1. Starting Point: Where would you be without Christ today? Where did God find you?

2. Salvation: What has God rescued us from, brought us into?

3. Balaam: Who has God used to bless and not curse?

4. Provisions: In what ways have you received cities you did not build and vineyards you did not plant?

Beyond the River—where Abraham had come from

Egypt—where they had been slaves for 400 years

Amorites—of the land of Canaan

Popularity and Reputation: We live for the opinions of others. We constant think about how others view us, and we want so much to be like and respected.

Wealth and Materialism: We live for money and what money can buy. Our minds are constantly going shopping, or we’re constantly thinking about our investments, or we’re always wondering how we can make more money.

We live for our careers, hopes of marriage, our kids.

Let me zoom in on one: the idol of comfort, laziness, apathy, spiritual consumerism.

There are people who complain about wanting deeper relationships, deeper community. They’re frustrated with superficiality, perhaps they feel people don’t really care. But in the midst of all their complaints, they do not do the work of building deeper relationships themselves. They do not reach out, invite people over, care for other, pray for others, work through issues, speak into people’s lives, etc. They only complain.

As we launch our new KOP campus, there are some who are making real sacrifices, giving their time, talents, energy. But there are some who are waiting for others to do the work, and then after it starts, they plan to check it out to see if they might like it. The attitude is not one of wanting to serve but to be served.

Others know that we have significant financial needs, significant building needs, significant needs in our children’s ministry (both immediate and long-term)—there is a lot going on right now. But again, the attitude can be, others should give their money, fix the problems, volunteer their time, make greater commitments, but for they’ll sit back and watch. They may even complain about the church, the leadership, the people—they are unhappy that they are better served. But they don’t want to be part of the solution.

There are some who do serve, give, pray and care. But there are some do not feel like serving, praying, caring. At a deeper level, there is little love for God, love for God’s people, love for God’s mission. If we’re honest, the deeper sin is that we don’t really love God; we’re selfish, we just love ourselves.

Let’s repent. We want to honestly identify our idols and throw them away.

This is first an attitude, a posture before God, but then it must lead to action. The Israelites were called to literally throw away their idols. It is not enough to say we repent of our selfish lifestyles but then do nothing to serve others.

I would like to challenge you to consider an action step. What would it look like to throw away your other gods? What would you stop doing, what would you start doing?

We turn away from other gods and turn toward God. It is the other side of the same coin. Negatively we no longer hold onto these other treasures. Positively, we treasure Christ. We incline our hearts to God. We are to love the Lord our God with all our heart, soul, mind and strength.

As mentioned, this is first an attitude, a heart condition. This is first about what we love and secondly about what we do.

We didn’t care about our popularity or reputation? What if instead of thinking about ourselves and our glory, we were able to think about God, God’s glory. We gave our energy not to wanting people to think highly of us but to think highly of God.

We didn’t care about wealth and materialism? What if we wanted to store our treasures in heaven, not on earth. What if we felt like our true treasure is our relationship with God and the privilege of serving Him. What if we saw ourselves as stewards of our Master’s resources and we want to labor, not for our increase, but for His increase?

What if instead of wanting to always be served, we see how much God has and does serve us. We see the mercies of God. We see how He has delivered, protected and provided for us cities we did not build and vineyards we did not plant. And we love and trust Him and want to serve Him.

What does it mean to serve the Lord with sincerity and faithfulness?

Specifically, for Renewal, this means being a Gospel-spreading movement. It means seeing God’s transformation deep and wide. It means getting busying looking at the mercies of God (living in the Gospel), and sharing that Gospel with others. We want to call on you to not be an observer but a part of the body, a teammate working together for our vision.

As Joshua calls the Israelites to commit themselves to YHWH, he doesn’t wait for their decision. He says up front, “But as for me and my house, we will serve YHWH.” He didn’t need to know what the others would do, and it doesn’t matter. He basically says, I will serve YHWH, whether you do or not. Even if I’m the only one, I will serve YHWH.

Our decision to serve YHWH with sincerity and faithfulness should not be affected by whether this is a popular thing or whether our friends are going to do this too. Though we want to do this as a church, at another level, this is a matter between you and God.

So let me ask you, as we make our covenant renewal, What if everyone else backs off. Would you still sign the covenant renewal? What if you’re the only one? Make your own decision.

After the people respond saying they will serve YHWH, Joshua warns them. He says they’re not able to serve YHWH, for God will not tolerate unfaithfulness. Although he wants them to commit themselves, he doubts their commitment. He wants them to consider this carefully. He wants them to see their own weakness, to see how difficult this will be, and how they may very well fail.

When you look at Israel’s history, Joshua’s doubts are very well justified. Israel failed time and time again. They repeatedly turned away. They are prone to unfaithfulness.

I think the warning is appropriate to us as well. We are prone to unfaithfulness. We so easily turn away from God. Our default nature is to serve ourselves, not God. And perhaps some of us have learned this, the hard way. Despite our best intentions, we’ve seen ourselves fail time and time again. It is good for us, in this covenant renewal, to more fully recognize our very inability to keep such a commitment. Are we just setting ourselves up for another failure? What’s the point of making a promise we can’t keep?

Israel failed time and time again. But where Israel failed, Jesus Christ succeeded. Jesus kept the law perfectly, He always loved and served God with sincerity and faithfulness.

The Gospel is the story of how we’ve failed but Jesus succeeded. That’s what we base our relationship with God on, Jesus’ faithfulness, not ours.

So where does that leave us regarding our covenant renewal.

Does Jesus’ fulfillment mean we don’t have to make a commitment?

No, it is the opposite. Jesus’ fulfillment means that we can make a commitment.

Because Jesus is faithful, strong, gracious and good to us, we make our commitment banking that Jesus will empower us to do what He calls us to do.

God’s grace doesn’t free us from a commitment life, God’s grace empowers us for a committed life.

When we know we are weak and unable to keep the covenant, but we make the commitment depending on His grace, our covenant renewal is an act of faith.

Example: Imagine our covenant renewal is like a pledge to give $1,000,000. We don’t have the money. We know we don’t have the money. But we believe God is calling us to give this money, and so we make the pledge, believing God will supply the money He is calling us to give.

Let me share my personal story. When I saw in college, I felt God’s call to full-time ministry. I changed my major from engineering to psychology, and then when I graduated I went to seminary. I felt a call and made a commitment to serve the Lord as a pastor. It’s been almost 16 years I’ve been in full-time pastoral ministry. Some of those years were seasons of joy, but some of those years were really difficult. Those who’ve known me through many of these years may recognize that God’s been teaching me, guiding me, refining me, sustaining me. I’ll have to confess over those 16 years, there had been times when I questioned my calling; there were times when I confided in friends saying I don’t know if I can go the distance. Thankfully those were very rare times, but my point is, my tenure as a was not because my commitment was so strong. I am weak, I can slip and fall, and there were times when I was slipping. I’ve been able to serve because the God who called me has been faithful. His grace didn’t free me from ministry, it empowered me for ministry. I have a story of how God sustains, guides, teaches, corrects, sustains. God empowers what He has called us to do.

Do you believe that? Maybe you feel you can’t throw away your idol, you can’t serve the Lord with sincerity and faithfulness, you can’t help the gospel transform deep and wide—and you can’t. But do you believe God can?

God empowers what He calls us to do. This takes us back to the beginning. The covenant is first a story of God’s deliverance, protection, provision, goodness and mercies to us. And even in our commitment and faithfulness to Him, that also is about God’s mercies and faithfulness to us.

The Gospel of God’s grace and mercies to us is the beginning, the middle and the end of it all.