The God of Another Chance Is Not Done With You

This week, we're going to talk about a guy named Aiken, what he did, how things happen. We started Joshua 6, last week, Joshua 6 is loud. Walls fall, trumpets blast, people shout, God shows up strong. It is one of the greatest victory chapters in the whole Bible. And then Joshua 7 happens. It's very quiet. It's even heavy and dark. See victory turns into funerals. Celebration turns into fear and it happens out of nowhere or it feels like it does. So they were rejoicing and Joshua 6, the walls came down, God moved supernaturally, they were on a high, they were strengthened, they were confident. And then out of nowhere, victory turns into funerals. Celebration turns into fear, Joshua 7-1. And Israel violated the instructions about the things set apart for the Lord. A man they makin had stolen some of these dedicated things so the Lord was very angry with the Israelites. Notice, he didn't say it was angry with Aiken, he was angry with the whole tribe, with the whole group of people. Aiken was the son of Carmi, a descendant of Zimray, a son of Zera, of the tribe of Judah. The Jericho was public victory, Aiken was private compromise. The enemy does not have to attack you from the outside if he can corrupt you on the inside. And then Joshua 7 verses 2-5, Joshua sent some of his men from Jericho to spy out the town of Aai, Aai, east of Bethel near Bethel. When they returned, they told Joshua, "There is no need for all of us to go up there. It will not take more than two or three thousand men to attack Aai, since there are so few of them. Do not make all the people struggle to go up there." So approximately three thousand warriors were sent, but they were soundly defeated. The men of Aai chased Israelites from the town gate as far as the quarries, and they killed about thirty-six who were retreating down the slope.

The Israelites were paralyzed with fear at this turn of events, and their courage melted away. One chapter, "Great victory, we're confident. We can go up to Aai. There's not many. We can go kill them. This is a small outpost." They sent about three thousand men, and they get soundly defeated, and thirty-six men are killed. Just remember that, they were killed, thirty-six men, thirty-six families are grieving, and the Bible says their courage melted away. They just watched walls fall, and now they are running in fear. Victory evaporates because of what one man buried under his tent. Joshua falls on his face before God, and listen carefully what God says, Joshua 7, verse 11. "Israel has sinned and broken my covenant. They have stolen some of the things that I commanded must be set apart for me. And they have not only stolen them, but have lied about it and hidden the things among their own belongings. God does not say aching his sinned. He says the whole country of Israel has sinned. Why? Because they were one body. Everybody say one body. And one part is infected, the whole body weakens. If your big toe hurts you, your whole body, oh man, your whole body hurts, come on. When your back is hurting, my back hurts a lot. Sometimes I get up in the morning and say, "Come on, pain, let's go." But it hurts your whole body. How many of you get paper cuts? How many of you all like those?

I hate them more than anything because they're just like they shouldn't hurt that much, and you can't touch things, you've got to put a stink and band it on because it keeps bleeding, but it affects everything you do. When one part of your body is messed up, it affects every other part of your body. Come on. It's the same way with the body of Christ. It's the same way with the children of Israel. One guy messed up, but it affected the whole nation. Listen to this. First Corinthians 12 verses 20 through 26. Yes, there are many parts, but only one body. Many parts, but one body. The eye can never say to the hand, "I don't need you." The eye needs the hand. The hand needs the eye. Come on. I mean, I'm the eye. I don't need your hand yet. You've got to see and be able to do things. I don't need you. The head can't say to the feet, "I don't need you." In fact, some parts of the body that seem weakest and least important. And the parts we regard as less honorable are those we clothe with the greatest care. Everybody say amen or homie, come on. (congregation laughing) So we carefully protect those parts that should not be seen. While the more honorable parts do not require this special care. So God has put the body together such that extra honor

and care are given to those parts that have less dignity. This makes for harmony among the members so that all the members care for each other. If one part suffers, all the parts suffer with it. If one part is honored, all the parts are glad. That's what the Bible says. Israel was one body, we're one body. When we're all doing our part, we're healthy and strong. When someone doesn't do their part, we're a little weaker. That's just the way it works. It's like a football team. See, Aiken committed a covenant sin. They were in covenant. And God commanded that nothing from Jericho be taken. That it would all go into his treachery. It's all God's stuff. It's like your money. We have money and the tithe is all God's stuff. But yet more than not withhold it from him. And think we're okay. And so if you look at a football team, they're playing the game, they run a play, the quarterback's back to pass. If one offensive lineman ignores the play or misses his assignment, the quarterback gets sacked. Guess who suffers the whole team? The receivers didn't mess up. The running backs didn't mess up. All the other lineman didn't mess up, but it affects us all.

It's the same way with Aiken. Because he had a covenant, he messed up and it cost him 36 lives. Let me speak to leaders for a moment. Dads, moms, business owners, ministers. Let me just say this. Leadership carries weight, whether it's in your home, in your business, when you go to work, leadership carries weight. What we tolerate in secret eventually weakens what we are leading in public. You're gonna have a strong platform. You're gonna have a strong home, whatever your platform is, and a weak private life, and eventually, the weak private life will collapse the strong platform. It's like people come to church, say you love God, you do that, your kids get in the car, and you question them, what did you learn, what did you learn, what did you learn, and if they don't know or they don't say anything, then, oh, you didn't learn anything, but you said to learn, oh, we get in the car after church and yell and scream at 'em, or yell and scream at each other, or yell and scream at each other in the parking lot. We just ruin our witness. You weaken your platform. And I watch parents do this to kids, they're tough on them. A lot of 'em are, but some of us are, and we gotta learn to control that. We gotta let 'em love God, love the church. We want 'em to come back. We don't wanna think every time we go to church,

it's a mess and a fight, and we get mad at each other. Come on, and I know how the enemy works, 'cause I bet some of you couples in here were doing great until you got in the car to come to church. Someone said something, and you didn't like it, and you're like, what did you just say? Well, you heard what I said, you better not say that again. And you come into church, oh man, and then you start worshiping, then eventually you hold each other's hands or something. 'Cause you know, man, I gotta get this right. But that's how the enemy works. So you have a flat tire, like, oh, things happen, but we can't let 'em get to us. See, sin never stays contained. Joshua 7, verse 20 and 21, "A" can reply, "It is true I've sinned against the Lord, the God of Israel." Among the plunder I saw a beautiful robe from Babylon, 200 silver coins and a bar of gold waying more than a pound. I wanted them so much that I took them. They are hidden in the ground beneath my tent and the silver buried deeper than the rest. Here's what he did, I saw, I wanted, I took, I hid. That is the anatomy of sin. It starts in the eyes, it moves to desire, becomes action, then it gets buried. And I promise you, he told himself, it's just a small thing with everything here. God won't notice. It's just a robe, it's just some silver,

it's just some gold, no one will ever know. But Joshua 6, 19 was clear. to the Lord and must be brought into His treasury. This was not random plunder. It belonged to God. Now here is the part that is heavy, and we cannot soften it because the Bible does not soften it. Are you ready? Joshua 7, verses 24 through 26, "Then Joshua and all the Israelites took Aiken. The silver, the robe, the barbed gold, his sons, his daughters, his cattle, donkey, sheep, his tent, and everything he had brought to them to the valley of Aikor. Then Joshua said to Aiken, 'Why have you brought trouble on us? The Lord will now bring trouble on you.' In all the Israelites, stone, Aiken, and his family and burned their bodies. They piled a great heap of stones over Aiken, which remains to this day. That is why the place has been called the valley of trouble ever since. So the Lord was no longer angry, and we can say, 'God, that's cold blood.' All they did was still no some, but 36 men died. It cost them. It cost them defeat. It cost their courage, their confidence, and they had no understanding why. God brought us here, because one man took something that he should have taken. One man violated the covenant. One. It is sobering. The valley of Aikor means trouble. The Hebrew word for Aikar means 'to trouble, to bring disaster.' Sin promises pleasure, but it delivers trouble. And notice something else. The stolen items were buried under his tent.

His family would have known. They were complicit. He said, 'Why'd they get his family?' Because they were complicit. Silence became participation. Sin rarely stays isolated, it spreads. And listen to this from Jesus, Luke 12 verses 2 and 3. The time is coming when everything that is covered up will be revealed, and all that is secret will be made known to all. What's he talking about? Whatever you have said in the dark will be heard in the light. And whatever you've whispered behind closed doors will be shouted from the housetops for all to hear. You get to choose. Now I want you to hear this. You get to choose. The light of confession or the light of exposure, but it is coming into the light. Joshua 719, then Joshua said, "Aik and my son give glory to the God of Israel by telling the truth. Make your confession and tell me what you have done. Do not hide it from me." Joshua says, "My son," which means even in confrontation he was kind. Giving glory to God by telling the truth, confession glorifies God because it agrees with him. God is not trying to shame you, he is trying to free you. Under the old covenant, exposure meant judgment. But under the new covenant, exposure means mercy, grace and mercy. First John 1/9, with what I've talked about a bunch, if we confess our sins, he is faithful in justice. Forgive us our sins and that cleanse us from all unrighteousness.

God is faithful. God is just. And when you listen to all this rhetoric of the world and you hear social justice and all the other justices, then it's no longer just because what they're saying is someone wins and someone loses under God when he's just, we either all win or we all lose. It doesn't matter who you are, doesn't matter what color you are, doesn't matter how much money you have or don't have, doesn't matter where you're from. When God is just, he's the same for everybody. All the other stuff is not just at all and we buy into it. He forgives and he cleanses, Hosea 215. I'll return her vineyards to her and transform the valley of trouble into a gateway of hope. She will give herself to me there as she did long ago when she was young, when I freed her from the captivity, just talking about the nation of Israel. The valley of trouble becomes a door of hope. How? What happened to Aiken points toward or forward to what would happen to Jesus? Isaiah 53, 5, but he was pierced for our rebellion, crushed for our sins. He was beaten so we could be whole. He was whipped so we could be healed. The wrath that fell in Joshua 7 falls fully on Christ at the cross today. Romans 8, 1, so now there's no condemnation for those who belong to Christ Jesus. That does not make sense small. There's no condemnation. When God's Word comes to you and it convicts your heart, it's not the condemn us to free you. And when we talk about confession, we're not talking about the other people, not talking about a priest, it's talking about the hymn. When you confess your sin to hymn, it brings it into the light and He'll forgive you every time.

And be careful to confess in it before people. Because they can be great and you get mad at each other, relationship breaks, then they start talking. I've watched this with people telling people certain things and then they actually know, hey, did you know this? Don't tell anybody, this is, don't do it. There may be people in your life that you know you can count on, that you could tell anything to, you could talk about anything and they know you and they're good and they help us, they don't hurt us. But confession comes to God because when we confess our sins to Him, we're recognized and we're accountable to Him. And He is our God. You have a pastor, I have to confess a lot. You're only confessing what He already knows. It's not like you're surprising Him. Like, I can't believe that guy did that. I can't believe that lady did that. I can't believe they talked that way. You're not surprising God. You're just confessing to what He already knows you did because you're showing you're accountable. You're showing you're my God and don't like it, forgiveness is from you. And there's no penance to forgiveness. You can't go out and run three miles and get, you know, forgive, I'm gonna do penance. I'm gonna run three miles or whip yourself.

There's no, the Bible doesn't talk about penance at all. It talks about restoration, that's totally different. You can't confess your sins to a priest and think you're forgiven. I went and said 10 of those and 12 of that. It doesn't mean anything. You confess your sin to God 'cause He's the only one that can forgive sin. There is nobody else that can forgive sin. (congregation applauding) Nobody, only Him. And the reason He forgives our sins is because Jesus paid a high price on the cross for all of us. He nailed our sins to the cross. He said, I know you're gonna blow it. God knows you're gonna blow it. God knows what you were brought up in. God knows what kind of life you were led to live. God knows all these things. And when He comes into your world, He wants to save you from those things. He wants to heal you from those things. He wants to give you a new life, a new platform, a new journey to walk on. But you and I have to submit to Him. Does it mean you're perfect? Nobody's perfect. Even people who think they're perfect, they're some of the worst.

'Cause they have no compassion for anybody 'cause they're so great. And that's religion, and that leaves hope for nobody. But when you have a relationship with God, He gives hope to everybody. The valley of trouble becomes the place of hope. Because of what Jesus did, we have hope. You can be forgiven. You're simply passionate. You don't know what identity doesn't matter. God knows, and He still says, He'll forgive you. You can't find a list of things God won't forgive. There's only one thing I believe God won't forgive, that if you don't accept Jesus as your Lord and Savior, you are going to hell. You will not pass go. You will not collect $200. You'll go straight there. Because people get born again and they feel like they've committed the unpardonable sin, but they don't even know what it is. I've never heard a great explanation on what it is. But I believe, my belief, is that the only sin He can't forgive is the one where you never repent. And you never ask Jesus to be Lord of your life. That dooms you for eternity. And when you ask Him to be Lord of your life, you've got a purpose to follow Him. Will you make mistakes?

Yes. Will you still sin? Yes. Will you stumble? Yes. Well, sometimes you have to crawl. Yes. But you will pick up that cross. The Bible says then follow Him. Even when you're stumbling, you're crawling. You keep carrying your cross. The good, the bad, and the ugly, and life. And we just keep moving forward. But Pastor, I've made lots of mistakes. Guess what? Everybody in this room, everybody in this world has made lots of mistakes. Yeah, but theirs is not as bad as mine. They're still the same. Sin is sin to the eyes of God. And He forgave it all. That's why there's no condemnation. Well, I don't feel worthy enough. I don't feel good enough. I know we feel this way. But it's not reality. The truth is, once you've made Jesus, Lord of your life, He gives you a gift of salvation. Not by works, lest any man should boast. He gives you the gift of salvation

that you don't deserve. We can't earn. He just gives it to us. So when we're over there rehearsing all the things we've done, God is just up there like I could see Him like this tap in His foot. Are you done? Yeah, keep going. Go find the devil more. Come on. Just listen. And he says, don't you get it? My grace is bigger than anything you could have ever done. He doesn't want any of us to perish, but come to everlasting life. That's the God we serve. That's only true God. That's only real God. Full of love and mercy and grace. So receive it and accept it. Quit talking yourself out of serving God. Colossians 2.14 says, "He canceled the record of the charges against us and took it away by nailing it to the cross." That means everything. There's not everything except. It's just everything. Aiken buried his sin under his tent. Jesus brought our sin into the open and nailed it to the cross. Hidden sin isolates, confess sin heals. You are only as healthy as what you are willing to bring into the light. God, I blew it. God, I messed up. God, I said this. God, I did it. Please forgive me. And he says, I got you. Hebrews 4.16. Listen to this. I want everybody to listen to this. So let us come sheepish. Weak. Let us come and shame and condemnation at O.O. with me. No. It says, "Come boldly to the throne of our gracious God." There we will receive

his mercy and will find grace to help us when we need it most. We come boldly, not arrogantly, not cocky, not like, "Hey, bro, hey, Lord, hey, hey, dude, no." We come home to God. Thank you for receiving me, not because of what I did, but because of what Jesus did. Thank you for allowing me to confess my sin before you so that it can be healing in my life and healing in my being. And God, I'm recognizing the whole time that you're the King of Kings and the Lord of Lords. We can't take what God said, don't take and be okay. And some of us, it's not the things we're doing, it's the things we're not doing that we should do that becomes the issue. So don't wait for exposure. Choose confession. Because in Christ, the valley of trouble can become the door of hope. Out of nowhere grace saved Rahab. Out of nowhere judgment exposed Aiken. Out of nowhere Jesus absorbed what we deserved. Bring it to the light. Here's what I want to leave you with. Freedom is always found where sin is confessed. And it's not time I confess and everybody else, it's time that you and God confessing your sin to Him. You can confess to the people. I've had people do that. But no one knows why. They've confessed it and then we prayed that God would forgive them. I can't forgive them. They just wanted to get it off themselves, I guess. But you can go directly to God. You can go directly to His throne room. Not because you earned it, but because Jesus paid a price so you could come there. And God will forgive you every single time. Thank God we serve the God of another chance. Another chance. How many in here have needed another chance? That's the God you serve. So let's, if you did

something, bring it to the light. Don't hold it. Don't let it fester. Say, God, I blew this. God, I'm sorry. God, please forgive me. I'm going to work on it. And can I say this as I close? Some of us are new in the faith and we got saved recently or made a commitment to the Lord or recommitted our lives recently. And you're growing, you're learning. So keep growing and learning. And some things tend to fall off us quickly when we get saved and born again. I don't know how God chooses how it works. Some things fall off us quickly and some things we have to fight the good fight of faith. We have to work at it. So don't get down on yourself if you're working at it. God, I've tried so hard and I've done this. I've had so many alcoholics, drug addicts over the years. I was doing good for six months, but I blew it yesterday. And they're in church on Sunday. I always look and say what are you going to do? I don't know what to do. And I say, here's what I know what to do. Let's start over. You made it six months. The next time you maybe make it a year. And then after that you make it two years. And the next thing you know, you're not even fighting that fight anymore. It may take time, but you don't give up on yourself. You don't give up on yourself while you're in the process of being molded and grown. Don't quit because you feel like, "Man, I messed up. I did this. I shouldn't have did." Everybody messes up. Everybody does something they shouldn't have done. Everybody says something they shouldn't have said. Every one of us loses our temper when we shouldn't lose our temper. Everybody has done something, but we have an advocate. Jesus paid a high price for our sin. We just have to learn to say, "God, I did it. You know I did it. I'm sorry. Please help me." And he will help you from that day on. But if you're a work in progress, how may I work in progress? Yeah. Then don't quit on the work. And don't quit on the potter who's molding the clay.

One day you look back and think, "Man, I've come a long ways." Not perfect, but I'm better. That's all God wants. Father, in Jesus' name, I thank you for your grace and mercy. I do pray, Father, that people at ears to hear what you're saying, speaking right to them, that we won't live in condemnation. We won't live in shame. We'll know to come to you and confess our sins. And God, you'll always forgive us. That's the great thing about you. And not only will you forgive us, you'll forget them. You throw them as far as the east is from the west and to the sea of forgetfulness. And you said, "I will remember it no more." Thank you for that. So when we stand before you, all these things won't come up again because they've already been forgiven. It's just those who are unwilling to confess, unwilling to yield, unwilling to come to you. Those are the ones that will experience true judgment. Because we're judging ourselves right now. We thank you, God, for never leaving us nor forsaking us, never abandoning us or rejecting us. Thank you for never giving up on us. And I pray, God, that none of us will ever give up on you. You're worthy to serve, you're worthy of honor and praise and glory, because you're so good to us and gracious. We thank you, Father, for your many, many blessings and your help and our time of need in Jesus' name. If you're here with every headbound, just for next few moments, and you say, "Pastor, see, would you pray for me?" I walked with Jesus, but I walked away. For whatever reason, it doesn't matter whether reason, but I'm coming home today. Pastor, would you pray with me? I've never asked Jesus to be Lord of my life. I prayed prayers. I've had people tell me I've been the altar of 20 times and nothing happened. That's because they're praying to get saved, not praying to ask Jesus to be Lord of their life. They want salvation without accountability. They don't want to go to hell, but they don't want to serve God either. When you make him Lord, he becomes the leader and we become the follower. Well, how do you know where he's leading us? According to the Scriptures, that's what we look at. If you're any one of those two spiritual conditions, you say, "Pastor, see, would you include me in your prayer?" I want to get it right. I want God's forgiveness. And Pastor Steve, I'm ready to ask Jesus to be Lord of my life. If that's you and Jesus' name right where you see it all over this place, what I'm going to ask you to do here in a moment is very simple, but it's really profound. The Bible says that we confess Jesus before man. He'll confess us before our Father in heaven.

When you look up that word, it means acknowledgement. So if you're willing to acknowledge Jesus now, in front of these folks, Jesus will acknowledge you in heaven. And I'm not even going to ask you to get up out of your seat. But if that's you and you say, "Preach your including your prayer." Are you ready? God, I just want you in my life. I don't care what anybody else knows or thinks. If that's you and Jesus' name right where you see it and you say, "Preach your pastor's even including your prayer, would you just lift your hand all over this place and say, that's me. God bless you, God bless you, God bless you, God bless you, God bless you, God bless you, God bless you, God bless you, God bless you, God bless you, God bless you over here. God bless you, Sir, I see you're in. God bless you up there. Thank you." So many. Why? Because your experience, thank you, God bless you. God bless you. Because your experience, God's true love and his nature. He's not trying to beat you up. He's trying to help you up. He's not trying to condemn you or shame you. He's just trying to get you to come to him so he can help you. I'm going to look across the top one more time. So many of them already lift their hands and I'm going to look across one more time. Is there anybody else up there? Thank you, God bless you, God bless you, God bless you, God bless you. Thank you, God bless you, God bless you, God bless you, man, God bless you. Only God can do this, God bless you. You can't even come unless it's the Holy Spirit drawing you to himself. That's how much he loves you. with all your stuff, with everything you know about you. Why? Because he cares. I'm going to look across the bottom section. Anybody else want to join these? We're all going to pray together. But I want to miss anybody. I want to give everybody as many options I can to say yes. Anybody else, God bless you. Thank you. Thank you. Father, in the powerful name of Jesus, thank you. God bless you. Father, in the powerful name of Jesus, thank you. I pray for each one. And I pray that you show yourself strong in the behalf that they would come to know you and know your ways,

that they would serve you from this moment on. And Father, we always don't know how to serve you, but we will learn. We'll be in church so we can grow and learn and be a part of the body and help serve someone else. We don't have to be perfect to serve you. If we did, none of us could serve you. We just have to be willing. So bless each one. Show yourself strong in the behalf that they would really come to know you and know your ways. Open their eyes of their understanding that they can see the true glorious light of the gospel. And that's Jesus. What he did, the price he paid, and how much you love us. Bless each one in Jesus' name. If you lifted your hand, I want you to pray this prayer aloud with me right where you see it. Loud enough for your ears to hear your voice. If you're right with God, would you join us in support? Because there's so many. Would you join us in support of those who lift their hands? So they're not playing alone, and they'll know, man, people supported us. They're for us. And maybe you didn't lift your hand, but you should have. Let me lead you to Christ. I'm not leading you to legacy. I'm leading you not to a church. I'm leading you to Jesus himself.

And he's the head of the church. Would you pray this prayer with me aloud, church? Would you pray God? I choose to believe in your son, Jesus. And I believe he's your only son. And you raise them from the dead to give me a new life. So according to your word, I believe that in my heart. And now I willingly confess, with my mouth, Jesus be Lord of my life. Thank you for forgiving me. Thank you for helping me. Thank you for never giving up on me. And I pray, God, that you help me to never give up on you in Jesus' name. Amen and amen and amen. Let's thank the Lord, church.