Josh 6:27, So the Lord was with Joshua, and his fame was in all the land. 
	In this morning’s reading, we have the account of the fall of Jericho. It was the plan and the mighty hand of the Lord that caused those defensive walls to simply crumble down. This showed that the victory was the Lord’s. In it, He proved that He was going before His people in the conquest of the Promised Land. As long as He was with the people, there would be no one who could stand before the nation of Israel. The Lord was with Joshua, as so promised, in order to bring good to Joshua, and through Joshua, to the nation as a whole.
	Our highlighted passage is one that gives us great hope in the course of our walk on this earth today, especially in the midst of the current chaos and upheaval. We want to spend a little time looking at the promise of God and how He blesses His Chosen people with the presence of Himself. We will look at several accounts from the scripture that are indicative of the heart of the Lord for those who are so blessed with the knowledge and the outworking of the Lord’s immediate presence in their lives.
	We begin with one with whom we are all so very familiar, that of Joseph. We know how his brother’s were so jealous that they threw him into the pit, and then sold him into slavery. One of the keys to recognize in this whole story is that, despite this treatment by his own brothers, we are told that the Lord was with him. 
This shows vibrantly that God is still with His people, even in the midst of the hard and bitter times when nothing seems to make sense in our lives. Joseph surely wondered at the treatment and the hardship that he was undergoing, yet God was with him as is pointed out in Gen 39:2+3, when he became ensconced in Potifer’s home. 
	Gen 39:2+3, And the Lord was with Joseph, so he became a successful man. And he was in the house of his master, the Egyptian. Now his master saw that the Lord was with him and how the Lord caused all that he did to prosper in his hand. 
	Potifer recognized that there was something unique about this slave whom he had purchased. As a result, because of the fact that the Lord was with Joseph, he brought prosperity to his master’s household. Potifer was blessed because Joseph was there and the Lord was with Joseph.
	Please note that Joseph was not a free man at this point. He was still enslaved as Potifer’s possession. So many people think that we need to be set up by our selves in order to know the blessing of the Lord. There is the deceitful and corrupting message spread which proclaims that we need to be in charge of our affairs and have our financial independence in order to show that the Lord is blessing us. That is far from the case. 
Where ever we are, under what ever tutelage or business environment, whether manager or worker, teacher or student, proprietor or consumer, we are to be such a witness of the presence of the Lord that all will know that there is something unique about us in the fact that we are blessed by God being with us. We do not have to possess anything, as Joseph had nothing to his own name in his slavery. Still he was extremely blessed with the presence of the Lord in his life. That is what needs to be shown in our lives.
	We will take this one step further with Joseph, as recorded in Gen 39:21-23. Here we see Joseph, no longer a slave; he was now a prisoner after being falsely accused by Potifer’s wife. 
Consider how uniquely blessed this young man was in the manifested course of his life. Up to this point, his life seemed to be anything but blessed. He had been tormented by his brothers and then sold into slavery in retribution for being their father’s favorite son. Then, because he was faithful to his master, refusing to betray the trust that was granted to him, he was falsely accused by the wife and thrown into jail. Yet the Lord was with him and he prospered even in jail as we read.
	Gen 39:21-23, But the Lord was with Joseph and extended kindness to him, and gave him favor in the sight of the chief jailer. And the chief jailer committed to Joseph's charge all the prisoners who were in the jail; so that whatever was done there, he was responsible for it. The chief jailer did not supervise anything under Joseph's charge because the Lord was with him; and whatever he did, the Lord made to prosper. 
    	As we know in the story, it was because of his incarceration that the opportunity was presented to Joseph to describe the meaning of the dreams that so troubled Pharaoh. As a result of the Lord’s manifold blessing of the interpretation of those dreams, Joseph was put in charge of all Egypt. In that position of honor and power, Joseph was able to save his family, bringing them into Egypt. 
It was here that they were able to grow into the nation that would become the means of God bringing to fruition His plan of the fulfillment of His promise to Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob. It was also the way of bringing the blessing of His salvation to all the nations of humanity through the giving of His Only Begotten Son, born of this Chosen People. However, we are getting ahead of ourselves at this point.
	The next person to consider is the one with whom we started this morning, Joshua. The Lord made a promise to this leader of the nation to be with him and to prosper him as the Lord had done with Moses throughout the wanderings of Israel in the wilderness. 
	Consider the encouragement from the Lord through Moses, in Deut 31:6, to Joshua. He was facing the prospect of leading this nation into the war of the conquest of the Promised Land. He needed to know that the Lord was going with him into this tremendous and unparalleled responsibility that was thrust upon him.  
Deut 31:6, Be strong and courageous, do not be afraid or tremble at them, for the Lord your God is the one who goes with you. He will not fail you or forsake you." This was the promise that Joshua required. It is the same promise that we each need to have embedded into our hearts and minds. The only way that any of us can truly not be afraid nor tremble at the ceaseless onslaughts of this age with all its pounding and crashing waves of doubt, and fears, and anxieties, and pandemics, and accusations and lies, and trials and tribulations, and smoke and mirror deceptions, is that we know the Lord is with us and that He goes before us. It needs to be embedded deep within the core depths of our hearts and minds that He will never fail us or forsake us, no matter what our circumstances or situation may be! God is with us always!
	 As the Lord directly told Joshua in Josh 1:5, he would not be alone after his mentor, Moses, was removed from the scene. The Lord would be with Joshua and would be as close to him as the Lord was to Moses. He had nothing to fear because no one could stand against the Lord Who was guiding and directing the every step of Joshua and His nation into the Promised Land.
	Josh 1:5, No man will be able to stand before you all the days of your life. Just as I have been with Moses, I will be with you; I will not fail you or forsake you. 
	Next, we will look at Eli and his sons, who suffered the opposite of the examples that we have considered to this point. They were a priesthood who did not count the Lord worthy of obedience. Eli was an old man who did not deal properly with his sons. They were using the Lord’s priesthood for their own ends, making a scandal of the name of Jehovah. They did not count the Lord as worthy of being honored and their priestly position as worth anything other than as an end to the means of their selfishness and fulfilling their lustful gratifications. The Lord withdrew His presence from them as expressed by the man of God to Eli in 1 Sam 2:30.
	1 Sam 2:30, "Therefore the Lord God of Israel declares, 'I did indeed say that your house and the house of your father should walk before Me forever'; but now the Lord declares, 'Far be it from Me — for those who honor Me I will honor, and those who despise Me will be lightly esteemed. 
    	Here we have the presence of the Lord being removed from the house of Eli because his son’s wickedness. They were God’s priests and representatives to the nation, but they did not esteem or show honor for that relationship with God. Therefore the Lord did not bless those men, but rather brought about their ruination in the midst of the people. 
We need to ever keep in the forefront of our hearts the fact that the blessing of God’s presence is something to be received with reverence and with honor. We cannot expect to know the blessing of God if we do not seek to bless Him with the honor and the joy and the reverence and the amazement of the fact that He desires to be with us. We need to be characterized by humble contriteness and utter thankfulness that He is with us in a living relationship as God Our Creator, Our Heavenly Father, Our Savior, Our Brother, and our Indwelling Guide and Comforter.
	One who knew this blessed presence of God and yearned to know the Lord in greater intimacy along the same lines as Moses and Joshua was David. We can read of this in several portions of scripture. We will begin with 1 Sam 18:14
	1 Sam 18:14, And David was prospering in all his ways for the Lord was with him. This was before David was King of Israel. It was during his time of service to King Saul. As a result of the Lord being with David, he was making a name for himself among the people. This would serve him well when he did become king. He was not seeking the throne, but the throne was his by virtue of his love for the Lord.
	Later, in 2 Sam 7:9, the Lord made known to then King David that his name would be carried forth forever. By virtue of the fact that the Lord was with David, his entire lineage would be blessed with the coming of The One Whose name would be above every name.
   	2 Sam 7:9, And I have been with you wherever you have gone and have cut off all your enemies from before you; and I will make you a great name, like the names of the great men who are on the earth. That name from the line of David is Jesus of Nazareth, The Christ, whose name will be forever worshipped and adored by those who are so blessed with His immediate presence. 
	This leads right into our next passage which details the fact that Our Lord Jesus Christ is the fulfillment of all that is put into place through the presence of God with man. It is in Jesus that the totality of all the blessing of God is lavished upon those who believe in His Only Begotten Son. We know a sense of the essence of the plan and the purpose of God in the giving His Son to die on the cross and then be resurrected in glory for you and for me. As a result of the victory of Jesus over sin and death, we are brought into that living relationship which transcends all else. Therefore we can know His immediate presence with us just as He promised for the fellowship of His believers in Matt 18:20.
	Matt 18:20, "For where two or three have gathered together in My name, there I am in their midst." As we are gathered together in the name of Jesus, so is His presence here with us. That is something that needs to be understood in our hearts and minds as we are in worship. So often we do so with merely that sense that it is something that is done on Sunday because we were taught to do it. Our parents did it and our grandparents, etc. It is more of a cultural or social gathering or a meeting of habit rather than the recognition that we are truly coming into the presence of the Lord God Almighty. We are His people and He is here, in this gathering with us! Accordingly, our behavior, our timeliness, our attitudes, our preparation, our focus, and our intentions need to be brought into line with the fact that we are gathered together to meet with the Lord and to bless Him with the best that we have to offer!
	As far as individually knowing the presence of the Lord, day by day, we have that promise as well from Christ recorded in Matt 28:19+20. This is the great commission, which applies to each one of us. It is not just for those who are called to the mission field abroad, or to the prisons, or the inner cities, or in any place that we think needs missionaries. It applies and calls us all into service in our homes, with our families and friends. It is at our jobs and in our classrooms. It is where we shop, or eat, or recreate. It is everywhere that we go because Christ Jesus is there with us and in us to minister to the needs of everyone we meet.
	Matt 28:19+20, "Go therefore and make disciples of all the nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit, teaching them to observe all that I commanded you; and lo, I am with you always, even to the end of the age. "   
	And as we read, this contains His personal promise to you and to me. This is the pledge from Christ, Himself, Our Savior, Our Lord, Our Brother, and Our Redeemer. …and lo, I am with you always, even to the end of the age. 
There is no where that we can go where we will be without the presence of the Lord in our lives. That is an assurance that we can hold near and dear in the midst of every situation and dilemma and circumstance. 
It is also a tremendous and awesome responsibility that can never be taken lightly of disregarded in any manner. Jesus Christ, the Lord of Heaven and Earth is with us in everything that we face on this earth. No matter what! We are never alone!
	As a manifest example, the Apostle Paul, in Acts 18:9+10, received this personal promise from the Lord when he was in Corinth. He was facing persecution and defiant hostility to the Gospel. Accordingly, the Lord promised His immediate presence with the Apostle through it all. It is the same promise that is ours in Christ. It should bring forth comfort and thanksgiving for our personal relationship in the immediate presence of our Lord. This is our comfort, especially in this devastating, ever changing, upside down, confused time in our lives. 
	Acts 18:9+10, And the Lord said to Paul in the night by a vision, "Do not be afraid any longer, but go on speaking and do not be silent; for I am with you, and no man will attack you in order to harm you, for I have many people in this city. " 
	This was such a strong and wonderful assurance of the power and the presence and the blessing of the Lord with his own, that the Apostle Paul wanted those believers in Corinth to know and to cherish it along with him. We find this tremendous truth, through the indwelling power of the Holy Spirit, recorded for them and for us in 2 Cor 13:14.    
2 Cor 13:14, The grace of the Lord Jesus Christ, and the love of God, and the fellowship of the Holy Spirit, be with you all.  
Then, in 2 Tim 4:17+18, the Apostle let Timothy know exactly how much we can all count on the very presence of the Lord to get us through the hardships and the turmoil and the assaults and the pandemics of this age. As Christ is with us, we have nothing to fear! He will see us through to eternity by the Omnipotence and Omniscience the Omnipresence that is found in God Alone!
2 Tim 4:17+18, But the Lord stood with me, and strengthened me, in order that through me the proclamation might be fully accomplished, and that all the Gentiles might hear; and I was delivered out of the lion's mouth. The Lord will deliver me from every evil deed, and will bring me safely to His heavenly kingdom; to Him be the glory forever and ever. Amen. 
    	Once again, we have the fact of the blessing of the Lord upon us as proclaimed through the Apostle to Timothy in 2 Tim 4:22. As we consider the grace of God with us through every stage and course of our life, we are blessed beyond measure. The Lord is with us and in that reality we are covered completely and perfectly by the full essence and assurance and presence of God, yesterday, today, and forever!
	2 Tim 4:22, The Lord be with your spirit. Grace be with you. So be it!
So the Lord was with Joshua, and his fame was in all the land. Amen. 

			
	This morning’s benediction is Ps 71:14. But as for me, I will hope continually, And will praise Thee yet more and more. Amen.