Complete the Work God Gave You

Hey, hey, good morning. Good morning. Welcome to coffee and devotions Coffee no coffee. Okay. All right. So this morning we are at Joshua chapter 18 the first 10 verses we're gonna talk about The so Judas got their land Manassas Manassas Ephraim and Reuben have their land They show a whole bunch of other tribes what about them So that's what we started getting into this time. So let's have some coffee. We'll pray and we'll get into God's word. Do you want some black gold? No? Okay. All right, let's pray.
Father, we thank you so much for this day. Thank you for the blessing that we get to spend time in your Word together. Please help us, Lord, to read and understand in Jesus' name. Amen. Here we go. Joshua chapter 18. Well, I read verses 1 and 2. You can read it 3 through 7, and then I'll read 8, 9, and 10. Okay? All right.
Now the whole congregation of the children of Israel assembled together at Shiloh and set up the tabernacle of meeting there. And the land was subdued before them, but there remained among the children of Israel, seven tribes, which had not yet received their inheritance. Verse three, Deborah.
Then Joshua said to the children of Israel, how long will you neglect to go and possess the land which the Lord God of your fathers has given you? Pick out from among you three men for each tribe, and I will send them, and they shall rise and go throughout the land, survey it according to their inheritance, and come back to me, and they shall divide it into seven parts. Judah shall remain in their territory on the south, and the house of Joseph shall remain in their territory on the north. Ye shall therefore survey the land, in seven parts, and bring the survey here to me, that I may cast lots for you here before the Lord our God. But the Levites have no part among you, for the priesthood of the Lord is their inheritance. And Gad, Reuben, and half the tribe of Manasseh have received their inheritance beyond the Jordan on the east, which Moses, the servant of the Lord, gave to them. All right, and then the last three verses here.
Then the men arose to go away, and Joshua charged those who went to survey the land, saying, Go, walk through the land and survey it, and come back to me, that I may cast lots for you here before the Lord in Shiloh. So the men went, passed through the land, and wrote the survey in a book in seven parts by cities. And they came to Joshua at the camp in Shiloh, Then Joshua cast lots for them in Shiloh before the Lord. And there Joshua divided the land to the children of Israel according to their divisions.
So let's go ahead. I'm going to pull up the picture here. So we can see what we're talking about. So you have the other seven and a half or seven tribes, they show up and they're like, Hey, yo, dude, Joshua. Where's our land? Right? Ruben's got theirs. Gad has his. Manassa's on both sides. Ephraim's got theirs. What about the rest of them, right?
They've set up the tabernacle in Shiloh. So they've set up the tabernacle in Shiloh and Joshua's there. By the way, what's the tabernacle? The mobile tent. Okay, so yeah, mobile temple, mobile temple, right? So the tent, that's well, who's supposed to be represented as living in that tent? God. So why does it matter that it's a mobile temple tent thing? Because they're moving around a lot. Okay, but now are they moving around a lot? Nope.
So now it's kind of got like a semi permanent home in Shiloh. Yeah, this is kind of like the capital, right? So it's a temporary capital because a little bit later, we're going to have David who sets up Jerusalem to be the mount where it's going to be. But and by the way, Shiloh has been archaeologically uncovered now, right? So people can go look that up online. But so where's Shiloh? It's not actually shown on this map. And so you have every city, county, state, country has a capital.
We live in Des Moines County. What's the county seat? What's the capital of our county? If we need to go to a courthouse in our county, where do we go to? Des Moines? Nope, we go to Burlington. But in our state, in Iowa, where's our- Iowa City. Nope, not Iowa City. That's the old capital. They got moved to Des Moines. Yeah. And in our nation, where's the capital in our nation? Washington, D.C. Washington, D.C. And who lives in Washington, D.C.? The president. The president, as well as all of our The Supreme Court justices, senators, and congressmen, right?
So there's a capital and that's where the leaders go. In Shiloh, who's the leader? Moses. Moses is dead. Joshua. Joshua! So Joshua is like the king, right? No. That's why the tabernacles are there? For Joshua? No. For God. Oh, so who's the ruler? God. Who's the judge? God. Who's the king? God. That's right. Who's the lawgiver? God. God. Right, in this economy. Okay, so they go to Shiloh because Joshua's speaking for the Lord, but it's very clear to them that this is the Lord's doing. So they come, come to Shiloh, and Joshua says, hey, hey, hey, hold on, hold on.
The south, Judah's got their land. Manasseh's got their land. Now there's going to be the borderline, right, between Judah and the other tribes. You all get everything north. y'all got everything north and so now go survey the land what does that mean to survey the land look at it look at it right make maps figure out this line to this line the city to the city come back here and and uh i will cast lots right so there to get lots for the It's kind of like on the borderline. Yeah, so it's mentioned both in Benjamin's land and in Judas, but what we read in a previous section was that the Jebusites would still live in Jerusalem and they had not been able to displace them until finally King David does it.
So, uh, okay. So, so that's right. There's, there's, you guys gotta go do that. And so this sets up what's going to happen in the next chapter and a half or two of dividing the land amongst the seven tribes, right? So they've got land they've got to take. So that's what this whole section is about. Ooh, that was a lot. So put it in one sentence for me. What's this about?
The land. Okay, so it's talking about the land. Good. So, it's talking about the land and the inheritance that God's going to give. So, what do you think is the best verse to summarize this section? Three. Okay, you think verse three. Okay. Either three or four. Okay, so it's... Oh, no. Ten. Three, four, or ten. Okay, which one, girl?
10. Okay, you want to say 10.
Now I'm going to pick up verse 3 as our sea calling. Did you notice what it said in verse 3? They've been in the land a while now. What does Joshua ask them? How long will you not get your inheritance? Yeah, right. Get your act together, boys. How long is it going to take you to go to war and go get the land? We see that there's almost like this hesitancy, isn't there? It's like they've gone part way, but are they finishing the work? Nope. Is it really easy to leave things half done? Yeah. Oh, yeah. Oh, yeah. Sometimes do we struggle with that with our work? Mm-hmm. Sometimes do we struggle with that with our own lives with our like holiness? Mm-hmm. Yeah.
Yeah, I'm not trying to put a guilt trip on you or anybody else, but It's really easy for me to do this with like Bible reading plans Or like I have good intentions like I'm gonna journal every day this year like I'm gonna pray every single day and then I As the days and weeks and months go on, what sometimes is tempting to happen? It's really easy to let our zeal grow cold, isn't it?
I think that's why God tells us, do not grow weary of doing good. We talked about this this morning, right, in the book of Hebrews. Do not forsake the assembling of yourselves together, as is the manner of some, right? Some people have good intentions, like, I want to be a Christian, I want to go to church, I want to be part of the assembly, and then there's the old kind of We need to stir each other up to loving good deeds.
We need to say, Debra, don't give up, right? This is Joshua saying, you got the inheritance, guys. Don't neglect it. Go, go get it. It's good for us to do that with each other, isn't it? It's good for you to say, Daddy, don't give up on being patient with me. Don't be a jerk. Love me, please.
We need that. We need other people to help us, encourage us. Because I think naturally it's easy for us to become kind of meh, isn't it? So I need your help. You need my help. We definitely need mom's help. We need each other and we need to be pursuing. But do you think there was one person who never needed that type of encouragement or help?
Jesus. Jesus. I can only think of one time where it was hard for Jesus, it seems, to do his father's will. On the cross. Well, just before the cross, wasn't it? If there's any way possible, Lord, let this cup pass from me. And yet, did he give up? No. No. Thanks be to God.
Ready to pray? Lord, we pray that you would please lift us up when we grow tired. Please let us not grow weary. Please let us not forsake you. Please, Lord, let us chase after your promises. Let us pursue holiness. Let us love one another fervently. God, it's easy. You know we're able to run out of steam. But Father, you, you, God, are the one who can strengthen us. So please, Lord, do it. In Jesus's name, amen. Well, may you look to the author and perfecter of your faith, Jesus Christ, and may you run the race with perseverance that's set before you. Walk worthy of the calling you have in Christ Jesus. Bye! Bye!