Well, I didn’t realize there were so many here. Good evening, brothers. It’s good to be with you.
I’ll ask you to open your Bibles, please, to Joshua 3, if you would.
I don’t know how this is going to work. As we come to the study of God’s Word, there’s a principle of Bible study that’s absolutely indispensable—a principle of Bible study that we can’t take for granted. We can’t live without.
I never tire of sharing that principle, and I share it with myself when I’m alone at home. I’m talking about total reliance upon God’s Holy Spirit: helpless dependence. That’s the indispensable principle, not only of Bible study, but of all life.
We thank the Lord for all of the helps, the aids, the assistances in the study of His Word. We’re thankful for the commentaries, the word studies, the concordances, the atlases, the books of sermons and meditations, and all kinds of help.
But after you’ve done the donkey work, and after you’ve looked at it academically, you’ve got to get alone with the Lord as a little baby, as a little child. You’ve got to pour out your heart to the Lord and just ask Him to put the light on the Lord Jesus Christ.
Only God can reveal God, and He delights to do it. He longs to do it. I’m believing that He wants to show Himself again this weekend as we meet in His name.
I’m going to ask you, brothers, to join with me, please, in prayer as we call upon the Lord and ask Him to guide us as we look at His Word—a very familiar portion of His Word—that He would dawn Himself upon us.
He has not promised to bless the word that goes forth out of my mouth. He has promised to bless the Word that goes forth out of His mouth. So, we need Him to speak. Let’s pray.
Our heavenly Father, we do thank Thee this evening that You have privileged us to come and to gather in Your name, and to wait before Your Holy Spirit.
We know that it is Your delight to put the light upon the Lord Jesus, and then, when He is in the light, to enable us to walk in the light, as He is in the light.
You inspired this Bible, and now we ask You to breathe again upon it. We pray that our hearts would be open to Your heart, that we might see in a living way our Lord Jesus Christ.
We thank You in advance that You’re going to meet us this weekend. We pray that all that You’ve planned from before the foundation of the earth would come to fruition now, this weekend, in every heart, in every life.
We pray that You’d enable us, by Your miracle, to be completely detached from all the affairs and the cares of life, that by Your miracle we might be focused in a living way upon the Lord Himself.
We pray that this would not only be a blessing to everyone here, but it might be a blessing to Your heart, Lord, as You see us gathered in this way, in this place.
Thank You in advance for over-answering our prayer. Meet with us now. We ask in the matchless name of our Lord Jesus. Amen.
In our time together, in our sessions together, I want to sort of look at a whole body, a whole divinity—a lot of ground to cover. May God help us to do it.
The foundational truths that I’d like to share with you this weekend are sort of cut out of Israel’s history. I don’t expect to give you anything you haven’t heard, but I pray that you get it in a living way, and that the Lord would anoint this precious portion of His Word.
It’s cut out of a very strategic part of Israel’s history. All of Israel’s history is redemptive history, and by that we mean that it tells the story of our redemption. But in a special way, some parts of Israel’s history are more strategic than other parts.
This particular section of Scripture, this slice of Israel’s history, is filled with profound instruction from every point of view. So, I just pray that the Lord will help us.
Everything before this in Israel’s history was preparing them for this particular event. Everything that follows this particular section of Scripture is going to relate to this and depend upon what’s happening here.
I’m talking about the section that begins with the crossing of the Jordan River and goes all the way to the victory at Ai.
Moses is now in heaven with the Lord. A second generation of believers—if we believe the last census that was taken in Numbers, a little over six hundred thousand of them—have gathered now and are standing on the shores of this swollen river.
In front of them, from one point of view, is a land of enemies: Canaanites, Hittites, Hivites, Perizzites, and so on. God had promised to dispossess them in order that His people could go into the land.
It’s called the Promised Land: a land of milk, honey, corn, wine, pomegranates, vineyards, valleys, and hills that drank the abundance of God’s rain. It’s called the good land, the fair land, the Promised Land, the fruitful land.
It’s the land of your possession. It’s the Lord’s inheritance.
He brought us out, that He might bring us in.
Deuteronomy 6:23.
This is the crisis of these redeemed people of God. They had been saved by power and blood out of Egypt. They’ve been wandering around for thirty-eight and a half years out of the will of God—still in the will of God, but you know the story—wandering around in that wilderness.
Now here they stood, with the good land in front of them and a man named Jesus, prepared by God to take them in. A new beginning, sort of a crisis in their history.
Now, because there’s so much material, I need to trust the Lord, and you need to trust Him with me, that as we touch on some of these facts that are so familiar, we wouldn’t be overwhelmed.
As I prepared my heart for this particular weekend, the Lord used my wife in a mighty way. I asked her for prayer, and we prayed together. We got ready to pray, and she said to me, “Exactly what would you like me to pray?”
Well, I was sort of hoping she would know.
What I said was, “I want you to pray that I’ll give what I’m supposed to give.”
But that’s not how she prayed. She told me a story first about Deuteronomy 32:2:
Let my teaching drop as the rain,
And my speech distill as the dew,
As the droplets on the fresh grass,
As showers on the herb.
Then she gave me this little story about the rain, and how some rain is good and some rain is not good for the crop. She said, “From what you’ve been sharing with me, I think you’re going to send the flood this weekend. You’re going to get all these facts and just dump it on them, and too much rain will hurt the crop.”
I said, “Pray that I might say what I’m supposed to say.” When she prayed, she prayed this way: “Lord, help him leave out what he’s supposed to leave out.”
I’ll tell you, that touched my heart.
That’s what I have prayed since we prayed together. I don’t want this gathering to be just a flood and a bunch of information and facts you already know and that you’re going to look at again. I don’t want to give everything, but I want to give something, and I want it to be God’s heart.
I want to share a very particular part of this marvelous section of Scripture, and pray that the Lord will make it intensely practical in your heart.
So that we’re all on the same page, let me sort of home in on what I’d like to look at, and then we’ll begin with it.
There are really four events. If the Lord allows what we put in the bulletin, I’ll have four opportunities. He can change that, you know, any moment—at His any-moment return, or any other way He’d like to change it. But here’s what’s planned:
Jordan, Gilgal, Jericho, and Ai.
You say, “Well, what are we going to talk about—how to cross the Jordan, and the lessons at Gilgal, and how to take Jericho, and how to continue after the fall at Ai?”
In a sense, yes, but not really.
My guess is, from what I know about this particular gathering, that probably for some of you, many, many years ago, you already learned what it meant to cross Jordan, and by God’s grace you’ve already crossed Jordan.
You already know what it means to have the reproach of Egypt rolled away at Gilgal, and you’ve been there. You’ve already tasted what it means to storm the walls of Jericho, how to fall down and get up after Ai, and continue on in faith.
So, we’re not really going to look at how to cross Jordan, though we are; how to go to Gilgal, though we are; and Jericho, and so on.
The burden that’s on my heart is this: there were about three-quarters of a million people standing there, ready to get into the land.
Not, “How do I cross Jordan?” But, “How can I help them cross Jordan?” That’s what I want to focus on.
How can I help so many people—especially the second generation of believers? Not so much, “How can I camp at Gilgal?” but, “How can I help three-quarters of a million people get to Gilgal?” Not so much, “How can I take Jericho?” but, “Is there some way I can help them take Jericho and learn the lessons of Ai?”
Let me home in a little closer. The chief point, of course, is the land. The land of milk and honey is God’s picture of Christ—the life of milk and honey.
What’s the point of crossing Jordan if you don’t get to the land? That’s the point of crossing: to get to the land. And the land is Christ.
How can I help others get to Christ? That’s the point.
What’s the point of going to Gilgal and learning the lesson at Gilgal if I can’t help others get to Christ? That’s the point of Gilgal. The preparation that they learned there was to get them into the land.
What good is storming Jericho if we don’t possess the land? And so on.
This weekend, what I’d like to look at, God assisting, is this: how can we help others get to Him, claim Him, appropriate Him, live in Him, camp in Him, and feed off Him, as you would live in the land and live off the land?
Let me focus one more time. It’s not only Jordan, Gilgal, Jericho, and Ai. It’s not only the crowd—how can we help them? But each story has a unique instrument that God used, and I’d like to focus on that instrument.
For example, how can I help others cross the Jordan? Watch the priests—the Levitical priests. They contain the key to how I can help others cross Jordan.
Glance at Joshua 3. Let me read a few verses.
When you see the ark of the covenant of the Lord your God with the Levitical priests carrying it, you shall set out from your place and go after it.
Joshua 3:3.
Joshua spoke to the priests, saying, “Take up the ark of the covenant and cross over ahead of the people.” So they took up the ark of the covenant and went ahead of the people.
Joshua 3:6.
When the people set out from their tents to cross the Jordan with the priests carrying the ark of the covenant before the people, when those who carried the ark came to the Jordan, and the feet of the priests carrying the ark were dipped in the edge of the water—for the Jordan overflows all its banks all the days of harvest—the waters which were flowing down from above stood and rose up in one heap a great distance away at Adam, the city that is beside Zarethan; and those which were flowing down toward the Sea of the Arabah, the Salt Sea, were completely cut off. So the people crossed opposite Jericho. And the priests who carried the ark of the covenant of the Lord stood firm on dry ground in the middle of the Jordan, while all Israel crossed on dry ground until the nation finished crossing.
Joshua 3:14–17.
By looking at the priests, brothers, God can give us some instruction. How can I help others get to a full Savior, appropriate a full Christ?
Then there’s that great ministry at Gilgal, and the spotlight turns from the priests. If I’m going to learn how to take others to Gilgal, I’ve got to watch the elders.
Now then, take for yourself twelve men from the tribes of Israel, one man for each tribe.
Joshua 3:12.
Take for yourselves twelve men from the people, one man from each tribe, and command them, saying, “Take up for yourselves twelve stones from here out of the middle of the Jordan, from the place where the priests’ feet are standing firm, and carry them over with you. Lay them down in the lodging place where you will lodge tonight.”
Joshua 4:2–3.
Joshua called the twelve men whom he had appointed from the sons of Israel, one man from each tribe.
It’s one thing to help them across Jordan and all that that symbolizes. But then we’ve got to carry them to Gilgal. Watch the priests. Watch the elders.
Then it’s my passion also to help people take Jericho. Watch Joshua, the military leader. God has instruction for it.
If we’re going to get them across the Jordan, we’ve got to see the priests. If we’re going to get them to Gilgal and learn what God would have us learn, we’ve got to watch the elders.
There is no route from Jordan to Jericho. You’ve got to go to Gilgal. You’re not ready for Jericho, and those who go to Jericho from Jordan end up awfully bloody.
They’ve got to go to Gilgal, and they all get there the same way. We’ve got to study the elders, and then we’ve got to study Joshua.
When we do Ai, we’ve got to study Joshua, the elders, and the body—the whole people of God.
I’m suggesting this weekend, and this is the burden on my heart, that God will not only teach us what it means to cross Jordan—I think we know that—but how can I help others? I’ve got to get them to Jesus.
How can God use me? Illustrated by the priests. How can God use us to get them to Gilgal? We’ve got to watch the elders. How can we take Jericho? Watch Joshua. How can we learn the lessons of the defeat at Ai and subsequent victory? Watch Joshua. Watch the elders as they call before the Lord. Let’s watch them. Let’s learn. Let’s watch the body at work as it deals with its problem, and so on.
Because of my wife’s prayer that we wouldn’t rain too much on you to destroy the crops, after that the Lord gave me Psalm 72:6. This will be my prayer this weekend:
May He come down like rain upon the mown grass,
Like showers that water the earth.
That’s my prayer. May He come down. If He rains at all, may it be on this field.
Ministry. Opportunity. Leadership. How can we get others to a full Savior, to a full Christ, that they might see Him, know Him, appropriate Him, and feed off Him? May God help us.
Matthew 6:13 sort of summarizes this. I was amazed because, when I finished studying the Jordan, in my mind it seemed to be summarized with the ark and the throne—in the shape of a throne—and God being in such control and dividing the water, and so on. I just said in my heart, “It’s Your kingdom, Lord. It’s Your kingdom.”
When I got to Gilgal and I saw in Gilgal all the parts, the lessons that He had illustrated by the stones, the flint knife, the sacrificial lamb, and the Man with the sword, I said, “It’s Your arm, Lord. It’s Your arm. It’s Your power.”
When I saw how the Lord got all the spoils in Jericho, I said, “It’s Your glory.” All of a sudden, Matthew 6:13 hit me:
Thine is the kingdom, and the power, and the glory.
At the Jordan, they learned that it was His kingdom. At Gilgal, they learned it was His power. At Jericho, they learned that it was His glory. At Ai, they learned, “Forever and ever. Amen.” That’s how it has to be.
I’m going to ask you to turn to Joshua 3, please, and let me just get this idea of the Jordan before you by meditating on the Levitical priests and their ministry.
Because God has given us analytical minds, logical minds, let me share with you at least three principles that I get from looking at these priests, which instruct us on how we can help others get across the Jordan and to a full Savior.
The first principle can be stated in these words: if I’m going to help my brothers and sisters get across the Jordan to a full Savior, then God will have to work in me what He worked in those priests. That is faith.
We must be leaders in faith. We must go first in faith. The priests had to go first in faith. They were leaders in faith.
I love, in this connection, Joshua 3:6:
Joshua spoke to the priests, saying, “Take up the ark of the covenant and cross over ahead of the people.” So they took up the ark of the covenant and went ahead of the people.
Do you realize that God didn’t give them the full story? They didn’t know that Jordan was going to open up at this time. Until the ark was on their shoulders, they didn’t know. They only had a little light, and they ran with it.
“Take up the ark and go ahead,” and they did. They went ahead. I think they walked right toward that swollen river, and then God had to speak another word.
Brothers, they’re looking for men of faith. Sometimes we get shy, and we just sort of wait until God sends all the information. Don’t wait for all the information. If you’ve got a word, go with it.
Like Peter, you might have to walk right up to the iron gate before it swings open, but it’ll swing open if it’s of the Lord. Don’t worry about that. Men of faith—we need to move with a clear word.
Their faith is also illustrated because moving under the ark was a brand-new thing to them. We sort of read this, “La, la, la,” but remember, they were following the Shekinah glory cloud. For forty years, that’s how they moved.
God says, “When it goes, you go. When it stops, you stop. When it starts again, you start again.”
Now the cloud’s gone, and God said, “I’m going to call you men to do a new thing.” Now the ark takes over, and they’ve got to follow the ark. But this is the first time. This is strange for them.
If we’re going to help others over, we’ve got to be men of faith like the priests. We’ve got to go with whatever light we have, even if it’s dim. We’ve got to be able to trust God to do a new thing that He hasn’t done before.
Sometimes we’re afraid to move if our light is dim and we’re called on to do a new thing.
It was certainly faith when you read Joshua 3:13:
It shall come about when the soles of the feet of the priests who carry the ark of the Lord, the Lord of all the earth, rest in the waters of the Jordan, the waters of the Jordan will be cut off, and the waters flowing down from above will stand in a heap.
I’ll tell you in our third message why I think these priests were barefoot. I won’t tell you that now. I think they were. But whether they were barefoot or not, it says the moment the soles of their feet touched the water.
Again, we sort of read these things, “La, la, la.” To the eyes of the flesh, this is a scary thing. They were not only called to face the impossible, but to step in it—to step out into the impossible.
Joshua 3:15 tells us that the Jordan overflows all its banks at the days of harvest. This was the flooding season.
Whether you take the word Jordan from its etymology, the word yarad meaning “to descend,” or whether you take the word to mean that which descends—the descender—it certainly was a descender.
It started off a thousand feet above the level of the sea, went over two hundred miles, and ended up twelve hundred feet below the level of the sea. It’s dangerous at all times. That river is a descending river.
But in the April floods, when it was flooding, it was especially dangerous. I like to think of it this way: God April-fooled the Canaanites. They wouldn’t have expected them to come over during the flooding season.
Let me ask you this question. When the priests, obeying God, were twenty feet from the flooding river, what did the river look like?
It looked like a flooding river.
When they were ten feet away, what did it look like? When they were five feet away, what did that river look like? When they were five inches away, what did it look like?
That’s pretty frightening to the flesh when it’s not happening and you’re getting closer and closer and closer, and it’s got to happen.
Well, if we’re going to help others over, we’re going to have to be men of faith. We’re going to have to run with the light that God gives us, even if we don’t think it’s enough.
We’re going to have to be daring enough to trust God to do a new thing, even if He hasn’t done it before. We’re going to have to be daring enough to step into an impossible situation at the Word of God, believing that God’s going to open the way by the time we step into that.
Joshua 3:16 says:
The waters which were flowing down from above stood and rose up in a heap.
I don’t know if you’ve ever tried to picture that. I don’t know exactly how to picture it—if it was like Jell-O, if it was a solid wall, or how to picture that.
This is different from the parting of the Red Sea, where there was a path in between two walls of water. This is a river. This isn’t a sea.
Evidently, what happened was that when the priests’ feet touched the water, then God rolled it back to the city of Adam, several miles upstream. We don’t know exactly to this day where that city was. Then He dried it up all the way to the Dead Sea.
That’s an amazing thing. I don’t know if the priests could see the wall of water or not. Maybe they could. They saw it rolling back. They could see it rolling back.
Let’s assume that they could see what the Bible calls a heap of water. Don’t forget, it’s piling up because it’s a river. It’s flowing and getting higher and higher and higher.
Imagine if the priests said something like this. They’re holding the ark of God, you know, and the people are ready to come. They said, “Hurry up! Move it, move it, move it! That thing’s going to crash on us!”
How much encouragement do you think that would instill in the hearts of the people?
These priests, brothers, were barefoot and silent as they stood there—men of faith. If we’re going to help others across, we’ve got to be like these priests.
Not only must the priests be leaders of faith, let me give the second principle. If we’re going to help others across, like the priests, we need to know what it means to take a firm stand on ground that God has dried up.
We need to take a rugged stand on ground that God has dried up.
Clearly, the Jordan River is a picture. Perhaps it would help us to nail it down a little bit if we’re going to understand this great principle. We’re going to cross over that dividing line, that barrier, that hindrance.
Thousands of Christians, brothers, will live out their Christian lives in the wilderness. Perhaps thousands, like the two-and-a-half tribes—Reuben, Gad, and one-half of Manasseh—are never going to cross over. They’re going to die on the borderline, right on the line, right on the threshold.
If we’re going to help brothers and sisters across that river, we need to identify what that river is.
I’m sure you’ve heard those who say the River Jordan is death and Canaan is heaven: “Michael, row the boat ashore,” right? “River Jordan is chilly and cold.” Hallelujah. Milk and honey on the other side.
The hymn writer certainly has used that idea. In a sense, that’s true:
On Jordan’s stormy banks I stand,
And cast a wishful eye
To Canaan’s fair and happy land,
Where my possessions lie.
Or, “I won’t have to cross Jordan alone when I come to the river at the ending of days, and the last winds of sorrow have blown,” and so on. Somebody waiting to show me the way. I don’t have to cross Jordan alone.
In a sense, that’s true, because didn’t He dry up that river? He certainly did. When our Lord Jesus rose again, He dried that up.
Someone says, “It’s death all right, but it’s not physical death. It’s death to self, ego, and self-will. If we’re ever going to get to enjoy a full Christ, or help others enjoy a full Christ, they’ve got to learn to die to themselves.”
Well, the only problem with that is we’re left to believe, as I believed for years, that you can surrender the river dry. And you can’t.
You can yield the river dry. “If I surrender enough, I can get across. If I yield enough, the river’s going to go dry.” That’s not how it works.
What is the Jordan? What does it symbolize?
I don’t know if the Holy Spirit makes the plays on words like I’m going to make a play here. Remember, this thing rolled back to Adam. Do you just read that as a city—that the river went back to Adam?
I get so impressed. There’s something else that takes place in the wilderness of Shur, and I say, “Well, wait a minute now.” When God met dear Hagar, it says she was on her way to Shur. She was on her way to Shur when God met her. I keep wondering if God’s playing on these words.
Joshua 3:16 says:
The waters which were flowing down from above stood and rose up in one heap a great distance away at Adam, the city beside Zarethan. And those which were flowing down toward the Sea of the Arabah, the Salt Sea, were completely cut off. So the people crossed opposite Jericho.
Whether or not God intended this, it’s a wonderful illustration.
What is the Jordan River? What does it symbolize? Well, God rolled it all the way back to Adam and all the way to the Dead Sea.
Everything that flowed from Adam and ended in death, He dried up. He dried up.
So whatever that is, you can fill it in: the river of sin, the river of flesh, the river of condemnation, the river of self. All I know is He dried it up.
Ten times in this chapter we read, “The ark, the ark, the ark of God.” Remember, the ark was in the shape of an oriental throne. It had a seat, it had arms, and it had a canopy over the top—the wings of the cherubim, and so on. It was a symbol of the invisible King, the presence of God.
The psalmist caught hold of that in Psalm 114:
The sea looked and fled;
Jordan turned back.
What ails thee, O thou sea, that thou fleest?
Thou Jordan, that thou turnest back?
Then he gives the answer:
Tremble, thou earth, at the presence of the Lord,
At the presence of the God of Jacob.
That’s why the sea backed off: because the Lord was there. Only He can dry up the river.
There’s two answers to the question: “When does a Christian cross the Jordan River?”
The first answer is this: every Christian crossed the Jordan River two thousand years ago when the Lord Jesus Christ died and rose again. That’s when they crossed.
When Jesus died on the cross, He dried up that river—everything from Adam to death that ended in death. Every sin, He took care of. That’s without exception.
You say, “Well, are you talking about every spiritual Christian?” Every spiritual Christian, every good Christian, every backslidden Christian—every Christian crossed in Christ, in Jesus their Substitute, two thousand years ago.
You say, “Yeah, but it’s the second question that I really want to answer.” Not theologically, not positionally, not theoretically. I know doctrinally we all crossed two thousand years ago, but when do I cross now in my life?
Here’s the answer to that question: I crossed two thousand years ago when Jesus died. I cross now when I believe I crossed two thousand years ago when Jesus died.
You cross by faith. That’s how you cross: by believing that you already crossed in the Person of Jesus Christ, your Substitute.
That’s why it’s so important to watch these priests, because they represent those who have understood that and have taken a firm stand on ground that God has dried up.
They’re standing there saying, “It’s done. It’s over.” They’re never going to cross unless somebody has faith and somebody stands there and says, “It’s done. It’s finished.”
People are getting frustrated trying to figure out how to get across. They’re being told a thousand different things about how to get across. How few there are, brothers, who will take a stand—a firm stand—on miracle ground and say, “It’s done. It’s over. It’s finished. He has dried it up.”
It was a miracle that they could stand on that dry ground. A miracle that those priests could get so close to the ark without being incinerated. It was a miracle that that heap of water didn’t come crashing down on their heads.
Look at Joshua 3:4:
There shall be between you and it a distance of two thousand cubits by measure. Do not come near it, that you may know the way by which you shall go; for you have not passed this way before.
Some have questioned, “Why does God give us this three-quarters-of-a-mile distance between the people and the ark?”
Some say, “Well, there has to be a reverent distance between you and God.” Others say, “Well, read the context. He’s talking about guidance.”
If you’ve got half a million people or more trying to follow an ark, it’s good if it’s out in the front. If it’s too close, only the front row will know the way. The second and third rows are going to have to follow the front row, and then you’ve got men following men.
They’ll be saying, “It turned right. It turned left. It’s gone west. It’s gone south.” You’ll have to listen to them.
But if it’s out in the front, more people can see it. They say that might be one reason God said that.
One thing I’m thankful for in this story: the people were not only three-quarters of a mile from the ark, but they were three-quarters of a mile from the priests that held the ark.
Why do I like that? Because we’re talking about helping them get across. That knocks in the head many ideas that people have about the way to get them across.
“They need instruction. They need teaching. They need somebody to follow them up. They need someone to have authority and be accountable to them. They need to learn about gifts. They need to learn about missions. They need to learn about tithing.”
They couldn’t even talk to them. They didn’t need counseling. They didn’t need follow-up. They were silent and barefoot.
If we’re going to help them across, we need somebody to go first by cold-blooded faith, believe God, stand on the finished work, and just stand there. Then they’re going to respond to that.
I think it’s more than a coincidence that these two thousand cubits, this distance, the Jews took to be the Sabbath day’s journey. That was the distance: a Sabbath day’s journey.
What’s the point of that? That’s as far as you can go without violating rest.
That’s what they needed to know. That was pictured by the priests. You can only go as far as rest. If you take one step beyond that, now let’s say some Jewish person says, “Oh, look at the ark. Look at the Lord. I want to get close to the Lord.” So they drew close to the ark.
Every step they took beyond rest, they got further from the Lord as they drew closer to the ark.
You see the point? Standing on the finished work illustrates this principle of rest. The only way to get across is by that rest and by that finished work.
Not only must we go first by faith, not only must we take a firm stand on ground that God has dried up, let me give this last principle, and we’ll wrap it up.
We’ve got to trust God. We’ve got to take a firm stand on a finished work. He’s done it all. It’s finished. It’s over, done through.
Their third responsibility was to hold up the ark. That was it: to hold up Christ, to hold up that throne of God—Christ the King, Christ upon His throne.
Joshua 3:17 says:
The priests who carried the ark of the covenant of the Lord stood firm on dry ground in the middle of the Jordan, while all Israel crossed on dry ground until the nation had finished crossing the Jordan.
They’re going to have to see Him. We’ve got to hold Him up.
Brothers, this is not a hard assignment when you think about it. How can I help others? Believe God, stand on the finished work, and hold up Christ.
When they held up the ark of God, the throne of God, that meant they were under it. What does it mean to be under the throne of God? It means to be under the lordship of Jesus Christ.
That’s what they’re looking for: somebody to trust God, somebody to stand on a finished work, somebody to hold up the Lord Jesus Christ and stand under His lordship. You’d be amazed how they follow that.
They’re looking for people who go forth in faith, stand on a finished work, and hold up Christ.
Someone says, “No, come on, that’s too simple. That’s too easy. Just to believe God, stand on a finished work, hold up Christ, and they’re going to come running over? They need lessons on obedience. They need to know that God’s their provider. They need to know that He gives life and that they have life in Him.”
Brothers, it’s all in the ark.
What was in the ark? The Ten Commandments were in the ark. Everything they needed to know about obedience is in the ark.
The manna was in the ark. Everything they need to know about provision is in the ark. Aaron’s rod that budded—everything they need to know about supernatural life is in the ark.
It’s all in Christ. They don’t need other things. They just need Him.
Where are the priests? We’ve got to get to Gilgal. That’s a whole different story. But first we need men that are priests, that will believe God.
Men that will stand firm on ground that God has dried up, that will just hold up Christ under His lordship.
What a scene, as they began to come, and they began to come. What were they doing? They were just standing there holding up Christ, and the people came.
Why aren’t a lot of people going today to find the full Christ? It’s because, brothers, we’re muddying up the water.
We’re making it slippery for them. We’re making it hard for them. We’re making it difficult for them. We’re telling them they’ve got to do this, and they’ve got to learn that, and they’ve got to memorize this, and they’ve got to go here, and they’ve got to have this counseling, and they’ve got to do that.
They don’t need any of that. They just need to see some godly man believing God, standing on a finished work, and holding up Christ.
You say, “Well, didn’t that get heavy after a while? How long did they have to hold it up?”
They were the first ones in and the last ones out. The King James says, “Till all the people had clean passed over.” They had to wait for the slowest of the slow.
We just stand there. That’s our ministry, and that’s all we do to get them across Jordan. Something else we do to get them to Gilgal, something else we do to get them to Jericho, but that’s all we do to get them across Jordan. We just stand there, and we hold Christ.
Remember when the ark was coming down from the house of Obed-edom? I don’t understand that verse in Chronicles, but it says the Lord helped the Levites carry the ark.
He will empower you to hold up Christ before the people. When it’s all over, they walk across on dry land.
I can see some grandchild in the future saying to his granddaddy, “Tell me the story. Tell me the story. How did you cross over? You must have been so brave. It must have been so hard. Tell me again, how did it happen?”
“You should have seen me, son. I walked on dry ground.”
I’ve got a granddaughter that’s a toddler that can do that. That’s not hard to do. That’s all they did.
It’s easy to get across Jordan. It’s not hard. It’s not difficult. It’s the first step to possessing a full Christ.
If we’re serious about really wanting to help those who’ve been redeemed but are stuck in the wilderness, those who’ve been redeemed and are settling for the foretaste on the borderline, if we’re serious, may God write it in our hearts.
Men of faith go first. They take a stand on ground that God has dried up. They hold up Christ under His lordship. That’s it.
No instructions. No pep talks. They just hold up Jesus, and they’ll come. They’ll come.
May God work that in our hearts. May God prepare us, because the next step, carrying those rocks up to Gilgal, is a little different.
Let’s pray.
Our Father, we thank You for the simplicity of our ministry. You’ve privileged us. You didn’t need those priests. You didn’t need the elders. You didn’t need the soldiers. You didn’t need Joshua. You could have done it with a word of Your mouth, but You were pleased to use Your instruments.
Teach us to go forward in faith, to respond to the light that You give us, to trust You to do a new thing, to enable us to step into an impossible situation, to trust You right up to the last minute, to stand on what You’ve finished and completed, and to hold up our Lord Jesus Christ, that others might go forth to a full Christ.
Will You work that for us, Lord? We pray in Jesus’ name. Amen.