Not as Easy (or Hard) As It Looks

Being a Christian isn’t as easy as we think—our best efforts fall short before a holy God. But it’s not as hard as it looks either, because Christ has already done the impossible for us, giving us His Spirit and His strength to live as His people.

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Good Morning. There were definitely times that I thought that being a pastor would make it easier to be a Christian. I realized how foolish that was even before going to seminary watching some rather famous pastors fall very publicly to temptation in the 80’ and 90’s.

And this isn’t about beating up on them, because without God’s grace and mercy, we can all be there. I was getting that point rather clearly, anyway, as I was preparing the lesson this week, because it’s not just the point of the Gospel, but also the point of the Old Testament Lesson, and the Collect of the day. Without God’s help, we have an inability to effectively ask for what we need or to do what we need to do. In other words, we have a problem.

The first thing that jumped out at me was the perspective that the Israelites had of the ease of following God. As Joshua’s book closes, we find a passage where our opening hymn comes from. Joshua declares for all to hear, As for Me, and My House, We will Serve the Lord.” His sermon to God’s people takes place after the 12 tribes are settled into the promised land, nice and cozy, some 20 years after Jericho fell.

Joshua says choose whether to worship God, or whether to serve the pagan gods of the Canaanites, or serve the Babylonians idols of Abraham’s time. But if you worship the Lord, you cannot do that and serve false gods.

The Israelites then recount all that the Lord did for them, in bringing them out of Egypt, and in the settling of the tribes into the Promised Land. Then they finish v. 18 by saying Therefore we also will serve the Lord, for He is our God.

Now, this sounds great. You would think Joshua would be happy with the response. If I preached a sermon and everyone said “YES! Great sermon, we’ll do everything you said!” I’d be pretty excited. The catch is Joshua’s response to them.

¹⁹ Joshua said to the people, “You are not able to serve the Lord, for he is a holy God. He is a jealous God; he will not forgive your transgressions or your sins. ²⁰ If you forsake the Lord and serve foreign gods, then he will turn and do you harm and consume you, after having done you good.” 

Imagine Billy Graham giving an altar call and then yelling at the people coming up the aisle that they really don’t mean it! “Go back to Your seat, because if you do this wrong, it will be worse than if you never came at all.”

What’s going on here? Why does Joshua first encourage them to follow God, and then immediately tell them that they can’t do it? I think the Gospel can shed some light on that, looking at Jesus preaching in John 8.

In verse 30, John records Jesus teaching in the temple some incredible things, such as the Father uniquely sending Him and putting words in his Mouth. Still Many Believe! And then in v. 31… Jesus immediately confronts the people who say they believe Him. The back and forth goes so badly those same people who believed in him are, minutes later, calling him demon possessed and trying to stone Him to death. Why? Because Jesus told them that they were slaves to sin.

These people, excited to follow a man they think just may be the messiah, now want to kill him for calling them sinners. It kind of shows you how they have no idea why they need a messiah. They may be a tiny bit bad, but not as bad as the Romans who are keeping them captive, so they aren’t the ones who are slaves to sin, like the real sinners.

As we look at these lessons, it is important for us to try and understand how far short of God’s Holiness we fall. The people of Joshua’s time, who are unholy, say that they will give their best effort, but that’s never enough. What they lacked, and something that we can all lack, is a true perspective of who God is, and who we are.

The term Forced Perspective is a term that popped into my mind in considering the lessons. Forced Perspective is one of those terms that we all understood long before we knew there was a term for it. It is a technique which uses optical illusion to make an object appear farther away, closer, larger or smaller than it actually is. Like on the Bulletin cover with the girl holding the sun.

There is a lot of fun photography which makes it look like you are holding the Eiffel Tower or a huge dinosaur is attacking your playground. Or just how Gabe squishes my head between his fingers while I’m preaching.

What is interesting about the lessons this morning, is that they point us to the fact that our skills and desires to follow God are, in a sense, a forced and very false perspective. While we may, just like the Israelites, or those listening to Jesus, believe we know how to follow God, in truth, we need God for that, because our best efforts fail.

The blessing of our liturgical service is that the words we pray are grounded God’s word and not our own feelings. In our collect of the day, we will pray:

LET Your merciful ears, O Lord, be open to the prayer of Your humble servants; and, that they may obtain their petitions, make them to ask such things as shall please You

What did the people of Israel trust in?

They trusted in their memory of the past and their good intentions to keep them straight. So where does that leave us? If Joshua says, “You cannot serve the Lord,” and Jesus says, “You are slaves to sin,” what hope do we have? That’s the point. Our hope is never in our effort, our memory of God’s past goodness, or even our intentions. Our hope is in the God who hears us when we can’t even ask rightly, who saves us when we can’t save ourselves, and who gives His Spirit to intercede for us with groanings too deep for words.

Joshua was right to warn the people. They couldn’t serve the Lord in their own strength. And Jesus was right to confront those who believed only in part, who thought they could follow Him without first admitting their bondage. But both warnings drive us to the same truth: only God Himself can make us holy, only God Himself can free us, and only God Himself can teach us to pray.

That’s why the Collect is here: “Make us to ask such things as shall please You.” It’s not about mustering up the right words or pretending that we’re stronger than we are. It’s about leaning wholly on God’s mercy, asking Him to shape our desires, our prayers, and our lives so that they align with His will.

Being a Christian—whether as a pastor or a layperson—is not as easy as it looks, because God is holy and we are not. But it’s also not as hard as it looks, because Christ has already done the impossible for us. He has borne our sins, given us His Spirit, and promised never to leave us. So, when you feel the weight of your weakness, let that be the very thing that drives you to trust Him more deeply. “As for me and my house, we will serve the Lord”—not because we are able, but because He is faithful.