Religion

Bible Study with Pastor R. M. Spooney, Th.D.
Mt. Zion Missionary Baptist Institutional Church, Orlando, FL
The Ministry of God’s Servant:
A Study of Joshua 5:9

9 And the LORD said unto Joshua, This day have I rolled away the reproach of Egypt from off you. Wherefore the name of the place is called Gilgal unto this day. The NLT reads, 9 Then the LORD said to Joshua, “Today I have rolled away the shame of your slavery in Egypt.” So that place has been called Gilgal to this day.
The reproach of Egypt has been rolled away. The reproach of Egypt! This is God talking! God says I have rolled away the Reproach of Egypt, in other words, He is saying I have erased your past! I have rolled away all your mistakes, I have rolled away 2019! Anybody paying attention? Every sin, every problem, every fault, every impression, every situation that took over your life in 2019 God says I have rolled them away. Everybody today got a fresh start. Yesterday is no longer, it’s gone! You messed up in January, God said it’s gone, stuff you did in September God say don’t worry about it because it’s been put to bed! Let me see if I can make that plain, you can’t be blessed in 2020 when you got issues from last year and you cannot let people determine how you praise God. You can’t let people in the church stop you from using the gift that God has given you. If it’s a real gift don’t let people have that kind of power over your life. If God is calling you to sing get in the choir, if you are called to Usher, then be an usher! Do whatever God has called you to do I mean whatever God has called you to do not what you think you want to do but whatever God has called you to do.
If God has called you to preach, I guarantee that He also called you to obey His Word. It blows my mind in the Church of God because too many of us in the church are just like babies everything bothers us, everything hurts our feelings, too many church people including supposed to be preachers are walking around with pacifiers in their mouths, you got to cuddle them, they feel entitled, you got to make them feel good about themselves. Well, you don’t need anyone to do that for you because you are a child of God, you have been bought with a price, God died on the cross for your sins to make you who you are! You don’t need anybody to validate you, Jesus did that for you when he died on the cross. So what if they don’t like you, they don’t put food on your table, but on the other hand don’t do stuff to make people dislike you!
The term “reproach of Egypt” refers to two events during Israel’s wilderness wanderings. The first is found in Exodus 32 when the Children of Israel made a golden calf and worshiped it as God. The bible says in Exodus 32:7, 7 And the LORD said to Moses, “Go, get down! For your people whom you brought out of the land of Egypt have corrupted themselves. May I Spoonerize that verse? Your people acting stupid!! The other happened at Kadesh-Barnea when the children of Israel displayed unbelief and refused to enter into the Promised Land as indicated in Numbers 14:11-12, 11 Then the LORD said to Moses: “How long will these people reject Me? And how long will they not believe Me, with all the signs which I have performed among them? 12 I will strike them with the pestilence and disinherit them, and I will make of you a nation greater and mightier han they.” The “reproach of Egypt” refers to the sins the people brought with them in their hearts and lives when they came out of Egypt. On both occasions, the Lord threatened to destroy the nation of Israel and start fresh with Moses. Both times Moses interceded with the Lord and reminded Him that destroying Israel would give the Egyptians a reason to mock God. In other words God brought them out of Egypt, but He had to also bring the Egypt out of them! And I found it interesting that these people forgot! You see, God had just brought them out of Egypt, God had just opened the Red Sea, God brought them manna from heaven, water from a rock and now they couldn’t remember who this God is! And I submit that some of you reading this have spiritual amnesia. All that God has done for you how dare you act like you made it just because you got a college degree. It was nobody but Jesus.
Now they are in the land and God has proven that He is well able to bring His people into their possession, so He tells them that He has rolled that reproach away! “Gilgal” means, “rolling.” In other words, their past was no longer an issue. It had been forever “rolled” away. It was a new day! The children of Israel were to contemplate the work of God in their lives in removing from them the reproach of the past. That tells me that too many of God’s children are still living under the “reproach of Egypt”.
You may be living with the shame of some stuff you did before you came to faith in Christ. You may be ashamed of times when you have failed the Lord since you were saved but let me remind you today that as you go into 2020 you need to contemplate, you need to consider the fact that if you have placed your faith in Jesus Christ for salvation, your past is no longer an issue because the Bible says in 1 John 1:9, says 9 If we confess our sins, He is faithful and just to forgive us our sins and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness.
Dr. Robert M. Spooney is the Pastor of Mt. Zion Missionary Baptist Church, the founder and CEO of R.M. Spooney and Associates.. He is an authority on church and business marketing and church outreach. Pastor Spooney is available to come and minister at any church function that you would prayerfully consider him. You can reach Dr. Spooney via email at rmspooney@gmail.com. On line donations to Mount Zion Missionary Baptist Institutional Church can be made through the Givelify Ap
You’re Invited: 10:45AM – Sunday Morning Worship, Mt. Zion Missionary Baptist Church, 535 West Washington St., Orlando, Florida 32801.