Well, I invite you to turn tonight to Joshua chapter 12. Believe it or not, we are close to concluding this study in the book of Joshua, and you say to me, well, how is that possible? We're in chapter 12, and there's 24 chapters. Because next week, we're going to look at, I think, chapters 13 through 20, all in one sermon, but we won't read all of that. So, you'll see why. It's land allotments, and you'll see, it's better to see the big picture with all the land allotments. And maybe Dr. Van E. won't be very happy with that approach. But, I was also thinking tonight, I have to read a lot of names here, and I do my best to have the Hebrew professor here. He's probably saying, no, it should be pronounced this way or that way. I always mess these up, but there's a lot of names here tonight, and they are important names. what you'll notice here that we have in chapter 12 is a list of all the kings of Canaan that are defeated by Joshua. So this would have been a very important chapter for Israel to look back and to see it cataloged who was defeated. You know, we read right by this stuff and think, they knew who the, a lot of these people knew who these kings were, and they knew how awful these kings were. And to think that Moses and Joshua conquered these kings of Canaan would have been a source of great encouragement to them. So we're going to look at chapter 12 tonight and look at these kings that were defeated. Now, verse 1, these are the kings of the land whom the people of Israel defeated and took possession of their land beyond the Jordan toward the sunrise from the valley of Arnon to Mount Hermon with all the Ereba eastward. Sihon, king of the Amorites who lived at Heshbon and ruled from Oror, which is on the edge of the valley of the Arnon and from the middle of the valley as far as the river Jabbok. The boundary of the Ammonites, that is half of Gilead, and the Ereba to the sea of Chenaroth eastward and in the direction of Bet-Yeshimoth to the Sea of the Ereba, the Salt Sea, southward to the foot of the slopes of Pisgah, and Og, king of Bashan, one of the remnant of the Raphaim, who lived at Ashtaroth and Edrei, and ruled over Mount Hermon and Salakha, and all Bashan to the boundary of the Geshurites and the Maakathites, and over half of the Gilead to the boundary of Sihon, king of Heshbon. Moses, the servant of the Lord, and the people of Israel defeated them, and Moses, the servant of the Lord, gave their land for a possession to the Reubenites and the Gadites and the half-tribe of Manasseh. And these are the kings of the land whom Joshua and the people of Israel defeated on the west side of the Jordan from Baal Gad in the valley of Lebanon to Mount Halak that rises towards Ser, and Joshua gave their land to the tribes of Israel as a possession according to their allotments in the hill country, in the lowland, in the Ereba, in the slopes, in the wilderness, and in the Negev, the land of the Hittites, the Amorites, the Canaanites, the Perizzites, the Hivites, and the Jebusites. The king of Jericho won, the king of Ai, which is beside Bethel won, the king of Jerusalem won, the king of Hebron won, the king of Jarmuth won, the king of Lashish won, the king of Eglon won, the king of Gezer won, the king of Debir won, the king of getter one, the king of Horma one, the king of Arad one, the king of Libna one, the king of Adullam one, the king of Makeda one, the king of Bethel one, the king of Tapua one, the king of Hefer one, the king of Aphek one, the king of Lasharon one, the king of Madon one, the king of Hazar one, the king of Shemron Meron won, the king of Ashpat, I was doing well, Ashap won, the king of Ta'anak won, the king of Megiddo won, the king of Kadesh won, the king of Jokniam won, and Carmel won, the king of Dor in Nefath, Dor won, the king of Goyim in Galilee won, the king of Terzah won in all, 31. kings. So we made it through chapter 12 in the reading tonight. Well, tonight we come to an important section, believe it or not, in the study of the book of Joshua. It's intended for us to take a step back, if you will, and look at everything you might say from a bird's eye view. Things always look different higher up, if you will. And this helps us to sort of step back from everything and see the great victory that was accomplished in Canaan and the conquering of the land and the conquering of the kings that we have worked hard to get to this to this point and so this like as I said in the intro as I said before the comments and before the reading this would have been a very significant section for Israel to meditate on and to think of all put together, all the kings that were defeated. Imagine all of the worst leaders of the world right now, if you could put them in a list to say they were all defeated, our jaws would drop. It's that kind of effect it should have. And it's important, I think, because, well, we seem disconnected from all this and we seem in our day confused about the kingdom of God. There's been nothing but debates about the kingdom of God, the coming of the kingdom. What is the kingdom of God? How will that look in terms of our eschatology? What can we expect? We know at our present moment, which is interesting, which most Christians have recognized in our time with the end of Christendom, what has been a great rise of interest is in post-mill theonomic, reconstructive ideas in our country, and post-millennialism is really taking off. The old dispensationalism of the past, nobody's talking about anymore. I rarely hear it. Now, maybe there are still some in Baptistic circles talking about the rapture, but the great interest right now is a sort of post-millennial idea, a golden era that will be established before the coming of Christ, before the second coming, when they are looking for all the enemies of Christ to be put under his feet. I was struck at the last Bonson conference that that was the great verse of 1 Corinthians 15, 25, and 26. He must rule until all enemies are put under his feet. And all of them said, see, you've got to be a post mill, because all enemies in this age have to be put under his feet. Well, in what way? That's the verse they're hanging their hat on? That's in the context of the coming of Christ in the parousia, the final coming, where he's going to stamp out all the kings forever. Well, we'll look more at that as this goes. The reality is, is things are not, it's an ironic moment where people are sort of having this millennial golden age frenzy when things at least looking outwardly are not getting better. It seems to be a surprising way to look at things. Most agree that Christendom has come to an end, and the reason I raise all of this tonight is because if our expectations are not set correctly, we're going to face major confusion and major discouragement in this present age as things continue to go, especially if things do get worse. In waiting for something to happen, that I'm going to make the case tonight will not happen until Christ comes. That will not happen until Christ comes. And if we forget that basic point, then we're going to be set up for a lot of discouragement. Now that's why Joshua is important tonight. That's why chapter 12 is important tonight. It's showing us things in shadowy form. Sure, we're looking at something from the old covenant that's helping us to see in what we would say a type or a shadow, something that the New Testament makes very clear for us, and that's where we'll end tonight. But it's helpful to see this. It's helpful to see us because when we talk about the receiving of Canaan, we should think new heavens and new earth. That's what we should think about. And the nature of the coming of the kingdom in fullness. And that's what we have pictured here tonight, where all the enemies are cataloged as under the feet of Christ and conquered. And this is the summary of that tonight. This is the summary that helps us and shows us what we've been building to. Think of the Psalms we've been celebrating. Think of the heart of these two Psalms that we have worked through, that we have been studying through Joshua, something like Psalm 2. Why do the nations conspire and the peoples plot in vain? The kings of the earth rise up and the rulers band together against the Lord and against his anointed, saying, let us break their chains and throw off their shackles for different translations so you can kind of hear it. And what's God's response to that when the nations conspire and when we are dealing with really big movements of evil? He who is in the heaven shall laugh. And his answer? I'll install my king on Zion's holy hill, and you better kiss the sun lest you perish in the way. You better kiss my king. You better bow to my king. And this was Psalm 110. The Lord said to my Lord, sit at my right hand until I make an enemy's a footstool for your feet. He will crush kings on the, listen, here it is for tonight. He will crush kings on the day of his wrath. He will judge the nations, heaping up the dead, crushing the rulers of the whole earth. Anyone who's not bowed down the knee to him. Well, that's chapter 12. Why do I say that? It's helping us understand the nature of the coming of the kingdom and what we can expect before he comes and before he gives us the new heavens and the new earth. Remember, this is, we've looked at the land of Canaan figures for us heaven and in the next chapters what you have are the land allotments the the land is given to them so this is a really beautiful section that is really helping us from everything that Abraham was looking for this is shown here in types and shadows Abraham was looking for the heavenly land well tonight Joshua shows us the kingdom victory over his enemies what that looks like and how Israel was to celebrate this and when we can expect it in full, which is the great issue that I'm sort of trying to help us with as we wrestle through this section. So we're looking at the conquest of the kings. I'm going to begin with that little emphasis here on conquest. We'll look at consolation and conquering, but let's start with conquest, and I'm going to cover the whole chapter in the first point. So that's something I don't think I've ever done, but we're going to do that tonight. What you will notice here is you have a list of all the kings that are defeated. And I won't bore you again trying to read those names, but I want to get to the meaning of this, and I think the structure is very fascinating and helpful. The chapter concludes, this chapter concludes the second section of the book, and of chapters 6 through 12. So you really have three sections of the book, 1 through 5, 6 through 12. This concludes, this summary concludes everything that we've been looking at since chapter 6. And what those chapters did was record the events of the conquest. But what it does now is to summarize for us the destruction of all the kings of Canaan, and now their land is given in the next section. That's what we're going to look at in large next time, large measure. But the sections are important here tonight in chapter 12. There's two sections to it if you didn't notice that. The first is a record of the kings defeated by Moses, and the second is a record of the kings defeated by Joshua. Now that distinction is not unimportant. It's a very important distinction to what the author is doing here. Remember that Moses and the children of Israel came up out of Egypt. He was not the one to lead them into the land, but his sin, remember, in striking the rock had prevented him from entering the land. And it was this warrior figure who rose up, this figure named Joshua, Yeshua, the name meaning Jesus, as we've studied and looked at, He would be the one to lead them in. So types are all over this, and He wants us to see that. But the structure is capturing something, I believe, as I was reflecting on this, something of the development of the kingdom of God. Something I've never caught before because I've never studied Joshua 12 before. I don't know anyone who runs a Joshua 12 and studies Joshua 12, except Dr. Vinny. He loves to do that, I'm sure. It's a great chapter. But it's not something you're going to run to. But here we're going to see something very fascinating. This is why these chapters are so beneficial. They show something about the development of the kingdom. Look at verse 1. These are the kings of the land whom the children of Israel defeated. There's the summary. But you'll notice that these were under Moses in verse 6. And who are the two kings that are mentioned in this section? Just two kings. Very important kings. Well, one is Og, and the other is Sihon, isn't it? Sihon of the Amorites. In verse 4, Og, king of Bashan in his territory, who was of the remnant of the giants. These are the kings that reign east of the Jordan River. Large territories are then rehearsed here. Well, in verses 7, you have a record then of all the kings that Joshua conquered. And you'll notice all the land there that is referenced to Abraham that would be promised to him of those nations, the Hittites, the Amorites, the Canaanites, the Perizzites, the Hivites, and the Jebusites, taken right out of Genesis 15, are then mentioned. And so the end says, all the kings and their kingdoms were destroyed. It is a sweeping conquest. 31 kings are mentioned there who are wiped out by Joshua in the second section. Now, why does the author want us to appreciate this? Why is this even important? Well, it's really amazing how much attention in the scriptures the Lord gives to Og in Sihon. Sihon. Remember in Numbers, Israel wanted to pass through the wilderness and they came to this territory of Sihon and they asked Sihon if they could pass peacefully. And he said no. Instead, he gathered his army and attacked them. Listen to Deuteronomy 2 verse 30. But Sihon, the king of Heshbon would not let us pass by him. This is Moses. For the Lord your God hardened his spirit and made his heart obstinate that he might give them into your hands as he is this day. There we are again with what we looked at last time in verse 20 of chapter 11. This is all over the Old Testament of the Lord hardening these kings hearts and giving them into the hand. so the difficulty came because this king said no then the king rallied up his troops and attacked them he did what he wanted to do and the Lord was sovereignly giving Sihon into their hands this was a an important concept that we looked at these kings doing what they really wanted to do it was God just removing the dread that was on their heart about Israel so that they would actually go and attack. And I made the point last time that this is always a good reminder to us when we come to things like this of the sovereignty of God, that God was doing something wonderful for Israel in exercising His sovereignty. Remember Deuteronomy 14? For you are a people holy to the Lord your God. The Lord your God has chosen you to be a people for his treasured possession out of all the peoples who are on the face of the earth. It was not because you were more in number than any other people that the Lord has set his love on you and chosen you. For you are fewest of all peoples, but it's because the Lord loves you and is keeping the oath he swore to your fathers that the Lord has brought you out with a mighty hand and redeemed you from the house of slavery from the hand of Pharaoh, the king of Egypt. That's a verse you just want to meditate on for a while. He is doing all this because he loves you. And he's judging the kings and kingdoms of the earth to give you the inheritance. When you hear that, I want you to think of Sihon. Then there was Og. Listen to Moses' description of Og. For only Og, king of Bashan, remained of the remnant of giants. Behold, his bedstead was a bedstead of iron. Is it not in Rabbath of the children of Ammon? Nine cubits was the length of his bed, and four cubits the breadth of it. And after the cubit of a man, Og had a bed which he slept in that was 14 feet long. This was a powerful king. Nobody's named their kid Og since, trust me. What happened? The Lord said to Moses, don't be afraid of him. For I have delivered him into your hands. Along with his whole army and his land. Do to him what you did to Sihon. King of the Amorites who reigned in Heshbon. So they struck him down together with his sons and whole army, leaving them no survivors, and they took the possession of his land. Now, those are Moses' captures. Why does it matter? Why the structure tonight? Why Moses, these two kings, and then Joshua, these 31 kings? Have you thought about how much attention Scripture gives to Sihon and Og? Well, Psalm 135, Psalm 136. We could do Psalm 136. You like this psalm. His love endures forever. It's the most repetitious psalm in this altar. Right? His love endured forever. He killed mighty kings. His love endured forever. Sihon, king of the Amorites. His love endures forever. Og, king of Bashan. His love endures forever. And gave their land as an inheritance. His love endures forever. An inheritance to his servant Israel. His love endures forever. Are we getting the point? Here's why it matters. These two kings were important for Israel to always think about, about history, about the long conquest. Victory over these two very powerful kings by Moses was something God always wanted Israel to remember. Why? Because it was a down payment. It was a pledge. That he was going to fulfill his promise to give all the land to them. All the kings would be defeated. This is what Moses said in Deuteronomy 3. For your eyes have seen all that the Lord your God has done to these two kings. So he will do to all the kingdoms into which you're crossing. You shall not fear them, for it is the Lord your God who fights for you. Now you understand why Og and Sihon were so important. When you heard those names in Israel, remember Sihon, remember Og, O children. They were to remember the promise, and they were to remember this is all a down payment. I don't change. I'm going to fulfill what I started. I don't start a project and then not complete it. It's what Paul raised in Philippians. He who begins the good work completes it. First half. Then comes the second half. Which closes out this section showing us the end of the story. It's been a long process, slow process, since Moses defeated those two kings to get to this point. That's what we don't realize. We read this, I'm gonna preach a sermon in like seven or eight chapters next week. This took time. This took years of patience and struggle. What Joshua is capturing for us in the full and complete conquering of the land, judges will show us problems, sure. But think about this. These last sections of Joshua, what they're saying to us is this. We're about to get there in Joshua 21. The Lord made good on all his promises. Listen to this. So the Lord gave Israel all the land he had sworn to give to their ancestors. And they took possession of it and settled there. The Lord gave them rest on every side. Just as he had sworn. to their ancestors, not one of their enemies, listen to this, not one of their enemies withstood them. The Lord gave all their enemies into their hands. Not one of the, all of the Lord's good promises to Israel failed. Every single one was fulfilled. That's Joshua 21. That means that this last section in chapter 12, what we have pictured then is for us the final crushing of the rest of the kings and kingdoms of the earth that is really a type and picture of the end of the world when Christ brings it all to a close. And then the kingdom of God comes in all of its fullness. We receive the land and we are reminded all the promises were fulfilled. Now, that's really important. Why is that so important? Because so many are confused right now and baffled at what's happening. What's been the message of Joshua the whole time? Be strong. Be courageous. Do not fear. Whose battle is this? It's the Lord's. It's not you they hate. It's me. It's my battle. Listen to me. It's my battle. It's not yours. The church needs this so much right now. I will complete the conquest. I will fulfill my promises. And what I don't want you doing in the interim is what Israel did, looking to other strongmen. I don't want you putting your trust in other gods. I don't want you looking to some man out there to fight this battle or fighting the battle in a way that the glory would go to someone else. That belongs to my Christ. I think this is our great challenge at the moment. Look at all the enemies of the Lord. All the enemies are rising up. At every angle, something is coming at us, whether it's an ideology, whether it's a king in a kingdom, whether it's what I mentioned this morning, even Satan worship, immorality, idolatry. What's our impulse right now? We're very impatient. Remember, why are we here? Because he's saving. We've got to stop it. It's time to reclaim. It's time to bring in the kingdom in all of its fullness. What have we been learning here? Who's sovereignly hardening hearts that things are going this way? Got to get back America. You say, I'm scared, I'm confused. What did this passage say to you? What about Og? What about Sihon? What about he who begins the good work? You think he's not going to complete it? What do you think your Joshua came to do? You're looking at flesh and blood as your principal warfare. Have you really considered what's happening? Behind all this, we're at war with principalities, powers, rulers of the darkness of this age. There is a cosmic satanic war behind all of this going on. And I've got news for you. You can't fight that. It's way too big. It's way too involved. There's stuff happening right now you can't get a hold on. What's the encouragement? Well, it's Colossians 2. And having disarmed principalities and powers and authorities, he made a public spectacle of them, triumphing over them at the cross. There's your down payment. He's already disarmed them. He's already, in principle, defeated them. Golgotha was the crushing of the skull of the Satan, which Romans 14 says he's going to finally do shortly under your feet. He will do. We live in the interim. You see the encouragement? You see why the Psalms kept celebrating the defeat of Sihon and Og? His love endures forever. His love endures forever. Sihon, king, Og, king, his love endures forever. They're already defeated. And the promise to you is that the final defeat is coming just as Christ went to the cross and he fought the ultimate cosmic battle and disarmed every power, spiritual principalities and powers. Sure, they're still present. It's just a matter of time. But you have to be patient in the fight. You can't fall into fear in the fight. You have to remember you've not been given and the sword in the fight. Jesus disarmed you and took down the swords. That's what Peter tried to do. Put it back. You come with the gospel of the kingdom. You come with a message of be reconciled to God. You come bearing to the nations good news to them, preaching and witnessing to the person in the work of Christ. Being faithful servants unto death to that message, which is the Great Commission, which is not to go and conquer kingdoms politically, but is to go from all the nations in the earth, from all the peoples in the earth, and give this message. That God's plan is to, for the moment, a day of mercy, not to destroy, but to save. And the Lord is telling us tonight, what I have started, I will complete. When I won at the cross, a great victory was announced to the ends of the earth. Forgiveness and righteousness has already secured for you, Canaan. But for the present, just for a short time, for the sufferings of this age, they're going to work in us a far more eternal way of divine glory. But very soon is this. Christ, the first fruits, that was at his death and resurrection. Then when he comes, those who belong to him. Then the end will come. When he hands over the kingdom to God the Father, after he has destroyed all dominion, authority, and power, is all talking about the second coming. For he must reign until he's put all enemies under his feet. The last enemy to be destroyed is death. For he's put everything under his feet. It's all under his feet. Ephesians 2 right now. That'll be realized in final judgment on that day. Now when it says everything has been put under him, it's clear that this does not include God himself who put everything under Christ. When he has done this, then the Son himself will be made subject to him who put everything under him so that God may be all in it. When he hands back the kingdom, he hands it back. It's an imagery for us of saying, the victory's won. There, I did. I saved. I conquered. I'm the lamb, and the victory was won, and I no longer, I no longer have to fight. It's over. Then the resurrection comes, and we receive the land, which is about what we're to see and Joshua promised to Abraham forever. So be encouraged in the fight. If the Lord were not on our side, then we would be afraid. But the Lord is on our side. And if that is the case, then we have nothing to fear. Be of good cheer, said Jesus. For I've already overcome the world. And that's the confidence we need to live in in this present age. Let's pray. Heavenly Father, thank you for your word to us tonight, you for encouraging us in the kingdom, and to see the great victory that's been won at the cross. Thank you for how you always encourage your sheep, even with Sihon and Og of these mighty warriors, how you put them out early as a down payment and pledge. And then when we look to the cross, we see that our Savior has disarmed principalities and powers, and that we can live confident that the kingdom of God will come in all of its fullness on that day. And so until then, O Lord, may we be about our heavenly Father's business of making known good news to the ends of the earth, that you might save a people out of every tribe, tongue, people, and nation to yourself for your glory, for your kingdom. In Jesus' name we pray. Amen. Thank you.