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MUSIC MUSIC MUSIC MUSIC MUSIC MUSIC MUSIC MUSIC MUSIC MUSIC MUSIC MUSIC MUSIC MUSIC MUSIC MUSIC MUSIC MUSIC MUSIC MUSIC Sunday evening service, good to see you all. Let's take our seats and open our green hymnbook page 247. Page 247. Save saved. MUSIC On the first. I found a friend who is all to me. His love is ever true. I love to tell how he lifted me and what his grace can do for you. Save by his power divine. Save to new life sublime. Life now is sweet and my joy is complete for I'm safe, safe, safe. He saves me from every sin and harm. Secures my soul each day. I'm leaning strong on his mighty arm. I know he'll guide me all the way. Save by his power divine. Save to new life sublime. I love to tell how he lifted me and what his grace can do for you. His love is ever true. Life now is sweet and my joy is complete for I'm safe, safe, safe. And all alone in love he said to me. Come unto me and I'll lead you home to live with me eternally. Save by his power divine. Save to new life sublime. Life now is sweet and my joy is complete for I'm safe, safe, safe. Good singing by the Robert. Can you open us to the word of prayer? And favorites this evening out of the green hymn book for the Robert. 51. Where We'll Never Grow Old, page 51. Far away strand is a beautiful home of the soul. Built by Jesus on high, there we never shall die. There is a land where we never grow old. Never grow old. Never grow old. In a land where we'll never grow old. Never grow old. Never grow old. In a land where we'll never grow old. Kathleen. 67. The pearly white city. Do you have another one? I'm not sure if I know this one. 70. I could come back to you. I don't know this one either. I'll come back to you. Sorry about that. Rachel. 4.15. Victory Through Grace, page 4.15. Conquering now and still to conquer righted the king in his mind. Leading the host of all the faithful into the midst of the fine. See them with courage advancing, clad in their brilliant array. Shouting the name of their leader, hear them exultingly say. Not to the strongest the battle, not to the swiftest the grace. Yet to the true and the faithful, victory is promised through grace. Sheila. 47. Let the sun shine again in my heart. On the verse. I remember the time when I first knew the Savior. When the sunlight a blessing so flooded my heart. Oh, the sweetness of first love with Jesus so near me. And I thought such devotion would never depart. Let the sun shine again. Let the flowers bloom again. Stir the embers of love in my heart. Holy Spirit reprove that embrace me again. Let the sun shine again in my heart. Bo CJ. 409. On the third. Got it. We'll do two more after this one. So choose wisely. Page 409. The fight is on. On the verse. The fight is on. The trumpet sound is ringing out. The cry to arms is heard up far and near. The Lord of hosts is marching on to victory. The triumph of the crisis soon appear. The fight is on. A Christian soldier in face to face in stern array. With armor gleaming and colors streaming. The right and wrong engage today. The fight is on but be not weary. Be strong and in his might hold fast. If God be for us, his banner o'er us, we'll sing the victor's song at last. Crystal. 160. 160. Crown him with many crowns. Page 160. On the verse. Crown him with many crowns. The lamb upon his throne. Hark how the heavily anthem drowns. A music but its own. Awake my soul and sing of him who died for thee. And hail him as thy matchless king through all eternity. Last one. Ali. 405. 405. Page 405. The banner of the cross. Actually 305, sorry. Oh, you're good. I'm not picking you again. No, just kidding. Just kidding. 305. Yield not the temptation. Page 305. On the verse. Yield not to temptation. For yielding is sin. Each victory will help you. Some other to win. Find me fully onward. Dark passion subdued. Look ever to Jesus. He will carry you through. Ask the Savior to help you. Comfort, strengthen, and keep you. He is willing to aid you. He will carry you through. Welcome back for the evening service. Let's take our bulletins and look through the announcements one more time. In case you weren't paying attention the first time. Anybody need one? Everybody good? Right on our front cover we have the verse of the week. As free and not using your liberty for a cloak of maliciousness but as the servants of God. 1 Peter 2.16. Our service time is 10.30 a.m. Sunday morning. We finished our series this morning for the new believers. And our Sunday evening service is 3.30 p.m. We are in Joshua chapter 4. Thursday evening Bible study. We are in 1 Chronicles. And I forgot what chapter still. But we will be in there this Thursday. And I will be preaching in Yakima on Wednesday. So I am not sure what I am preaching there either. But I have a couple of days to figure it out. Alright. Sowing times listed below there. Is there any need to adjust any of the times because of darkness? Or are we good so far with everything? Shawn, your time never really changes. But maybe a long view might need to be adjusted. I am not sure. But Thursday is just kind of what it is. So alright. And we will see about the 12 to 4. We might have to make it in December. Maybe 11 to 3 or something. But when we do our next sowing thing that we do. But I think we will be good this weekend until 4 o'clock. And then the homeschool field trip is this Thursday. So that is at 11 a.m. November 16th is the Super Soul winning like I was mentioning. That is this Saturday 12 p.m. in Longview. And again you can show up at 2 or 3. Whatever time you want. Dinners at stuffies and meals provided. The ordination for Dylan Oz, 24th in Oklahoma City. And they might end up, I think they might end up still having it at the building. It might be at a rented facility. So not 100% sure about that. But I think they are still trying to have it at the building. November 26th is the Pi Social after church Tuesday night the 26th. There will be no Thursday service that week. Children's Choir practice starting Sunday after Thanksgiving December 1st. It will be after the evening service. December 7th is the cookie exchange. Ladies cookie exchange white elephant gift will be involved. No more than $20 please for that. And then that is at 11 a.m. Anything you need to know just ask Juju. December 15th Dr. Stringer preaching for us both services. And December 22nd are Christmas services. And we will have the Children's Choir singing in the morning. We will have a Christmas dinner potluck for the sides and desserts. And meat will be provided by the church. And that is all I think that we have for announcements. Baby Sophia was born last night. I am not sure what time. Weighing in at 6 pounds 2 ounces. They are not doing a meal train so don't ask. I was just told before the service. So I felt like there was something else. Oh yeah. How many salvations did we get today? I heard three from Sean. He said three. Did anybody else get one that wasn't counted by any chance? All right. So three salvations. So praise the Lord for the three salvations. So mark them down brother Rylan. That is all I got. Let's sing another song and we will receive the offering. All right. Let's open up to page 198. Sing our third song Joy Unspeakable. Page 198 Joy Unspeakable. On the first. I have found his grace is all complete. He supply every knee. While I sit and learn at Jesus feet. I am free. Yes free indeed. It is Joy Unspeakable and full of glory. Full of glory. Full of glory. It is Joy Unspeakable and full of glory. Oh the half has never yet been told. I have found the pleasure I once scraped. It is joy and peace within. What a wondrous blessing I am saved from the awful gulf of sin. It is Joy Unspeakable and full of glory. Full of glory. Full of glory. It is Joy Unspeakable and full of glory. Oh the half has never yet been told. I have found that hope so bright and clear. Living in the realm of grace. Oh the Savior's presence is so near. I can see his smiling face. It is Joy Unspeakable and full of glory. Full of glory. Full of glory. It is Joy Unspeakable and full of glory. Oh the half has never yet been told. On the last. I have found the joy no tongue can tell. How its waves of glory roll. It is like a grid or flowing well. Springing up within my soul. It is Joy Unspeakable and full of glory. Full of glory. Full of glory. It is Joy Unspeakable and full of glory. Oh the half has never yet been told. Great singing this evening. As the ushers come forth, we will receive our offering. Brother Jesse, can you pray for us? The Lord is saying that for his salvation is really paid. That's the applause to his service, the applause to his preaching, and we ask that he will bless the offering for you. And ask that we give him his gift. In Jesus' name we pray. Amen. Thank you. Thank you. I come with me in your Bibles to Joshua chapter number 4. Joshua chapter number 4. If you don't have a Bible there should be one under the seat in front of you. Joshua chapter 4. Joshua 4 the Bible reads, And it came to pass, when all the people were clean past over Jordan, that the Lord spake unto Joshua, saying, Take you twelve men out of the people, out of every tribe a man, and command ye them, saying, Take you hence out of the midst of Jordan, out of the place where the priests' feet stood firm, twelve stones, and ye shall carry them over with you, and leave them in the lodging place, where ye shall lodge this night. Then Joshua called the twelve men, whom he had prepared of the children of Israel out of every tribe a man, and Joshua said unto them, Pass over before the ark of the Lord your God into the midst of Jordan, and take ye up every man of you a stone upon his shoulder, according unto the number of the tribes of the children of Israel, that this may be a sign among you, that when your children ask their fathers in time to come, saying, What mean ye by these stones? then ye shall answer them that the waters of Jordan were cut off before the ark of the covenant of the Lord, when it passed over Jordan, and the waters of Jordan were cut off, and these stones shall be for a memorial unto the children of Israel forever. And the children of Israel did so, as Joshua commanded, and took up twelve stones out of the midst of Jordan, as the Lord spake unto Joshua, according to the number of the tribes of the children of Israel, and carried them over with them unto the place where they lodged, and laid them down there. And Joshua set up twelve stones in the midst of Jordan, in the place where the feet of the priests which bear the ark of the covenant stood, and they are there unto this day. For the priests which bear the ark stood in the midst of Jordan, until everything was finished that the Lord commanded Joshua to speak unto the people, according to all that Moses commanded Joshua, and the people hasted and passed over. And it came to pass, when all the people were clean, passed over, that the ark of the Lord passed over, and the priests in the presence of the people, and the children of Reuben, and the children of Gad, and half the tribe of Manasseh passed over armed before the children of Israel, as Moses spake unto them. About forty thousand prepared for war passed over before the Lord unto battle to the plains of Jericho. On that day the Lord magnified Joshua in the sight of all Israel, and they feared him, as they feared Moses all the days of his life. And the Lord spake unto Joshua, saying, Command the priests that bear the ark of the testimony, that they come up out of Jordan. Joshua therefore commanded the priests, saying, Come ye up out of Jordan. And it came to pass, when the priests that bear the ark of the covenant of the Lord were come up out of the mists of Jordan, and the soles of the priests' feet were lifted up unto the dry land, that the waters of Jordan returned unto their place, and flowed over all his banks, as they did before. And the people came up out of Jordan on the tenth day of the first month, and encamped in Gilgal in the east border of Jericho. And those twelve stones which they took out of Jordan did Joshua pitch in Gilgal. And he spake unto the children of Israel, saying, When your children shall ask their fathers in time to come, saying, What mean these stones? Then ye shall let your children know, saying, Israel came over this Jordan on dry land. For the Lord your God dried up the waters of Jordan from before you, until ye were passed over, as the Lord your God did to the Red Sea, which he dried up from before us, until we were gone over, that all the people of the earth might know the hand of the Lord, that it is mighty, that ye might fear the Lord your God forever. Brother Robert, will you pray for us? All right. I'm still without a clock, so it's not my fault. I don't know what happened. I'm just the boss. I'm just the leader. All right. We're back in Joshua chapter four now. So the title of the sermon is The Twelve Memorial Stones. Let's look at verse number one. The Bible says, And it came to pass when all the people were clean pass over Jordan, that the Lord spake unto Joshua, saying, Take ye twelve men out of the people out of every tribe a man, and command ye them, saying, Take ye hence of the midst of Jordan, out of the place where the priests' feet stood firm, twelve stones, and ye shall carry them over with you, and leave them in the lodging place where ye shall lodge this night. So if you remember last time, the flow of the Jordan River was stopped. It was flowing, maximum flow. So obviously God, when He does miracles, He doesn't wait until it's a trickling little creek in the drought of summer. He's waiting until it's flowing at its maximum in the sight of all the people of Jericho. They're looking at this army ready for war, and they're probably looking at this river, and they're just like, Oh, yeah, let's see how fun it is for them to cross here. And then all of a sudden the priests dip their toes in the water, and everything just stops. And then they stop in the middle, and they're kind of on this heap of stones, and everything just dries out, and the priests are standing on this kind of little platform where these stones are. It seems like it's almost like a natural little rift there. And their feet stand firm, if you remember in the last chapter, and they're standing there with the Ark of the Covenant while all the hosts pass over. Now, remember, they're not with all their families. All their families are not with them. This is the soldiers that are out for the battle. And so now it's just kind of continuing to tell the story. So we kind of saw how they had to step out by faith, and there was lots of lessons of stepping up by faith. And if you allow God, there were just many lessons. Like last week I was just talking about how you have to step out by faith, and when they stepped, they just dipped their toe just a little bit, and God just did a great miracle for them. Well, now they're actually crossing over here, and now God's commanding Joshua to pick men out. Now, there's already men leading them, so now these are people that Joshua has been asked to pick out specifically. And this is really kind of a picture of the 12 apostles, if you think about it, because Joshua pictures Jesus. They have the exact same name. In Hebrew, it's Joshua. In Greek, and transliterated into English, it's Jesus. So he pictures Jesus in a lot of ways, and Jesus picked 12 apostles, didn't he? He just walks up and picks them. And so you have this kind of picture of Joshua having to pick these 12 guys, and the Lord just says, hey, just pick 12 people. And so you have Joshua picking 12 men, and so he doesn't just pick whoever he wants, as far as just like, they have no qualifications whatsoever. He says, take, let's see, he says, take you out 12 men out of the people out of every tribe of man. I mean, I guess he doesn't really say they have to be this specific type of people, but he just says, pick them. So, and then he says, take your hands out of the midst of Jordan, out of the place where the priest stood firm, 12 stones. So he takes 12 men, and then he's supposed to pick 12 stones, and then take them, and carry them, and leave them in the lodging place where he shall lodge this night. And so that's a pretty cool picture of just that we, you know, of course the rock, you know, the rock always pictures God, or pictures the Lord, pictures the Lord Jesus Christ, and then when you have multiple rocks, then it pictures other, we'll get into that, I don't want to get too far ahead of myself, look at verse four, it says, then Joshua called the 12 men whom he had prepared. So again, picturing, I mean, I really do think that this pictures the apostles because, you know, do you think that the apostles were prepared by God? I mean, Judas was prophesied to be this bad guy in the Psalms, and do you think that Jesus knew who Judas was when he picked him? Of course he did. He was picked because the scriptures must be fulfilled. And so just like Judas was picked and prepared, so were the other guys. And so here you have Joshua picking men whom he had prepared. It wasn't the leaders that were already picked, these are different guys. And so he picked who he had prepared of the children of Israel and of every tribe of man. Now again, in the Old Testament, you had the children of Israel by the flesh who were actually the sons of a man named Jacob whose name got changed to Israel. In the New Testament, we are the children of Israel by faith. So, you know, we have that picture there. And then, so again, these guys weren't just chose by random, they were prepared. Effort was put into them by Joshua, and he didn't just say eeny, meeny, miny, moe, catch a tiger by the toe, if he hollers, let him go. My mommy told me to pick the very best one and you are it, or whatever. He didn't do that, it says whom he had prepared. So obviously he had put some effort into these men, he was probably grooming them for some sort of leadership. Look at verse five, it says, And Joshua said unto them, Pass over before the ark of the Lord your God into the midst of Jordan, and take ye up every man of you, a stone upon his shoulder, according unto the number of the tribes of the children of Israel, that this may be a sign among you that when your children ask their fathers in time to come, saying, What mean ye by these stones? Now, I don't know how big of a rock you guys can pick up, but rocks are pretty heavy. So I wouldn't imagine that they're like gigantic boulders. And if you think about it, like if you can pick up a rock about this big and pick it up, that's pretty heavy and you're probably gonna strain to pick it up as a man. You're probably gonna, if you're right-handed, you're gonna put it on your right shoulder and it's gonna be pretty tough. They're pretty unbalanced. Rocks usually have these weird forms to them. I'm sure it wasn't just a super circular, perfect medicine ball type looking rock. It was probably ugly and craggy and maybe it was smoothed over by the river, but it was probably a difficult thing to do. So they probably weren't that big, unless you're talking Joshua prepared them, like made them Olympic champion weightlifters or something. And I don't think that's what it was talking about when it said he prepared them. So these guys just probably picked up ones that they could pick up with their shoulders. So it's just 12 of them. So I mean, this pile isn't gonna be some super huge pile of rocks. 12 rocks about this size, that's not that big of a pile. But then it says that when your children ask you in time to come, saying what mean you by these stones, I mean, this is one place in the promised land with a little tiny pile of rocks. I mean, how are their kids gonna be asking about this little tiny pile of rocks? It doesn't really seem to make that much sense. But maybe there's gonna be more made of it. Maybe they're gonna put some kind of fencing around it. Because when you think about memorials, the smallest park in the Guinness Book of World Records is just right across the river in Portland, Oregon, downtown. Did you guys know that? I forgot, what's the name of the park? Does anybody know? I've seen it, I've been there a million times. But, huh, no? It's like this big. Like, you cross a crosswalk, and it's like in a median, and then it's just like right there, and it's just like a little tiny, it's just considered a park, I guess, somehow. But it's the smallest park in the world. So just look it up, if you guys ever wanna go down there and brave being killed for fentanyl or something, you can go down there and see the smallest park in the world. But it's not that dangerous during the daytime. But anyway, it's been a while since I've been down there. But I'm just saying that memorials usually can have some kind of gating around them, and there's places that you can, they do some kind of fancy things so you will know when you see it that it's a memorial, there's signs to it, there's ways to get to them, right? So maybe they did something like that so that people would always know that that little pile of 12 stones was there. I mean, we have memorials all over the place. You can drive all over America, and you're gonna see big memorials or the tiniest park in the world memorials. There's a memorial at Grand Canyon. You can't miss that one, really. I mean, unless you're driving at night and you drive off the edge of it or something. But hopefully they have some sort of guard rails. I don't think that they do, though, really. I've never been there, but I'm pretty sure a lot of people die every year walking off the side of the Grand Canyon. But anyway, so, but this question is gonna be asked, and when we, I mean, it just makes me think of every year the kids in our church probably ask their parents, well, why can't we partake of the Lord's Supper? And then that's an opportunity for us to tell our children about Jesus Christ. And so this is also an opportunity for their kids to tell, to be told about God and what he did for them in this time. So memorials are a good thing. So God, and God talks about memorials throughout the Bible. God tells them to do things for memorials in the Bible. And so this chapter, I mean, if you wanna really get down to it, the main topic of this chapter is about memorials. So our children are gonna ask us certain things of why we do things. Why do people get baptized? And I think that part of the reason why God has us do those things, not only to remember him or as a symbolic thing to picture his death, burial, and resurrection, but witnesses see those things and they wanna know. When I was in England, I did, I think, 22 baptisms or something like that. And when I did those baptisms, it was in a public place at like an amusement park on the sea. And, I mean, people in England just don't get baptized very often, I'm sure. And so here I am standing in this knee-deep water and it was gross, but I'm baptizing all these people and this huge crowd gathers around and is watching me baptize all these people. I've never had anything like that happen in my life, but people have just never seen people get baptized. They've probably seen it like people get baptized in the Church of England, like where someone puts a teaspoon of water on their head or something or however they do it. But they were just like in awe of the fact that people are getting baptized. And it was a testimony, and they're probably like asking their parents, what does this mean? And they're probably like, I have no idea. But maybe that instilled something in their heart that leads them to get saved at some point in their life. I mean, this is the reason why God does things and has memorials. And then when we do the Lord's Supper every year, what is the purpose of us doing it? This do in remembrance of me. We're memorializing the fact that Jesus bled for us. He died on the cross for us. He was beaten and pulverized for us for our sins. And we remember that every year by breaking that bread, passing it out amongst us, and drinking that cup that represents the sinless body and the sinless blood of Christ that he gave for us. That our kids, they do, they ask us, don't they? What does this mean? And maybe a lot of them know because they're older now and they've been able to partake themselves and gotten saved themselves and understand it. But as we get more kids born into this church, they're gonna surely ask the same questions and wanna know the reasons why we do that. And then we can teach them about salvation. This is the same thing God wants these children to know. That God did these great things for you in the past. See, God told them in the books of Moses to diligently teach your children these things. Don't forget these things. Put these verses on your doorpost. Teach them when they wake up, when they go to bed at night, when they wake up in the morning, while you're walking in the way. Put them on your doorpost. Diligently teach your children because your kids wanna know. Because there's gonna be a time when they don't wanna know. And you need to teach them now, when they're asking questions, when they want to know, when they care about these things. Because they get to a certain age and then they just, they're not gonna care anymore. And so it's our responsibility as parents to teach our children, and when God puts something in the book and memorializes it for us, there's a reason why he does it. Because these, it was a big, this was a big deal. We just think, oh, it's the Jordan River. It's not the Columbia River. But it's still the Jordan River when it's overflowing its banks. Look at verse seven. Then ye shall answer them, that the waters of Jordan were cut off before the ark of the covenant of the Lord when it passed over Jordan. The waters of Jordan were cut off, and these stones shall be for a memorial unto the children of Israel till next week, for a couple months. No, it says forever. Forever. Are those rocks still there, you think, right now? Actually, I don't think that they are. They probably aren't there. So, am I saying that God's lying? No. I just don't think that they're physically there. But they're still there because they're memorialized right here for us to know that they were there. So, could they still be there? I mean, I've never been there before. I don't know what that location is exactly. I guess we could probably find out and pinpoint it and go to the spot where Jericho, where the wall, I mean, because they've excavated that area, they found that the walls fell down just like the Bible says. But to find the exact location where they crossed, I mean, the devil likes to have things removed so that we don't have proof of those things taking place. But even though the walls of Jericho fell and they found the place in ruins just like the Bible says, people still don't believe the Bible. Even though people think that they found Noah's Ark. I mean, everybody says they think they found Noah's Ark. And then there's that one picture where you can see that it kind of looks like a big boat. And they have that Noah's Ark Observatory place. And they found these stones with holes drilled through them. Who knows if that's really Noah's Ark? We don't really know. But one thing I do know is that this is still memorial unto the children of Israel forever, whether those rocks are there or not. So a memorial is just that, something that we remember. Why is remembering important? Well, I don't know, but it's instilled in our brains as human beings. We remember holidays. And holidays are just kind of like holy days. And then we've kind of turned them into, let's make money off these things in America. But holy days, holidays. But I mean, if you celebrate holidays, it's not wrong. As long as you're doing it for the right reasons. As long as it's not some heathen holiday, like Halloween or something. But we remember things all the time. We remember anniversaries, is that wrong? Our anniversary for our church, that's not wrong. Our anniversary for our wedding anniversary. I mean, you get married and you're married for so long sometimes you have to take your shoes off and count on your toes, too. But as the years go by, it's a little harder to count. And if you're married an odd year, it makes it even more difficult. But people celebrate their birthday. We put anniversaries and birthdays in our bulletin for a reason because there's nothing wrong with memorializing somebody's birthday. We memorialize great moments in history. Why do people think history is so interesting? I don't know, we just do. Not everybody does, but I think it's interesting. I think certain things in history are cool. Great battles are memorialized. They'll come to someplace that says this battle took place here and there'll be a stone. I like to get out and read stuff like that. Who likes to do that? All the men, come on. But tomorrow is Veterans Day. And veterans are gonna be praised tomorrow for being in the military, even if they never did anything. As long as they have a uniform or a hat, they're gonna be like, thanks for being in the military. But if someone did something that was worthy of being praised or whatever, they're gonna get the day. Most people get the day off tomorrow and it's a paid holiday, even though Easter's not, which is strange to me. But Easter's on a Sunday, too, so I don't know. But yeah, I'm not gonna get into that. But great storms are memorialized. When I was in England, there was this, I was at this, I don't know, this oceanfront area, and there was a big mural all the way down and it was just talking about this storm that happened and it basically destroyed this whole town that we were in. And the, I don't know, the wall failed that they had. The seawall failed. And so they had all these paintings of all the things that got destroyed or whatever. And so it's memorialized in a mural so that everybody knew and they have all these plaques and stuff. But I mean, Hurricane Katrina, everybody remembers Hurricane Katrina, or at least you know what it is because it was a really bad hurricane that destroyed and killed a lot of people. My mom remembers the day that the Columbus storm hit in this area. It was on Columbus Day. That's why it's called the Columbus Day Storm. But it was kind of like a hurricane that hit on Columbus Day in like, I don't know, it was like in the 60s or something. And we remember natural disasters, fires, earthquakes, volcano eruptions like Mount St. Helens. They just, what was it, like the 30 year or whatever it was for Mount St. Helens erupting just recently? And you know, what was the one that you preached about, Brother Sean? Vesuvius, yeah. Where all the queers got barbecued. Yeah. Wipes out whole cities. I mean, that stuff's displayed and traveled around and you know. Hebner, Oregon is like a small town out in the middle of nowhere and that whole town got destroyed by a flash flood because the dam failed. But they fixed that. I mean, I wouldn't want to live in a place that the whole town got wiped out and almost everybody died, but you know, I'd be like, hopefully they got that fixed. But great feats of engineering are memorialized. I mean, there's a lot of things in our world that are memorialized, but the great things that are done for the Lord, those are the things that are really worth memorializing, aren't they? And you know, like Mary, she washed Jesus' feet and then Judas is like, you know, we could've given this money to the poor. And then Jesus is like, no, she's gonna be memorialized wherever the gospel's preached for the thing that she did for me. And me just preaching that right there is that prophecy coming true once again. The great things that the Lord has done for us, those things are memorialized forever and there doesn't need to be some cross at Calvary with a red thing draped on it and like a crown of thorns hanging off of it for us to remember that Jesus did that. It's forever memorialized in this book for us. The great things that God did, you know, even the Passover, it was something that they were supposed to do every year to show that God released them from Egypt, which pictures salvation and the blood on the doorpost, the future thing that Christ was gonna do, which turned into the Lord's Supper because He actually fulfilled that shadow of fulfillment and actually literally was the Passover and died for us. So now the Word of God is a literal memorial. So I'm not gonna have you go to the scriptures I was gonna have you go to just for the sake of time, but I don't have a clock, okay, we're doing good. Turn to Exodus chapter 17. So I mean Jesus literally tells us every, I mean He doesn't tell us how often, He said as often as you do it, this do in remembrance of me, as often as you eat this bread and drink of this cup that we're supposed to do that in remembrance of Him, that is a memorial, that is remembering what He did. Now as far as what happened with the woman that was anointing Jesus, it says in Matthew chapter 26 verse 13, Verily I say unto you, Wheresoever this gospel shall be preached in the whole world, there shall also this that this woman hath done be told for a memorial of her. So she is memorialized forever around the whole world because of the thing that she did for the Lord. And Judas is a villain for all time for the things that he did against the Lord. And literally nobody calls their children Judas. They might say Judah, but they're never gonna call them Judas. So because Judas is like a byword, right? So Exodus chapter 17 says, And Joshua disconfited, verse 13, Joshua disconfited Amalek and his people with the edge of the sword, and the Lord said unto Moses, Write this for a memorial and a book, and rehearse it in the ears of Joshua, for I will utterly put out the remembrance of Amalek from under heaven. And Moses built an altar and called the name of it Jehovah-Nissi, for he said because the Lord has sworn that the Lord will have war with Amalek from generation to generation. Now the only reason why we even know who Amalek is is because it's recorded in this book that he's gonna destroy them, utterly destroy them. But nobody else in the world knows who they are. I mean Amalek is not a nation anymore because God completely wiped them off the face of the planet and so did it come true? It did come true. And he said write it in a memorial and a book. And guess what? We're reading it right there. He wrote it in a book. It's called Exodus, the chapter is number 17. And then when it came to pass is all throughout the Bible. I've done long studies about Amalek and how you can track it throughout the Bible and then they just cease to exist and cease to be brought up after that even though modern day Israel says Amalek attacked them on October 7th. There's two October 7th mentions in one day, there you go. But it wasn't Amalek that attacked them because Amalek is wiped off the face of the planet. So only Israel remembers it and only the Bible is gonna memorialize the fact that God said he was gonna have war with them forever. So are all those 12 memorial stones still there in the same spot? I don't think that they are but they are in a sense. It is recorded for us right here and the words that are written in the Bible are settled forever in heaven and it's being read for you tonight. It's being preached to you tonight and we are the children of Israel by faith so it is still there in a sense, isn't it? Spiritually it's a lesson to us 3500 years later. I mean that's a long time ago, isn't it? And we're not even close into forever. I mean we're pretty young into forever, aren't we? But 3500 years ago is a long time ago. Turn to Psalm 119 verse 89. Psalm 119 verse 89. Psalm 119 verse 89. The Bible says forever, oh Lord, thy word is settled in heaven. Thy faithfulness is unto all generations. Will that include this generation that we're in right now? Absolutely. Thou hast established the earth and it abideth. It's still here. The word of God's still here. It's still into this generation. It's still here for us 3500 years ago. So I mean though places might be destroyed like the physical places, the physical rocks might have got thrown into the Jordan River a long time ago by some enemy of God that doesn't want that to be true but that doesn't make it not true because it's still recorded in the book for us. Look back at Joshua four verse number eight. The Bible reads, and the children of Israel did so as Joshua commanded and took up 12 stones out of the midst of Jordan as the Lord spake unto Joshua according to the number of the tribes of the children of Israel and carried them over with them into the place where they lodged and laid them down there. So they did exactly what Joshua told them to do because unlike with Moses, they actually listened to what Joshua said to do. But again this is the rocks that they stood upon and their feet were firm. Remember it says take those rocks where the priests stood firm upon. Now let's see. Look back, just keep your finger there and look back at Joshua three verse 13 because it said that this was gonna be what they were gonna do. It says in verse 13, and it shall come to pass as soon as the souls of the feet of the priests that bear the ark of the Lord, the Lord of all the earth shall rest in the waters of Jordan, that the waters of Jordan shall be cut off from the waters that come down from above and they shall stand upon and heap. So I'm not just making that up. There was a heap that they stood upon those rocks and the rocks that they were standing upon, so if they were already standing on a heap, that heap was already there, wasn't it? So the waters stop and there's this heap that they are standing upon that's higher than the rest of everything else. They're already standing on this pile of rocks and so God says, I mean, to take from those rocks, right, that their feet were firm upon and take those rocks and take them up with you. It's really interesting. Now turn to Ephesians chapter two verse 19. Ephesians chapter two verse 19. I just think that this is really interesting. I mean, you might not find it interesting, but I do, so I don't care. I'm the pastor, so if I think it's interesting, I'm gonna talk about it, but Ephesians chapter two 19, because we're built upon the foundation of the Lord Jesus Christ and we're built upon the prophets in the Old Testament. We're built upon, I mean, because the 12 tribes were a big deal, but then we have the prophets that come out of those 12 tribes, then we have the 12 apostles that were built upon that, so we're built upon the prophets, built upon the apostles, and we're built up into a spiritual house. So we're built upon something that was already there for us beforehand. That heap of rocks was already there. God knew that heap of rocks was already there in that spot. I mean, God's just amazing. I mean, I can't say how did he know that. He's God. Of course he knew that, but he already had that figured out well before and there just happens to be this place where the priests get to stand because it's kind of like a little platform where they get to stand and the Ark of the Covenant's there. It's high enough up so the people can see it because remember, they weren't supposed to walk right up to it and they all get to pass over, but Ephesians 2 to 19 says, Now therefore ye are no more strangers and foreigners, but fellow citizens with the saints and of the household of God, and are built upon the foundation of the apostles and the prophets, Jesus Christ himself being the chief cornerstone, in whom all the building fitly framed together groweth unto an holy temple in the Lord, in whom ye also are builded together for inhabitation of God through the Spirit. So in the New Testament, we're builded together for inhabitation of God through the Spirit and when we're in church, we are the church, we're builded together, we're like a heap of rocks that are gathered together to do the purposes and the will of God. Now look at 1 Peter chapter 2 verse 4. 1 Peter chapter 2 verse 4. Now this really has some interesting words in it that really kind of connect well with this, these river rocks and everything. It says in verse 4, 1 Peter chapter 2 verse 4, it says, To whom coming as unto a living stone, disallowed indeed of men, but chosen of God and precious. Now didn't he say choose those specific rocks out of the water and bring those rocks and put them on your shoulder and stack them into a certain place? So just like those rocks were supposed to be chosen, those rocks were chosen in specific, God chose us also and he chose us and we become precious just like Christ is precious, he was chosen of God, but we also are precious. Look at verse 5, it says, He also as lively stones are built up a spiritual house. So like what's the picture here that we have in this chapter is that he says take those 12 stones and stack them in a pile for remembrance. It's not a big one, but it's just a pile of lively stones. Where were they at? In the bottom of a river that you probably couldn't see, they're all murky and in the mud, probably all nasty looking and dirty. When fish are in the water, they go to the bathroom in the water, don't they? When things die in rivers, their dead body parts fall on the bottom of the water. When you pick stuff up out of, who's like picked up rocks out of the river and cleaned them off before? Probably everybody, right? And a lot of people are rock hounds. They like to take rocks and make them pretty and polish them up and stuff like that. Well, we're kind of like that. We're like these gnarly, ugly, muddy, poopy rocks that God picks up and he cleans us up and he takes us out of this nasty old gnarly muddy river and cleans us up and Jesus Christ picks us up, takes us on his shoulder, puts us on the dry ground and puts us in a good pile because there's lots of rock piles all over the place, isn't there? I mean, if you've worked in construction at all, you've probably gone to lots of places where there's just regular rocks and you can go buy those rocks and fill gravel into your construction holes or whatever, but there's also semi-precious rocks and those are a lot more expensive, but there's also precious rocks all over the place and they're precious rocks because they're less common. Now, look at verse five again. It says, he also has lively stones, so these are stones that are alive, right, are built up a spiritual house and holy priesthood to offer up spiritual sacrifices acceptable to God by Jesus Christ. Wherefore, also it is contained in the scripture, behold, I lay in Zion a chief cornerstone, elect, precious, and he that believeth on him shall not be confounded. Unto you, therefore, which believe he is precious, but unto them which be disobedient, the stone which the builders disallowed, the same is made the head of the corner and the stone of stumbling, a rock of offense, even to them which stumble at the word being disobedient, whereunto also they were appointed. So the people that don't get saved, stumble over the rock. They trip over his words. They can't handle the words of God. They hate the word of God and they trip over it, they read the words of God or they hear the word of God preached to them and they hate it and it's a stone of stumbling unto them. It's ugly to them, but we love that stone. We want to be built upon that stone and so that's what we're like. We get built upon that rock. He's the one, the foundation stone that we're built upon. It says, but ye are a chosen generation, a royal priesthood. So the priests, what were they doing? They were standing on that pile of rocks with the Ark of the Covenant, which had all the testimonies and the rod that butted, the ministry, the manna, the laws of God, all the things that were supposed to be in there and they're standing on that pile of rocks and it says an holy nation. So in the Old Testament this is talked about as well and that's what God called them out to be, a holy nation. It says a peculiar people, people that are different, people that are called by his name that you should show forth the praises of him who hath called you out of darkness into his marvelous light. Remember the river was flowing over this big pile of rocks then he rebukes the water, the water goes back, they're on this pile of rocks standing there, everybody's crossing over, this holy nation is crossing over and then he says pick 12 rocks out of there. The ones that they were standing on, the ones that their feet were firm on top of, who was standing on them? The priests were standing on them and they were what? Holding the Ark of the Covenant. He says go get those rocks. They pick them up, they take them over to the other side and put them in a pile by themselves and it says called you out of darkness onto a marvelous light. I don't know if you realize this but in most rivers you can't see the bottom of it unless you have like a flashlight or something. Now I mean so that's a perfect picture. You know they're in this dirty, gnarly old river where you can't see the bottom of in the mud, in the fish stuff, all that and they take them out and they set them out in a pile in the light where they can be seen. It says which in time past were not a people but are now the people of God which had not obtained mercy but now have obtained mercy. So I just think it's a really cool picture. You're like well maybe I think you're stretched at Pastor Thompson. I think it's cool. I think it's a cool picture. We're once like these muddy, filthy, grimy rocks but the Lord kind of took us out of the mud, cleaned us up, polished us off a little bit and we're a work in progress. We got a lot of rough edges when we first get saved. You go to church and he kind of buffs us out a little bit and hopefully through sanctification in our lives we get sin out of our lives, we get cleaned up a little bit that of course we're never gonna be perfect. I'm sure that these weren't perfect egg glistening stones in the end but it's one day we are gonna be perfect. We're gonna be like our savior but he still took us and separated us out from all that stuff and put us into that promise. So he took us out of the river and put us in that promised land, didn't he? So let's look at a couple more verses here. Psalm chapter 40 verse two. Psalm chapter 40 verse two. And the Bible kind of has a lot of these little, these little things that are said in the scriptures that kind of allude to this same type of philosophy here. Psalm chapter 40 verse two says, He brought me up also out of an horrible pit, out of the miry clay and set my feet upon a rock and established my goings. And that's what it's like when you get saved. It's like he takes you out of the pit you were about to go into. I mean we're headed for hell. We're already judged. The wrath of God is already abiding on us when we're not saved. We're a car crash away from hell. We're a drunk driver walking across the street and a crosswalk away from going to hell at any moment and he saves us and takes us away from that, that sure death in hell. Look at first Samuel chapter two verse six. First Samuel chapter two verse six. First Samuel chapter two verse six. The Bible says, The Lord killeth and maketh alive. He bringeth down to the grave and bringeth up. The Lord maketh poor and maketh rich. He bringeth low and lifteth up. He raiseth up the poor out of the dust and lifteth up the beggar from the dung hill to set them among princes and to make them inherit the throne of glory from the pillars of the earth are the Lord's and he has set the world upon them. He will keep the feet of his saints and the wicked shall be silent in darkness for by strength shall no man prevail. Those are the words of Hannah, her prayer, but those are cool verses. He raiseth the poor out of the dust, lifteth the beggar from the dung hill to set them among princes. I mean, we are kings and priests unto our God. I mean, we're nothing. We're headed for hell and then next thing you know, we're in the royal family. Woo! Eat your heart out, Prince Charles, or King Charles. I guess he's King Charles now. Psalm chapter 113. Turn to Psalm chapter 113. Psalm chapter 113 verse five. It says, who is like unto the Lord our God who dwelleth on high? Who humbleth himself to behold the things that are in heaven and the earth? He raiseth up the poor out of the dust and lifteth the needy out of the dung hill that he may set him with princes even with the princes of his people. He maketh the barren woman to keep house and to be a joyful mother of children. Praise ye the Lord. God's so good to us and we definitely don't give as much back. But he doesn't expect it either. Which is good because we're definitely not as good to him as he is to us. So turn back to Joshua chapter four verse nine. Joshua four nine. The Bible says, and Joshua set up 12 stones in the midst of Jordan and the place where the feet of the priests which bear the ark of the covenant stood there unto this day. So at the time of the writing of Joshua that's where they were. For the priests which bear the ark stood in the midst of the Jordan until everything was finished and the Lord commanded Joshua to speak unto the people according to all that Moses commanded Joshua and the people hasted and passed over. And it came to pass when all the people were clean passed over that the ark of the Lord passed over and the priests in the presence of the people and the children of Reuben and the children of Gad and the half tribe of Manasseh passed over armed before the children of Israel as Moses spake unto them. About 40,000 prepared for war passed over before the Lord unto the battle to the plains of Jericho. So they're the first to inherit and also they're passed over for war like Moses had said that they would be. On that day the Lord magnified Joshua in the sight of all Israel and they feared him as they feared Moses all the days of his life. And people get this idea that you're not supposed to fear leadership but they feared him in a healthy way. It's not like they were like oh Joshua don't chop me into pieces but I mean he might have had to chop the people into pieces. I mean if they deserted or whatever I mean Moses just think about Samuel he literally chopped someone up into pieces. He chopped up Agag. I mean Moses had to swing he had to proclaim people to be put to death the guy that picked up sticks on the Sabbath day the guy that cursed the Lord who was a half Egyptian they had to put him to death. I mean they were the leaders of the people. So he was like the judge Joshua was like the judge of the people. So he was the judge but also controlled the armies and in a certain extent controlled the priest in the times of war. Of course he didn't have anything to do with the sacrifices and all that stuff but he did control the people. So verse 15 it says the Lord spake unto Joshua saying command the priest to bear the ark of the testimony that they come up out of Georgia that they come up out of Jordan Joshua therefore commanded the priest saying come ye up out of Jordan and it came to pass on the priest that bear the ark of the covenant of the Lord were come up out of the midst of Jordan that the souls of the priest's feet were lifted up onto the dry land and the water of Jordan returned unto their place and flowed over all his banks as they did before. So as soon as when they first dipped it in it went up and then when they the moment they took their feet out the banks overflowed. It says the people came up out of the Jordan on the tenth day of the first month and camped in Gilgal in the east border of Jericho. And those twelve stones which they took out of the Jordan did Joshua pitch in Gilgal which is where Samuel chopped Agag into pieces by the way and he spake unto the children of Israel saying when your children shall ask their fathers in time to come saying what meaning these stones then you shall let your children know saying Israel came over this Jordan on dry land for the Lord your God dried up the waters of Jordan from before you until you were passed over as the Lord your God did to the Red Sea which he dried up before us up from before us until we were gone over. And you know just to say this God is not just like a one miracle God but there's in between generations where they do still need to hear the stories of the Bible. And like we don't see these types of things happen but we might be in the generation where we see the things of the book of Revelation happen. But will people have faith when those things happen? It's important to have that faith. It's important for people to be saved when these things start to happen because we don't want any kids in our generation or any people in our church to not be saved and then potentially be duped into taking the mark of the beast or anything like that. Or to die unsaved. Look at verse 24 it says that all the people of the earth might know the hand of the Lord that it is mighty that you might fear the Lord your God forever. That's a great scripture there. And it's not that God just wants Israel to be saved. It's not that God just wants the children of Israel to know about it and the children of these soldiers and these families to know. He wants the whole earth to know. The people of the whole earth. That's why when Rahab in chapter 2 that's why Rahab was like I already heard all this stuff. I already heard about what happened in the Red Sea. So that's why she already had gotten saved. You know. So God wants everybody to know and He wants everybody to fear. And this is why He does the great mighty works that He does so that everybody would get saved. God's not slack concerning His promise. God wants all people to be saved. He wants all to come to repentance. His will is not that any should perish. So and remember they don't have their families at this point but they will at some point. Once they do all the conquering then they're going to go back and get all their families and bring them in and they're going to say hey look at this place here. Here's where the stones are. Here's where we killed all these giants. Here's the remnants of this and that. Look at this castle. You know there was a whole bunch of giants in this one and we did this and that. And so God wants those stories to be told and retold. And today why do we go through the whole Bible? Why don't we just stick to the New Testament Pastor? Well because the stories in the Old Testament matter too. The whole Bible. That's why Paul said I kept back nothing from you. So I mean we just need to keep retelling the stories of the Bible over and over again. So that everybody gets a chance to hear them and hear the great things that God has done for us and that they might fear the Lord their God forever. And that's the point that people get saved and they're saved forever. Because if they don't get eternal security then they're missing the boat. If they think that they could walk away or give away their salvation then they're not saved. It's just that simple. So if someone you know when I got saved eternal security was not pounded into me. But I don't think that it has to be for someone to get saved but it sure is helpful. I didn't like have some doubt of salvation. Like I knew it was eternal security. Like it was no doubt to me whatsoever. I never have doubted it was eternal security. But I mean obviously they explain it enough to where I got saved and I didn't have to have that happen. But like I didn't have anything to be pulled out of. I didn't have any false doctrine to unlearn. So that's why I probably didn't have that problem. But if someone's been a Pentecostal their whole life and you don't cover that with them there's problems. They just re-prayed with you. That's all they did. If someone's a Catholic or someone's just some whatever kind of quote unquote Christian and they thought they could lose their salvation and you didn't shore that up with them and teach them about eternal security they're not going to get saved if you just pray another prayer with them. Catholics will pray with you all day long. They'll hold your hand and do the little satellite. They'll do this. Anybody will. I've got out sowing and other people are out and they try to hold hands with us while they pray and stuff. It's weird. Don't touch me. You don't want to be mean. Get your hands off me man. Especially when it's dudes. Get your sweaty palms off me man. I know that sounds mean but it's just like I don't know maybe I need to do a study about when dudes hold each other's hands in the Bible because I just haven't seen that one. Anyway so again this is just not some small miracle this is a big deal and that's why God just keeps saying it over and over again. When your kids ask this is what happened. But really the main take away in this is that God does memorialize great events and it isn't just not a big deal. We need to make things a big deal. We need to make the Bible a big deal. The stories of the Bible a big deal. And whatever God says to emphasize we emphasize. So if God says emphasize this story. Emphasize remembering this story. Teaching your children about this story. Those are the things we need to emphasize with our children and with people. That's what we need to do. And the other thing is that God can take some pretty rough characters. Some pretty mucky people. Some pretty dirty rocks and ugly muddy fish poopy rocks and turn those into some polished you know upstanding kingly priestly style people and take them out of that muck and put them in a pile by themselves. Clean them up save them and let them do great things for God. And be told as a tale later on. Being an inspiration for others to do great things also that God did great things for them. Because it's not us it's not because of us that we do great things. It's because of God that we do great things. And someone hopefully will something hopefully will be built upon the things that we've done here because we were built upon the Lord and the prophets and the apostles and the people that were before us. And hopefully we can leave a legacy another pile of rocks here somewhere that someone else can build upon and have their lively stones be built upon the sure foundation and the strong tower and the mighty fortress and whatever other churches we start. Amen. Alright that's all we got. Let's pray. Lord we thank you so much for this great church. Pray Lord that you just bless us as we go about our week. Pray you help us give us opportunity to talk to someone this week and give them the gospel. Pray you bless our sowning efforts this week. I pray you bless our sowning on Saturday. Give us some good weather and even if you don't Lord pray that you would just help us to get some people saved. I pray that you just Lord bless the rest of our year. Help us to have a vision for next year and some great missions trips. And Lord help us to just continue to love our city Vancouver. And if we don't love it now help us to love it even though we have trouble loving it now. I pray that you just give us a great love for our city for our state even if it does have some really horrible politics and some really weird people in it. Lord that we would just go after the remnant and that we would do our best to try to bring forth that remnant. Lord let our love not grow cold and I pray that you just help us to stay fired up and zealous for the things of God here. And Lord that we would bring forth much fruit. Jesus say we pray. Amen. It's 257 on the first I've a message from the Lord hallelujah the message unto you I'll give is recorded in his word hallelujah it is only that you look and live look and live my brother look to Jesus now is recorded in his word hallelujah it is only that you look and live I've a message full of love hallelujah message oh my friend for you is a message from above hallelujah Jesus said it and I know it is true look and live my brother live look to Jesus now and live is recorded in his word hallelujah it is only that you look and live life is offered unto you hallelujah eternal life thy soul shall have if you'll only look to him hallelujah look to Jesus who alone can save look and live my brother live look to Jesus now and live is recorded in his word hallelujah it is only that you look and live on the last I will tell you how I came hallelujah to Jesus when he made me whole was believing on his name hallelujah I trusted and he saved my soul look and live my brother live look to Jesus now and live is recorded in his word hallelujah it is only that you look and live man it was good seeing you guys this sunday we'd love to see you back here next week brother Alex you want to end us with a word of prayer you