SUNDAY SERMON: Choose, this day!
By Rev. Stephen Baldwin
OT: Joshua 24.1-2a, 14-18
Judaism was the world’s first monotheistic religion. The first religion to believe in one god. Up until that point in history, it was a polytheistic world. Everyone believed in many gods.
The god of cinnamon rolls, the god of pizza, the god of ferris wheels, and the god of cows. I’ve still got the State Fair on my brain…but you get the point. There was a separate god for everything up until that point. And Judaism was the first religion to put forward the radical idea that one God, Yahweh, was Lord over all.
As you might imagine, that idea was as popular as a raw vegetable stand on the midway. People wanted nothing to do with it.
That’s where we pick up today’s reading, with Joshua delivering his final sermon to people trying one last time to convince them they believe in the one true God.
The context is that Joshua led the people of Israel into a new land. These are good times for them. And Joshua wants them to remember why times are good. Because God took care of them. God kept the covenant with them. God protected them. The question now is: Will the people remember God? Will they remember to worship the God who has blessed them? So he famously says, “Choose this day whom you will serve.”
For Joshua, it’s an urgent choice because we are constantly struggling to center ourselves. Frederick Buechner, a Presbyterian minister and author, puts the same concept a little differently. He speaks about two battles we all engage in. One is the battle to be somebody. The battle to do well, to find success, to have a nice house, to drive a fancy car, to have a good job. That battle is all that stuff in our pockets. We all work hard and fight that battle to find our place in the sun.
But we often fail at that battle because of the real battle. It’s the one inside us. The battle to find our soul’s center. Not the external stuff. We get the nice house, but we never feel at home. We find success, but we never feel satisfied. You know what that battle feels like? It can be exhausting. Then choose this day whom you will serve and find your soul’s center.
We’re all going to serve someone or something, right? That is part of our constitution. An easy way to think about it is this: what do you go to bed thinking about? What do you think about when you wake up? That might be your god. That’s probably what or who you serve.
Everybody’s life has to have a center. That changes over time. Joshua says with urgency that he and his household are choosing to serve God and everything else flows from that.
We have to make the choice because God is not going to compel us. God will not compel us to worship God. While God chose us long ago, we don’t have to choose God. While God called us, we have to choose to respond.
Think about some of the most important decisions you’ve ever made. Family. Kids, jobs, marriage, faith. What are some of the most important decisions you’ve ever made? When you think about those moments, were they forced? Can you force anybody to love you? Can you compel someone to respect you? It doesn’t work that way. When we think about the most important moments in our life, we realize what Joshua was getting at. Servants of God don’t do it because they have to, they do it because they want to. Choose this day whom you will serve.
The Rev. Christine Johnson wrote the following covenant renewal which I found to be very helpful in setting me in the right frame of mind for Joshua’s message:
“Every day we journey on this earth is a day in which we make choices: left or right, up or down, in or out, yes or no? Some choices are simple, and some are very complex, but one choice informs all the others: Who will be our God? Who will we trust to see us through this journey? Who has been with us from before the beginning, bringing us into existence? Who has loved us and blessed us and sent us on our way? Who has pointed us toward the path and posted the signs we need to find our way? Who has been at our side when the road has been smooth and gently curving? Who has kept with us through hairpin turns
and construction zones and potholes and detours? Who will celebrate with us when we complete our course and seek the comfort of eternity?
Only One. The One and Only. Holy One. The One and Holy.
Will you choose this day to stay faithful to the One who is faithful to us?
Count us in.
Will you choose this day to place your whole trust in the One who is trustworthy? Count us in.
Will you choose this day to commit your talents and your resources
to the One who first endowed them? Count us in.
Will you choose this day to love the One who loved us first? Count us in.”
My favorite part of this story actually comes later. After Joshua challenges the people to choose this day whom you will serve and the people essentially say, “yes,” he keeps going. He doesn’t stop there! He wouldn’t just take yes for an answer. That puzzles me. Why isn’t yes good enough?
It’s because all the deep commitments we make in this life need to be renewed. Think about a young couple standing in front of a congregation to make their vows. They’re nervous. They stumble through the words. They worry about how they look. He puts her ring on the wrong finger. She drops his on the ground. They smile. The minister tries to guide them.
But the vows are only the beginning. The couple will endure all sorts of things in the years to come. Moving trucks and assembling furniture and puppies and taxes and children. Losing parents. Changing jobs. They had a sense of urgency at their wedding, but that commitment requires renewal through the changes of life.
That’s why Joshua says choose THIS DAY whom you will serve. Because it’s a commitment we must renew every single day. There was a lady I used to visit at the nursing home, and when you’d ask her how she was doing, she’d say, “I’m taking it half a day at a time.” Wise words indeed.
Numerous things compete for our attention every single minute of every single day. Choose this day whom you will serve. Renew the commitment you made long ago. Find your soul’s center. Choose this day whom you will serve. And be ready to make that choice every day from this day forward. Amen.
