Following the Word to Conquer Canaan (Josh. 3:1-6)
Last week, we went from Joshua 2:1-14, so we will go from Joshua 2:15-3:1-6 today. Conquering Canaan is the work of God, and when we live according to the will of God, I believe the works of conquering will take place. There’s only one of two options: will you live a life of a conqueror or will you be enslaved? For people who hold onto God’s covenant, God’s work of conquering will take place through us; otherwise, we are bound to live as slaves to Gen. 3, 6, and 11.
Even as God was calling the Israelites out of Egypt, He was guiding them, already having prepared the land of Canaan. That is God’s will and His absolute plan. For people who don’t believe in that, they had disbelief and then they left this earth. God is not moving for us, but in Col. 1:16, it says God is moving and creating the world for Christ. God didn’t create us because He was lacking something; everything was created for Christ.
But we keep thinking in terms of what He can do for us, but He did not create the world for us. He created us in His image, for His own sake. The people who are created in the image of God are created to live, receiving everything they need from the Triune God. Then, we will receive the answers of reigning and conquering.
Moses was a prophet who relayed God’s Word, and a leader of the peoples, and after he passed away, he raised up two spies to survey the land of Canaan. God sent in the two spies already having prepared Rahab. God has prepared someone who already knows the field so well, and the characteristic of these people is that they listened to God’s Word. She had already been listening to the Word of not only the Exodus and the Red Sea, but also the conquering of the kings of Bashan and Og.
When you receive answers, without a doubt, there is someone who is prepared to also receive answers. As soon as the Red Sea was split, God had already prepared someone for the land of Canaan. As you continue to receive answers, God is preparing evangelism. The two spies go into the land of Canaan and they didn’t know anything about Rahab, but God gave them the ultimate blessing of meeting. She’s the prostitute Rahab who knows all the information about Jericho already, and she says she wants to believe in the Jehovah God. Everyone who goes in and out of Jericho would stay at her place and rest, so she has so much information.
God has prepared somebody like this in the field. In other words, somebody who can give informational influence, and someone who completely wants to follow God’s Word. Even if you’re in your business, there’s someone very knowledgeable about your business. You need to meet that person in order for your work to take place, and on top of that, they completely believe in Christ. God works following this pattern.
Then, Rahab makes a request, “I’m staking my life to save you and this spy, so make a promise that you will save me and my family. Make a contract with me that says how you will save me and my family when you come here to wage war.” That is the content of the latter half of Joshua 2. So, the spies make a contract, because when the other Israelites come in, they will not know where Rahab’s house is. So, then they tell her to use the sign of hanging a scarlet scarf outside of her window. People asked, “What if she had hung out a green cord or black cord?” The scarlet cord represents the covenant that she had accepted and death passes over them. That is the meaning of the cord.
Then, the last verse of Joshua 2 talks about how they hid for three days, and the soldiers sent out by the king of Jericho couldn’t find them, and the two spies returned to their land crossing the Jordan river. In Joshua 2:24, they gave back the report, “All the people are melting in fear because of us.” They had accurately surveyed the spiritual state of the people of Jericho and brought that report back.
When you go into camp, first, you need to determine the location in which you must go. The 12 tribes have already determined what land they must conquer, and you must determine that in prayer. Then, the second thing is, when you go in to survey the land, there is, without a doubt, a disciple that is prepared for you to do that. It is a person who knows so well about the field in that region, and that is the person who will first start to receive answers. If you go into that region before you receive these answers, then you will fail.
In Acts 13, God says, “First raise the people who will do the work of the Lord,” meaning, first, designate the people in the tribe to do God’s work, and they raised five people. What is the work the Lord called them to do? It is to save lives and to raise disciples in the field. The first place God led these people was to the region of the island of Patmos, and the first person they met there was the proconsul.
What is this talking about? Even before you go into the region, you already receive God’s answers, and you receive the answer of the team with which you must go into the region, and you receive the answer of where you must go. Then, as you go into the region, you find the one who can give the most influence, and in this case, it’s the sorcerer and the proconsul, then the entire island is already finished.
Same thing in the Old Testament, the 12 tribes already knew what land they must conquer when they went in. You need to go in the area for camp already having received the answer from God, and you receive the answer of the team with which to go. Then, in the field, you need to go in, already having received the answer of the person prepared like Rahab. If you go in before you receive these answers, then you will just lose strength. Because God is the One Who does the conquering, you must follow God’s rules.
But why do we lose strength in camp? Because you did whatever you wanted, whatever made you happy. “I want to go here today, I want to go there today,” you live however you want. I hope you will designate; receive that answer first in prayer. Then, God will give you the answer of the person in that field who can give you a lot of information about that field, whether they are a believer or nonbeliever.
In Acts 16, it says Paul and his team were going to the place of prayer because they needed to receive the answer of the field, and that’s when they met this person named Lydia; she’s just the same as the prostitute Rahab. God attached someone to them who knows all the information of the region of Phillipi and can give influence there, and then she asked them to come to her house and open up a regional church. Then it’s already finished. God’s method is the same in the Old Testament, in the New Testament and today. You are going in there already knowing the mental and spiritual state of the people and already having victory. You’re going into that field already knowing the spiritual state of that field and what answers you must give them.
If that region has a lot of idolatry, then they will have a lot of work of evil spirits and darkness, but the reason we get bogged when we come to America is because you’re not able to see the field of America. In Taiwan and places in China, there are people who are visibly demon-possessed but America is different. You must be able to see the field. How is Satan holding onto the field? We’re living our lives in order to analyze the field. We are studying the culture, and that’s how we study the world as well. But our goal is completely different.
You’re not doing this so you can survive; you do this to find God’s will and glorify God. It’s completely different. And remnants, as you are studying at a young age, you need to study with this goal, that is how you will discover the talent God has given to you. You will also find the answer of specialization and He will guide you into the field. The reason we are bringing all these different types of professionals before the youth is so that they can find their talent and specialization. It doesn’t matter whether that person is a believer or nonbeliever. It might be better if they were a believer, but it doesn’t matter. Even if they were a nonbeliever, the remnants can open their eyes to their specialization. This is how we must raise up the future generations when they are young for world evangelization to take place.
However, it is possible we will create believers who receive spiritual training ever since they were young but are not able to do the evangelism movement. And it just ends with them protecting their faith. It’s because all they have heard is very dark. So how can we protect our faith? It’s talking about a very defensive faith. From the very beginning, when we were created in the image of God, we were created to rule over the world with the strength and power of God. In other words, we were originally created as a blessed creation to do world evangelization.
But when I go out into the field, the people with relatively more faith are trying to protect their faith from the world. Most people just associate with the word. So, from the perspective of someone like me, who used to be a nonbeliever, we can almost laugh at these people because they’re such easy prey. You must be sure in this life. This is how nonbelievers live. But the Christians that I know ate not this.
It’s not about protecting your faith; we must change the field. You must place this into your children when they are young through God’s word. “You are a Remnant,” that’s what it means. “You are the sojourner, the remaining one, the conqueror.” It seems like nothing, doesn’t it? But these words that go in while they’re young turn into their imprint, root, and nature later on. That was Moses. Until he was weaned from his mother, he was told “You will lead the exodus.” Do you think that God will not have revealed that much to his mother? That’s why even though all the babies should have been killed, God gave this woman a heart to save his baby.
Then after he was weaned from the breast milk, she gave Moses to the Pharaoh’s daughter. Ever since he was young, he was always under his mother’s prayer, because she knew there was a limited time before she lost her son. Imagine how sincere and earnest she was. If you know when you would die, then you will not dawdle your time. If you knew that you would die tomorrow, then the gaze in your eyes would be different. Right now, you may think it’s optional for you to do this, but if you die tomorrow, then you know. We don’t know anything.
There was a singer who passed away unexpectedly. No one could have predicted it, because he was singing even the night before. You don’t know what’s going to happen tomorrow. He said that he would live to 100 because the type of singing that he did made him very healthy. But he passed away in five minutes, when God called him. So, for the limited number of years that Moses’ mother had him, she was doing Camp and knew what she had to place into him. The Spirit listens to it all.
John the Baptist was six months older than Jesus, and when they were both in their mother’s womb, John the Baptist recognized Jesus. That’s what happens when the Holy Spirit works. Then of course, this spiritual mystery was imprinted in Moses, ever since he was young through his mother and prayer. And later on, when Moses was about 40 years old, he has what was imprinted in him and he had the present reality, so there is a conflict with one another. Ultimately he rejects all the pleasures of the palace, and he chooses to leave because of what was imprinted in him when he was young.
Same thing with David when he was young. David’s fourth generation above him was Rahab. It’s not a normal family line. She was completely a nonbeliever and she staked life to hold onto the covenant. Her child’s wife was the Gentile Ruth. So that whole family line used to be Gentiles and nonbelievers, and they completely held onto God’s covenant. This means that they surely received God’s grace. After that generation was Jesse and he is David’s father. This covenant never changes. Whatever goes inside of you will, without a doubt, bear fruit.
But fake believers only live their walk of faith, looking at the physical things and being worried about what other people think. That is someone that does not believe in God. God is working right now through His word, and the word that has been imprinted in you will continue to, without a doubt, be fulfilled. However if the Word of God has not been imprinted in you, then it’s nothing to you because those words are logos. Instead, what is imprinted in the person is Gen. 3, 6, and 11. The person is being centered on me, and that’s how they will move.
The two spies reported this news back to Joshua, and the Israelites were camping out in the region of Shittim. They have to go near the Jordan Bank before crossing over. And they woke up early in the morning. When we say that successful people wake up early in the morning, then we sound just like nonbelievers. But it says here to wake up early in the morning. If you’re waking up early in the morning, it means that you are spiritually preparing for what God has prepared for you today. Nonbelievers also wake up in the morning, but for us, we wake up early in the morning to prepare the spirituality.
Then, it says in Jos. 3:2, after three days, the officers went through the camp, bringing the orders to the people. They are talking about the officers or leaders, but in today’s term, church officers. But there are some people who don’t need that, because they don’t know the goal with which they live their lives. For people whose goal in life is just to work diligently, to make money, and then eat, they don’t need this. However, for the people whose goal in life is to conquer the land of Canaan and change, conquer their field, without a doubt, they need the church officers to relay the Word to their tribes. Joshua relays the Word of God, but if the Word is not relayed to every individual, then they may as well not exist.
It doesn’t matter how great the message or sermon is; if it doesn’t get relayed, then it just ends right there. Why were you called as a church officer? You are called to relay this world to the members of the church. Why is this not taking place? Because the goal with which the church officer lives their life is not the covenant. So, because the goal of their life is something else. That person becomes Satan’s prey. If you just think the word you received on Sunday and gave you grace and that’s it, what’s not going to be a headache? You keep saying, “Me, Me,” however, there is a stream, a goal with which God gives you his Word.
God gives you His Word in order to conquer and save the field. So, Gd continuously gives you His Word, and the church officers must be trained. If people are busy, the best church officers without receiving training will just work hard and they don’t know what it is. Then the old ladies will do the dishes as they did at home, and that’s fine. The men don’t know what to do so they walk back and forth. It’s because they never received training on what a church officer is, and they were just raised up urgently. I think even they were raised up in God’s guidance.
I hope you will follow the Word even now. That’s why we designated regions or groups. However, if we raised up a group leader who is not receiving training, that’s not a good idea because from the perspective of the past, there’s a problem, so I haven’t raised up group leaders yet. If there’s someone who is 100% obedient to the word of the pastor, then what must we do? You can do it according to your regional church. Or if somebody doesn’t know that? That can be the remnants, it can be the adults, it can be the new believers who are coming in, but if somebody doesn’t have this or that, they must repent.
If God has raised you up as a church officer, then you must play the role of a church officer. I will share the Word of God I received this week from these people. As you remain within that stream, You will receive answers. That is the church officer.
If they’re not able to do that at all, the church officer must at least send the church officer messages and confirm they have received it.
In Joshua 3:3, it says, “When you see the ark of the covenant of the Lord your God, and the priests, who are Levites, carrying it, you are to move out from your positions and follow it.” The standard they must wait for is to follow the One carrying the ark of the covenant. The ark of the covenant is Jesus Christ. Because Jesus Christ is fighting the battle in the forefront; follow and obey that Word. Follow the Word that is given to you. Honestly speaking, everything you’re doing is really only one thing: your business, your studies, and everything else exists for camp. If you don’t see that Word, you shouldn’t follow it. This is the stream of the Word given to you. But with another standard, you will fail in battle.
You shouldn’t expect anything else, only follow the Word, so don’t judge what color the suit is; only look at the Word. Stop arguing what kind of personality you’d prefer; only follow the Word. “I wish they had a different hairstyle,” or things like that. But foll. No reason to follow anything else. Even if you follow something else, you’ll be disappointed, and it’s the same thing with the members of the church. If we have the ability to understand one another, that would be great, the more you know about each other, you’re disappointed because all you know .
“I’m only telling you,” but even the person speaking is speaking with their natural spiritual state, so don’t listen to them. Only follow God’s word because God’s Word is the truth. Everything else, no matter how sincerely they tell you, you can just keep it as reference. That doesn’t mean we should just ignore what everyone says, but we have to listen to God.
There are people who come from Korea to America to do business. There was an acquaintance I knew a few decades ago, and they started talking to me on social media, and it sounds like they’re trying to start some kind of business. Because I, too, used to live as an unbeliever, I knew exactly why he was contacting me. I asked them, “Why are you contacting me?” so I could cut out all the introductions.
“I’m interested in your ministry,” but that’s a lie. This person is in a multi-level marketing scheme and wanted to pierce the Los Angeles market through pastors. They’d already gone to another church in Los Angeles and we got connected at a missions convention. But I’m someone who trained others on sales strategies, I know their tricks. That is not going to work on me. As I’m following God’s covenant, I must find the person God has prepared for me. People are doing things that just won’t work out. They keep trying to manipulate people inside the church? That’s not going to work. We need to go to the field where there is nobody and receive an answer there.
It seems everyone does the same thing, right? We need to actually do camp, we need to take this answer and go into the field and do camp with the people whom God has prepared through your business, you shouldn’t look at the people already in church. Those people may be tested, they don’t know what kind of people we are, but if your eyes are blind, it’s not aligned with God and it must be that the answers are in the field, with nonbelievers, and with things that don’t even make sense. I know that because you don’t know about those answers, you think about the people you know already, but once you start exchanging money, Satan destroys you. God his going to say, “You made this relationship so you can make money, but this soul is dying.” God is holding onto this person and God is holding onto your success and failures.
“Why is this coming out today?” You need to find the people whom God has prepared in the field of missions and evangelism, that’s where it is, but if you try to run your business without having received evangelism and missions training. Eventually you run out of people. The successful people don’t do that. The evangelism strategies as well as the strategies for life.
I trained other people on sales, and the people who are successful go to the place with no answers and raise things. If not, then you wouldn’t be able to make any sales, so he goes early in the morning and greets everybody so the customers open their hearts to him as he’s been there. That’s what Korean people are like, if they find someone they like, they’ll even change the entire company.
I’ve seen them do their business like that. At first, the reception is very cold, “Why should I receive this person’s products?” People are the same. “I like this person” then they open the doors. It’s the same thing with your job. I tell my daughter to greet other people. It’s not something she’s used to doing, but it happens in the Bible. I’m not telling to just say “hi,” but greeting them with a true genuine smile. There was someone at first, a hispanic person who was nervous, but I kept greeting him and found out that he and I are the same age. There are still others who are reserved. Through your job that you do, through your human relationships, if you do something for those people, they will open their hearts to you. But because our goal is just to succeed tomorrow, we’re disinterested in the people around us.
Joshua 3:5, prepare yourselves spiritually. To prepare yourself spiritually in the early morning means, don’t just wake up and prepare yourself in a worldly sense, but prepare spiritually. The reason is because tomorrow, the Lord will do amazing things among you, so you must be spiritually prepared. If my spiritual state is not prepared, God is working but I can’t see it, and that’s how you become a physical captive. You must be able to see the spiritual things as well as the physical things. Then you can see the work God is doing.
Joshua 3:6. What does this mean? It means go into the field with faith, holding onto the covenant God has given you, but if you don’t have the covenant, you don’t know what you need to do, and because you don’t know the covenant, you are afraid. Because you don’t have this certainty, of course you’re afraid, because missions is something God is doing through you. People just follow the covenant.
The New Year’s message, the pulpit message, the field message, it is the specific direction of the field, why? We fight the war of conquest. If you’re not fighting the war of conquest and you’re just trying to make a living, you don’t need this at all. Anyone could live diligently for themselves, but what happens? Everybody just dies in the wilderness. That is Satan’s deception and the imprint Satan planted inside of us, so we’re easily deceived by it. But for you and me, I hope you will believe, as soon as God prepared salvation, through your business, how will you save the 70 regions and 70 disciples? What about retired people? Do camp in your retired state because you’re still alive. What about the people who are sick? Do camp while sick because God does it through your circumstance. If you give up on yourself, you’ll be at a great spiritual loss. May you enjoy and testify of this blessing.
Let us pray holding onto the Word we have received. “I feel so distant from the Word of God,” then you received the Word of God well, and that’s the reason we pray, to bring the Word of God and ourselves closer together. That is the prayer God desires.
Second, let us pray for the regional church. Let us pray for Yakima regional church and Moses’ family in Sedona. And let us pray for the camps we are doing, Rise Kohyang, 3rd street, Larchmont, USC, CSUN, Southwestern Law School.
Starting April 19-22, they gather the missionaries from all over the world, and though not everybody can attend, they can scatter with the message in their fields. There’s also the world businessperson’s conference, the world remnant conference, and the way God moves our organization is through the three worldwide conferences for the pastors, businesspeople, and remnants. There are some pastors who go to Korea for all the conferences to lead the businesspeople and remnants. Ultimately God moves everything so the Word flows all the way out into the fields. I hope you will know the meaning of this and the work God is doing through these meetings.
In the church, there is a time schedule in the local regions, and it is the way the word flows here. The church officers take this into the field. If someone lives their lives irrespective of world evangelization, they will say, “this message is the same as that message,” they’ll say useless words like, “Just listen on YouTube,” but God has chosen us for world evangelization. I hope you will know this and move with meaning, knowing why we received the pulpit message and why we send pastors to receive training in Korea. Let us pray for the World Missions Convention and those we are serving.
Last week we sent $5000 to Sedona and they confirmed that they received it. There is a goal for missions and evangelism. If someone is crying out to us for help, it is not right for a church to ignore it and turn a blind eye. On top of that, we have missions and evangelism so we sent our offering. Please pray for that. It is a family where the gospel has never gone in, the father was an evangelist, but he used the name of Jesus Christ to control his kids, so the family rejects Jesus Christ.
For the boy in prison now, Pastor Dick Snyder visits him twice a week. The mother is important. She is the post and must have continuation. The children are important but if the mother isn’t raised as the post, there is no continuation. The mother is doing a bakery, and one child is in Seattle, and another is in jail, so she has to raise six children. The mother cannot concentrate on anything. I’m planning on traveling there in May. When we go to Navajo in June, we also want to stop by there, so we aren’t able to get tickets yet. We need to organize transportation for getting from one place to another to finalize whether we go by train or another mode of transportation.
For the Karen kids, Pastor Hong has not been able to worship for about four weeks, so I think it would be good if you help them so they can worship, because I would like the Karen people to know we have been praying for them for over 10 years. We need to lift up the servants of the Lord well to get the spiritual connection. Because these servants of the Lord have gone there, they set foot on the land and prayed for them, these families are arising. That’s my opinion.
If possible, we can only go to Portland if they have a meeting set up. If they aren’t able to worship, we can’t go there. The two Karen kids are here, so if anything, people will misunderstand my intentions if we do that. If we do end up going to Karen, Portland, we will go to Yakima, as well, and I am telling you so you can pray. When I see Yakima, God opens the doors to the multiethnic people. The reason I tell you these details is because these are what is taking place, let us pray accordingly.
Benediction
Now may the grace of our Lord Jesus Christ, the unending love of God, and the indwelling, working, guidance, and communion of the holy spirit, be upon all the heads of the people of God, the remnants, and the multiethnic people who desire to raise up the bartizan of light in their fields, be with us from now until forevermore always, amen.