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GOD KNOWS

Christopher English

This chapter in Joshua is perhaps an unusual one to read in the gospel. We read it at home some months ago and I wondered as to it and it was commented on in the reading. As we prayed at the outset this is the gospel of glad tidings concerning God’s own Son Christ Jesus – good news. But we need to realise what we are as individuals and I feel very strongly about this, perhaps just for myself – the realisation of what we are. Here in Joshua there had been a sin which had been committed, theft, something which had been committed which God was exceedingly unhappy about. God said to Joshua to do what we have read. God knew the whole time what we were reading about in the chapter, God knew from the very outset who the guilty party was, and who was wrong, what the guilt was, where it was, where the mantle was, where the gold bar was, God knew. Nothing is hidden from the sight of God. I wish to say that solemnly; nothing is hidden from God’s sight. We are all here today under the sound of the gospel again. Recently the preacher has spoken about the amount of times in which we can come under the sound of the gospel, the many hundreds of times we can be brought together every Lord’s Day at this time to the preaching. But, how much of it actually affects us – that is a test. God knows. Nothing is hidden from His sight. Your state of soul, I say again solemnly, God knows, He knows what is burdening you, what there is of trouble in your heart, He know what burdens you bear, He knows everything about you. Scripture says, “but of you even the hairs of the head are all numbered”, Matt 10: 30. God has a record of everything, He knows. How often we come together in life and treat things so lightly. This man here did just that, he treated things lightly and wanted these things for himself. There may be persons whom we can put into that place; there maybe persons that you yourself could say that you could think of someone who is guilty like this. God said, bring them forward as a tribe and still this guilty person did not come forward and say. That is what we read, and as I was reading it, that is what struck me, our brother saying in the reading, this guilty party, this person, did not come forward the whole time. The family came forward and still he did not confess. Again, I wish to repeat that perhaps there is someone you and I can put into that position, someone perhaps even in this room, or someone we know whom we can say is like that, they are harbouring something in their hearts, holding something, that you know is not right and yet they are not bringing it forward. Still man-by-man they step forward and still this person is in the hope that what he has in his tent can be hidden. Finally, when he has nowhere to run, nowhere to hide, when he realises that himself, this brother, this son, as Joshua calls him, “My son”, when he is put into a corner he confesses, “thus and thus have I done … I coveted them and took them … they are hid in the earth in the midst of my tent, and the silver under it”. Beloved, there is a great deal of seriousness in what we are saying; there is a great deal of seriousness in being here at the gospel tonight. Tonight might be the very last time that we have to do in grace with a God whose arms are outstretched to bless. Make no doubt about it. I feel very strongly about it tonight that we need to know God and who He is because He becomes close in the Person of Jesus Christ, our Lord and Saviour. Do not underestimate the gospel, do not underestimate the power and what Christ can see and what God can see because He knows everything about you, regardless of how old or young you are. We often focus on the young, I wish to say to the older ones here as well, God knows. The reality of the gospel is very powerful.

I feel very tested in what I am speaking of, for Christ Jesus came here once, He came here. Once He was faced with a similar thing. There was a woman caught in the very act of adultery. It is similar in that she had nowhere to go, nothing to hide, it was already seen. She had been caught in the very act; she could not hide it, the very same thing as this man here. He did not confess, she had been caught, faced with her own Creator at that time. The Lord Jesus bows down and writes with his finger upon the ground (see John 8: 6). If you know someone like this, if you can picture someone who is like this, who is guilty and yet hides it, you are the same as me in that we do not wish to face up to the fact that that person is us individually. Beloved, do not put anyone else in that box, do not tick the box for them, that person, if we admit it to our own hearts and souls, is us individually and I the preacher am no greater than anyone. Just because I am on this side of the desk means nothing, I am a sinner and I am no better than this man who we read of in Joshua. Let the realisation of that soak into your soul and understand, because if you were truly honest with yourself you would say that that is true. There are some things in our lives we would not want to uncover to others, we would want them to remain private, strictly for ourselves, something we hold or have done in our past, and at times these things come to haunt us in our minds, our conscience can work. Sometimes we can hold off – beloved there is a door here that we came through, and if by the grace of God we finish here tonight, by that door we will go back out again. Do not put off confessing that you are a sinner.

Again I wish to stress very powerfully that that is not to be trifled with, you cannot trifle with time, you cannot trifle with anything. We have come in here tonight to hear of Jesus and to hear of Him being spoken of, but we need to have a realisation in our souls of what we are. This person did not confess until the very last minute. The last minute, perhaps, is now, there may never again be another gospel preaching. This person we read of was stoned and died and yet in the gospel we read of the Person who took my place. I am no better than this man. If we honestly realise it in our own hearts none of us are any better than him; and yet what he went through, going into death and dying for his own sins, is something that we do not need to do for ourselves. Beloved, there is One who has done it for me, He has done it all, everything which I owe, that huge debt of the things which I do in my life, that enormous debt, the debt which we cannot pay, was paid by One who did not owe, and that is Jesus. Jesus Christ, my Lord and Saviour came here two thousand years ago and He came here with one goal and that was to save me. Beloved, can you say the same? I feel very powerfully and strongly, can you say the same from your own heart? You have come through the door tonight: do not leave, do not put it off for another Lord’s Day, do not put it off for even another half an hour, do not put it off. Do not trifle with the realisation in your own heart that you need a Saviour. We all do. Every single last one of us, we are all exactly the same, none of us are any different. Jesus came here – why did He come here? Why did He do it? Because He loved me and He loves me; He loved me in that He came here two thousand years ago and died for me. But that did not end, not only did He die but His blood was shed because God, the great and terrible God whom we have, the One who created us, requires that blood must be shed before sin can be washed away, and that blood was given by Jesus. He died and His blood was shed. The order is correct, He died and His blood was shed, the terrible reality of death came upon my Saviour, the terrible reality of what He was about to do came upon Him, speaking very carefully of the Lord Jesus, just prior to Him being delivered up and that was because of His great love for me. The very place which I deserve Christ took for me. Beloved, each one of us needs to know that for ourselves, to understand it. There is no other way. Teachers of the children will tell them that there are persons who have done great works and as a result go to heaven: there is only one door and that is Jesus. He is the door. He says Himself, “I am the door”, John 10: 9. Beloved, there is no other way, if you do feel the reality of your burden of sin upon you tonight, that in itself is very positive, the gospel is a time of good news, and if you do feel that burden of sin, your conscience working with you, that is positive. Give that burden to Jesus. The Lord says, pass it over, give it to Jesus, confess it. Confess as this man did not do until He was put in a corner – perhaps that corner for you is tonight, perhaps you have been put in that corner tonight. Do not put another in the position, do not think of anyone else who is worse than you, think of yourself and confess the name of Jesus. Not only did He go into death, and the horror of death itself was there for my Saviour, not only that but now by the grace and might of my God and Father He is raised victorious and the Person whom I present to you tonight in Jesus is not One who is dead, but One who is alive and living for evermore, ascended at God’s own right hand. Jesus is there and He is listening with very great attention, not so much perhaps to the preacher, but to how you respond, to how I respond to the word which He is saying, which is Come.

O come to the Saviour, He’s calling today;

How long wilt thou linger? His voice now obey. (Hymn 324)

Beloved, accept, all we have to do is believe. We often say in the preaching, the gospel itself is very simple, we need a Saviour, we are sinners and we need a Saviour, Christ Jesus is that Saviour and all that is left for us to do is believe, simply believing:

Why unbelieving? (Hymn 217)

Do not leave here this evening without that knowledge in your own heart that Jesus is your personal Saviour. That being the case then you can also ask of your heavenly Father for the Holy Spirit, Christ’s own Spirit. It says, descending as a dove, and coming upon him” (Matt 3: 16), the very self same Spirit has access to each one of us and all we have to do is ask and we will be blessed. So whilst you can have your sins forgiven and know that your future is entirely safe with Christ, by having the power of the Spirit we can be preserved whilst here because the temptations will always remain. The temptations that this man went through in Joshua will always remain for us, but through the power of the Spirit we can be preserved from them. Beloved, believe these things – I wish to say very strongly – in your own heart, in a feeble way perhaps, but beloved believe them, this may be the last time that we are together. May the Lord bless the word. For His Name’s sake.

KIRKCALDY

25 May 2003

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