives

01:02:42.740 in some small way

01:02:44.240 to bring this about

01:02:45.180 we pray these things

01:02:46.720 in Jesus name

01:02:47.540 Amen

The NXR Podcast - July 30, 2023

SUNDAY SERMON - Christian Nationalism & Baptist Covenant Theology

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