NUMBERS 33
51 Speak unto the children of Israel, and say unto them, When ye are passed over Jordan into the land of Canaan;52 Then ye shall drive out all the inhabitants of the land from before you, and destroy all their pictures, and destroy all their molten images, and quite pluck down all their high places:53 And ye shall dispossess the inhabitants of the land, and dwell therein: for I have given you the land to possess it.
FINAL INSTRUCTIONS
This is one of the final instructions given to the children of Israel, they were to destroy all evidence of the people who lived in the land of Canaan.The instructions given to us in the New testament are the same, we are to destroy all the works of the flesh。The destruction that the Israelites had to do was a complete one.. nothing had to be left. To do this they had to go to war.. it was to be a tough battle; it took time and it took resources.
It takes all their effort.. likewise, it will be a battle for us. This is no part time battle. You cannot sit back and expect to win the war.Likewise, with us, we are at constant warfare, Ephesians 6 tells us to take up our weapons.
The children of Israel had their weapons and we also have our weapons, which are outlined in the verses of Ephesians 6.
Our warfare will be constant, we need to be full time not part time to complete the task..although we will never fully get rid of sin until we get to heaven. Does it mean that we shouldn’t fight?So many Christians have put down their weapons? They think this task is too difficult. They think sin will never be cleared from their lives, so why should they start this task.The Israelites did not deal with the people who lived in the land, they left some people in the land and what happened, these people compromised the children of Israel, this is the situation with us, if we do what the children of Israel did, we will be tied up by the power of sin.In the second devotion, we will see what compromise leads too.Have you believer driven out all the bad habits in your life?
Have you torn down all the idols in your life?God bless you
Keith
JUDGES 210 And also all that generation were gathered unto their fathers: and there arose another generation after them, which knew not the Lord, nor yet the works which he had done for Israel.11 And the children of Israel did evil in the sight of the Lord, and served Baalim:12 And they forsook the Lord God of their fathers, which brought them out of the land of Egypt, and followed other gods, of the gods of the people that were round about them, and bowed themselves unto them, and provoked the Lord to anger.THE LOST GENERATIONSomeone once said that Christianity was one generation away from getting totally wiped out.All through their wilderness wanderings, the children of Israel, were told to train the next generation, they were told to pass on the great works of God. They were told to bind the word of the Lord
on their wrists and to keep his word before their eyes.How was it then that this new generation did not know God? In Joshua 24, when Joshua asked the children of Israel, if they would serve the Lord, they said Oh yes we will serve the Lord.What were they doing?, they had forsaken their responsibilities to train their children. Look at verse 10, this generation did not know the Lord, they didn’t even know what God had done for
the children of Israel. They didn’t even know what God had done with Jericho.What was the previous generation doing?More to the point, what are you in this generation doing for the next generation?Has your church got a Sunday school?Is it reaching out to the youth in its locality?As a parent…are you teaching your children and grandchildren the truths of the bible?As I said at the start, Christianity is one generation away from being lost, we need to make sure
we pass on this glorious faith. One of the jobs of the church is to train and teach the next
generation of leaders.Like Moses did with JoshuaLike Paul did with Timothy and TitusLike Barnabas did with MarkLike Jesus did with the twelveWhat are you doing to prevent the next generation from being lost?God bless youKeith