Have you ever felt like you didn’t belong? Like you weren’t good enough or didn’t live up to the standards that either you or other people had set? In Ephesians 2, we will learn that this is not something that is new to our world. We will see how all were once separated from Christ, not originally included in the promises of God, but that Jesus made a way to extend the invitation to belong to the family of God for ALL people, including me and you!
Sometimes it feels like we are stuck in a rut, or even at a dead end. The people with Joshua had felt it several times before. At the edge of the Red Sea, when food ran low, when what direction to go was fuzzy. In each instance God moved, God worked, God did something in and around them to show and remind them of his faithfulness. What are our stories that we can look back on and remind one another about how we have seen God at work?
Grit, doing hard things, perseverance are words that I hear often. What about when it gets challenging, when the pressure is on and when emotions run high? Rahab models a faith in God, that believes who God will be today is connected to who God has been before. That while faith still is hard, we ground it in who we know God to be, and trust what he will do.
What does it look like to be strong? There are lots of images of strength we know from our families, books, and our world. As Joshua steps into a major leadership role, God charges him to be strong, and to live with courage. The passage also names and qualifies that the kind of strength that Joshua is being invited to is not one that comes from within him, but relies on God, and grounds itself in his word.