← Divine Savior Church-North Collin County
Divine Savior Church-North Collin County
Confirmation Sunday | May 17, 2026 | Pastor Caleb King
00:19:35
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God's word for our consideration this morning comes from our first reading from Joshua, chapter 24. We bow our heads to pray. O Lord, may the words of my mouth and the meditation of all of our hearts be pleasing in your sight. For you alone are our rock and our redeemer. Amen. In the name of Jesus, my dear brothers and sisters in Christ, especially you, Jude and Briar, on your confirmation day, they were back where it all began. You see, God's people were gathered in a very special place in Joshua, chapter 24. It was a place called. Called Shechem. It was the same place where God had visited Abraham years, years earlier and gave Abraham promises, promises that he was going to be faithful to Abraham and faithful to the descendants of Abraham. In fact, it was the same place that these same Israelites had stood not all that long ago, before they began their whole conquest of. Of the promised land. You see, after 40 years of wandering around in the wilderness, God had brought them to the promised land. But the land was not theirs yet. There were battles that still needed to be fought. And now, standing on the flip side of all of those battles, where they saw God bring to ruin and destruction all of those other nations and all of their other gods, they now stood right back in the place where it all began. And you can imagine the excitement, can't you? We did it. It's our home. No more fighting, no more roaming around. It's ours. This is where we get to live. I can't help but think of a couple of comparisons between the Israelites and you on your confirmation day. You too are standing back where it all began. At the font. Where God made promises to you, to be faithful to you all of the days of your life. Where he put his name on you, calling you his child. Jesus has defeated all of your enemies too. Sin, death and the devil. All of them. And the cross stands to remind you how he did it. But pouring out his lifeblood there on the cross for all of your sins, to pay for them in full. And I don't know, but maybe you're thinking today. Hey. We did it. Three years of confirmation instruction. No more memory work, no more assignments, no more tests. Okay? I know you would never think those things. There is one more maybe comparison though, that I would like to make. As Joshua stood there before the Israelites one last time before he died, he reminded them of everything, their whole history of where God had brought them up until this point in time. Not only so that they wouldn't forget their history, but so that they would Remember where their faithfulness to the Lord comes from. Joshua says this. Now fear the Lord and serve him with all faithfulness. Throw away the gods your ancestors worshiped beyond the Euphrates river and in Egypt and serve the Lord. Remember all of those false gods Joshua says that you just saw God bring to ruin, that you just saw God bring to destruction. Throw them away. Get rid of them, because they get you nowhere. Worshiping the Lord your God and serving him only means you can't have any of these other gods, because God does not settle for just half of your heart. He wants the entirety of your heart all the time. But Joshua says if serving the Lord seems undesirable to you, then choose for yourselves this day whom you will serve, whether the gods your ancestors worshiped beyond the Euphrates or the gods of the Amorites in whose land you are living. But as for me and my household, we will serve the Lord. It's almost hilarious, isn't it? If you don't want to serve the God who has all power and all authority, if you don't want to serve the God of heaven and earth, if you don't want to serve the God who saves, if you don't want to serve the only true God, well, then choose for yourselves who you are going to serve. And here are your choices. How about those gods that you just saw? All get destroyed in the land that you're now living in. See how well that's going to work out? Or maybe, if not them, maybe some of the gods that your ancestors worshiped, or maybe some of the gods of the Egyptians who, oh, by the way, God showed that they held no real power because they were not real gods at all, and he brought them all to ruin and destruction. Go ahead and try them. Joshua isn't pretending that the Israelites had some ability to choose God on their own. You have memorized it. Well, at least twice, if not three times over the past three years. I cannot, by my own thinking or choosing, believe in Jesus Christ, my Lord, or come to him, rather, as you have memorized. It is the Holy Spirit who has called me by the Gospel, enlightened me with his gifts, sanctified, and kept me in the true faith. Israel did not belong to God because of their choice, but rather because of God's grace, God's undeserved love. And it's no different for you. You do not belong to God because of some decision that you made to follow Him. You do not belong to God because of some choice that you made. No, it's because of the Holy Spirit, who has brought you to faith through the Word. And now, having received that beautiful grace of God, that beautiful, beautiful, incredible love of God, Joshua now challenges the Israelites to not just say the right thing. It's easy to say the right thing. You know how to say the right thing, but to do the right thing. And they said, far be it from us to forsake the Lord to serve other gods. It was the Lord, our God himself, who brought us and our parents up out of Egypt. It was the Lord our God himself, that performed those great signs before our eyes. It was the Lord our God himself, who protected us on our entire journey among all the nations through which we traveled. And. And it was the Lord our God himself, who drove out before us all the nations, including the Amorites, who lived in the land. We too, will serve the Lord because he is our God. They couldn't conceive of an idea of serving another God other than the true God. Ha. Some choice, they said. We would have had to have gone mad to choose those other gods instead of serving the one true God. God's the one that's protected us. God's the one that's delivered us. God's the one that has won victories for us. There's no choice. You'd say the same thing today, wouldn't you, Jude? You'd say the same thing today, wouldn't you, Briar? You'd say the same thing today, wouldn't you, people of God? It's no choice. Especially having stood again in the place where it all began, having been reminded of God's faithfulness, just as the Israelites were, and then responding with that promise to be faithful. In those three years of catechism instruction that you have went through, you have learned what God's word says to you, what God has done for his people, what God has done for you. And that's exactly why Joshua's warning matters so much. Because the truth of the matter is today is easy, by God's grace. Today is simple. It's joyful, it's celebratory. Just like the Israelites, having been reminded of God's grace, were eager to promise to be faithful to him, to the one true God. But Joshua is not just challenging them to say the right thing like they did, but to do the right thing. And that's where things get tricky. You see, false gods don't just announce themselves as false gods. It looks like after confirmation, you have no relationship with your Bible because you think that you have learned it all. And Therefore you know it all. And therefore you can spend all your time doing anything else but study Word. It looks like this you no longer regularly attend worship because there are more important things going on in your life than being part of the body of Christ, of which God has made you a part by sending his Son to die on a cross so that you could be a part of the body of Christ. So you don't. It looks like this, years later down the line, you read something in God's Word that you don't really remember reading, but you don't really like it. So you go somewhere else and you find somewhere else that's going to tell you what you want to hear and make you feel really good about yourself and maybe even affirm, especially even affirm those sinful feelings. It looks like this chasing your dreams and chasing your future career and chasing your goals and your hopes becomes more important than your relationship with God. It looks like this the next step in your life is filled with new friends and new people that are going to come into your life. And well, if you want to be part of that new friend group, then you got to compromise. Maybe just one part of God's Word, but you really want to be part of that friend group. So you see how false gods sneak their way into life after confirmation, especially after confirmation. The devil is so good at playing his cards so well to make the idols of our heart, to elevate them so high that we don't care how much they might be bad because they are so fun, they're so entertaining, they're so important to us, they maybe even make us so much money. I can't possibly set it aside. Joshua is challenging the Israelites. And as he does that, he tells them what it means to be faithful to the Lord. And it means to throw away all of those idols. And as the book of Joshua comes to a close and as the book of Judges begins, we're told that the next generation went back to those idols and they lost the Lord in the process. Really easy to say the right thing, even harder to do the right thing. Friends, today is not the end. It's not a graduation. It's but the beginning or really the continuation of a life lived under the cross following Jesus. It's your opportunity to stand here today with this body of believers and confess right along with them that we too will serve the Lord. But realize this, what brought the people to bring to confess that truth was not their own strengths. They were not strong enough to make that promise, nor were they strong enough to keep that promise. Rather, it was Joshua reminding them of the Lord's faithfulness to them. Because as the power of God's grace is put on display back in the place where it all began, it empowers and inspires faithfulness to the Lord. It inspires determination to. To remain faithful to the Lord. Not out of forced obligation, not out of forced compulsion, but rather in gratitude for everything that the Lord has done for you. That's what God's faithfulness does. And having received God's faithfulness, God's incredible grace, his unfathomable love, the people couldn't conceive of worshiping another God than the true God. That's why you're back here today in the place where it all began. The strength of the promises that you are about to make, to be faithful to the Lord for the rest of your life. That strength does not come from you. It comes from remembering your history. It comes from remembering what the Lord has done for you. His unfathomable grace towards you undeserved love that you did not receive what you did deserved, which was death and hell. But rather you have received from him what you do not deserve, which is eternal life with Christ in heaven. Friends, it is the Lord your God who has brought you out of slavery, to sin, death and the devil by pouring out his lifeblood on the cross to pay for all of your sins. It is the Lord your God who has made promises to you to be faithful to you all of the days of your life and put his name on you. It is the Lord your God who has convinced you by the power of His Spirit working through the Word, that he is the only one true God. It is the Lord your God who works through the power of his spirit in the Word that has convinced you, convinced you that not only is he the one true God, but that you are his and his forever. It's the power of the Lord your God and his faithfulness to you that inspires your faithfulness to Him. Faithfulness that responds to the Lord's call in the same way as those Israelites saying, far be it from us to forsake the Lord to serve other gods, we too will serve the Lord because He is our God, the living God, the God who wins victories, the God who will never leave you or forsake you. The God who leads you through all areas and times and eras of life with everything that surrounds you and leads you into eternity on level ground. That's what God's faithfulness does. As you stand again in the place where it all began. I suppose there is one last comparison to make. After Joshua said these words to the Israelites. He went and got a big stone. And he set it up underneath a tree there in Shechem. And that stone was meant to serve as a witness of sorts. To the promises that they had made to be faithful to God. And the promises that God had made to be faithful to them. Every time they saw that stone, they'd be reminded of their history. What had happened in that place and the promises that were made. There are a few things that are set up in this place, too. To remind you of the promises that you are going to make to God. And really the promises that God has made to you. This place is meant to remind and call something to mind for you, too. His unrelenting faithfulness to you. The font which stands to remind you of what God has done for you. How God has made promises to you to be faithful to you all the days of your life. And he has put his name on you, claiming you as his own. The altar which stands to remind you of why it is that you get to enter the presence of God at all. But rather because of the sacrifice that's been made on the altar in your place of Jesus. And the cross that stands to show you how it all happened. As Jesus made good on the promise that was made to you. Sins paid in full as his lifeblood was poured out for you on the cross. The lectern that stands to remind you. And to show you that God still speaks to you. He speaks to you through His Word. This place and the things that are set up here in this place. Are meant to remind you and allow you to stand again where it all began. Why? Because it's God. And what God does alone that shows his grace to you. That really convinces you of God's faithfulness to you. And therefore inspires your faithfulness to Him. It inspires determination in your heart to remain faithful to Him Even after you have failed. Not out of forced compulsion, not out of obligation. But rather out of gratitude for what the Lord has done for you. And will continue to do for you all of your days. So keep returning to this place where it all began. Jude. Keep returning to this place where it all began. Briar. Keep returning to this place where it all began. People of God. Because having stood again in the place where it all began. Having received yet again God's unfathomable love and his incredible grace. Yet again. These words of Joshua become your words yet again. That as for me and my house. We will serve the Lord because he is our God. The only God. The only God of your heart. Happy Confirmation day, Jude. Happy Confirmation day, Briar. Amen.