We are passing from a Moses era to a Joshua era. Because the spiritual warfare will grow more intense we will be encountering severe challenges, testings, forms of deception. There are lessons we can learn from the Joshua Era, the time when God led His people into their inheritance.

The Lord Jesus Christ is removing His shepherd's garments and donning the helmet of war.

There were behaviors of the Israelites under Moses that brought the disfavor of God on the people and hindered their progress.

They grumbled and complained against their leaders—in actuality against God.

They wanted to go back to Egypt.

They were hard of heart, disobedient, rebellious, weeping and howling in unbelief.

Sounds like some of us today.

Because of their grumbling and unbelief many of them were destroyed in the wilderness, thus becoming a warning to us who have left the world and are supposed to be pressing toward the inheritance, the rest of God in Christ.

Now that we are preparing to enter our land of promise, the fullness of our inheritance in the Lord Jesus Christ, there are four additional dangers we must guard against:

Departure from the written Word.

Covetousness leading to disobedience.

Assumptions, taking matters for granted.

Willingness to come short of final victory.

Departure From the Written Word.

Do not let this Book of the Law depart from your mouth; meditate on it day and night, so you may be careful to do everything written in it. Then you will be prosperous and successful. (Joshua 1:8—NIV)

I was given this verse by members of the Navigators, when I was first converted in the Marine Corps.

I don't believe there is an Evangelical who would not support one hundred percent the admonition to read the Bible and to be careful to do everything written in it.

But we of today have departed grievously from the written Word. Let me give you a few examples of current errors. These doctrines and concepts may have served in time past, but because of the intense spiritual warfare we are facing we must go back to the Scriptures. Careful adherence to the Scriptures is the only guarantee we are on the right track with the Spirit of God and therefore on the right track to victory.

A first unscriptural tradition is that the Lord is coming to take His Church to Heaven. The Scriptures declare consistently that the Lord is coming in order to set up His Kingdom on the earth and to bring justice to the saved nations.

A second unscriptural tradition is that Heaven is the eternal home of the saint. Eternal residence in the spirit Paradise is not the goal of salvation. Nowhere in the Scriptures is such a concept found. Rather, this idea comes from the influence of the philosophy of Gnosticism, a poison that has influenced Christian thinking from the first century.

To be continued.