(Disclaimer: This transcript is auto-generated and may contain mistakes.)

So basically what we see in Joshua, we're gonna go through this verse by verse, but what we see in Joshua 22 is a big overview, essentially sending the children of Reuben, Gad, the half tribe of Manasseh back to their land. And he explains, you know, that they did what they were supposed to do. When they wanted to get their possession on the other side of Jordan, and they said, no, no, this land's real good for us, even before they ever went into the Promised Land. They said, no, this is good for us, we'll keep this. The commandment was okay, you can have this land. God, you know, they defeated the enemies, you know, Og, the king of Bashan, and they defeated the kings that were there, and the people that were there, so they inherited that land. And God was okay with that, as long as they promised to go in and help their brethren and help the other tribes to go and defeat the enemy, so that they didn't just be like, okay, well, we're good, we got our place, you guys go ahead and go off to fight. And they did that. So we see here, they kept all that, now they're finally sent back, and then they build this altar which becomes a point of controversy. So we're going to dig into this story, and you know, essentially that's what happens in this entire chapter, but there's a lot of little things that I want to point out. So let's dig in here, verse number one, the Bible says, Then Joshua called the Reubenites and the Gadites and the half tribe of Nasi and said unto them, You have kept all that Moses the servant of the Lord commanded you, and have obeyed my voice and all that I commanded you. You have not left your brethren these many days unto this day, but have kept the charge of the commandment of the Lord your God. And this speaks really well to them, obviously, there was a lot of fights, a lot of battles, and they stuck it through all the way to the end. Exactly, and we're not going to go back and read what they were commanded, everyone should remember that, and I already summarized that, but they did. They stayed all the way up until everyone got their inheritance, and then they were able to go and return home. Let's keep reading here, verse number four, it says, And now the Lord your God hath given rest unto your brethren as he promised them. Therefore now return ye and get you unto your tents and unto the land of your possession, which Moses the servant of the Lord gave you on the other side, Jordan. But take diligent heed to do the commandment and the law which Moses the servant of the Lord charged you, to love the Lord your God, and to walk in all his ways, and to keep his commandments, and to cleave unto him, and to serve him with all your heart and with all your soul. So we see here in just these first five verses, first they end up getting praised for doing the right thing. They get recognized, they get recognized and say, you did everything you were supposed to do, good for you, you know everyone's at rest now, you can go home. And they stayed loyal all the way until the end, but now they're admonished as they're leaving, saying take diligent heed. Okay, you've got the victory, you're going to be entering into peace, now take heed to yourselves, don't just forget God's law, don't forget God's commandments, you did a really good thing in keeping what the Lord commanded you to do here. Don't get slack, don't get relaxed, you're going to be going back to your land now to enjoy your rest, enjoy that time, enjoy your freedom, enjoy your peace, but don't ever forget God's law. And this is a warning that everybody should be able to take, you know, don't allow yourself to get too puffed up or relaxed. Especially after great victories, when you struggle, when you fight, when you battle, when you war, it can help keep you humble, it can keep you motivated, it can keep you going and pushing forward. But oftentimes what happens is, after all that struggle, after all that battle, you finally win, you get a great victory, you start to enjoy peace, maybe enjoy some prosperity, just enjoy being able to relax, and so many times that is when many people will fall. They've been growing and fighting and doing better and better and better, and then the great victory comes, and they allow themselves to kind of go over the cliff as it were. Because after they've been on this journey, you know, going up the mountain, they get to the top and succeed, and then they fall off because they allow themselves to get in some big sin or they get some big head about themselves, they get arrogant and proud, and start to maybe attribute more things to themselves than they ought to just be attributing to God. Or even just from being weary of all the fighting, now it's okay for me just to indulge, and then you allow yourself to indulge and that indulgence can lead to just maybe more fleshly lusts that bring you down into some carnal sins that can end up destroying you. So we need to watch out for that. Now, of course, our entire life is going to be ups and downs. I mean, you're never going to be stagnant. You should always be, you know, striving to do more and to do more than you've done before, do more reading, more sowing, more praying. But it's not always going to be reality. I mean, there's going to be some times where you're going to start dipping down and you're going to go back up and dip down. What we want to avoid is like that steep crash, that big fall. And that's why you need to take diligent heed. Diligent means you're being really, really careful about it. I mean, we're taking heed that all the advancements that you make in your life, you get victories over sin and stuff. Let's not slide back. Let's not undo everything that we just done and go back to the beginning in those struggles and in those fights. Let's take diligent heed to do the commandment of the law, to keep God's law and to not get slack in any of it or just think you've arrived or anything like that. So they're given this warning. Let's keep reading. Verse number six says, So Joshua blessed them and sent them away, and they went under their tents. So they received a blessing for all their hard work. Verse number seven. So he's speaking to them because what happened is after all their fighting, all their victories, they got a lot of spoil, right? They got a lot of gold and silver and cattle and things through all these various victories of defeating their enemies. And basically he's just saying, hey, split it with your, you know, they came and traveled over here with you. Send it back home with them. They get their fair share. Everybody gets to split the pot evenly because everybody fought in these battles. So he admonishes them to split up all the stuff that they got, and they do that. Verse number nine. built there an altar by Jordan, a great altar to see to. And the children of Israel heard say, Behold, the children of Reuben and the children of Gad and the half tribe of Manasseh have built an altar over against the land of Canaan in the borders of Jordan at the passage of the children of Israel. So this is what ends up happening. They're on their way back home and they get back to where they have to go on the other side of Jordan. And they go back to the place where they crossed over Jordan initially, and they decided there to put up an altar. Now, later on in the chapter, we understand why they do it. But at this point, you know, the rest of the children of Israel hear what they do. They build this, and it says it's a great altar to go and see to. It's this big, you know, pretty, I would guess, a pretty massive altar, you know, for a lot of people to see. It's a major public display, this great altar that they build. And it truly is an altar. Now, they didn't build it with these layers. They didn't build in order to burn sacrifices on, but that's what altars are. Altars were created for the purpose of offering up a sacrifice unto the Lord, an animal, and to kill, to slay an animal, and to offer up a burnt sacrifice unto the Lord. That's what altars were for. And before we go any further, one of the things I want to cover, since most of this chapter is literally revolves around this altar, is what we see in many churches today with an altar call. Now, I don't believe that altar calls, as they're practiced in churches today, are scriptural. And I don't think they should be done. I'm going to explain why. Now, just because I believe that doesn't mean that there's nothing good can ever come from an altar call or whatever like that. There are some things that I think, you know, maybe some good results that things can happen, but there's a lot of good things that can happen in many things that we do. But the things that we do, we ought to be looking to scripture for and backing up by the Bible, and following God's methods and God's practice and God's pattern. Right? So, an easy example is, with soul wanting, you know, God, the pattern that the Bible gives for us is to go out to and to, you know, in the streets, in the highways, in the hedges, from house to house, right? And to go and preach the gospel of Jesus Christ. Now, there's many other ways to preach the gospel. I'm not saying that any of those are bad or wrong, but we need to make sure that we're following God's standard and what he tells us to do, and at least be able to back it up with that. And that's not the perfect analogy for what we see here, because there's actually some things, there's some aspects of an altar call I think are just wrong and shouldn't be done at all. And this is the reason why I think they shouldn't be practiced. I don't have a problem with people making a decision to, you know, change something in their life as a result of hearing a sermon, right? Or, I'm definitely not against somebody getting saved in a church service, right, and calling on the name of the Lord. Of course I'm okay with that, but my point is going to be, and you'll see this as we get through and understand what the altar is, there's plenty of other ways for people to get saved, and I think those same exact people that would have gotten saved, or that have gotten saved at an altar call, can very easily have gotten saved, and probably even more people would get saved if they were approached one-on-one after a service instead of relying on the altar call for someone to actually stand up and come before the whole church to get saved. So, praise God for the people that came forward during an altar call and ended up putting their faith and their trust in the Lord Jesus Christ. Of course we're happy about that, but everything we do, especially the things we do in church, let's model it and pattern it off of the way that God explains and tells us how to do things. Now, turn back, if you would, to Genesis, chapter number 12, keep your place here in Joshua, because we see in the Bible, and we're definitely not going to look at all the references of altars, a lot of references to altars in the Bible, we see Noah builds an altar unto God, Abraham builds altars, plural, unto God, Jacob builds altars unto the Lord, and some of those verses, you're going to see them calling on the name of the Lord at the place where they build the altar. You'll find that, and the reason why I'm covering this is because I can understand where someone might come from that would want to defend an altar call in a church. So we're going to look at some of those verses, but I think the reasons that they might give you for having an altar call are invalid. I don't think they're applying scripture correctly in doing what they're doing. Before I get into all the reasons why I don't like it and why I think it's actually a bad idea to do it, we're going to see just some of these references that might be used. For example, when they say, hey, they're calling on the name of the Lord in the Old Testament when they built these altars, so that's why we have people calling on the name of the Lord and have this altar call where people can come forward and do that, and they'll say they're just patterning that after the Bible. It says, I don't know if I already read this, in verse number 7, chapter 12, the Bible says, Then the Lord appeared unto Abram, and said, Unto thy seed will I give this land. And there builded he an altar unto the Lord, who appeared unto him. And he removed from thence unto a mountain on the east side of Bethel, and pitched his tent, having Bethel on the west and Haai on the east. And there he builded an altar unto the Lord, and called upon the name of the Lord. And flip over to Genesis chapter 13, verse number 4, we're going to see something very similar. Unto the place of the altar which he had made there at the first, and there Abram called on the name of the Lord. And then in chapter 26, verse 25, it says, And he builded an altar there, and called upon the name of the Lord, and pitched his tent there, and there Isaac's servants digged a well. So we see, those are just a few of the references, we see that they called on the name of the Lord. Now first of all though, what we're seeing is that they build an altar at each one of these places. They build it, and they call on the name of the Lord. We're not seeing congregations at all, they're not gathering together to worship the Lord, and this is what they do regularly, and they're just constantly calling on the name of the Lord. What we see is that some great event happens. These are all about some major event happening in their life. God brings them somewhere safely, God makes a promise to them, there's a covenant made. Whatever the case may be, they meet an angel of the Lord, and God tells them to do something, and they build an altar in that place. Because it's kind of like a holy place for them, because God met with them, God talked to them. And what we also need to understand is that when they're calling on the name of the Lord, I know the Bible says in Romans chapter 10 that whosoever shall call on the name of the Lord shall be saved. We know that. We know that people believe on the Lord Jesus Christ and they call on the name of the Lord to be saved, but that's not the only time you're going to see the words calling on the name of the Lord being referenced. It's not always about your soul being saved. You can call on the name of the Lord for any reason. That's what you do, you're praying to God, you're asking God for something, you're calling on the name of the Lord. You can be trusting in the Lord and in his safety, and you can call on the name of the Lord to be your defense, to be your strength. David called on the name of the Lord many times. He had many needs. We read that through the book of Psalms. Abraham, and look, it's very evident, because you see how many times Abraham calls on the name of the Lord. You think he's getting saved every time he's calling on the name of the Lord, and he's building different altars? Of course not. He was saved one time, like everybody else gets saved one time, when they put their faith on the Lord. That's what he did. He believed. But multiple times, he's building altars, he's sacrificing unto God, and he's calling on the name of the Lord. So, just because they have these verses doesn't mean that they're just getting saved in all these instances. That's why I make sure that we're clear about that. Now, these altars were built to honor the Lord. You can turn to Exodus chapter 20, we'll see another example here. In Exodus chapter 20, we're going to see how God wants his altars to be built. Because there's a lot of significance, there's a lot of symbolism, there's a lot to learn about the altar. The altar is where sacrifices were made, were given unto God. And the ritual of offering up a sacrifice unto God was performed at an altar that was built for God. And because of that, God gave instruction and said, here's how you're going to make my altar. Look at verse number 23 of Exodus chapter 20. Exodus chapter 20, of course, has the Ten Commandments, the beginning part of this chapter. Verse number 23, it says, Thou wilt make an altar of stone, thou shalt not build it of hewn stone. For if thou lift up thy tool upon it, thou hast polluted it. Neither shalt thou go up by steps unto mine altar, that thy nakedness be not discovered thereon. So, he says a bunch of things here. He says to make the altar of earth. And he says, if you do make an altar of stone, you can't carve it out, you can't use tools on it, it needs to just be the stones as is, you know, the natural stones. And because if you lift up a tool to it, you polluted it. And he says not to have it go up by steps. So, if we're going to have any type of reference to an altar, or you wanted to have an altar as part of your service because they did it in the Old Testament. Well, first of all, they had it in the Old Testament to offer sacrifices. And offering sacrifices unto the Lord is blasphemous in the New Testament. Because we know that that was symbolic of the Lord Jesus Christ being sacrificed for us. So, I don't know about you, but I don't think altars really have anything to do with our service to the Lord anymore in the New Testament. So, I don't know why we're going to make up something that's really not even an altar and just call it an altar call. Now, what if people do an altar call, where is the altar? Did anyone build an altar of earth or of stone and put it in front of the people? They don't do that, yet they still call. So, what is the altar? Is the altar the pulpit? Seems to be that way. Because where do people congregate and gather during an altar call? They all come forward to the front of the auditorium, right in front of the pulpit. And this is where I started to have a problem. And also, I don't think I've ever seen one time in any church I've been to that had an altar call, the altar being on level ground, there's always steps. There's always steps going up to the altar. What does the Bible say? Neither shall thou go up by steps unto mine altar. Okay? But I think one of the worst things about the altar call is that you have the podium up here and you've got everybody else coming and then what do they do? What do they do? They get down, right, and they bow their heads down and they're kneeling before the altar. Now, what does that look like if you've got a pastor standing behind the pulpit and you've got a whole bunch of people in the congregation coming and bowing down in front of them? What if someone were to walk in that service and be like, what is going on? You know, some unsaved person. But even, let's forget about someone just walking in. How does that look to God? Because you know what worship is defined as in the Bible? Worship is when you bow down. When you get on your knees before someone, that is worship. I know today people think worship is, oh, praise the Lord, right, and you're waving your hands up and people call this worship. But that's not how worship is defined in the Bible. Every time you see, he fell on his face and worshiped him. And I don't have time to go through the whole Bible study on that, but look it up. Do a word study just on the word worship. And you'll see just every time people are falling down on their face, they're humbling themselves, they're going low, they're kneeling before someone, that's worship. And when you have a bunch of people on the ground on these steps at a supposed altar, now maybe, hopefully, there's not a man standing behind the pulpit. But how wicked is that to have that going on with someone standing there? But even when someone's not standing there, it's like, what are you doing? Because I guarantee you when the people in the Old Testament were offering up their sacrifices at the altar, they weren't getting on their hands and their knees in front of the Levites as they cut the throat of the bull or the lamb or whatever they were, they were, you know, slaying to offer as a burnt offering. They weren't getting down on their hands and their knees. The problem is what they're doing is they're mixing various things because they see some symbolic references in the old fashioned altar, in the altar of the Old Testament, and they try to merge that into the New Testament, but then you start getting into these weird areas of people, you know, maybe bowing down before man and doing stuff that God never told us to do. Now, I understand what they're trying to do. I understand that they're humbling themselves and they think they're humbling themselves before God, right? I understand that they're getting on their knees because they're approaching the Lord with something that's in their heart that they want to offer up as a sacrifice to God, whether they're sacrificing their fleshly lust or whatever decision they're making, you know, whatever it is, supposedly they're bringing some unseen sacrifice to God. But even that doesn't really make sense. I mean, sacrifice, you're giving something of yourself. I mean, they're bringing animals, they're bringing something to give and offer and say, here's a sacrifice. And yeah, that's the way they got right with God in the Old Testament. You know, if you're a believer and you sin, you commit some sin, well, you're supposed to bring a sin offering that to get you back in good standing with the Lord, not for your salvation, just to get right with God. That was a way of getting right with God. And, you know, they'll say that people today, well, you know, we don't have a sacrifice to give. Well, if we don't have a sacrifice to give, then why are you having an altar or pretending there's an altar to be there when there is no real altar? It just doesn't make any sense. And I think it's just more confusion than anything else. And when you get people bowing down, it doesn't look good at all. Turn if you go to Deuteronomy chapter 27, we're going to see the altar that the children of Israel made, that the children of Reuben, Gad, and the half tribe of Manasseh made, because this is what I believe they're mirroring. If you remember, when they crossed over, we covered this in a previous Bible study, I think it was in Joshua 8, when they crossed over the Jordan River, they were commanded to build an altar on the other side, Jordan. And that was to be a memorial of their crossing. Remember, they also made that pillar of stones that was like in the midst of the river. And then they also built an altar. So what they end up doing, though, is they come, now they cross back over, and they decide to build this altar on the other side. And we're going to start reading here verse number 1, Deuteronomy chapter 27. The Bible reads, 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 Jordan unto the land which the Lord thy God giveth thee, that thou shalt set up the great stones, and plaster them with plaster. And thou shalt write upon them all the words of this law, when thou art passed over, that thou mayest go in unto the land which the Lord thy God giveth thee, a land which floweth with milk and honey, as the Lord God of thy fathers hath promised thee. Therefore it shall be when ye be gone over Jordan, that ye shall set up these stones, which I command you this day, in Mount Ebal, and thou shalt plaster them with plaster. And there shalt thou build an altar unto the Lord thy God, an altar of stones. Thou shalt not lift up any iron tool upon them. Does this sound familiar? It sounds just like Exodus. You either build an altar of earth or of stones, and if you build it with stones, you can't put tools to it. You can't form it. Verse number 6, Thou shalt build the altar of the Lord thy God of whole stones, and thou shalt offer burnt offerings thereon unto the Lord thy God. And thou shalt offer peace offerings, and shalt eat there, and rejoice before the Lord thy God. Now this was built, this altar, we already saw that, they fulfilled that commandment that they were given in Joshua chapter 8. And I believe that this new altar that was built is basically just on the other side of Jordan to show that they believed the same things as the other children of Israel. On the other side, that's why, and then we will see this again, we'll get to this in a little bit, but the whole point was for future generations to show that, yeah, we know you have your altar over there, it's got the law engraved in it, it's etched in stone in that altar, but then on the other side, they were basically making the same thing, and they made a real big one just to make sure that they saw it, that it's like a monument that they're putting up to say we believe the same thing too. Look at verse number, let's go back to Joshua 22. And we'll pick up, I think in verse number 11 is where we left off, the Bible says, So they hear about this, so they say, wait a minute, what's going on there, verse number 12, Now, this was a very high point for them, they had just conquered all their enemies. They were being sent home in peace, they were divided up to spoil, things were going really well for them, and even though they have peace from their enemies, this is really a high point for them spiritually also, because they are taking diligent heed to make sure that people aren't screwing things up. People of this generation in Israel, they're looking well to the ways of the Lord. They don't just blow this up, when they hear about some of their own brethren building this altar, they take that seriously, and for good reason, because the appearance of what they were doing, what they thought they were doing is just basically establishing their own place to worship God, their own altar, and just saying, okay, we're going back home, and we're just going to stay over here, and you guys can stay over there, and we're just going to build this altar over here, and this is the impression that they got. And they understand why this is a big deal, and they're willing to go to war against their own brethren for such a perceived transgression against the Lord. Let's keep reading, verse number 13, the Bible says, And the children of Israel sent unto the children of Reuben, and the children of Gad, and the half-tribe of Anashe, into the land of Gilead. Phinehas the son of Eleazar the priest, and with him ten princes of each chief house of prince throughout all the tribes of Israel, and each one was an head of the house of their fathers among the thousands of Israel. So they send Phinehas along with the other princes of the tribe. These are all the important people, right, the leaders of the tribes of their day, respected men, men of wisdom, and they were prepared to go to war with their brethren because they had more respect unto the Lord. They were willing to fight and die and kill for what was right and what was right, and look, this isn't just over any little thing. They perceived this as they're already starting to go after strange gods. They're already just completely disobeying and disrespecting the commandment of the Lord in a huge public way. By building something like that, that's not the same as someone just kind of going and doing their own thing. They're just public just going, boom, this is where we stand, right? And that was a big affront, or at least seemingly. And they were willing to go and fight for that. And they were willing actually to follow God's law in all their thoughts. Turn to Deuteronomy chapter 13 to keep your place here. Just showing you, this is the level of commitment that the children of Israel had near the end of Joshua. At this point, when God has delivered all of their enemies into their hand. And this is, you know, for good reason. They ought to have these types of an attitude. In the last chapter, in chapter 21 last week, the last verse says, There failed not ought of any good thing which the Lord had spoken unto the house of Israel all came to pass. Every single good promise, good thing that the Lord promised them, everything came to pass. So you better believe they should be thinking, we owe everything to God. He's given us everything good. He's kept His word in all matters. We better keep our word to Him. We better follow His law and follow His commandments. And this is exactly what we see them doing here, or at least trying to do. And we're going to see where they even get this from. Where did they even determine that it would be a good idea to go to war with them? Well, they're getting it from God's law. Look at Deuteronomy chapter 13, verse number 6, the Bible reads, If thy brother, the son of thy mother, or the son of thy daughter, or the wife of thy bosom, or thy friend, which is as thine own soul enticed thee secretly, saying, Let us go and serve other gods which thou hast not known, thou nor thy fathers, namely of the gods of the people which are round about you, nigh unto thee, or far off from thee, from the one end of the earth, even unto the other end of the earth, thou shalt not consent unto him, nor hearken unto him, neither shall thine eye pity him, neither shalt thou spare, neither shalt thou conceal him, but thou shalt surely kill him. Thine hand shall be first upon him to put him to death, and afterwards the hand of all the people. And thou shalt stone him with stones that he die, because he hath sought to thrust thee away from the Lord thy God, which brought thee out of the land of Egypt from the house of bondage. This is an aspect of God that we need to remember, that he made a law like this. And God said that it was good. And I don't care who's going to try to pin you out to be some terrorist, or, oh, you're like a Muslim, whatever. Look, I believe all of God's word, and if you're a Christian, you should believe all of God's word, too. Don't tell me that this is wicked. This is the judgment of God. This is what he said to do. And it makes perfect sense. One of the first two commandments in the Ten Commandments, not to have any other god before him, not to build any altars, any graven image, any idols to any other gods. God demands our respect. He demands our worship. He is God, and he deserves to be revered as such, and he doesn't want to share that with anybody. He has saved. He has given of himself. He has done everything for us and for everybody. And he says, I delivered you from bondage. I've done these things. And I've given you salvation. And when someone's going to come and try to turn you away from the Lord God, that's a death penalty. That is a crime punishable by death. And this isn't just anybody from some other land. This is among the children of God, among his people. He's saying, someone comes to you eagerly trying to say, hey, let's go worship these other gods. He said, we're not going to stand for that. We're not going to put up with that. You're not going to go worship any other god, because the Lord is God. And this is his judgment. So the children of Israel, what are they doing? They're hearing that even some of their... And the example that's given in Deuteronomy is, if it's your own brother, if it's your own son, if it's your close family member, you need to have the loyalty to God over everybody else. Now, obviously, that's not like it's something that anyone would ever take joy in or want to have happen or want to see happen, but it's still something that God says ought to happen. And the children of Israel, they were grieved. They didn't want to go to war with their brethren. They weren't just on a hair trigger to fight and to kill and to have battle. They'd done enough of that. They were ready to just enjoy peace and just enjoy their lives in the Promised Land. It's not like they wanted to fight another fight. But even after all that, they were still willing to fight that other fight and to go even against their own brethren if they're going to go and just publicly maybe build an altar under some other god or whatever. But see, they go and ask questions. They don't shoot and ask questions later. Right? They go and ask questions first. They do it wisely. Let's just keep reading here in Deuteronomy 13. Let's finish this off. Verse number 11. The Bible says, And all Israel shall hear and fear and shall do no more any such wickedness as this is among you. And think about how damaging that is to you. You say, I still don't understand why you need to be put to death. I mean, they believe whatever they want. You know why it's so damaging? Because it affects people's souls. I mean, when you start steering people off into worshipping other gods and false gods, you're damning all of those people that you gather with you and make them twofold more the child of hell than yourself. And it really I mean, you just destroy people's lives forever for eternity. You say in order to stop that from happening, you could end a physical life here and now, as opposed to just gathering this, amassing this whole group of people from departing from the Lord, departing from salvation, going back into Egypt, going back into bondage. You're saying stop that right now. And he says once you do that, it's not like you have to do that regularly, like just all the time. Because once you do it one time, people are going to hear and they're going to fear and be like, OK, maybe I won't say that because you're not going to stop people from believing what they believe anyways. But at least they're going to stop them from just going around and proselytizing for the devil. Says in verse 12, if thou shalt hearsay in one of thy cities, which the Lord thy God hath given thee to dwell there, saying, certain men, the children of Belial, the children of the devil, are gone out from among you and have withdrawn the inhabitants of their city, saying, let us go and serve other gods which ye have not known. Then shalt thou inquire and make search and ask diligently. And behold, if it be truth and the thing certain that such abomination is wrought among you, thou shalt surely smite the inhabitants of that city with the edge of the sword, destroying it utterly and all that is therein and the cattle thereof with the edge of the sword. And thou shalt gather all the spoil of it into the midst of the street thereof, and shalt burn with fire the city and all the spoil thereof, every wit for the Lord thy God. And it shall be in heap forever. It shall not be built again. This is exactly what we see the children of Israel doing. They hear what was done. They hear, hey, these guys built an altar. They're ready to go to war and to destroy them and to burn their cities and just not take any spoil and just burn it all into God, because that's what this law says. But first they go and inquire and they go and make search and they don't jump to conclusions and just see this and just automatically, oh, man, you guys are worshipping the devil. They go figure it out. They search it out. They ask diligently. They figure out the truth of the matter. What's really going on here? That's why they sent Phinehas. That's why they sent these heads of the tribes and these people that should have wisdom and discernment and understanding what's going on. They sent them to ask the questions. Let's go back to Joshua 22. Verse number 15. The Bible reads, And they came unto the children of Reuben, and to the children of Gad, and to the half-tribe of Manasseh, unto the land of Gilead. And they spake with them, saying, Thus saith the whole congregation of the Lord, What trespass is this that ye have committed against the Lord God of Israel, to turn away this day from following the Lord, in that ye have builded you an altar, that ye might rebel this day against the Lord? What are you guys doing? What in the world are you thinking? What are you doing? Verse number 17. Is the iniquity of Peor too little for us, from which we are not cleansed until this day? Although there was a plague in the congregation of the Lord, but that ye must turn away this day from following the Lord, and it will be, seeing ye rebel today against the Lord, that tomorrow he will be wroth with the whole congregation of Israel. So they bring up. Turn back to Numbers 25. Numbers 25. They bring up Peor. In this place where they had broken God's laws, basically they had, this was around the story of Balaam, when Balak tried to hire Balaam, the false prophet, to go and curse the children of Israel. So he hires them to curse the children of Israel, but he can't do it. God doesn't let him do it, and he ends up blessing Israel, right? Well, when he wasn't able to curse him, he ends up still instructing the people on how they can get the children of Israel cursed. Because what they do is they lure them into fornication with the women of the land in Peor, and attract the Israelites into committing sin, because in so doing they're going to bring God's judgment upon them because they're children of God. So that's a way of cursing them without actually cursing them with your mouth. But of course it's still up to the children of Israel to commit that sin. And that's why obviously they're held responsible for it. But let's look at verse number one here. And of course we're going to see Phinehas is the one who's bringing this up. This is the first thing that comes to Phinehas' mind when they're seen building this altar. They're saying, don't you remember what happened with Peor? And we're going to see why it's important, because Phinehas was personally involved in staying God's wrath from that sin. He was one of the main reasons why they actually got some mercy there. Look at verse number one, the Bible says, And the people began to commit whoredom with the daughters of Moab. And they called the people unto the sacrifices of their gods, and the people did eat and bowed down to their gods. Remember we just got done reading what God's law should be if your brother or sister are going and enticing you away to serve other gods as a death penalty? And we know what the first two commandments are, and what's happening here? They start committing whoredom in the land, and then they go and start worshipping other gods. They start learning already the way of the heathen, and start worshipping their gods. Verse number three, And Israel joined himself unto Baal Peor, and the anger of the Lord was kindled against Israel. And the Lord said unto Moses, Take all the heads of the people, and hang them up before the Lord against the sun, that the fierce anger of the Lord may be turned away from Israel. And Moses said unto the judges of Israel, Slay ye everyone his men that were joined unto Baal Peor, and behold, one of the children of Israel came... And look, this is their brethren that he's telling them to kill. Hey, everyone that's joined unto Baal Peor, all these people were committing whoredom and worshipping these other gods. You need to kill them right now. That's what God's saying. That's their judgment on them. They need to be put to death. And behold, one of the children of Israel came and brought unto him, unto his brethren, a Midianitish woman in the sight of Moses, and in the sight of all the congregation of the children of Israel who were weeping before the door of the tabernacle of the congregation. So you have, you know, a lot of, you know, the children of Israel, they're crying, they're weeping before the door of the tabernacle, because this is a big deal. They've got their brethren being put to death. There's all kinds of chaos going on. It's not some happy times here. People are dying, and then you've got this guy with this boldness to bring out this Midianitish woman that he's been shacking up with and committing whoredom with, who they're not supposed to join themselves unto the daughters of the heathen. That was another one of God's laws, that they're not supposed to do that. He's committing whoredom with the people of the land, and what does he do? He's so brazen, he just brings her right out, right out in the sight of Moses, like, what are you going to do? And this is the type of wickedness that we, for one, this is the size of, we can't tolerate this type of thing in church either. This is what was going on in the Church of Corinth. He's saying, it's just widely known that, you know, there's fornication among you, and it's not just any fornication. Fornication is a man that has his father's wife. Like, what's the matter with you? And you're not doing anything about it. You're all just smiling and looking the other way. He said, put that wicked person out from among you. Deliver such a one unto Satan. And we got this guy in the sight of Moses and in the sight of all these people. These people are the ones that are fearing God. They're on their face. They're weeping on the Lord. And he just comes right out, like, what are you going to do? Phinehas shows him what he's going to do. It says in verse 7, and when Phinehas, the son of Eliezer, the son of Aaron, the priest, sought, he rose up from among the congregation and took a javelin in his hand, and he went after the man of Israel into the tent and thrust both of them through, the man of Israel and the woman through her belly. So the plague was stayed from the children of Israel. His action of going and doing that and saying, no, no, we're not tolerating this. God just told us to kill these people, and I don't care who you are. And it's even more, this woman that he had was like a princess, right? She was a daughter of a ruler in Midian. And, you know, an important person. And Phinehas is like, I don't care who you are. You're someone that you're not supposed to be laying with, and this guy, you know, one of the sons of the princes of Israel, I don't care who you are. You've got no clout with me. You're disregarding the law of God, and you're going to steer a bunch of people away from serving the Lord, and you're bringing a great plague upon us. And see, what he did was actually very kind and merciful, not to the person that ended up getting killed, but to everybody else that was dying as a result of the plague that the Lord had put on the children of Israel for their disobedience and for their whoredoms and for worshipping other gods. Because it wasn't just those, you know, there were people dying, many people were dying as a result of this sin, and Phinehas stopped that plague. He saved lives by killing those two people, those two wicked people that never should have been doing that to begin with. Verse number eight, and he went after the son, excuse me, verse number nine, it says, And those that died in the plague were twenty and four thousand. Twenty-four thousand people died in the plague that God sent. That's a lot of people dying. I don't know about you, but I'd be pretty angry, too, if because of the sin of these people committing whoredom, you know, there's this great plague spreading and people are just dying and dying. I mean, twenty-four thousand people are dying, and then you just see this guy just come up all bold with this woman he's committing whoredom with. Yeah, it's going to make me angry, too. I'm sick of these other people dying. We're going to stop this right here. We see the result of their sin, and this is what Phinehas knew firsthand. And it says here, we're going to see how the Lord answers Phinehas, like, Oh, you shouldn't have gone and done that. Why didn't you preach him the gospel? That's not what they say unto him. It says, Even the covenant of an everlasting priesthood, because he was zealous for his God and made an atonement for the children of Israel. He did the right thing according to God. That was the right thing for him to do, and he was blessed as a result of that. But since he had already been through this, he's seen the result of such a wicked sin, people joining themselves and worshipping other gods, and this plague that happened, that he's like, Do I have to remind you guys? What are you doing building this altar? Don't you remember what happened? How many people died? He was personally involved with that. He brings that up to them. Now it's obvious they don't want to have war with their brethren. So as he's going to them, he's offering them another way out. Because he still hasn't heard the explanation yet. He's still thinking like, You guys don't go down this road. It's going to be bad for all of them. It's not just going to be bad for you, but you're going to cause all of us to be receiving from the wrath of God because of your sin. And he says, I'm going to stay the plague again. I'm going to make sure this stops. And he offers them, back in Joshua 22, verse number 19, he says, Not withstanding if the land of your possession be unclean. There's something not good about your land. You go back and you decide, I didn't really like this anyway. You went into the promised land. You say, Hey, this is way better, whatever. And there's something now you don't think it was as good as you thought it was. He says, Then pass ye over unto the land of the possession of the Lord. Wherein the Lord's tabernacle dwelleth and take possession among us. He's saying, Come on over here. We've got plenty of land. We'll set you up. Whatever you do, don't rebel. He says, But rebel not against the Lord, nor rebel against us, in building you an altar beside the altar of the Lord our God. He's saying, You need to go and worship at the altar of the Lord. That's where you need to be. That's where you need to stay. He set his name here. Don't go and join yourself unto any other God. Don't go and build an altar that you shouldn't be building. You need to be coming among us. So we see very clearly they didn't want to get in this war and this battle with them, but they were willing to anyways. Let's keep reading here because now they're going to give the explanation. Verse number 20. Oh, then he brings up one more example. Verse number 20. Did not Achan the son of Zerah commit a trespass in the accursed thing, and wrath fell on all the congregation of Israel. And that man perished not alone in his iniquity. And we saw that in the book of Joshua. Achan, of course, he coveted after that silver wedge and the Babylonish garment, you know, and he hid them in his tent. And then when the children of Israel went to fight in the battle, in the war, they were defeated. And people lost their lives because God wasn't with them because of Achan, because of his sin, because of his trespass, because of his lust. And we see that Achan didn't die alone either. Innocent people lost their lives as a result of Achan, not just in the battle, but then his family and everyone connected with him. His whole posterity was cut off. They were all put to death as a result of that man's actions. And he's saying, we don't want to make God angry. So we're not going to let you start worshipping other gods or start even just building this altar here, contrary to what God said to do. They were taking diligent heed. Look at verse number 21. Now they're going to get the explanation. Then the children of Reuben and the children of Gad and the half-tribe of Manasseh answered and said unto the heads of the thousands of Israel, the Lord God of gods, the Lord God of gods, he knoweth. They're saying, well, God already knows. God knows our intention. And they say, in Israel, he shall know. So we're going to let you know too. If it be in rebellion or if in transgression against the Lord, and in parentheses, this parenthetical statement says, save us not in this day. They're saying, look, if what we're doing is in rebellion and transgression, then don't save us. Let us die. We're willing to do that. That's fine with us. He says that we have built us an altar to turn from following the Lord, or if to offer thereon burnt offering or meat offering, or if to offer peace offerings thereon, let the Lord himself require it. He's saying, if we've done these things for all the wrong reasons, let God require it. Here we are. He says in verse 24, and if we have not rather done it for fear of this thing, saying, in time to come, your children might speak unto our children, saying, what have ye to do with the Lord God of Israel? For the Lord hath made Jordan a border between us and you, ye children of Reuben and children of Gad. Ye have no part in the Lord. So shall your children make our children cease from fearing the Lord. So they're saying, look, we all know that we're all believers in the Lord now. What we're worried about, though, is the future generations. Because someone might say, well, wait a minute, why do you guys think you're our brethren? Look, God's divided us with this great river. You know, people would just start becoming ignorant of their history, ignorant of God's word, and just saying, you know, and what they're worried about, we don't want our children to stop worshipping the Lord. Because they say, oh, you should just go worship those other gods, because obviously there's a division here between us and you, so you go worship them. And they're saying, here's how we're going to, you know, defend against this. We're going to build this great altar, this monument, so that it'll be around for a long time. And people can look at that and say, oh, this is just like the altar on the other side of the river. And they can say, see, look, we believe the same way. We're brethren. And he says here in verse number 26, therefore we said, let us now prepare to build us an altar, not for burnt offering nor for sacrifice, but that that may be a witness between us and you and our generations after us, that we might do the service of the Lord before him with our burnt offerings and with our sacrifices and with our peace offerings, that your children may not say to our children in time to come, you have no part in the Lord. So they're saying, we're going to continue to come and offer our sacrifices. We're going to continue to go to the place where God has put his name, and we are going to continue to worship there. And we don't want to be told, you're not welcome here. So we built this altar. He said, this altar isn't for us to burn sacrifices on. It's not for us to worship the Lord with. It's literally just to show that we believe the same things. It says, verse number 28, therefore said we that it shall be when they should say so to us or to our generations in time to come, that they may say again, behold, the pattern of the altar of the Lord, which our fathers made not for burnt offerings or for sacrifices, but is a witness between us and you. God forbid that we should rebel against the Lord and turn this day from following the Lord to build an altar for burnt offerings, for meat offerings, or for sacrifices beside the altar of the Lord our God that is before his tabernacle. And when Phinehas the priest and the princes of the congregation and heads of the thousands of Israel, which were with him, heard the words of the children of Reuben and the children of Gad and the children of Manasseh spake, it pleased them. And Phinehas the son of Eliezer the priest said unto the children of Reuben and to the children of Gad and to the children of Manasseh, this day we perceive that the Lord is among us, because ye have not committed this trespass against the Lord. Now ye have delivered the children of Israel out of the hand of the Lord. So they're saying, okay, now that we understand this, they've made their diligent inquiry and they understand, okay, yeah, this actually isn't the reason to go to war. You're not doing anything wrong in what you did. Now they did something the Lord didn't say to do, but at least they understand, you know, they weren't doing it wickedly, they definitely weren't going to use it for any sacrifice or anything like that. And it actually pleased them to hear that and say, okay, yeah, you are committed to this and you really want to be a part of this and to show it. Look at verse number 32, the Bible says, and Phinehas the son of Eliezer the priest and the princes returned from the children of Reuben, from the children of Gad, from out of the land of Gilead unto the land of Canaan to the children of Israel and brought them word again. And the thing pleased the children of Israel, and the children of Israel blessed God and did not intend to go up against them to battle to destroy the land wherein the children of Reuben and Gad dwelt. And the children of Reuben and the children of Gad called the altar Ed, for it shall be a witness between us that the Lord is God. So all they were trying to do is just show, hey, the Lord's God and that's what we believe. That was the purpose of their altar. I think the big takeaway from this one is just understanding what an altar is. And they built it for a witness or they built it for sacrifice. And if you want to, if you have something you want to sacrifice unto the Lord, we don't have an altar to do that at. You can make whatever sacrifice you want unto the Lord in your heart. And if you have decisions you want to make, by all means make them unto the Lord. But another thing, one last point, and I didn't have an outline of all the things that bother me about altar calls. Because there's a lot of different things. But the last one that just pointed in my head right now, just came into my mind, is often times there's a high pressure to pressure people into making a vow unto the Lord. And that's another very, very serious matter. I mean, the Bible says not to vow at all. You know, it's better to not vow at all than it is to vow and to not pay. And when you're, it's one thing if someone decides, I'm going to make a vow unto the Lord. Just on their own free will, of their own volition, just decide in their heart, God, I will never do this or I am going to do this. And you make a vow unto the Lord. You do that on your own, that's between you and God. But when you have someone pressuring you to make some kind of a vow unto God, that's not right. You know why? Because if someone already thinks it through and decides to make a vow unto God, okay, there's nothing you can do about it, it's between them and God. And if they break that vow, they're held responsible for that and it's hard to have sympathy on someone who has already just done it on their own. But when you're coercing people to make vows that maybe they're not really ready to make, that maybe they haven't thought all the way through, and they're opening up their mouth unto the Lord and then they end up breaking that vow, I think there's a little bit of responsibility on a person who's just pressuring that person to make the vow. Because God's going to punish the person that makes a vow and doesn't keep their promise. They're not held guiltless, the people that don't keep their vows. It's a serious thing to open up your mouth unto the Lord. I'm all for people changing their lives. I'm all for people making decisions to change their lives, to get sin out of their life or whatever. But you shouldn't be coerced into making a vow unto God, come up to this altar and you get right with God, you tell God you're never going to do that again or whatever. Look, I want you to never do those things again, but I'm not going to encourage you to make a vow unto the Lord. Especially if it's a vow that you don't think you're going to be able to pay. It's better just to say I'm not going to do this anymore, but you're not going to promise that to God. Just don't do it. How about that? Let your yay be yay and your nay be nay. You don't need to go making any extra special promises and vows just for safety sake. Just say I don't know if I'm going to keep it. I'm not intending to, I'm not planning on breaking this, I want to do this. Then just do it. God doesn't require you to make some vow to Him. And we could go on into all the various verses on breaking vows and stuff, but we're not going to do that until we run out of time. Let's have a word of prayer. Dear Lord, we thank you so much for all the great teachings and scripture. Lord, I pray that you would please help us to do things, all that we do, all of our service to you, from the singing to the preaching to the soul winning to everything that we do in service to you, Lord. Help us to just have clear instruction and to have good understanding on what we ought to be doing. God, I pray that you would please just help us to spot any errors in the way that we do things that might start getting unbiblical and unscriptural and cause more confusion than anything else. Lord, I pray that you would please just help us to retain a humble attitude and just be able to serve you the way that you'd have us to. In Jesus' name we pray. Amen.