From Ebal to Gerizim

And open your Bibles, if you would, to Joshua, chapter 8, starting in verse 30. We read, "Then Joshua built an altar unto the Lord God of Israel in Mount Ebal, as Moses the servant of the Lord commanded the children of Israel, as it is written in the book of the law of Moses, an altar of whole stones, over which no man has lifted up any iron. And they offered thereupon burnt offerings unto the Lord and sacrificed peace offerings."

Let's pray. Father, as we take time this evening to look into Your Word and consider this passage of Scripture before us, I ask that You would speak to us, Lord. You are holy, Lord. You're awesome. As we were singing those songs of Your holiness, it just reminds me again of how small we are. And yet, You still love to hear us sing to You. You love to receive our offerings, our sacrifices of praise. We thank You that You've allowed us, that You've opened the door for us to come into that throne room of grace. As we sit tonight to hear Your Word, I pray that You would pour out Your grace upon us afresh. For we ask it in Jesus' name, amen.

You can be seated. We have seen that the children of Israel have come into the promised land. Several weeks ago, we saw how they came against the city of Jericho and how that city fell by God's great power, by His outstretched arm. That very same power that brought the children of Israel out of the land of Egypt as they crossed over the Red Sea. The very same power that rose Jesus from the dead, and the very same power that's alive in those who believe.

We saw how that wall fell down, and the children of Israel went up straight before them and took the city of Jericho. They had such a wonderful, great, and awesome victory there, but it was God's victory. God brought it about. Yet, just a few short days later, they went against Ai, a smaller city, much smaller. Spies went up there, and they came back with a report to Joshua, saying, "Don't send that many people up there."

Maybe 2,000 or 3,000 people were needed to take the city of Ai, for they were but few. Joshua, heeding the voice of men, sent just 3,000 people up there, and the children of Israel were beaten back by this small city, this small foe. They lost 36 men and returned to the area of Jericho in the south, crying out to God. The Lord spoke to Joshua and said, "Get up off your face. Why are you crying? There is sin in the camp. Something needs to be taken care of."

The Lord instructed Joshua to bring all the children of Israel before Him the next day, and He would reveal the person who had sin in their life. The Lord passed by all the tribes and picked Judah. He had the tribe of Judah pass by, and then He chose the house of Zerah. The process continued until they came to Achan. Surely there was sin in his heart and in his life, for he had taken of the accursed things and hidden some gold and silver in a garment in his house that he was not supposed to take. The things of Jericho were to be given over to the Lord.

They took Achan and his entire family and removed the leaven; they removed the sin. Then the Lord said, "Now go up, as we saw two weeks ago, back up to Ai and take all of the army, not just a small group. Take the entire army." They were going to set an ambush, and the people at Ai would have puffed-up hearts, thinking, "All right, we've got them on the run again." When they drew all the men of the city out, the ambush would rise up and burn the city down. They said, "Set fire to the city."

After that point, learning their lessons, the children of Israel did not rush into another battle. They did not take Ai and then immediately say, "All right, let's go, let's get the rest of the cities." Instead, they paused. They traveled 30 miles to the north. For us, 30 miles may not seem like a big deal; many in this room may commute more than that every single day, driving to San Diego or other places. However, imagine having two to three million people on foot. A 30-mile trek is a long way.

Joshua said, "Now that we've taken the city of Ai, we're going to pause in our battles, and we're going to go up to this area in the north, 30 miles away. We are going to offer sacrifices to the Lord."

And so it says in verse 30 that Joshua built an altar unto the Lord God of Israel in Mount Ebal. Thirty miles north of Ai were these two mountains. In between these two mountains was a valley called Shechem. The mountain to the north of Shechem was Ebal, and the mountain to the south of Shechem was Gerizim. The children of Israel went up to this place by command of Moses. They were following the words of the servant of God, Moses, who had told them back in the book of Deuteronomy, when you come into the land. In Deuteronomy chapter 11, he says, "It shall come to pass," in Deuteronomy 11, verse 29, "that when you come into the land which the Lord God has brought you into, that you shall go in to possess it, you shall put a blessing upon Mount Gerizim and a curse upon Mount Ebal."

God told the children of Israel that they were to go in and to this place. They were to speak the blessings of God and the cursings of God. They were to put a blessing on Mount Gerizim and a curse upon Mount Ebal. Now the children of Israel do that, and Joshua takes them up there. They build an altar unto the Lord, and he begins to worship the Lord. Moses had commanded it, and the children of Israel now do it, as it was written in the law. They made an altar of whole stones. They gathered large whole stones, and they weren't to take iron to the ground. They weren't to split them or in any way change the form of these stones. They were to take all of them and just stack them up to build an altar.

Then they were to offer sacrifices, burnt offerings, and sacrifices of praise there, peace offerings to the Lord. A burnt offering, as many of you know if you have read through the book of Leviticus before, was a sin offering. Israel came before the Lord the way they should have after they had taken the city of Jericho. They built this altar of whole stones, piled them up, and as we move on, we will see that they plastered them together and wrote the law upon them. They offered many burnt offerings for their sin.

We all know that we are sinners; we have all fallen short of God's grace, and the children of Israel knew that as well. They offered sacrifices to the Lord to atone for their sin, and then they offered peace offerings. You see, before you and I can offer or have a peace offering, or have peace in our lives, we first need atonement for our sin.

Because we cannot have the peace of God until we've received the grace of God and atoned for our sins, many times throughout the epistles, Paul would write to churches and say, "Grace and peace to you." We know that any time we want peace, we must accept God's grace first.

The children of Israel offered their burnt offerings to the Lord and then peace offerings. In verse 32 of Joshua chapter 8, it says, "And he, Joshua, wrote upon the stones a copy of the law of Moses, which he wrote in the presence of the children of Israel." Joshua goes to an altar they are preparing to use, and they put some sort of plaster upon it. We find back in Deuteronomy chapter 11 that they write upon it the law, most likely the Ten Commandments—the commandments that God had given to the children of Israel in Exodus chapter 20.

After they had come out of the land of Egypt, they wandered in the wilderness for a period of time, and God brought them straight from Egypt to a place called Sinai. There, on top of Mount Sinai, as Moses fasted for 40 days and 40 nights, Joshua was with him just outside the presence of the glory of God. The Lord gave Moses the Ten Commandments. Of course, you know the story: the children of Israel down the mountain were already breaking them. They came to Aaron and said, "Where is this Moses? He's gone. We don't know where he's at." Just after a few days, actually a couple of months, after they had seen God part the Red Sea, the children of Israel in Exodus chapter 32 were dancing around a golden calf, praising it as the God that brought them out of Egypt.

When Moses came down the mountain, you probably saw just a couple of weeks ago that "The Ten Commandments" was on TV. He came down with the law, these tablets—the Ten Commandments that God had inscribed upon stone. When he saw what the children of Israel, his people, were doing, he took the tablets and cast them down, breaking them as a symbol that they had already broken the law. The law that God was giving at that very moment had already been broken.

You see, all we like sheep have gone astray, as the book of Isaiah tells us. In Isaiah 53 verse 6, we read that all of us like sheep have gone astray. We've all gone in our own direction, turning everyone to his own way. Every single one of us has strayed away from God's law.

Even the children of Israel were tested by the Lord. In His mercy and grace, He didn't wipe them out that day. He tested Moses to see if Moses would desire that. However, God chose not to wipe them out. Instead, just a couple of chapters later, He declared His name to Moses in Exodus chapter 34, saying, "The Lord, the Lord God, merciful." God is so merciful to us; He does not give us what we deserve. Every one of us in this room deserves death. We deserve a curse.

The children of Israel, now aware of this, came to a place in the middle portion of Israel, north of where they were, called Shechem. In the valley of Shechem, Mount Ebal stood to the north and Mount Gerizim to the south. It is interesting because from the peaks of these two mountains, one can see almost all of the promised land that God was giving to the children of Israel. They would stand upon the tops of these mountains and see the entire land that God was giving them out of His mercy and grace.

Yet, they were to utter the curses of the law and the blessings of the law there. They were to agree with the law, which is good, as Paul says in Romans. We must agree that the law of God is holy, just, and good. God's law is not bad. We often dislike it because it reveals our sinfulness, but it is actually holy, just, and good, as the Bible tells us. We are the ones who are bad.

In Jeremiah chapter 17, verse 9, God spoke to Jeremiah, saying, "The heart of man is deceitful and wicked above all things. Who can know it?" The law shines upon our wicked, dark hearts and tells us that we are sinners. It shows us the direction we are heading if we do not turn to God.

The children of Israel went into this place in the middle part of their new promised land and built an altar of whole stones. They plastered it and wrote upon those rocks the law of God. They offered burnt offerings for their sin and then a peace offering, remembering that God had given them peace.

All Israel, along with their elders, officers, and judges, stood on one side of the ark and on the other side of the ark before the priests and the Levites. The Levites bore the ark of the covenant of the Lord. As well as the stranger, those born among them, half of the people stood opposite Mount Gerizim and half stood opposite Mount Ebal.

As Moses, the servant of the Lord, had commanded before, they should bless the people of Israel. So they went to this place, built an altar, wrote the law upon the altar, and offered burnt offerings for their sin and peace offerings to remember the peace that God had given to them.

Then the children of Israel were to be divided in half. Half of the tribes, six of the tribes, would go against Mount Ebal, while the other six tribes would go against Mount Gerizim. The Lord was going to have Joshua speak to the children of Israel as they were divided in half. It says in the end of verse 33 that the people should be blessed there. In verse 34, we read that after they read the blessings and the cursings according to all that is written in the book of the law, there was not a word of all that Moses commanded which Joshua did not read before all the congregation of Israel, including the women, the little ones, and the strangers who were conversant with them.

Here’s the picture: the Ark of the Covenant of the Lord is in the valley with an altar made of whole stones. No iron had come to them; they had no chisel, no plaster upon the rocks, and the law was written there. The blood flowed down over the rocks. Joshua stood there and declared that he would turn to those who were against Mount Ebal and announce all the cursings of God. Then he would turn to the people against Ebal, the other half of the nation of Israel, and pronounce the blessings of God. He pronounced all the words that Moses had commanded, likely reading the entire book of Deuteronomy. Those were the very last words of Moses to the children of Israel—the whole book, all 32 chapters of Deuteronomy.

It’s very likely that Joshua stood up there and they were there all day long. Could you imagine? I mean, 32 chapters! It takes me a little while to read the book of Deuteronomy. In the last verse of chapter 8, it says that it wasn't just the men, but also the women and the little children who stood there in complete silence all day long as Joshua read to them the blessings and the cursings of the law.

Now, I don't know about you, but I have a hard time standing in one place silently for more than 10 minutes. I'm surprised that people can sit through one of my studies and be quiet.

Because I have a hard time, and yet here the children of Israel stood as the Lord was pronouncing His law. Why? In absolute reverence of His holiness. They had seen God do miraculous things. They knew that God was a powerful God. And they were all silent as they listened to Joshua pronounce the law. He spoke to them these things.

What things? Turn in your Bibles to Deuteronomy, Chapter 27. Deuteronomy 27, verse 1, says, "And Moses with the elders of Israel commanded the people, saying, 'Keep all the commandments which I command you this day. And it shall be on the day when you shall pass over the Jordan unto the land which the Lord thy God gives to you, that you shall set up great stones and plaster them with plaster. And thou shalt write upon them all the words of this law. And when you are passed over, that thou mayest go up into the land which the Lord thy God gives to thee, a land that flows with milk and honey, as the Lord God of thy fathers has promised thee.'"

Therefore, it shall be when you have gone over the Jordan that you shall set up these stones which I command you, verse 4, this day in Mount Ebal. In Mount Ebal. The very story we are reading in Joshua Chapter 8 is a fulfillment of the command that Moses had made to the children of Israel. He said, "When you pass over," what absolute faith Moses had. When you come into the promised land, you're going to go to this mountain range in the middle of the nation, and you're going to build an altar there to the Lord.

I command you this day there in Mount Ebal, in verse 4, and you shall plaster it with plaster. There you shall build an altar unto the Lord thy God, an altar of stones. You shall not lift up any iron tool upon them. You shall build an altar of the Lord thy God, whole stones, and thou shalt offer burnt offerings thereupon unto the Lord thy God. Notice how many times Moses reiterates that you are going to build an altar.

An altar. Build an altar. Go there. Build an altar. Put up stones. Don't bring an iron to them. Build an altar.

Do you have an altar in your life? Is there a place in your life where you worship the Lord? Not just on Sundays, Saturday nights, or Wednesday nights, but in your heart every single day? Is it in the middle of your life? Everything in your life stems from there, just like the children of Israel went to Mount Ebal and Mount Gerizim, right in the middle of the nation. Is your worship for God the center and utmost part of your life? If it's not, you're going to be off-kilter.

I can tell you from experience that there are many times, many days that go by, many weeks that go by, where I just can tell that something's not right. And you know what the Lord constantly brings me back to? You're not worshiping Me. I'm not first and foremost in your life. You're not revering Me. There's no altar. You're not giving Me all that you are. Everything doesn't seem to work correctly. Things don't seem to move just right when I'm not worshiping.

So Moses says, build an altar, an altar, an altar. Because, as I've said many times, it's there at the altar that our lives can be altered. The Lord can change us. He can transform us. We come and bow before Him, confessing our sins and giving Him burnt offerings. Remember the sacrifice that He gave, and just go to Him saying, "Lord, I know that You've forgiven me. I confess my sins." As 1 John 1:9 tells us, when we sin, we need to come before Him and confess our sins, and He is faithful and just to forgive us our sins and to cleanse us of all unrighteousness.

But it's only there at the altar that we can be changed and experience again the peace that God gives—the peace that passes all understanding, as the book of Philippians, chapter 4, tells us. Remember what Paul said in Philippians chapter 4: it's through prayer and supplication, it's when you're at the altar that the peace can overflow in your life and mine.

So Moses reiterates, it's an altar that you're going to build. You shall offer, as verse 7 states, peace offerings, and you shall eat there and rejoice before the Lord your God. You shall write upon the stones all the words of the law very plainly. Moses and the priests and the Levites spoke unto the children of Israel, saying...

Take heed and hearken, O Israel, this day that thou art become the people of the Lord thy God. You shall therefore obey the voice of the Lord thy God and do His commandments and His statutes which I command you this day.

Moses charged the people the same day, saying, "These shall stand upon Mount Gerizim." He said, "When you come into the land and when you cross over the Jordan River, go there to the middle of the nation where Gerizim and Ebal are." The tribes of Israel were to stand against Gerizim when they crossed over the Jordan: the tribe of Simeon, Levi, Judah, Issachar, Joseph, and Benjamin. These tribes shall stand upon Mount Ebal to curse Reuben, Gad, Asher, Zebulun, Dan, and Naphtali.

The Levites shall speak and say unto all the men of Israel with a loud voice, "Cursed be the man which makes a graven or molten image, an abomination unto the Lord, the work of the hands of the craftsmen, and puts it in a secret place." All the people shall answer and say, "Amen."

So the Levites were to stand, and that's exactly what they were doing. They were to pronounce a curse. What is a curse? If you remember a couple of weeks ago when we were looking at Jericho and how Achan had taken of the accursed things, the things that were banned, the things that were set apart, separated to God, a curse is basically to be excommunicated, to be disfellowshipped, to be expelled.

The children of Israel were to stand there, and the Levites would turn towards Ebal and say, "Cursed be the man that makes a graven or a molten image. He shall be expelled from Israel. He shall be expelled from God's people. Separated. Excommunicated. The man who makes a molten or graven image is an abomination unto the Lord, the work of men's hands, the craftsmen." Then that person puts it in a secret place, and all the people shall answer and say, "Amen. Amen. So be it."

He continues in verse 16, "Cursed be he that sets light by his father or does not honor his father, thinks lightly of his father and of his mother." And all the people shall say, "Amen." The Levites would turn to Mount Ebal.

Cursed be the man or the woman who takes his father and mother lightly and dishonors them. The people standing there against Mount Ebal would say, "Amen. So be it. We'll expel that person. That person will be excommunicated." Cursed be the one, verse 17, who removes his neighbor's landmark. And all the people shall say, "Amen." Cursed is that man who is crooked, who doesn't follow through on the landmarks that they've set up.

During this time, they didn't have little boundary lines for houses and everything, but they would make them with rocks. They would stack up pillars of rocks, and these pillars would say, "Hey, this is my property, and then your property's over here." Cursed is the man who goes and moves those rocks, who is not an honorable man. He's wicked; he's trying to take what is not his. The children of Israel, those standing over there against Ebal, would say, "Amen."

In verse 18, cursed be he that makes a blind man wander out of the way. And all the people shall say, "Amen." I hope to God that on that day they said "Amen" a lot louder. I'm going to ask you every single time to say "Amen." To say so be it, that we agree with that. The children of Israel were saying, "We agree. It's right. This is God's law."

Cursed be he that perverts judgment of the stranger, the fatherless, and the widow. And all the people shall say, "Amen." Very good. Cursed be he that perverts judgment and lies with his father's wife because he uncovers his father's skirt. And all the people shall say, "Amen." Cursed be he who lies with any manner of beasts. And all the people shall say, "Amen."

In our day and age, we see that there are people who do many of these things: those who dishonor their father and mother, those who make for themselves graven or molten images. You might say, "Well, we don't have little false gods that people bow down to." However, I saw many people while I drove around today who were bowing down to their God, God Ford, as they cleaned the tires and made it look really nice.

There are those who go out and all day long try to make their house look so much better, or those who can't help but be at work and have to make money, checking the stock market every single day. That's your God. It'll leave you high and dry.

In the day of Christ Jesus, there are people today who engage in very sick practices. Vile people who commit bestiality lie with animals. It is an abomination. God says, "Cursed be that person who lies with any manner of beast." Cursed be he who lies with his sister, or the daughter of his father, or the daughter of his mother. All the people shall say, "Amen." Cursed be he who lies with his mother-in-law. All the people shall say, "Amen." Cursed be they who lie with their mother-in-law and smite their neighbor secretly. All the people shall say, "Amen." Cursed be he who takes a reward to slay an innocent person. All the people shall say, "Amen." Cursed be he that confirms not the words of this law to do them. All the people shall say, "Amen."

The very last one there states, "Cursed be all them who do not confirm the words of this law." Cursed be those who don't say, "Amen," those who don't agree, who in their hearts do not agree. Every single one of us can say that, but do we really believe it? Do we really mean it in our hearts when we hear the curses of God? Do we say, "Well, that's not really that big of a deal"? We look at these and think, "Oh, sure, God says that's wrong, but this is so old and archaic; it's really not that big of a deal." We have no problem just saying, "Yeah, Amen, whatever, sure."

But in our hearts, when we leave, does our life show it? Do we confess? Do we confirm the words of God? Those who say with their mouths, "Yeah, Amen, whatever, great," might think they won't get in trouble if they say it with their mouths, but they don't live it in their lives. The Bible says that person is to be expelled. As we read those verses, we might think, "Oh, man, I don't really like these cursed things." God knew that.

In chapter 28, it says, "It shall come to pass that if you shall hearken diligently unto the voice of the Lord thy God, to observe and do all his commandments, which I command you this day, that the Lord thy God will set thee on high above all nations of the earth." Moses says, "If you will follow the word of God diligently, if you will do what He's called you to do, then I'm going to set you on high above all the nations of the earth, and all these blessings shall come upon you." Notice there it says, "And they will overtake you." Underline that in your Bibles. There are those in our nation...

Those in our world who have been overtaken by the blessings of God have hearkened unto the voice of the Lord. What an awesome thing it is to be overtaken, like a tsunami wave coming at you, and to be completely enveloped by God and His blessings. God says, "If you want to be overtaken by my blessings, then take heed to my word that I command you. Hearken unto that."

Blessed, verse 3 states, shall you be in the city, and blessed shall you be in the field. Blessed shall be the fruit of your body, the fruit of your ground, and the fruit of your cattle, the increase of your kin, your people, and the flocks of your sheep. Blessed shall be your basket and your store.

You see, there are people in this world whose lives curse God. They live according to the curses of chapter 27, yet they want the blessings of chapter 28. They desire to have a blessed family and a blessed storehouse. They want to be blessed in the city and out in the field. They long for the great fruit of their body and the fruit of the ground, hoping that everything they put their hands to prospers. However, they live a life that curses God, and those who do such things shall not inherit the kingdom of heaven, as the Bible says. Those who engage in such behavior will be expelled from God's blessings. They will not receive the blessing of God if they do not take heed to His word.

The person who does not say, "Lord, I desire to follow you," will miss out. As we read these blessings, surely every single person in this room would say, "Yes, that's what I want." But we saw in Joshua chapter 1 that the person who lives a successful life, a life abundantly blessed by God—not in material things, but in the things of God—is the one who hearkens unto the voice of the Lord their God. This person meditates upon the word of God, as Psalm 1 says, and shall be like a tree planted by the rivers of water. Their leaf shall not wither, and they shall bring forth their fruit in due season.

But the wicked are not so. Those people who live according to the curses of chapter 27 desire the blessings of chapter 28. Yet, they are not willing to lay hold of those blessings or to lay down their lives to receive them. Verse 6 says,

Blessed shall you be when you come, and blessed shall you be when you go. Now, there are some people who are a blessing when they come, and there are others who are a blessing when they go. You know those people that you just love to be around? It's such a blessing to hang around certain individuals who you know love God. Every time you're around them, you're encouraged and blessed.

But then there are other people who, boy, are you blessed when they leave. Oh, to be that person who is blessed when they come and blessed when they go! Wherever they go and whatever they do, they have the blessing of God upon their life.

The Lord shall cause your enemies to rise up against you. Notice that right there: the Lord shall cause your enemies to rise up against you. When the enemy comes against you, when someone begins to belittle you and come against you, that is someone that God has brought before your path. Why? To be smitten before your face.

Now, we like that idea, but we don't like when the enemy comes. A lot of times, we wish that the enemy would be smitten immediately. However, God uses that person as an instrument of His righteousness to cut things out of your life and mine. Those people we look at and say, "I don't like that person; they're an enemy." God has put them in your life, just as Pat has said many times, to be that sandpaper ministry.

Unfortunately, in my life, they're not normally like sandpaper, which is something that feels manageable. Most of the time, they're like a jackhammer. They come around, and you just wish they would go. You'd be blessed if they left, just like the last verse suggests. But see, the Lord allows those enemies to come around us. He causes those enemies to rise up to be smitten before your face.

How does He want them to be smitten? A lot of times, we think of that as, "Yeah, smite them, crush them into the ground." But have you ever seen someone who is smitten in love? I think the Lord would desire that they be smitten with God's love, that God would bring them to Him. God could and would do a work in their life and in ours.

I encourage you, when you have an enemy—someone who, most of the time, are people in the church that we just don't like—consider this: that person took my parking space, that person took my seat, and I don't like them. Most of the time, those are the people we look at as our enemies.

Someone once said to me, "Miles, what if that person was an angel and you were just unaware, like Hebrews talks about?" Boy, does that change my perspective on those people who bother me. I think, "Wow, this person is like...".

Maybe they are an angel sent from God to test me, to see how I'll weather that storm. They shall come against you one way, but they shall flee from you seven ways. Now, obviously, Moses is speaking specifically about the enemies of Israel. They will come against you one way; they will come right at you. However, so many times when the enemies of Israel would come, they would scatter in so many different directions because God was for Israel when they were following Him. They would lead that blessed life.

The Lord shall command a blessing upon you. Every single one of us would like the Lord to bless us, to command a blessing upon us in our storehouses and in all that we set our hand to. He shall bless you in the land which the Lord your God gives to you. The Lord shall establish you as a holy people unto Himself, as He has sworn unto you, if you shall keep the commandments of the Lord your God and walk in His ways.

There are people who go to church regularly. I hope that none of them are here at this church, but there are people who desire the blessing of God. They really like what these verses have to say, yet they are crooked in their business practices. They would like to see their storehouses filled; they would like to see their business prosper, and yet they refuse to give God His due glory.

If that is you tonight and you're wondering why it always seems like a battle, while the guy down the street seems to be doing so much better than you, maybe you need to come before the Lord tonight and say, "Lord, as David did in Psalm 139, search me, Lord. Am I wrong? Am I doing wrong?" Sometimes it's so very subtle that we don't even realize our hearts are wrong. Many times it takes somebody else, one of our enemies, to point it out. That's probably why we don't like those people sometimes, because they show us that we are in error.

But He says there that your storehouses will be blessed. He shall bless you in the land which the Lord gives you. He is going to establish you and command a blessing upon you if you shall keep the commandments of the Lord your God and walk in His ways. All the people of the earth shall see that you are called.

By the name of the Lord, they shall be afraid of thee. The Lord shall make thee plenteous; there shall be lots and plenty. He will bless the fruit of thy body, the fruit of your cattle, and the fruit of the ground in the land which the Lord swore unto your fathers to give to them. The Lord shall open unto you His good treasure, the heaven, to give the rain unto your land in its season and to bless all the earth. He will bless all the work of your hand. You shall lend to many nations, and thou shalt not borrow.

What an awesome thing that God desires to put upon His people—that they would be blessed! Oh, how happy it is, as we looked at several weeks ago when we were going through Matthew chapter 5. The blessings of God are not always immaterial things. There are some who are blessed materially, but most of the time, the blessings of God are spiritual blessings, as we see in Ephesians chapter 1. God has given to us all spiritual blessings in heavenly places.

These are the things that we read in Galatians chapter 5: love, joy, peace, kindness, gentleness, and self-control. These are the things that the world cannot apprehend on their own; they must come from God. Because those are the things that bring God the most glory.

The Lord shall make you, as stated in verse 13 of Deuteronomy chapter 28, the head and not the tail. You shall be above only, and thou shalt not be beneath, if you hearken unto the commandments of the Lord thy God, which I command you this day, to observe them and do them. You shall not go aside from any of the words which I command you this day, to the right hand or to the left, after other gods to serve them.

But it shall come to pass, if you will not hearken unto the voice of the Lord thy God, to observe and do all His commandments and His statutes which I command you this day, that all these curses shall come upon you and overtake you. If you don't follow the Lord, then the curses will overtake you like a tidal wave.

You could read, though we won't, from verse 16 right on through chapter 30, up to verse 68, and see more curses of God. We are not going to do that; we know the curses. We've seen the curses in our own lives. How do we apprehend the blessing? How does this passage at the end of chapter 8 of Joshua apply to us here in 2003?

Every single one of us, as I said earlier, has strayed away from the Lord, as Isaiah 53:6 states: "All like sheep have gone astray; we have turned everyone to his own way." We haven't turned to God; we've turned away from the Lord. The Bible says in the Psalms that the Lord was speaking to David, and David, you were conceived in sin. From the very second you were conceived, you've been a sinner.

All of us know the passages in Romans chapter 3 that say all have sinned and fallen short of the glory of God. Chapter 6 states that the wages of sin is death. You see, every single person in this world who is born, has been born, or will be born stands on Mount Ebal. They are born to cursing, and they stand upon Mount Ebal. Apart from the work of God, they will die there and be separated, expelled from God for eternity.

From Mount Ebal, you can stand and see across the valley to Mount Gerizim, where the blessings you so desire are found. But how do you get there? You have to go through the valley. To get from Mount Ebal to Mount Gerizim, you must go through the valley. People don't like to go through the valley because it's humiliating. They don't want to get off their high mountaintop experience in the world. They like the power, the possessions, the prestige, and all that they have in the world. But they are still on Mount Ebal.

Sure, they may experience temporal blessings there on Mount Ebal, but the day they die, judgment will come, and they will be cast into eternal darkness, where the fire is not quenched and the worm dies not. For 70 or 80 years, many people in the world think that living on Mount Ebal is just fine for them. As humans, we often focus only on the here and now—today, next month.

Like the man in Luke chapter 12 who built great storehouses to hold his abundance, the Lord said to him, "Thou fool, tonight your soul shall be required of you." James said, "Our life is but a vapor. It's here one day and gone the next." It doesn't last. The Psalms say that a man's life is 70 years.

And if by reason of strength, 80 years seems like a lot. Now, when you're young, 70 or 80 years feels like an eternity. But tonight, if you're 40 years old, you're halfway there. Sorry, it's the truth. I'll be there tomorrow, like next week. It happens so quickly. Really, life goes by fast.

There are so many people in the world trying to hold on to what they have right now. That's why we have plastic surgery. People are trying to capture back what they've lost, their former glory, as the flower begins to fade. But you know what? No matter what they do to their face or how many times they suck the fat out, they're still getting older. There's no way to turn back the clock. They are still on Mount Ebal, and they can see Gerizim off in the distance. They desire to go down there, but they see the valley below and refuse to take the step down into the valley.

However, for the person who does, there is a blessing. What was in the valley again? Remember, the Ark of the Covenant, the presence of God, and an altar made with whole stones. What are those whole stones? There was no iron to come upon them. They weren't to be chiseled in any way or made to look better—just whole, rugged stones with dirt caked on them, down there in the valley to make an altar. Those stones are you and I.

You see, the Bible says that you and I all have stony hearts. We are wicked people. In Ezekiel chapter 18, verse 30, the Lord tells us about this hard heart that we have. But there are people in the world who think, "Before I can go down in there, I've got to clean up my life. I've got to chisel away this dirt. I've got to make this rock look better." But the Lord says, "No, I just want whole stones. I just want you—hard heart and all. I want you to come down into the valley and make you into my altar."

Because it's there at the altar that the Lord wants to transform us and change us. Remember, upon the altar, after they had made that altar of whole stones, they put plaster there upon it.

And then they wrote the word upon the altar, and they offered a sacrifice. You see, the Lord wants to take us, rocky as we are, stony people. He doesn't want us to try and change ourselves, clean ourselves up, and take the chisel to knock off our rough edges. Before I come to God, before I come before the Ark of the Covenant of the Lord, I don't need to get rid of my flaws. The Lord just wants you, as you are, to come down the mountain and say, "I'm going to remove myself from that place I've been trying to sit for so long to get the blessings of this world." I'm going to come into the valley and lay myself upon Your altar.

Remember Romans chapter 12. Come there as a living sacrifice and lay yourself down so that the Lord can offer the sacrifice of His Son upon you. In Ezekiel chapter 18, verse 30, the Bible says, "Therefore I will judge you, O house of Israel. Everyone according to his ways," says the Lord God. When we start to think, "Lord, I don't want You to judge me according to my ways. I want You to judge me, Lord, according to Your righteousness, according to Your mercy and Your grace, not according to my ways."

The Lord says, "Repent and turn yourselves from all your transgressions so your iniquity shall not be your ruin. Cast away from you all your transgressions whereby you have transgressed. I will make you a new heart and a new spirit. For why will you die, O house of Israel? For I have no pleasure in the death of him that dies," says the Lord God. "Wherefore, turn yourselves and live."

I hope and I pray that every single one of you in this room, if at one point in time you saw that you were on Mount Ebal and recognized where it was taking you, turned and said, "I don't want that." You went down into the valley, brokenhearted and wicked as you were, and laid yourself down on the altar of God. The offering of the Lord God was made, and He offered a sacrifice upon you. Because then He is able to take out that old, fleshly, disgusting, crusty heart and give you and me a new heart.

In Ezekiel chapter 36, verse 26, we read, "A new heart also will I give you, and a new spirit will I put within you. I will take away this stony heart out of your flesh and give you a heart of flesh. I will put My spirit within you and cause you to walk in My statutes, and you shall keep My judgments and do them."

As we read the blessings of God in Deuteronomy chapter 28, it says that if you keep the commandments of God, you may desire the blessings, but you might feel unable to keep the commandments of God.

I tried. Israel did for years. They tried and they tried to keep the commandments of God. But when we come to that place of the altar and we lay ourselves down upon the altar, that big, whole rock that you are, and God offers the sacrifice of His Son upon you, then He writes His law upon you, upon your heart. He causes you to walk in His statutes and keep His judgments, and then that is the blessed life.

When we take up the life of Christ, laying down the life that we have so many times strived to maintain and keep, it's an awesome promise that God has given to us in Ezekiel chapter 36. He says that He will take away that stony heart and put a new heart of flesh in you. He will put His Spirit upon you, and you will keep His statutes and His judgments, and then you will have that blessed life.

You might say, "Gosh, that's a great promise," but before we can apprehend the promise, we have to let go of ourselves, go down the mountain, and lay ourselves down there upon the altar. We must let His sacrifice, the blood of the sacrifice of His Son, come upon us. Then the Lord can give us a new heart and write upon that heart the law.

As the Lord spoke to Jeremiah in Jeremiah chapter 31, verse 33, it says, "But this shall be the covenant which I will make with the house of Israel after those days," says the Lord. "I will put my law in their inward parts, I will write it upon their hearts, and I will be their God, and they shall be my people. They shall teach no more every man his neighbor and every man his brother, saying, 'Know the Lord,' for they shall all know me, from the least of them to the greatest of them," says the Lord, "for I will forgive their iniquity and I will remember their sin no more."

You see, the Lord desired for the children of Israel to come down the mountain, to realize that Jesus was the offering for their sin, and to lay themselves upon the altar of God, saying, "Lord, let His blood come upon me." It's interesting; I don't know if you remember, but when the children of Israel said, "Crucify Him!" Pilate washed his hands of this thing and said, "His blood's not upon my hands." The children of Israel responded, "Well, His blood will be upon us and our children." Oh, that it would come true, that the nation of Israel would come to that point. We know that they will. We know that in the last days during the tribulation, that will happen.

But have we taken God's blood upon ourselves, allowed Him to take out the stony heart, and put in the heart of flesh?

And to write upon our lives His law, so that we no longer go around and command people and teach them, "Hey, you've got to know the Lord." Why? Because you will know the Lord, and He will forgive our iniquities and remember our sin no more. What an awesome thing that God says, "I'm going to choose to remember your sin no longer. I'm going to remove it as far as the east is from the west."

These promises, the Bible tells us in 2 Corinthians 1:20, that all the promises of God are in Him, yes, and in Him, amen, to the glory of God. These promises are yes, they're amen, they're true, they're real. God is not slack concerning His promises, as 2 Peter 3:9 says. He is long-suffering, not willing that any should perish, but that all would walk off of the ball, that they would repent, turn from their wicked ways, come down the mountain, lay themselves upon the altar of God, and say, "Lord, cover me with Your blood and bring me into Gerizim, the blessings that You desire to give to me, Father."

But you see, there are some, and we'll finish up here real quickly. I'm sorry we're going over, but there are some who walk down the mountain, look at all that God has for them, see the blessings, see what God has called them to, and yet they don't completely give themselves over to Him. They go back to the peak of Mount Ebal for temporal pleasures, prosperity, money, pleasure, whatever it is.

Hebrews 6:4 says, "For it is impossible for those who were once enlightened, and have tasted of the heavenly gift, and were made partakers of the Holy Ghost, and have tasted of the good word of God and the powers of the world to come, if they shall fall away, to renew them again to repentance, seeing that they crucify to themselves the Son of God afresh and put Him to open shame."

What does that mean? It means that there are some who come to church, experience worship, and feel a little bit of the Holy Ghost upon their life. They see what God has for them, taste of the good word of God and the power of the age to come, and yet they say, "I don't want that." They put Christ's sacrifice to open shame and walk away, and God says it's impossible to renew them again to repentance. Why? Because their stony heart just got a little bit harder.

And I pray that every one of you in this room...

Will have broken your hearts upon the cross of Christ. If you haven't yet, I pray that you would by the end of this night. Do not harden your hearts, as in the day of rebellion, as Hebrews chapter 4 tells us. When my people did not heed my voice, they did not hearken unto me, the Lord says, but they turned and rebelled. Every one of them died in the wilderness. They died longing for the blessings that God had for them, but they never achieved it.

In Deuteronomy chapter 30, just before Moses' death, he said to the children of Israel in verse 19, "I call heaven and earth to record against you this day, that I have set before you life and death, blessing and cursing. Therefore, choose life, that both you and your seed may live." After he told all of these cursings and blessings to the children of Israel, he said, "I call before you this day heaven as a witness against you. I've set before you life, and I've set before you death, and blessings and cursings. Choose life that you and your seed might live."

That's what Joshua did in Joshua chapter 8 when he stood between Gerizim and Ebal. He looked over to the six tribes that were towards Ebal and said, "Cursed," and they responded, "Amen." Then he turned to those on the other side and said, "Blessings, if you do this," and they also said, "Amen." When he was done, he declared, "I call heaven to witness against you this day. I've set before you life, and I've set before you death, and I've set before you blessing and cursing. Choose life."

Tonight, as we conclude, I have set before you the very same, and I call heaven to witness against you and me. God is a witness tonight. There is blessing and there is cursing. There is life and there is death. The amazing thing is that the God of the universe, the one who created you and me and everything that you see, has given us the choice of whether or not we will leave Ebal and give ourselves over to the Lord and come into His blessing. It's our choice.

You choose, not just tonight, but tomorrow and the next day and the day after that. Don't be like those in Hebrews chapter 6 who saw it, who tasted of it, and then walked away, saying, "I don't need that."

It's a sad thing. Let's pray.

Father, I do thank You for the blessings. I thank You that I know many of my brothers and sisters are here tonight, many who know You and have come into that place of blessing. Lord, I ask that You would overtake them with Your blessing, that You'd fill them to overflowing with Your Spirit.

Lord, strengthen them to be witnesses and lights in this dark world. Help them to call out to other people and say, "Come on down off Ebal. Turn away from all that you've been trying to get. Lay your life down at the feet of Jesus so that He can lift you up in due season."

Lord, help us to humble ourselves before You every single day and allow the blood of the sacrifice to come upon us, upon our wicked deeds. Help us to die to sin and to live for You, for we ask it in Jesus' name. Amen.