Being Formed into a Corporate Joshua to Take the Land by Enjoying the All-inclusive Christ

In order for us to possess the good land and defeat the satanic forces, we need to be formed into a corporate Joshua, an army, so that we may take the land and enjoy Christ in His all-inclusiveness.

We have seen that for us to enjoy Christ as the all-inclusive One, the reality of the good land, there is the need of spiritual warfare, for the enemy fights against us because he doesn’t want us to enjoy the all-inclusive Christ and take the land.

Ephesians 6 gives us the spiritual reality of the warfare existing in the spiritual realm, and the book of Joshua shows us a practical picture and illustration of what this warfare is like.

Everything is ready for us as God’s people to enter into the possession of the good land, but we need to rise up and go out and take the land, that is, we need to enter into the enjoyment of the all-inclusive Christ daily.

We were dead in sins and offenses but God raised us up and made us alive in Christ, and He has transferred us into His kingdom, giving us an allotted portion of Christ to enjoy with all the saints in the light.

We need to fight against the satanic forces which keep us from the enjoyment of Christ, realising that there is a spiritual warfare in the invisible scene behind the visible scene. There are many things that are used and usurped by Satan to hinder us from entering into the land to enjoy the all-inclusive Christ.

There are demons and spiritual forces, and there is also our natural life with its many aspects, which is being used and manipulated by the forces of evil to frustrate us from taking possession of the all-inclusive Christ as the reality of the good land and from enjoying His riches.

We may think that we don’t sin and we don’t commit evil things, but as long as we live in our natural life, we are frustrated from possessing Christ and enjoying Him. Oh Lord Jesus!

May we be those who are young and living and fresh, those who are formed into a corporate Joshua to enter into the good land and possess the good land to enjoy all the riches of the all-inclusive Christ.

To Possess the Good Land We need to be Formed into a Corporate Joshua, the Army of God

The people of Israel had to go through some particular experiences and have a particular training and requirements in order for them to be qualified to enter the army and go and possess the good land.

In order for us as believers in Christ to possess the good land and defeat the satanic forces, we need to be formed into a corporate Joshua (Josh. 1:2-3, 6-9).

God has called us to enter into the good land and enjoy the riches of the all-inclusive Christ, but there’s the need of fighting.

Our fighting is not against flesh and blood, but against the spiritual forces in the air, and especially against the enemy within us.

To defeat the satanic forces and possess the good land, we need to be formed into a corporate Joshua.

There has to be an army formed. And for this, there are some steps:

1. We need to take Christ as our Passover, enjoying Him as the Lamb of God and being saved inwardly. This is typified by the people of Israel eating the Passover in Egypt.
2. We need to leave the world behind. The people of Israel are the Passover and left Egypt. We need to eat Christ and leave the world behind.
3. We need to have the testimony of God. The children of Israel has the tabernacle set up and built, and this was the testimony of God and His presence. We need to have the testimony of God in our living daily, and in particular we need to have the testimony of God in our church life.
4. We need to experience Christ as the reality of all the offerings. We need to take Christ as the reality of the sin offering, the trespass offering, the meal offering, the peace offering, and the burnt offering.
5. We need to experience Christ as our High Priest and enter into the priesthood. We need to assume the priesthood and serve God.

When we go through all these experiences, we will be formed into an army. Furthermore, as we see in the book of Joshua, there are some qualifications for being formed into a corporate Joshua, that is, for joining the army to fight the battle for the good land. There at last five such qualifications.

1. For us to be part of the army we need to have a pedigree, that is, to have a genealogy, a lineage. We need to be part of God’s family and know who are our fathers in the Lord. Not just anyone can join the army – you had to be part of God’s family and have a spiritual genealogy.
2. We need to have a certain growth in life. Only those twenty years old and over could join the army, which denotes that a certain growth in life is necessary for us to be part of the corporate Joshua.
3. We must be under our own standard according to our houses. The people of Israel were in their tribes, and each had to be under their own standard. By God’s sovereignty we are in a certain local church, where God placed us, and we should drop our preference and choice and be joined to the saints where we are to be God’s army. Even if we don’t particularly like the saints we are with or we prefer to have different leading brothers, we still have to stay where God placed us and be formed into a corporate Joshua.
4. We need to be in a proper order. When the people of Israel were moving, they had the tabernacle at the center surrounded by the priests, and then the twelve tribes were properly ordered in the four directions. In the Body of Christ there’s a particular order, and we need to exercise submission to the Lord’s arrangement. For us to be formed into a corporate Joshua we need to exercise submission to the Lord’s arrangement in the church life.
5. We need to be fresh and young. The old generation which came out of Egypt were strewn and died in the wilderness, but their children who were now fresh and young entered into the good land. We need to bury away the old and be fresh and young with the Lord to be formed into a corporate Joshua.

Lord Jesus, we want to be formed into a corporate Joshua so that we may possess the good land and defeat the satanic forces. Amen, Lord, we take You as our Passover, we eat You, we come out of the world, we want to build up the church and have the testimony of God, and we want to enjoy You as the reality of all the offerings. Lord, may we experience You as our High Priest, and may we enter into the priesthood. Amen, Lord, form us into the army that fights for gaining the good land! Grant us the adequate growth in life. Save us from our preference and choice. Grant us to be submissive to your arrangement, and make us fresh and young!

Christ as the Good Land is Ready: we need to Possess the Good Land by Enjoying the All-inclusive Christ!

When did God’s people possess the good land? It was not when Abraham entered into it and walked in it, and it wasn’t when the people of Israel were in Egypt; the promise of possessing the good land was fulfilled when the people of Israel gained it and took possession of it.

The promise was there; the land was theirs, but it was only when they took possession of it that this became a practical fact. God, the Giver, has done everything; there was the need for Israel, the receiver, to do something to take possession of what God has given.

It is the same principle with us today. God’s salvation has been promised, prepared, and completed in Christ; everything is ready for this salvation to be given to the sinners. But who responds to God and who receives His gift of salvation?

Whoever opens to the Lord and receives Him, he does God a favor – he receives God, he enjoys God, and he enters into the good land.

In the beginning of the book of Joshua we see how the land is ready, but the people of Israel had to go and take the good land, possess it, and enjoy it.

Christ as the all-inclusive One is ready – He has been prepared by God, and He is ready to be enjoyed by us; we, however, need to enter into the possession of the good land and enjoy it.

Where are those who are ready to take Christ, possess Christ, and enjoy Christ as the all-inclusive good land?

Many sinners are not willing to respond to Christ, and even many believers are not willing to respond to Him by taking Him, possessing Him, and enjoying Him.

God needs man’s cooperation in the principle of incarnation; we need to be one with God in His heart’s desire and in His move today.

On His side, Christ is ready, He has been given to us, and He is truly the reality of the land flowing with milk and honey; on our side, we need to take the land and enjoy Christ.

God gives us the all-inclusive Christ as the good land, but we can’t sit passively and wait for the land to become ours; we need to go out and take the land!

We have to put aside our passivity, take the initiative, and stand with God’s word to go out and take the land, the all-inclusive Christ! This requires that we deny the self, deny our passivity, and reject anything that holds us back, so that we may render the Lord our cooperation.

On His side, the Lord is ready to remove these satanic forces and spiritual powers, but He will not do it all at once; as seen in Exo. 23:29-30, God promised to drive these pagan tribes little by little, not all at once, otherwise the land becomes empty and beasts would come in.

Even though we have to fight and defeat the satanic forces, the natural life, and the self, God will not wipe out all these enemies at once; He will do it little by little, depending on our growth in life and cooperation with Him.

As we go forward and respond to the Lord’s call to take the land by being formed as a corporate Joshua, we grow in life, and the enemy is defeated little by little. The more we grow in the Lord, the more we defeat the enemy.

We need to cooperate with God by rising up to fulfill God’s commission to possess the good land (Josh. 1:10-15). Every place on which the sole of our foot treads God has given to us, even as He has promised; every inch of Christ that we enjoy and possess is ours as the good land.

Lord Jesus, we want to cooperate with You and enter into the enjoyment of the all-inclusive Christ! Amen, Lord, we want to take the land by enjoying this Christ every day! We stand against any passivity and we reject the self and the natural life; we come out of ourselves and unto You to be one with You and enjoy You as the good land! We want to be one with You and Your heart’s desire and in Your move on earth today. Hallelujah, the all-inclusive Christ is the good land ready to be taken by us, His believers! Lord, may we be ready to take Christ, possess Christ, experience Christ, and enjoy Christ in His all-inclusiveness!

References and Hymns on this Topic

• Inspiration: the Word of God, my enjoyment in the ministry, the message given by James Lee for this week, and portions from, Life-study of Joshua, msgs. 1-2 (by Witness Lee), as quoted in the Holy Word for Morning Revival on, The Spiritual Warfare of the Church as the New Man (2018 Memorial Day Conference), week 5, The Formation of a Corporate Joshua to Possess the Good Land by Defeating the Satanic Forces.
• Hymns on this topic:
  # Let’s take the land! The land that God has given us; / In all our living, Christ can be so much: / To take this land, we have th’ equipment that we need— / The blood, the Word, the Spirit, and the church. / Let’s take the land! O Christian brothers, / The land that God has given us. / Be strong and take it, for we can make it / And gain this land so glorious! (Hymns #1287)
  # It’s “Amen, Lord! Amen, Lord! Amen to Your Word!” / On to victory! On to victory! / Cries our great Commander—On! / We’ll move at His command / And now possess the land / By “Amen, Lord! Amen, Lord! Amen to Your Word!” (Hymns #1286)
  # God has set the land before us, / And the land we will possess. / God has finally found a people / Tired of the wilderness. / Down with every weight and sin; / Let’s go up and enter in. (Hymns #1166)