Speaker 1: Most of us eat every day, some of us too much,
because yesterday's food is not enough to supply energy for
today's needs. Why then, do some of us expect yesterday's
portion of heavenly manna, the word of God to keep
us through today's challenges. On this program, we are going
to change all of that. Let's experience God's words today
and receive the power we need to live healthy, vibrant lives.
Welcome to Your Daily Portion with your host, author speaker,
Elle David Harris.
Speaker 2: Good morning, good morning, good morning. It is Tuesday, November eleven,
twenty twenty five. Hello, my name is El David Harris.
I am your host, and this is your Daily Portion
where we give you God's Word every single day, and
today is no exception. We are continuing in our lesson
study series Lessons of Faith from Joshua, and our caption
for today is Alters of Renewal, Alters of Renewal. We'll
get into that in just a moment, but first I'd
like to say welcome to everyone joining us, especially those
joining us for the very first time. Please go over
to your Daily Portion dot com pick up the Your
Daily Portion Life Application Guide. Also, also, please if you'd
like to have the music that we share on Friday evenings,
go ahead there and pick up the music at your
Daily Portion dot com and let us know where you
are in the world. This is one of the ways
that we continue to build faith and fellowship. Let's go
ahead and pray and then get underway. Father, We thank
you for this day. Thank you for giving us a
way to renew our commitment to you. Please help us
to do it in Jesus name, I pray, Amen and
Amen again alters of renewal. Okay, So the lesson writer
asks a very important question at the very top of
the lesson, what was Joshua's motivation for building an altar
to the Lord? And of course we have a few
passages to consider, so let's super simplify the question again.
What was Joshua's motivation for building an alter to the Lord?
The first passage we'll read is coming in from Joshua
chapter eight and verse thirty Joshua chapter eight, and I'll
just read verse thirty and the Bible reads, then Joshua
built an altar unto the Lord God of Israel in
Mount Ebel. He did that in Mount Eball. Now let
me read from Deuteronomy, chapter twenty seven, verses six and seven.
And see if we can make a connection. Thou shalt
build the altar of the Lord, thy God of holestones,
and thou shalt offer burnt offerings there ron unto the
Lord thy God, and thou shalt sacrifice peace offerings, and
shall eat there and rejoice before the Lord your God.
And so Joshua's motivation, very simply for building an altar
was simple, but it was profound. So let's not get
lost in the simplicity. It was simple, but profound. It
was just. It was obedience and remembrance. God said so,
I love it. God said so, and he wanted to
be obedient. And of course part of that God saying
so was to say, wait a minute, this is how
the Lord has led us. God had commanded through Moses
that once God's people entered into the Promised Land, they
were to build an altar on Mount Ebel and reaffirm
the covenant. Joshua was determined to do exactly that. Before
moving forward in conquest, he made sure the people moved
forward in worship. You see the people of God in
the past, that first generation that all died in the
wildern with the exception of Joshua and Caleb. Those individuals
had forgotten so much about God. Yeah, they murmured and
complained when God had been so good to lead them
by pillar of cloud by day and a pillar of
fire by night. They had forgotten. Remember the quote that
I shared with you multiple times over the last few weeks.
There was no fear for the future, except you forget
or we forget, how God has led us in the past.
You see. So Joshua was determined. He was one of
only two people above the age of twenty who left
Egypt who were now entering into the land of Promise.
And He's like, listen, those guys did not enter because
of unbelief. Those guys did not enter because they kept
breaking their vow and not mending with God or coming
back to Him in order to show repentance, you see.
And so I'm not going to do that. The altar
was not built after every enemy was defeated. It was
built in the middle of the conflict. Remember I keep
alluding to that gospel song don't wait till the battle
is over. You can shout now hah, don't wait till
the end You're gonna win. Remember that. So Joshua wanted
his people, God's people to understand that their success was
not secured by their weapons. I said it many times,
the weapons of our warfare are not carnal, they are spiritual,
but by their submission to God's word. The altar was
a visible symbol. Now they could look at it of
their dependence upon the Lord and a public declaration that
every victory belonged to God. So Joshua knew that worship
was not negotiable. It was a non negotiable. It was
a core value. We are going to worship the Lord
in the beauty of holiness, and the altar stood as
both both a testimony and a teaching tool that God's
covenant must be renewed, his commands must be obeyed, and
his faithfulness remembered, his faithfulness remembered. Let's go to the
Book of Psalms, chapter one hundred and three, verses seventeen
through seventeen and eighteen. And if I'm running along too quickly,
please come back to the program, press pause, get your
Bible out, your note taking tablet and apps, or whatever
way you do it, write it on a slip of
paper and pray over it, because I'm going to have
to run. Right From the Book of Psalms, Chapter one
O three, verses seventeen and eighteen, the Bible reads, but
the mercy of the Lord is from everlasting onto everlasting.
That means any generation in the past, anybody who were
your ancestors experienced the mercy of the Lord. Anybody all
the way back to the line of Noah, those individuals
experienced the mercy of the Lord. Anybody all the way
back to Adam, the first human being ever created. Everybody
has experienced the mercy of God, all the way back
to those angels who may have been deceived in heaven
and then repented.
Speaker 1: Huh.
Speaker 2: Not all of the angels. Not all of the angels
who had ever even considered to follow Lucifer actually followed Lucifer.
Some of them were convinced and then decided to go
back to God. Those individuals, they had experienced the mercy
of the Lord. And if there were some other beings
that God didn't reveal to us that had to, you know,
some kind of way amend their ways. I'm not saying
they existed. Do not quote me on this. I'm just saying,
if there's something God has not revealed about some people
or other beings in the past. God's mercy was from
everlasting and will continue to be into every life for
those who respect him, worship and revere Him to such
as keep covenant and to those that remember His commandments
and to do them. And so we need to set
aside time, Yeah, invest time to renew covenant with God.
We talked about that a little bit earlier, didn't we
recommit your heart to obedience to God, not out of fear,
because that's not really obedience anyway. I'm really tired of
people talking about whether you can keep the Sabbath and
be a fill in the blank some kind of other
sinner at the same time, Like, can I be a
racist and be a sabbath keeper? Knows the answer. Can
I be a wife beater and part of me if
that's jarring to you? But can I be abusive to
my wife and be a Sabbath keeper? No. I can
say that the Sabbath is the seventh day of the Lord,
my God, I can quote the Bible text, but that
does not make me a keeper. Only covenant keepers can
receive the promise of God that He will work out
through them his laws, you understand, And so we're talking
about covenant keepers who are careful to obey the commandments.
Now we know we can't actually obey the commandments out
of fear. We can look like it, we can act
like it, but not really do it, but out of
the love of God, who always keeps his promises. And
I'm grateful. Now from the book Patriarchs and Prophets, as
we come to a swift closed page five hundred, as
Joshua read the blessings and the curses, the people stood
reverently before the Lord, accepting the conditions of the Covenant
of life. I'm grateful. Are you willing to keep the
covenant or renew your vow with God? Today? Peace?
Speaker 1: Thanks for joining us listening. Friends, Always remember we cannot
live by bread alone, but by every word that comes
from the mouth of God. This has been your daily
portion with el David Harris, make it a great day. Yeah,