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  DISCUSSION                                                              The eastern tribes were returning home after a long time of fighting and being away from their families. As a remembrance and memorial to God, they built a monument. The other tribes got the wrong idea of what that monument was for. They believed it was opposite of what God would want. So now they are ready to go to war with their brothers. Sometimes we just jump to conclusions way too soon. This could have ended up in a civil war and much bloodshed. Phinehas the Priest showed a cool head and wanted to talk to both sides and get a better understanding of what the intentions were of both sides. After talking to both sides he realized it was just a misunderstanding. All were living for God and praising Him. This is why we need calm rational people to think before we react. We need to hear both sides of an argument before we jump to a judgment. The last thing we need is Christians arguing with Christians. Prayer

  DISCUSSION                                                               Under the old law you had to have cities of refuge; Places to go after someone had been killed and you had been the one to kill them. It was a place where you could get a fair trial, a fair decision on guilt or innocence. The key was you had to get to those cities before you were killed by the family that had lost a loved one. Today, we find people guilty through the media or by gossip. We don’t usually wait on the facts, we just like the gossip. Today if someone is accused of something, they are treated as if they are guilty even if they are found innocent. It’s sad but that is the way of our world. As Christians, we should be the opposite of that. Whatever happened to innocent until proven guilty? Maybe we should remember that we are Christians and should not indulge in juicy gossip. Prayer Requests:_______________________________________________________________  

  DISCUSSION                                                                                      Joshua has spent 40 years wondering in the wilderness because people had been selfish and had not trusted in God. Now, finally, it’s time to divide up the land and before it’s even finished people are complaining. “I don’t have enough land, give me more.” Why do we always want things handed to us? We will complain about anything. These people are in a land flowing with milk and honey. They are not in Egypt, they are not in the wilderness and yet they complain. Joshua is probably very tired and he plainly tells them you want more land go fight for it. Put your big boy pants on and go get it! They didn’t like that answer because it wasn’t easy. It wasn’t handed to them. When we pray to God, do we pray selfishly? Do we ask for a bunch of favors from God? Think about how blessed you are. When you pray, pray a big thank you to God for all the blessings you have in your life. Stop being selfis

  DISCUSSION                                                                                                 In Joshua 12-15, we see a list of kings that have been defeated in the time of Moses. Then we see a list of kings that were defeated in the time of Joshua. Joshua is getting old and tired at this point in the book, and all the land has not been conquered yet. It will be in the time of Solomon before it is all taken. But it’s at this point in the story that we see Caleb get his inheritance. Remember, Caleb was one of the two spies that said we can take Cannon, 40 years earlier. Joshua was chosen to lead God’s people after the death of Moses. Why not Caleb? Do you think he wondered why he wasn’t chosen? Caleb didn’t complain, he just waited patiently for his time and his inheritance. He had even told Moses years ago that he wanted this mountain where the giants live. Why? Probably because he knew they could take the giants over 40 years ago so he wanted to take them now. Did the

  DISCUSSION                                                                A whole new generation circumcised after they crossed the Jordan. Why? Well the obvious reason is that God needs a commitment from us. Why did He wait until they were in enemy territory? The reason is, God will take care of us in any situation. He wants to take care of us. By performing surgery on these men, in enemy territory, they had to totally depend on God to protect them. We must lean on the Lord with 100% confidence. After this they began to celebrate the Passover again. Maybe we all need to come back to basics and renew our spirit and draw near to God. When God is put first in our lives we can handle the battles. Jericho falls to God’s people because they obeyed every rule God gave them. From how many times to march around the wall to how quiet to be while walking. But at AI, which should have been an easy win, God’s people suffered a defeat because of sin in the camp. The children of God also under

  DISCUSSION                                                                                                As we read the first four chapters of Joshua, we see our new leader, Joshua, taking over for Moses. Moses led the children of Israel out of Egypt at age 80. We know he doesn’t get to enter the promise land because he struck the rock (Numbers 20:11). Moses made other mistakes, (Mark 10:4 says that he gave the right to divorce and we know God was against that). In Exodus chapters 3 and 4 we see several excuses he makes to God so that he won’t have to lead God’s people. Even before all of that, we see him kill a man in Exodus 2:12. Moses was a flawed man, but he was a man God could use. Joshua arrives on the scene fired up and ready to go. He constantly told the people to be strong and courageous. Joshua is on a spiritual high and ready to lead. The task at hand is huge and he is ready to lead. In chapter 2 we see the faith of Rahab in hiding the spies. This faith of a sinful woma

  DISCUSSION                                                                                   Then the devil took him to the holy city and set him on the pinnacle of the temple and said to him, "If you are the Son of God, throw yourself down, for it is written, "'He will command his angels concerning you,' and "'On their hands they will bear you up, lest you strike your foot against a stone.'" -Matthew 4:5-6             The context of the above passage is when Satan tempts Jesus by asking Him to prove His deity by jumping off of the pinnacle of the Temple.   His thought process is that if you do, the Old Testament reveals that angels would come to His rescue.   Isn’t it ironic that Satan is the one quoting Scripture to Jesus? The passage that the Devil knows comes from Psalm 91.   Traditionally, this psalm was written by David as a song of encouragement to those that are righteous.   God knows that life can deal us some painful blows, but for th

  DISCUSSION                                                                                       "See, I have set before you today life and good, death and evil. If you obey the commandments of the LORD your God that I command you today, by loving the LORD your God, by walking in his ways, and by keeping his commandments and his statutes and his rules, then you shall live and multiply, and the LORD your God will bless you in the land that you are entering to take possession of it. But if your heart turns away, and you will not hear, but are drawn away to worship other gods and serve them, I declare to you today, that you shall surely perish. You shall not live long in the land that you are going over the Jordan to enter and possess.” (Deuteronomy 30:15-18)         I have always said that life should be simple.   You have only one real choice to make, with only two possible options: Heaven or Hell.   While on the surface the choice seems simple, it really is a lot more diffi

  DISCUSSION                                                                                             For the last 16 years, I have had the privilege of teaching Bible at our local Christian high school.   On the very first day of class, I have always presented the students with a syllabus.   A syllabus is simply a document that a teacher gives their students that explain what the class will be about; but it also contains a list of the expectations that the teacher has for the student by way of assignments.   For instance, if the student completes assignment A, B, C and D, they will receive a 100 for their grade.   However, if the student only completes assignments A and B and fail to do assignments C and D, they will receive only a 50 for their final grade.   Every year I will always have a few students that procrastinate and not pay attention to the syllabus by failing to complete all the assignments.   When I ask them why they did not follow the directions, their reply is alway

  DISCUSSION                                                                                              In the New Testament, Christians are commanded to give on the first day of the week to “…put something aside and store it up, as he may prosper…” (I Corinthians 16.1).   The idea is that when we are blessed, the first thing we should do is give back to God a portion of what we have prospered that week.   I used the phrase “give back to God” on purpose, because it is He that has given to us in the first place.   This is done as a weekly reminder of all the blessings that God has bestowed upon us.   However, this isn’t just a New Testament command.   In Deuteronomy 26, God gives specific instructions for the children of Israel to give back the “first fruits” of all the produce.   They were to take these “first fruits” and place them in a basket and carry it to the priest.   When the priest takes the offering, they were to answer before the Lord with this “… "And you shall mak

  DISCUSSION                                                                                                  As the Children of Israel begin their conquest of the land of Canaan, God wanted to make sure that His people continued to be fully committed to His ways.   To ensure that, He gave specific instructions for them to not “imitate” the pagan practices of the current inhabitants.   His instructions for them were clear in Deuteronomy 18.13 “ You shall be blameless before the Lord your God ” (NASB).   That word “blameless” meant “perfect, complete, sound, intact”.    It was God’s desire that His people be completely different from the people that inhabited the land of Canaan.   That desire still exists for God’s people today. Today He calls us a “chosen race, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, a people for his own possession, that you may proclaim the excellencies of him who called you out of darkness into his marvelous light.” (1 Peter 2:9).   As a child of God, He expects you to

  DISCUSSION                                               In Deuteronomy 16, Moses explains the details concerning the Feast of Passover.   There is no way of us knowing just how long it had been from the time of the actual Passover until now, but one would assume it wouldn’t have been that long ago.   If we recall, in Exodus 12 the Passover as it happened, is when God separated His people from their captors: the Egyptians.   From that event, God has always wanted the Israelites to partake of a yearly feast as a reminder of the victory that God had given to His people.   However, the feast was designed to be much more of a way to help them to remember their freedom from the Egyptians.   It was also a way to point them in the direction of Jesus.   He was the true Lamb of God, without blemish, and it was through His death on the cross (the blood on the doorpost), that we gain God’s protection, as well as the freedom from the sin that enslaves us. The Passover was an allusion to the cr

  DISCUSSION                                    Idolatry is not a word that we would think to have to be concerned with in the brotherhood.   When we think of idolatry, our mind conjures up images of Buddha or some other powerless figurine to which mindless followers are bowing down.   Although there may be some truth to that, idolatry is much more of a threat to the believer than we might want to think.   The same was true for the Children of Israel as they were preparing for their conquest of the Promise Land.   This was so much of a concern of God’s, that He sent word to Moses to warn them of the dangers of idolatry.   "Take care lest your heart be deceived, and you turn aside and serve other gods and worship them.” (Deuteronomy 11.16).   I can only answer for myself, but I just don’t think I would be tempted to bow down to a figurine of an overweight man, who really has no power at all.   However, I have found myself bowing down to a great many other things; lust, pride, hat

  DISCUSSION                                 If you are reading this post, I would assume you are no stranger to prayer.  Our prayers consist of many different things; expressions of gratitude, petitions for forgiveness and pleas for things we would like God to consider.  However, I wonder how many of us pray for mercy? I don’t mean crying out to God to be merciful to us, but to show mercy on others that are guilty and deserve punishment.  In Deuteronomy 8-10, that is exactly what we see from Moses.  In Exodus 9, Moses is recounting the incident with the Golden Calf.  He is aware of this extreme form of wickedness that the people had done.  He is also fully aware that God had become so angry, He thought to destroy the entire nation and save Moses alone. It was then we see something different within the prayer of Moses:    “ "So I lay prostrate before the LORD for these forty days and forty nights, because the LORD had said he would destroy you. And I prayed to the LORD, 'O

  DISCUSSION                                         Have you ever tied a string around your finger to serve as a reminder of something?   The purpose of doing this, was to have the string serve as a symbol of what it is that you were not to forget.   The reason why this strategy is so faulty is that most of us forget what it was we tied the string for in the first place.    God knows that we are imperfect people.   He knows that as our days and life’s grows even busier than it already is, we tend to forget even the most important things.   In the case of the children of Israel, God knew that when life got to some sort of normalcy for them in Canaan, they would forget what all it took for them to get there.   To help them remember to never forget, he provided them with the Shema in Deuteronomy 6.4-5.   The word “shema” rendered in English comes out to “listen”.   This passage would become the daily prayer of the Israelites and later the Jews, to remind them of the events that took pl

  DISCUSSION                                                                                 Although the Israelites were known for their constant complaining and their lack of faith in God to take care of them, they must have understood just how great they had it.   They had lived in the nation of Egypt and had seen all of those statutes of idols, all of those temples that had been dedicated to imaginary god. They had to notice that the entire time they had been there, they had not once witnessed an act by one of those “gods”.   The Egyptian “gods” must have seemed so distant to them, as well as the Egyptians.   In fact, they were the one nation that got to experience first-hand what Jehovah God had done for them.   No other god had ever done what Jehovah God had done.   Note the words of Moses in Deuteronomy 4.7-8 “For what great nation is there that has a god so near to it as is the Lord or God whenever we call on Him?” The question was a rhetorical one; they already knew the answ

  DISCUSSION                                        The “cities of refuge” that are mentioned in today’s reading, consisted of six Levitical towns, in which a person who was guilty of an accidental homicide could flee to and find safety and refuge.   Outside of these cities, blood vengeance was allowed within the confines of the Law of Moses.   We really don’t read of any Bible characters taking advantage of such a place, but there must have been some instances where they did but God did not deem it necessary for us to know.   So, what is the application for us today?   Although we don’t have any specific cities that have been labeled as “cities of refuge”, we do have a place that we can find refuge in the church.   All of us are guilty of sin and sin is what nailed Jesus to the cross, so in essence, we are guilty of the death of Christ.   The only way for us to find refuge and safety with the body of Christ itself, is the church.   Those who are outside the church leave themselves o

  DISCUSSION                                                                    As the book of Numbers draws to a close, God begins to give His people final instructions as they prepare to enter the Promised Land.   His instructions are very clear; when you go into the land of Canaan…” CLEAN HOUSE”.   He wanted them to drive the Canaanites out of the land, “destroy all of their figured stones and destroy all of their molten images and demolish their high places” (Numbers 33.52) God didn’t want any remnants left of the Canaanite’s pagan civilization.   God knew that if they did not do exactly what He asked, that the idolatry would slowly creep back into their lives.   God gives us the same instructions when we allow the Holy Spirit to come into our lives.   He wants us to lay aside all the deeds of this life so that we completely clean out all the residuals of our former life.   When we become Christians, the blood of Jesus washes our sins away.   This allows the Holy Spirit to live

  DISCUSSION                                   In Numbers 31, God tells Moses that it is time for them to take vengeance on the Midianites for something that they had done to the children of Israel earlier in Genesis 25.1-17.   The Midianites had invited the Israelites to join them in worshiping their “gods”.   The Israelites that participated in this pagan worship were punished in Genesis 25; however, now in Numbers 31-32, God is punishing the Midianites for their deceit and poor influence that they were to God’s people.   It seems that these Midianites had deceived the Israelites in some way causing them to stumble and sin. The Bible is very clear about each person giving an answer for the deeds that they have done while in the body (2 Corinthians 5.10), but did you know that God will also punish those that have become a stumbling block to those that are trying to live a Godly life.   Jesus said in Mark 9.24, that whoever caused a little one to sin, it would be better if a millston

  DISCUSSION                                                 What is a vow?   It seems like the only time we use the word “vow”, is when we are at a wedding ceremony referring to the vows that the husband and wife make to each other.   The word simply means “promise”, and even though it is only three little letters, it is a BIG WORD!   The promises that we make to our spouses are extremely important, as are those vows we make to God.   Several years ago while at a lectureship, I remember hearing someone refer to the act of baptism as the believers wedding ceremony. That is a very interesting way to look at it, but it does make a great deal of sense.   When you are making vows to your spouse, you are promising that you will be faithful to them and never leave or forsake them.   You are joining the two beings into one.   That is the same thing that happens when a believer takes on our Lord in baptism; we make promises and allow Jesus to become part of our life (Galatians 2.20).   In Nu

  DISCUSSION                                                                      In Numbers 26-27, we see why it was called “numbers”.   Chapter 27 is a detailed census that was taken by Moses, Aaron and Eleazar of all the sons of Israel that were 20 years old and older.   When you begin to add up these people, you get 624,730.   That may not seem like a whole lot of people to you, so look at it this way.   According to 2015 census, when you add up Lauderdale County, Colbert County, Limestone County, Lawrence County and Madison County; you get 629,817.    When we look at the nation of Israel at this time in the course of the story, the male population is similar to the entire population of all five of the neighboring counties combined.   However, the most interesting thing of that 624,730 is found in Numbers 26.64-65: “But among these there was not one of those listed by Moses and Aaron the priest, who had   listed the people of Israel in the wilderness of Sinai. For the LORD had

  DISCUSSION                                                                        When one begins to reflect on just how magnificent God is, it is easy to get so caught up in what He is that we forget what He is not as well.   In Balaam’s discourse to Balak, he reminds us of something so simple that we tend to forget.   He said, “God is not a man…” (Numbers 23.19). Those words should offer us a great deal of comfort.   How many times have we been let down by humanity?   Human beings tend to disappoint us, even when they have no intention to do so.   However, God is not a man.   God will never let us down or disappoint us, and as Balaam said, He cannot lie. That should come as a comfort to us, because the Bible is full of many great and precious promises that God has made to His people.    If God ever failed to follow through with even one of those promises, that would make Him a liar.   How blessed we are to have a God that “is not a man”.   PRAYER REQUESTS:__________________