Battling Spiritual Drift: “As for me and my house…”

¹⁴ “Now fear the LORD and serve him with all faithfulness. Throw away the gods your forefathers worshiped beyond the River and in Egypt, and serve the LORD. ¹⁵ But if serving the LORD seems undesirable to you, then choose for yourselves this day whom you will serve, whether the gods your forefathers served beyond the River, or the gods of the Amorites, in whose land you are living. But as for me and my household, we will serve the LORD.” — Joshua 24:14-15

In this passage, Joshua, the great leader who had guided God’s people into the Promised Land, gathered the elders and leaders of Israel at Shechem as he prepared to die (just as Moses had done). This was a historically important place with covenantal overtones; it was where God’s promises were remembered or renewed with Abraham and Jacob. Against the backdrop of this historic location, Joshua was preparing for his farewell as he performed a covenant renewal ceremony so that the next generation of God’s people would remain faithfully committed to the Lord.

Joshua begins to preside over the renewal of the covenant among the elders and leaders of Israel whom he gathered (24:1) by first recalling God’s covenant faithfulness (24:2-13). He recalls God’s faithfulness to Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob. He reminds Israel of how God delivered them from slavery in Egypt through Moses. He recalled the protection of the Lord in the Israelite journey through the wilderness amidst their enemies, the Amorites and Moabites. And of course, there was the crossing of the Jordan River and the victory that God handed his people at Jericho so that they could enter the Promised Land. In other words, “This is what God has done for you.”

Let’s take a brief break right here. What do we learn so far? That when there’s uncertainty and transition in our lives, when times are dark or difficult, when there are reasons to shrink back in fear, we are called to remember God’s faithfulness. Why? Because like Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, we are still like pilgrims in the world; we may have an address, but that is not our real home. We may live in a “free” country, but that doesn’t mean we are not still enslaved by sin and idolatry; our idols today may not be made of wood, stone, or gold, but they are still controlling powers in our lives—the gods of money, power, marriage, family, politics, comfort, and approval, as examples. We may live in or near a large city, but the Bible says that all of life is still a wilderness; danger is everywhere, and enemies are always present seeking to deceive, trap, and devour us. Here’s the issue: we’ve grown comfortable with a perception of security, freedom, and safety; we’ve become desensitized to the dangers that lie ahead. Not just in the immediate ten months ahead; I’m talking about ten years: in the next ten years, some of us will experience the death of loved ones, some of us will experience tragedy, some of us may experience betrayals and the types of brokenness that could break up our families, some of us will lose financial security, some of us will grow sick, and yes, some of us will lose our lives. Joshua recounts every horror that Israel endured throughout its history and concludes, “Our Lord has been faithful in keeping his covenantal promise to his people; remember what God has done for you.”

Why do we so easily forget? We are what is called a syncretistic people—meaning, the greater issue is not that our hearts are “binary” in our affections—that we choose to love and serve other gods apart from the Lord; that certainly is a problem, but likely not the greater issue in our day. Perhaps, the greater issue is that we have found ways to merge our devotion to worldly gods while somehow managing to clear our consciences and still profess faith in Jesus. We have learned to pursue wealth apart from our relationship with God, even as we profess that God is our Savior and Lord.

Let’s be clear about how this plays out in the church across America in our society. Today, people have no issue with confidently saying that their relationship with God is a priority; the issue is that our relationship with God is not our highest priority. So, we readily worship with one hand raised high, while the other holds a latte (this is a metaphor—I am clearly not saying that it’s necessarily wrong to do that). We don’t hold the Scriptures as the standard by which we assess cultural values—even values that the church could readily align with. We say that our relationship with the Lord is important, but statistically, only 14% of professing Christians read the Bible at least once per week; we attend our churches roughly two times monthly, participate in community groups unless something better comes up, rarely attend Adult Sunday School classes or outreach to the neighborhood, almost never give sacrificially, consider signing up for conferences and retreats in the church when there are no better options, and go silent when friends in the church attempt to speak into our hardness of heart, complaining heart, self-serving heart, or rebellious heart.

If this is what we mean when we say our careers are a priority—thus, how we conduct business, work culture, and participation at work—we’d likely not have work in the near future. If this is what we mean by saying our families are a priority, we’d have angry family members. If this is what we mean when we say our education is a priority—or any given class, project, or thesis—we’d likely not be able to earn a degree. If this is what we mean by saying our wealth is a priority, we’d likely end up losing much of it. See, but we don’t mean that when it comes to our careers, families, education, or wealth. When we say that we value any of these things, we put a tremendous amount of time, energy, money, and dedication to building our lives into them; there is a double standard when it comes to spiritual flourishing versus material flourishing.

The thing is, Israel had never done well in times of prosperity; at least half of the Old Testament can directly speak to that. And we’re pretty awful ourselves. Our syncretism and compromise are like an epidemic in the American church today. It’s what we call spiritual drift. Spiritual drift is a gradual movement of the heart away from a steadfast faith, hope, love, and obedience to the Lord, not through an intentional choice to reject or rebel against God, but through neglect, distraction, and misplaced loves that feed unbelief. It often happens through a gradual distancing from one’s relationship with the Lord due to overriding, competing values that either replace or coexist with it in our lives.

Joshua—and the leaders before and after him—were very concerned about drift—even more so than Israel’s homelessness, its enemies, and its perils. What was Joshua’s solution to spiritual drift? He says, “Fear the LORD, and serve him with all faithfulness (24:14).” How? Throw away the gods that everyone around you worships and serve the LORD. Or choose whom you will serve (24:15). This is striking because look at all that Joshua recounted regarding the faithfulness of God, but he clearly knew that God’s people were prone to wander away from intimacy with the Lord and his promises. So, Joshua says, “But my household will serve the LORD.” When he says, “We will serve the LORD,” he was referencing a covenantal word for the name of God, Yahweh—a name used only by people who had a deep, personal relationship with God. This was a commitment to a singular faithfulness and a personal repentance (the ridding of one’s idols in 24:14) in response to the grace afforded God’s people; he was responding to what he remembers.

Then, how do we battle spiritual drift? We have an even greater resource that we can remember. We can recall One who is greater than Abraham, who “left the Father’s throne above, so free, so infinite his grace,” and lived life as the ultimate pilgrim—homeless and poor—because of his faithfulness to the promises of God. We know One greater than Isaac, who sacrificed his life to fulfill the promise of God. We can recount One who is greater than Jacob—who wrestled and endured the full wrath of God—and died to fulfill his promises. We look to Someone who is greater than Moses, who wrought the true plague of God’s judgment on himself and bore them for the sake of his people; Jesus Christ willingly entered the waters of God’s wrath on the cross so that his people can cross over to new life. We can trust in Christ, the true and faithful Israel, who went into the ultimate wilderness of death on the cross—and faithfully endured—so that we can enter the ultimate land of promise in his presence forever.

No one served the Father, was obedient to death and yet paid the price for our violations of our covenant relationship with God like Jesus, and when we trust in him, it does not remove us from the work of battling spiritual drift, but it assures us of victory and gives us the power to see it, confess it, repent of it, endure it, and return to the Lord worshipfully, responsively, generously, and actively. The gospel of Jesus Christ doesn’t free us from any work required to battle the causes of our drift, but it frees us from the work to earn God’s favor through it. We’ve been saved from our sin and idols. Our God is present in every fear, every uncertainty, every failure, every trial, every plague, every loss, every wilderness, and every dark moment to yield good fruit in those who remember the gospel and remain steadfast in the Lord. They will then say, “I will remember the deeds of the LORD; yes, I will remember your miracles of long ago (Psalm 77:11).”

The summer season has begun. For many of us, it’s a time to rest and recover: we take long vacations and make the most of the longer days with family and friends. It’s these moments of prosperity when we are most prone to forget God. We often abandon the Fourth Commandment. We would rather not live sacrificially. We forsake intimacy with God through his Word, while pursuing other relationships. We would prefer to withhold than to be generous. Doing what honors the Lord, regardless of how you feel, is not legalism; rather, not doing what honors God unless you “feel like doing it” is selfish hedonism.

Remembering the faithfulness of God in the Person and Work of Jesus Christ is not merely a cognitive act; it requires faithfulness of heart, soul, mind, and will. So, apply the pattern of Joshua’s call to God’s people in this passage (1) by recalling God’s faithfulness—through the Scriptures—and in your personal story of salvation—How has the Lord been faithful to you in Christ? (2) by removing the idols that have been competing for your soul by replacing old patterns with godly patterns—these are matters of the will; (3) by renewing your commitment to God’s covenantal love and promises—these are matters of the heart—about committing in prayer and meditation, how you feel, what you are thinking about, what you daydream about, and what you desire; (4) by renewing your worship of the Lord among those whom you love—through corporate worship and intentional fellowship and discipleship.

Why am I sharing this as we head into the summer? Because there is no greater way to prepare for the busyness of the latter half of the year than to intentionally reflect, repent, and shift our focus on the Lord during a season of growth, vacations, rest, prosperity, and enjoyment. Second, spiritual drift is a real problem among all generations in the church today; it is my prayer that we would battle it together, personally and corporately, as a church. Lastly, we are so concerned about this as a key to the spiritual demise of many in the church—and because we are all so at risk—that we are dedicating our first churchwide conference to confront the issue as a body. Don’t give spiritual drift any oxygen to breathe; of course, many of us have been in drift quite a while. In any case, the summer is an amazing time to be honest with yourself, and to renew your covenant commitment to the Lord the way Joshua called on God’s people by challenging them to “choose for yourselves this day whom you will serve, whether the gods your forefathers served beyond the River, or the gods of the Amorites, in whose land you are living. But as for me and my household, we will serve the LORD.”