Joshua 24:11-26  (NIV)

¹¹ “‘Then you crossed the Jordan and came to Jericho.  The citizens of Jericho fought against you, as did also the Amorites, Perizzites, Canaanites, Hittites, Girgashites, Hivites and Jebusites, but I gave them into your hands.  ¹² I sent the hornet ahead of you, which drove them out before you—also the two Amorite kings.  You did not do it with your own sword and bow.  ¹³ So I gave you a land on which you did not toil and cities you did not build; and you live in them and eat from vineyards and olive groves that you did not plant.’

¹⁴ “Now fear the Lord and serve him with all faithfulness.  Throw away the gods your forefathers worshiped beyond the River and in Egypt, and serve the Lord.  ¹⁵ But if serving the Lord seems undesirable to you, then choose for yourselves this day whom you will serve, whether the gods your forefathers served beyond the River, or the gods of the Amorites, in whose land you are living.  But as for me and my household, we will serve the Lord.”

¹⁶ Then the people answered, “Far be it from us to forsake the Lord to serve other gods!  ¹⁷ It was the Lord our God himself who brought us and our fathers up out of Egypt, from that land of slavery, and performed those great signs before our eyes.  He protected us on our entire journey and among all the nations through which we traveled.  ¹⁸ And the Lord drove out before us all the nations, including the Amorites, who lived in the land.  We too will serve the Lord, because he is our God.”

¹⁹ Joshua said to the people, “You are not able to serve the Lord.  He is a holy God; he is a jealous God.  He will not forgive your rebellion and your sins.  ²⁰ If you forsake the Lord and serve foreign gods, he will turn and bring disaster on you and make an end of you, after he has been good to you.”

²¹ But the people said to Joshua, “No!  We will serve the Lord.”

²² Then Joshua said, “You are witnesses against yourselves that you have chosen to serve the Lord.”

“Yes, we are witnesses,” they replied.

²³ “Now then,” said Joshua, “throw away the foreign gods that are among you and yield your hearts to the Lord, the God of Israel.”

²⁴ And the people said to Joshua, “We will serve the Lord our God and obey him.”

²⁵ On that day Joshua made a covenant for the people, and there at Shechem he drew up for them decrees and laws.  ²⁶ And Joshua recorded these things in the Book of the Law of God.  Then he took a large stone and set it up there under the oak near the holy place of the Lord.

Being a part of the early church wasn’t easy.  The apostles and new disciples experience opposition, persecution, suffering and many forms of execution.

From 33 AD (death of Jesus) in Israel part of the Roman empire ‘till 311 AD Christianity was always dangerous and always perilous.  To be a Christian took courage.

Acts 5:27-42 (NIV)

²³ Having brought the apostles, they made them appear before the Sanhedrin to be questioned by the High Priest.  ²⁸ “We gave you strict orders not to teach in this name,” he said.  “Yet you have filled Jerusalem with your teaching and are determined to make us guilty of this man’s blood.”

²⁹ Peter and the other apostles replied: “We must obey God rather than men!  ³⁰ The God of our fathers raised Jesus from the dead—whom you had killed by hanging him on a tree.  ³¹ God exalted him to his own right hand as Prince and Savior that he might give repentance and forgiveness of sins to Israel.  ³² We are witnesses of these things, and so is the Holy Spirit, whom God has given to those who obey him.”

³³ When they heard this, they were furious and wanted to put them to death.  ³⁴ But a Pharisee named Gamaliel, a teacher of the law, who was honored by all the people, stood up in the Sanhedrin and ordered that the men be put outside for a little while.  Then he addressed them: “Men of Israel, consider carefully what you intend to do to these men.  ³⁶ Some time ago Theudas appeared, claiming to be somebody, and about 400 men rallied to him.  He was killed, all his followers were dispersed, and it all came to nothing.  ³⁷ After him, Judas the Galilean appeared in the days of the census and led a band of people in revolt.  He too was killed, and all his followers were scattered.  ³⁸ Therefore, in the present case I advise you: Leave these men alone!  Let them go!  For if their purpose or activity is of human origin, it will fail.  ³⁹ But if it is from God, you will not be able to stop these men; you will only find yourselves fighting against God.”

⁴⁰ His speech persuaded them.  They called the apostles in and had them flogged.  Then they ordered them not to speak in the name of Jesus, and let them go.

⁴¹ The apostles left the Sanhedrin, rejoicing because they had been counted worthy of suffering disgrace for the Name.  ⁴² Day after day, in the temple courts and from house to house, they never stopped teaching and proclaiming the good news that Jesus is the Christ.

In the early church one of the church fathers Tertullian said, “The blood of the Christians martyrs is the seed; the more you kill us the more we grow.”

The disciples needed courage in the face of persecution, shunned public life, shunned economically, people refused to do business with them and had family hunger.

What was this courage?  Where did this courage come from?  How can we tap into the source of courage?

God says spread the good news and we must no matter the who is over us.

Heroism or courage means we stand on principle in the face of opposition or danger.  Heros walk alone.  Heros consult their conscience.  A person with courage does what is right, not what is easiest or what they think will work out the best for them.

Being courageous means, you choose to do something when you have other, less dangerous options.

Irony is a brief against the embrace of positive values.  The world wants things to be varying shades of grey; Christians talk about ways of redeeming what is wrong in the world.

There are two sides to the issue of being a hero.  1) The first side of this discussion, the people who say the trouble with talking about good and evil, heroes or villains, is that there is no nuance, and everyone gets put into a camp of either good or bad.

If you are in one camp there is tendency to treat the other side bad.  The problem with all this good and evil is making a value judgement.  We all need to accept various shades of grey, so let’s fight less.  There are no good or bad, no villain, no hero.

Think about this, if there are no villains and no heroes, who then will stand up against injustice?

2) The next idea of heroism is that it cannot be abused or twisted.  This gets personal, because what we think of as heroism, you charge a machine gun or move to another country to help the impoverished, this is not going to happen.

We are going to need courage in our lives to live the way God says we are supposed to.  We may need to tell someone something they don’t want to hear.  Their lives are in danger, or their eternity is in danger.  And hopefully we have the courage to endure the danger and shape words.

One commentator said staving off death is American favorite past time.  Death is coming for all of us, no one gets out alive, we need courage to face the inevitable.

Where did the followers of Jesus get their courage?

Verse 29, “We must obey God rather than men.”  The God of our father raised Jesus from the dead – when you have killed Him by hanging him on a tree.  God exalted Him to his Own right hand of the Prince and Savior.

Savior in the Greek is ‘soter’ and the word Prince is ‘archegos’ which means hero.  Translated into English at time is translated to ‘captain’.

In the Greek culture a mythical person who was both, called a ‘sorter’ (Savior) and a ‘archegos’ (Prince) and that person was called Hercules.

A Greek person would make the connection that Jesus is a hero who is in a fight to the end, with the one who holds the power of death.

The stories of Hercules and what Jesus actually did are different.

The poem “Dream of the Rood” C Rood, the title means, is old wounds of the cross. 

Then the young hero – it was God almighty: strong and steadfast, stripped himself for battle: he climbed up on the high gallows, ionstart in His purpose.  Mounted in the sight of many, mankind to ransom.

Was Jesus a hero in this sense?  Yes.

Did He face death bravely?  Yes. He could have gotten off the cross.  Was Jesus a man of principle?  Yes, let your will be done.  Did Jesus voluntarily go to the cross?  Yes, no man takes it from me I lay down voluntarily.  I lay my life down for my friends.

Jesus was like the old-world hero.

-But Jesus had all the power from the beginning.

-Jesus was God and had all the power of the universe.

–His transformational moment was giving up power, becoming fully human, came down and ended up on the Cross.

Jesus gave up eternity to come to bless us (short time).  Jesus gave up intimacy with God to become fully human in order to give us a chance to be cleansed and accepted by God.

Jesus came to give up power.  Jesus gave all to take on the punishment of our sis.  Jesus shows us how to live the way God would have us live collectively and also very personally, Jesus’ heroism is for the weak (that means all of us).

How do we get into the hero mindset?  Verse 41, The apostles left the Sanhedrin rejoicing because they had been counted worthy of suffering disgrace for His name.

Hebrews 12, Fix your eyes on Jesus, the archegos and finisher of our faith, who for the joy set before Him ran the race, endured the cross, despise the shame and set at the right hand of God.”

We get courage through hope.

Fix your eyes on Jesus, the archegos and finisher of our faith, see that he was brave, and that it’ll help us to be brave.

Think about Jesus getting ready for the cross.

Remember the apostles before they went before the Sanhedrin.

Fill your heart, pray for courage and allow Christ to give you courage for what is before you.

If you have questions about courage, failings, discouragement let’s get together, call me, come see me.  Let’s find courage together to live life well together.