“Then Joshua said to the people, ‘You will not be able to serve the LORD, for He is a holy God. He is a jealous God; He will not forgive your transgression or your sins. If you forsake the LORD and serve foreign gods, then He will turn and do you harm and consume you after He has done good to you.” (Josh. 24:19-20)
Joshua had just asked the nation if they were going to serve God and they had resoundingly said, “YES!”… and then Joshua tells them they won’t be able to. Joshua saw in their momentary eagerness a need to remind them of what it was they were committing to.
To serve Jehovah is a grave and serious thing – like marriage, swearing fealty to God should only be done after we have counted the cost (see Lk. 14:28). Far too often we view our Christianity as something that is part of our life when Christ asks for all of our life. We promise our very existence to Him and then expect to only give Him a couple hours on Sunday.
For the Christian, everything we have (our health, our time, our homes, our children, our marriages) are only “ours” in the sense that Jesus gives us stewardship of them. All these things are talents given by the King, and someday He is coming back and will ask us to give account for what was His all along. Stop to recognize the responsibility and tremble. Even the one talent man knew what sort of a Master he had.
“He also who had received the one talent came forward, saying, Master, I knew you to be a hard man, reaping where you did not sow, and gathering where you scattered no seed, so I was afraid, and I went and hid your talent in the ground. Here you have what is yours.” (Matt. 25:24-25)
Matt. 4:4 #Biblebites