They had, after all, waited for this day for centuries! They probably looked again and again upon the 12 stones that were set up as a memorial, running over and over again in their minds what had just happened, shouting aloud: “God did it! He really did it! Praise be to the Lord God Almighty, the God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob indeed he is the Lord over all the earth!” There surely must have been dancing and singing around their campfires. However, before they made their way across the Jordan, God told Joshua to instruct 12 men, one from each of the 12 tribes, to pry loose from the river bed a large stone, to hoist it upon their shoulders, and to carry it to Gilgal on the east border of Jericho.Īlthough nothing is said explicitly in the text, I can’t help but imagine that it was a time of incredible celebration and thanksgiving. As the priests stepped into the flood waters of the Jordan, it parted, much as did the Red Sea some 40 years earlier, allowing the people of Israel to enter the promised land on dry ground. Upon their return, Joshua commanded the people to keep their eyes fixed on the ark of the covenant, the place of God’s presence and power. It all began in chapter two when Joshua sent two spies into the city of Jericho to search out the land and to gain information on the size and strength of the enemy. Allow me to briefly remind you of how we got to this point in our story. In other words, remembering is not designed to transport you back into the past but to prepare and equip and encourage you for the future!Īnd there is no better illustration of this than what we find here in Joshua 4. The purpose for biblical remembering is to remind us that the God who acted back then is the same God who acts now. Remembering is not for the purpose of complaining that things now are worse than they were then. But the difference is that the Christian does not remember or reminisce out of some desire to return to days gone by or to relive the years of their childhood. Much is said in Scripture about not forgetting what has gone before.
The Bible actually has a lot to say about remembering the past.
In any case, people love to talk about “the good old days” when life seemed simpler and supposedly less sinful. I have to confess, aside from Christian music, the only kind I listen to is from the 60’s! I suspect that one day I’ll grow out of that, perhaps on my deathbed!
People love the past, particularly their own. I’ve decided it will probably never go away. Every time I think it is but a passing fad, it makes a comeback.
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