By His grace, what the radical life of Christ should look in an American context!

Mark 1:22 – We operate in the authority of Jesus Christ as He said in the Great Commission. We are acting on His authority when we “Go, and make disciples of the nations”. Jesus’ authority extended not only to the “physical” world but also to the “spiritual” world. We engage in spiritual conflict when we obey His command to go.

1 Corinthians 2:14 – As we walk and work in this natural world we will see more evidence of the spiritual blindness that impedes our progress. The natural person is blinded to the spiritual reality and spiritual truth. Yet we are trying to win them with a gospel that is centered on things of a spiritual nature.

We ourselves, if not for the work of the Holy Spirit in us, would have no proclivity to the spiritual things. He has opened those things to us by His grace. Our response should not be to despise and reject the natural person, but rather to pray for the work of the Holy Spirit to open such a person up to spiritual truth.

Psalm 74:12 – We often seek the vengeance of God when calamity strikes. Yet, our perspective should be on His heavenly will. Why has God allowed such a thing to occur? As much as we may be hurt and upset about the circumstance, we can be certain of two things: #1 God is big enough to handle our hurts and frustrations so we can take them to Him; #2 God is allowing this circumstance as part of His working salvation in the midst of the earth.

Joshua 6:6 – In Revelation, John’s 7 trumpets are drawing upon the imagery of the fall of Jericho.

Joshua 6:18 – We must be careful in our walk with the Lord that we keep ourselves clear from things that will destroy our walk. Remember that all the sinful behavior and habit of this world is devoted to destruction, it is passing away. Just as Jericho fell, so will also the sinful ways of this world.

We should take great care that we are walking pure and holy before God that we have no ways within us that are devoted to destruction. We do not want that trouble brought upon ourselves.

Joshua 7:9 – The thing that is most troubling is that we not only damage our own name when we dabble in things devoted to destruction, but we are found to be standing in the way of God bringing glory to His great name.

Even little Ai became too much for mighty Israel because of Achan’s compromise. Our enemies are empowered against the gospel when we live in compromise with the ways of this world. We must resolve to avoid compromising our faith at all costs.