The Saints Overcome with Pastor Joshua
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The Saints Overcome with Pastor Joshua
Joseph Pt 2 (Forgiveness Live Service)
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This is the continuation of the story of Joseph. Our church lost half the video. We pray that you get something out of this.
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Live from the Saints Headquarters in Tolleson, arizona, spreading the Gospel, equipping the Saints, standing for the word of truth, proclaiming God's grace. Now, on a podcast near you, welcome your host, pastor Joshua, on the Saints Will Overcome Ministries. This is basically a chorus which came out in the late 70s.
Speaker 4:So, what else?
Speaker 1:can you do, don Huh, what else you can do if you don't have a sermon for a parent, you just sit up here and go. What?
Speaker 5:do you want me to say Amen to that? I've had to pull that one out a couple times.
Speaker 4:Believe it or not? I've said okay, lord, you've got to help me out.
Speaker 3:That's one of the biggest things, isn't it, John? Yes. Is turn around and listen to the Holy. Spirit. How many times have you gone into a place to preach and you've gone in there with all this stuff laid out and God changes it right in the middle? A lot and I turn around and I say why did I bother studying? All this time.
Speaker 3:But, the Bible says we study to show ourselves approved. Yes, yes, so we've got to keep that constantly pulling in our minds. You know, when I go out and do my walks in the morning, I walk around this place three times in the morning Takes me forever, but I walk around three times in the morning, so much of the time I'll get to talk.
Speaker 3:Lord, talk to me today. Tell me what I need to know. You know I talk to him and he does. Things will roll over in my mind and everything else like that. Am I perfect? No, there ain't no way. But one of the things is sometimes we need to be attentive and listen to what god has to say for us, even in our everyday routine, whether maybe it's doing laundry, maybe it's sweeping for us, but we don't have to do that anymore. I still have to do a lot, but that's one thing.
Speaker 4:Lord, I lift your name on high.
Speaker 4:Lord, I love to sing your praises.
Speaker 4:I'm so glad you're in my life.
Speaker 4:I'm so glad you came to save us. You came from heaven to earth To show the way From the earth to the cross, my debt to pay. From the cross to the grave, From the grave to the sky. Lord, I lift your name high. Do the chorus again. From the grave to the sky. Lord, I lift your name high. Hear the chorus again. You came from heaven to earth to show the way From the earth to the cross. I'm dead today. From the cross to the grave, from the grave to the sky. Lord, I lift your name on high. Look at the top. Lord, I lift your name on high.
Speaker 4:Lord, I love to sing your praises. I'm so glad you're in my life. I'm so glad you're in my life. I'm so glad you came to save us. You came from heaven to earth To show the way From the earth to the cross. I'm meant to be. From the cross to the grave, From the grave to the sky. Lord, I lift your name on high. Hang it up. Lord, I lift your name on high, Lord I lift your name on high.
Speaker 3:A lot of times there's signs to do this. It says you came from heaven to earth to show the way. From the earth to the cross, my debt to pay. From the cross to the grave, from the grave to the sky. Lord, I lift your name.
Speaker 5:God is such a good God.
Speaker 5:A faithful God. How about we bow our heads and we say a prayer? We'll open up with that and then we'll get into the word. Father God, we thank you for allowing us to come to you today to worship in your name, to extol you, to honor you, to love you and to be here with family, Because you brought us here to learn about you, to walk in your ways and to cherish you in your son Jesus' name. Amen, to walk in your ways and to cherish you in your son Jesus' name.
Speaker 5:Amen. I hope you all had a great week. I've had a great week, but you know, no matter how fulfilling, my week is the most fulfilling time of the week when we can come together and we can praise God and learn about his word, learn how to honor him and learn about the glorious holy God we served. And before we get into this message about Joseph and continue about forgiveness, I would just like to talk a little bit about the holiness of God. I was reading, I was doing some study lately and I was writing a paper and the the professor was asking about what is the whole point of the law of the old testament?
Speaker 5:you know, because a lot of people they'll read the old testament, let's say well, the old testament is a different God and the new testament is a different God, because they don't understand God. And I always say if you remember, when Moses, god commanded Moses to take his sandals off, before the law was ever given, the 613 laws, he said take your sandals off, moses, for the ground you're going to approach is holy ground and the ground does what it always does. The ground didn't change, the elements didn't change, the dirt was the dirt. But God said you're approaching me on this ground, so acknowledge my holiness. So this law was to reveal the displacement of man and the chasm between man and God and to show the holiness of God. So I always stress the importance that we read this Bible. We are reading and serving a holy, majestic God, a king of the universe. His son, that was given to us as a sacrificial lamb, revealed himself as a lion in certain instances, and especially after his resurrection. So I would like to read, before we get into the story of Joseph's continue, I would just like to kind of reveal what the greatest commandment is right, because we could have all the theology in the world, we could be the smartest person in the room, we could study the Bible day and night and even win debates.
Speaker 5:But what if we don't understand the nature of God? What if we don't understand who he is and how much we should actually love him and adore him? You know, and I even told one of my colleagues I said well, god pours his self out in the Old Testament of how much he loved his people, how much he desired to bring them back to him, how much it broke his heart, especially in Ezekiel's, has just come back to me. I love you. Well, the law was in place. Grace has always been there. The Old Testament is riddled and lined with grace.
Speaker 5:I even told somebody recently they're kind of perplexed that the law was given by grace, even though Jesus fulfilled the law and we experienced the ultimate grace. Because without the law, how would we know the chasm that exists between us and God and what we would need to be redeemed from? So as we look towards the law and we're not fighting by the law, we can respect the law and we can get a prism of many different beautiful colors of the majesty and holiness of God. So when we enter here and we worship God, we're entering, in a sense, the tabernacle, the new tabernacle, the church, where God, the angels and Jesus Christ himself are amongst us even now, in the invisible and the heavenlies that we just can't see.
Speaker 5:He's here and isn't that a blessed thing that we get to take part in. Let's read what's called the great shaman, deuteronomy 6 4 and I want to just read this before we get into this story about joseph, because what his brothers did, they didn't do particularly this. And moses writes in the shema. He writes now this is the commandment, the statues and the rules that the Lord, your God, command me to teach to you. That you may do them in the land which you are going over to possess it, that you may fear the Lord, your God, you and your son and your son's son, by keeping all of his statutes and his commandments, which I command you, all of the days of your life, and that your days may be long. Hear, therefore, o Israel, and be careful to do them, that it may go well with you, and that it may go well with you and that you may multiply greatly, as the Lord, the God of your fathers, have promised you and the land flowing with milk and honey. So Moses goes through this dissertation about do this and you're going to be okay, follow the law. He's talking about the law, but this is what Moses writes subsequently Hear, o Israel, the Lord, our God.
Speaker 5:The Lord is one. You shall love the Lord, your God, with all of your heart, with all of your soul and with all of your might, and these words that I command you today shall be in your heart. You know the law, everything you know. Isn't it fascinating? God says love me with all of your heart, with all your might, with all of your mind. See, I, when I read this bible, when I study theology, when I read this Bible, when I study theology, when I preach, it's all about a relationship with God. How much you honor him, how much you love him. Can you imagine being in a relationship in your life with one of your children, even thinking in the past, if you were married, a friend, and you took the element of love and just removed it out of the relationship? Completely, 100%, all together. Right, because every relationship in its own sense is defined by rules.
Speaker 2:Right.
Speaker 5:There's things you can't say to me. There's things you can't do. There's boundaries you can't cross. There's respect that you have to have, but what if you took love out of all of that? So all these rules in the Old Testament, these 613 precepts, that's why God says love me with all of your heart, your mind and your strength. Because people are complicated, right. But Paul says says love doesn't keep account it covers a multitude of sins.
Speaker 5:You know god is saying all this is pointing forward to the relationship and the love that I want to demonstrate to you. You know that's when we're going to time travel back into Joseph and him and his brother selling him into slavery. You know, and I read this story and it's just I look at my own trials in life and I say Joseph got it right, he really got it. Let's travel back in time, and I'm going to start here. Continue on chapter 37, go over this real fast because we read it. But we can refresh our memories Now.
Speaker 5:His brothers went to pastor their flock father's flock near Shechem. Now his brothers went to pastor their flock father's flock near Shechem. And Israel said to Joseph, which his name is, jacob Are not your brothers pasturing the flock at Shechem? Come, I will send you to them. And he said to them here I am. So he said to him Go now see if it is well with your brothers and with the flock and bring me word. So dad jacob is sending his brothers to go give a report. He's sending joseph to give a report on his brothers and at this point his brothers can't stand him right. The bible says they hated him. His dad made him a coat of many colors and joseph danced in it all day long, right. So, as we were talking about last time, we saw what the favoritism of jacob did, we saw what the resentment of his brothers did, and we're going to continue the story to capitalize on that. So he sent him from the valley of hebron and he came to shechem. A man found him wandering in the fields and the man asked him what are you seeking? I am seeking my brothers. He said tell me please where they are pastoring the flock. And the man asked him what are you seeking? I am seeking my brothers. He said tell me please where they are pasturing the flock. And the man said they have gone away. For I heard them say let us go to Dothan.
Speaker 5:So Joseph went after his brothers and found them at Dothan. They saw him from afar and before he came near to them they conspired against him to kill him over their jealousy. And that's why I opened up with the Deuteronomy 6, 4, the great Shema. Because were they loving God with that intent in their heart, with all their heart, with all their strength, with all their mind? They were so far away from God, god, so far away from the majesty, all that they were taught by jacob the patriarchs, abraham, noah, that they were of israel. But they gravitated so far away they wanted to kill their brother. They conspired to kill him. They said to one another here comes this dreamer. Come now, let us kill him and throw him in the pits and we will say a fierce animal has devoured him and we will see what will become of his dreams. You know, if they would have got their way and killed Joseph, we would never have the Redeemer.
Speaker 5:Think about the providence of God in his hand in the midst of all of this, because Jesus is a descendant of Joseph, right? So God, invisibly based off his providence, is involved in all of this and he's directly involved in Joseph's life. And so what lesson is that for us? You know, when we're suffering persecution, when we don't have the answers, when we think life isn't going right, how involved is God in our personal lives? He's involved in our lives as he's involved in Joseph's life, and I'm sure Joseph couldn't even see all this at the time. So they said let's report to father that a fierce animal has ripped him apart. But when Reuben heard it, he rescued him out of their hands, saying let us not take his life. And Reuben said shed no blood, throw him in to the pit here in the wilderness, but do not lay hands on him. That, but he said it so they might restore him to his father and we'll jump ahead and we'll sing a song, but we'll jump ahead. But I want to show you how God was directly involved in Joseph's life For our sake, so we could have a Savior. And what Joseph had to learn through trial and tribulation, suffering because he learned about God, he learns about the Savior.
Speaker 5:I want to ask everybody here a question. If we could look back on our lives 20 years ago, 30, 40 years ago, whatever, and we took all the suffering out of our life, what would we have learned? Suffering is the chisel in God's hands that he uses to shape us for the entirety of our life. So Joseph is suffering, he's being betrayed, he's being sold into slavery, even in the next chapter, where Potter, first wife, accuses him of trying to violate her. All this is literally pointing to the fact that God is revealing himself to Joseph and who he is, based off his providence.
Speaker 5:The most valuable lessons I've ever learned is the times of trial, the times of suffering, some of the closest times I've ever felt close to God is when I felt like life has left me behind. Has anybody ever felt like that? Some of my deepest prayers have came from times of trial, times of loss. You know, when Joseph was in that cell, rotting in that dungeon, the only thing he had was prayer. The only thing he had was his relationship with God. But you know what God tells us in Deuteronomy 6 for do not forget me when I take you in to the land of prosperity, because usually when people they acquire a lot in life, especially in this world, they forget all about God they don't pray anymore, they don't search for him anymore, they don't really want a whole lot to do with him.
Speaker 5:And it fascinates me that if I turn the TV on and talk to people and just look where the world's at as a preacher and this tells me something about the society we live in, don, as a preacher, sometimes I tell God I said I just feel like a relic to this world, like something adequate, like a paperweight To you. I'm not. You told Elijah, you're not alone. 7,000 have not bowed the knee to Baal. Don't have a pity party, josh, you're not alone. I have my chosen. You know what bears witness to that? Well, all of you are here right now. You know we're a certain amount of people that have not bowed the knee to Baal, right. What a beautiful experience that we get to worship with God in a world that is so dark, in absence of the light Right, and to be part of that. So, don, I'm going to let you take it away, because I want you to sing a song, because I want to stop talking.
Speaker 3:We need three more. Let me get three books. Yeah, come in. Let's go to page 25. And he's turned around talking about the blessings and stuff like that. This 25 is going to kind of throw us into that situation too the blessings that it has. Having a hard time getting in here, page 25.
Speaker 4:Blessed assurance. Jesus is mine. Oh, what a foretaste of glory divine. A pair of salvation's purchased divine glory. This is my story. This is my song. Praise be my Savior, honor the one. This is my story. This is my song. Praise be my Savior, honor the one. Number two, perfect submission, perfect delight, number two. And those of mercy, worships of love. This is my story. This is my song, praising my Savior all day long.
Speaker 4:This is my story, this is my song. This is my story. This is my song, praising my Savior all the day long. Number three, perfect submission all is at rest, lying my saviour, and happy and well, sager and happy and well, watching and waiting, looking above, filled with His goodness, lost in His love.
Speaker 2:This is my story.
Speaker 4:This is my song Praising my Savior all the day long. This is my story. This is my song Praising my Savior all the day long. Praising my Savior all the day long.
Speaker 3:Praise God. Isn't that the truth? Don Praise Him, my Savior, all the day long. All the day long, Blessed assurance.
Speaker 5:Paul tells us to pray without ceasing. You know, I've been asked about that question and it's impossible to pray all day long, 24 hours a day, seven days a week, 365 days a year. Paul is stressing an idiom. Basically, he's saying talk to God all day long, conversate with them all day long. He is there. You know, I was criticized recently by a man.
Speaker 5:He sent me a message and he said you know what, pastor Joshua? Well, forgiveness sets non-Christians free too. You know, I really thought about that and he had some explanation marks at the end of it, you know, and I was thinking and I said well, no, not really, it doesn't, because freedom is only freedom in Christ. Right, so we can donate to charity, we can be a secularist and we can forgive people all day long, but where does that get you? It doesn't get you salvation. It doesn't get you any more right with God, doesn't get you any more right with God. When we truly forgive, we expect nothing in return. And I want to kind of clarify what I said last time Our forgiveness is unconditional, like Joseph, there's no conditions attached. You know, it's for our relationship and our benefit of our relationship with God. And I was telling a person last week.
Speaker 5:Reconciliation has to do with the three R's. The person wants to reconcile you when they've harmed you. They need to repent, understand what they've done, turn a different direction, ask for forgiveness. They need to provide restitution, which means monetary, or somehow build the relationship back up from destroying it, which means monetary, or somehow build the relationship back up from destroying it. And three, they have to rehab themselves, proving that they've rehabilitated themselves and the defense is no longer going to be propagated against someone because it demonstrates true repentance.
Speaker 5:So there's a misconception of the bible that forgiveness just is equal to doormat. You just let people walk over you and I get a lot of questions. They go ain't I just supposed to keep dealing with people that take advantage of me if I forgive them? God says no, because forgiveness is unconditional. You do it no matter what. It's for me and you, so you don't become bitter. So you don't. You don't get in the way of our Own relationship and we're going to continue on. But I like asking questions Because I remember my own life. Anybody here ever held a grudge in their life? I have. I have quite a few grudges in my life and I'll admit it and I've noticed that that's because you don't want to forgive, because a I'll admit it and I've noticed that that's because you don't want to forgive, because a person will tell God you know what, not right now, god, I just don't have the time. I'm going to do this my way, I'm going to go through my process and I'm going to meet these conditions in order to forgive.
Speaker 5:But you know, then you have this chasm with God. The valley gets wider, wider, wider, deeper and deeper and deeper. And you know, what I've noticed when that's happened to me is God's voice gets further and further and further and further away. I would almost say it's like being trapped in the darkness in the wilderness and somebody's screaming on top of a mountain. And the closer you get, the louder the voice gets and you're saved when you end up coming out of that darkened forest and you experience that joy. But if that voice gets bleaker and dimmer and dimmer and dimmer, well, you're just stuck in that darkness, you're stuck in that chaos, you're stuck all along. They say hell is a place that a person has left unto themselves. I couldn't imagine anything more tragic and frightening being in a place where I've been left to myself for all eternity. I just thank God that he's given us hope. He's given us truth. He's given us truth. He's given us a savior. And look what Joseph faced Now.
Speaker 5:Joseph had been brought down to Egypt after he was sold and Potiphar, an officer of Pharaoh, the captain of the guard, an Egyptian, had brought him to the Ishmaelites who had brought him down there. Remember, joseph was sold into slavery. His brothers wanted to kill him. The family was in turmoil, favoritism, jealousy, choosing another child over their child, selling him ended up in egypt and the bible says god was with him the whole time and he brought him up and he elevated him into a position of the captain of the pharaoh, a man named potiphar and says the lord was with joseph and he became a successful man and he was in the house of his egyptian master. His master saw and it says Well, how is that?
Speaker 5:A pagan that had thousands of gods looked at Joseph's character and knew the Lord was with him. You know, when we walk with God, when we talk with God, we sing songs to God. People see God in us and people are so lost they will gravitate towards you. The holy spirit will flow out and they will want to change. It's not complicated. So our prayer life, our walk with god.
Speaker 5:Just like joseph, he says he observed, and pharaoh knew it was his god. So jose Joseph found favor in the site and attended him and he made him oversee his house and put him in charge of all that he had. From the time that he made him oversee in his house and over all that he had, the Lord blessed the Egyptians house, for's sake. The blessing of the Lord was on him. He had no concern about anything but the food he ate. Joseph's hand, god's hand, was on Joseph, it says for his sake.
Speaker 5:Now, joseph was handsome in form and appearance and after a time, his master's wife cast her eyes on Joseph and said lie with me. But he refused and said to his master's wife behold, because of me, my master has no concern about anything in this house and he has put everything that he has in my charge. He is not greater. He is not greater in this house than I am, nor has he kept back anything from me except you, because you are his wife. How then can I do this great wickedness and sin against God? And as she spoke to Joseph day after day, he would not listen to her, to lie beside her or be with her. You know, and it's amazing when I read this, because scripture jumps out and it speaks to us and Joseph says how can I sin against you and do such a wicked thing? Because I would be sinning against my God.
Speaker 5:You want me to tell you what the difference between Christians and non-Christians are in this world. What restrains a non-Christian? The world Philosophy, what restrains them? We know, when we do something that we're alienating our God, that we're in love with and that love, that law of liberty, keeps us from doing things we should not be doing, like Joseph in the story did. He would not lie with her, but one day, when he went into the house to do his work and none of the men of the house were there in the house, she caught him by his garment saying lie with me, but he left his garment in her hand and fled out the house.
Speaker 5:I know a lot of you heard this and this is true, heard this and this is true. Sometimes, when it comes to sin, the only thing we can do is run from it. You know, and we read the story of Joseph, but what character is not being mentioned and what character is missing from this whole story? The enemy, satan. Satan was there whispering in his brother's ears. Satan was there whispering in Potiphar's wife's ears. Satan was directly involved in this whole entire thing, and so was God. Remember the story of Joseph. He says take all away, that he has Job, I mean, and he says, but you cannot kill him. So the whole story of Job is you've got this whole story about the battle, in a sense, between God and Satan. So God's active, jesus is active, the Holy Spirit's active, but Satan is active also, and that's when we're reading this story. He is at work in Joseph's life. I always tell people when you're saved, when you love your God, when you honor your God, satan's not far behind.