Ep. 60. Joshua 3-4 | River Crossing

EPISODE 60

RIVER CROSSING: JOSHUA 3-4

We left Rahab behind in Jericho yesterday, but today, we bring the Hebrew people to the edge of the Jordan River. At their head is Joshua. He will be the one to lead the people into the Promised Land. Moses could not be the one who brought the people into the promise of God. Moses is inextricably tied to the Law, and we know that the Law can save no one. Joshua (Yeshua, God Saves) would lead the people into the Promised Land. Jesus is the one who brings about the promise of God. (It has never been through the Law)

God caused the water of the Jordan River, which was at flood stage, to stand up in a heap so the people could walk across on dry land. This very thing would solidify in the hearts of the Hebrew people Joshua as their leader. Those who had been around forty years earlier and had not died in the wilderness remembered Moses leading through the Red Sea on dry land. Those who had previously followed Moses were now ready to follow Joshua. This is helpful for us as we consider how to think about the Law of Moses and Jesus as people of the New Covenant. Since Christ has come, the Law has been brought to nothing. The Law was a tutor and a guardian until Christ, the Promised One, would bring about the New Covenant of God. That which had previously had glory has now come to have no glory. Moses had been the leader; now Joshua was. The Law, like Moses, served its purpose and has been replaced by something better in Christ.

We see that the Hebrews crossed the Jordan on the tenth day of the first month of the forty-first year, or 10-1-41. It was five days shy of their initial exodus from Egypt back in Exodus chapter 12.

Joshua instructed twelve men to take a stone each and to carry it to the place where they would spend their first night in the Promised Land, but Joshua set up another pile of twelve stones in the midst of the Jordan at the place where the feet of the priests were standing with the ark. One pile of stones was to be buried in the river Jordan, and one pile of stones was set up at Gilgal as a memorial to all generations of what God had done. Similarly, we who have died with Christ and been buried with him have also been raised to walk in the newness of life. Old things have passed away, and all things have become new. We have been crucified with Christ, and we no longer live, but Christ lives in us. The former person has been put off, and the new man has been put on in the likeness of Christ, righteous and holy. Too often, people, in sharing their testimony, make a big deal about who they WERE before Jesus, but the testimony in the Bible is always about who we now ARE in Christ. The pile of stones at the bottom of the river was buried in the river, as we have been buried with Christ. The stones in Gilgal would forever bear the testimony of God's gracious work, and we, now sealed by the Spirit and made new, daily bear the testimony of God's gracious work in us.

Whenever you have the chance to talk about who you are in Christ, fly quickly past the former things and quickly to the saving work of God.

ADDITIONAL READING: Exodus 14; Romans 6:1-7; 2 Corinthians 5:17; Galatians 2:20; Ephesians 4:22-24