Printer Friendly VersionI suppose most of you here today could tell a story about trying
to find a place you’ve never been to before without having adequate
directions. It happened to me again just a couple of weeks ago.
Now, I’ve never considered inadequate directions, or even
a lack of directions altogether, to be a particular problem. I mean, if I
have the address or the basic location of something, I always figure that
eventually I can find it. I don’t know, I guess there’s something
I like about the challenge. My idea of adequate directions is kind of like
this: if you want to go, say, to Wrigley Field in Chicago, that’s really
all you need to know. Because in my mind, you just go to Chicago and it’s
got to be there somewhere.
Maybe it has something to do with the pioneer spirit. I guess I enjoy the
challenge of trying to find my way through the urban jungle. Amazing as it
may seem, my wife doesn’t particularly appear to appreciate this aspect
of my personality. I was reminded of that on a recent journey we made together.
We drove down to a nearby city a couple of weeks ago and our
simple task was to find a particular church. How hard can that be, right?
We even had some directions and this nifty city map I found over the Internet.
So I thought we were set.
Let me summarize my sordid tale by telling you we were late
to our appointment. And needless to say the atmosphere in the car was a little
tense. You know what she was saying to me the whole time we were lost, don’t
you? “Why don’t you just call and ask directions?” You see,
that just demonstrates how little you wives understand about these things.
You probably think it’s because we don’t want to
find a phone, pull over, get out, and make the call. That’s not the
point. I had a phone at my fingertips. I could have made the call. But it’s
the principle of the thing. You’ll just never understand.
Well, it is amazing, isn’t it, how often we try to find
our own way? Not just in terms of finding locations, but in lots of ways in
our lives, each of us is probably guilty of trying to make it on our own when
we really do need help.
As we’ve been reading the story of Joshua and the nation
of Israel trying finally to cross over into the Promised Land, we’ve
discovered (I hope) some truths that apply to our own lives.
We’re taking this story as a kind of metaphor for our spiritual journey,
realizing God has called every one of us into a new land—spiritually.
He has called us to leave the desert of our own making and cross over into
a life of freedom and joy and peace He has provided for us through our Lord
Jesus Christ.
Yet even though the promise is great, and the new land is wonderful,
many Christians find themselves still wandering the desert, camped out on
the wrong side of the river, unable to cross over. Sometimes it’s the
past that keeps us from crossing over. Sometimes it’s fear that keeps
us from crossing over.
And yet we heard the Lord say to them, “It’s time
to get up and dust yourself off and get moving. Stop allowing your future
to be defined by your past and move on.” We heard him say, “Don’t
be afraid because I have already gone before you to prepare the way and to
remove the barriers.”
Now we come to chapter three and the people were ready finally
to cross over. It was time to go. But there was still a problem. Joshua and
his officials defined the problem very clearly and concisely in verse 4: “You
have never been this way before.” In other words, “You don’t
have adequate directions. And it’s not good enough to think that somehow
you can just figure it out on your own. You can’t make it on your own;
you need help.”
I think it’s another mirror of our spiritual lives. Perhaps
one of the reasons some of us have never really crossed over into God’s
new land of promise is that we’ve tried it before, but we got lost.
Once we started the journey, we tried to go our own way, tried to follow Jesus
on our own terms, and we got lost. We hear God’s call to go deeper in
our spiritual lives and immediately we think, “Okay I can do that. I
know the way. ”
The problem is, when God calls us to something new and deeper
in our life with Him, we can’t just strike out on our own. We don’t
know the way. We’ve never been this way before.
I’ll give you an example. Sometimes we sense God’s
inner call to deepen our spiritual disciplines, to become closer to Him. But
then we think we can do it individually and we resist truly making ourselves
accountable to another. We resist receiving spiritual direction. We think
we know the way. But we don’t know, so pretty soon we make compromises
and wrong turns and before you know it we’re wandering around spiritually,
not quite sure where we are anymore.
The simple truth is that when God calls us to a new land, we
need help. We need a navigator whether we want to admit it or not.
Well, Joshua 3 is a simple but powerful story of how God showed these people
the way to the new land. There are three actions to which these people were
called, and I believe they could be instructive for us.
First, they would have to follow Yahweh. The way to do that
would be to follow the ark of the covenant, the symbol and center of God’s
presence with His people at this time.
It’s interesting that in chapters 3 and 4, the ark (the
symbol of God’s promise and presence) is mentioned no less than 17 times.
It’s as if the writer wants to make sure we don’t lose sight of
it.
I think he got the lesson. If you lose sight of God, you’re sunk. If
you lose sight of the goal, all your religious activity comes to nothing.
If you lose sight of the Father, you’re wandering in the desert, no
matter what you call it.
Now following God in this journey to the new land sounds very
reasonable. It’s obviously the right thing to do. The crazy thing about
it is that so often God leads us in directions that seem to be the absolute
opposite of what we would do.
He was going to lead these people across the Jordan river. The
thing is, He did it at a time when the river was at flood stage. Now that’s
crazy. And these people had waited 40 years, so what would the harm be in
waiting a few more months until the river went down?
It doesn’t make a lot of sense according to our way of
doing things. But have you ever noticed God often seems to work like that?
When it’s time to cross over, it could be that God will ask of us something
that seems crazy on the surface, at least to our way of thinking.
The issue is: “Will you follow me? Even when it looks
to be against common sense, will you follow me instead of trying to find your
own way?”
There’s a second action to which these people are called.
Joshua went through the camp and told the people, “Consecrate yourselves,
for tomorrow the Lord will do amazing things among you.”
Consecrate, sanctify, set apart. There was a special preparation
called for on the part of the people, whenever God was about to reveal himself
in a special way. And somehow this preparation was critical to the people’s
understanding clearly that what was about to happen was God’s work.
Could it be that we don’t see mighty acts of God more
often simply because we don’t prepare for them? You know what we tend
to say? We tend to say, “God, you do something great and we’ll
respond. God, you move powerfully in my life and I’ll really get serious
about following you.” But God says, “You get serious and following
me and then I’ll do something great in your life.”
We’ve seen some mighty acts of God’s power right
in this congregation. He has been gracious to us and shown himself to us.
But I wonder, would we see even more of his mighty acts if we were intentionally
consecrating ourselves, preparing ourselves in expectation of seeing him move
among us?
What might that mean? I believe God calls us to different things
at different times in terms of preparation. But I also believe it always includes
some basic things.
For example, we must simplify our lives. I am convinced many
of us are just so busy and crammed full of activity that we never really hear
God when He does speak. We need to eliminate from our lives that which is
superfluous and quiet ourselves long enough that He can direct us and shape
us. A large part of this is prayer.
We’ve been focusing together about what it would mean
for prayer truly to become the very center of our spiritual life and health,
individually and corporately. The primary question is not about the discipline
of prayer. It’s about our hunger and thirst for God.
Are we hungry to see God move? Are we thirsty to know Him in
His powerful presence? Moving toward that hunger and thirst for righteousness
is a part of how we consecrate ourselves in preparing for the mighty acts
of God.
There’s a third thing these people were called to do.
I’ll confess it makes me a bit uncomfortable to talk about it, but it
is so clearly a part of this text I cannot ignore it.
Besides following God and consecrating themselves, the people
were told to follow the leader. Very often the way God takes us to new places
in our spiritual journey is through the spiritual leadership of those He has
placed in our lives.
In this case it was primarily Joshua. God clearly said to Joshua,
“I am going to exalt you in the eyes of the people and I am going to
show myself to them through you. I’m going to direct them through your
actions and your mouth.”
That’s a tall order. But throughout the history of God
dealing with His people, that’s how he Has directed them. They were
to follow Joshua and they were to follow the priests whom God had appointed
to lead them across the river.
Now this is hard for us. We have learned to be very independent
and individualistic in our faith. We aren’t taking orders from anybody!
But the truth is, based on the consistent witness of the Scriptures, the pastors
of this church have been placed here to give spiritual guidance and leadership
to the people. And at the risk of being terribly misunderstood, may I suggest
this to you?
Perhaps one reason some of you aren’t growing in your relationship with
the Lord is because you aren’t listening to your pastor. Now before
you go taking off with that idea, please hear me out. I am not saying I am
“holier than thou.” I am not saying I am infallible in knowledge
and wisdom. I am not saying you should never challenge me or disagree with
me or teach me.
But I am saying I am here for one basic reason: to be the mouthpiece
of God in this place and among this people. I am here as a priest. I am here
as a prophet. I am here as a shepherd.
And yet some of you insist on treating me like nothing more
than a spiritual errand boy. All you really want me for is to take care of
the ceremonies related to hatching and dispatching. All you really want me
for is to conduct a “nice” service on Sunday.
Whether you recognize it or not, I am here to proclaim to you,
“Thus says the Lord.” I promise you I never step into this pulpit
without having come before the Lord and pleaded with Him to speak to you through
me. May I remind you I’m not working alone up here? The Spirit of God
who is present and active in this place takes the words God has given me and
delivers them to you as a word from the Lord.
God clearly designed it so that if these people wanted to cross
over successfully, they would have to follow the leader. First of all, God—but
also God’s servants. It’s not different now.
I say to you as your pastor with an awesome sense of what this
means, “Follow me as I follow Christ.” When the truth of God pierces
your heart, don’t write it off just because it came through these feeble
lips. You listen to God. And follow the leader.
Well, the Israelites put these three things into practice. They
watched as the ark of the covenant went on before them. They followed their
leaders as they took the ark and stepped into the swollen waters of the Jordan.
They watched in utter amazement as the waters of the Jordan
River stopped up and allowed them to cross over to the Promised Land on dry
ground.
And they knew God was with them. They learned the lesson again—when
God calls you something new, when He calls you to something deeper, when He
invites you to cross over into a new land, He will never call you where He
does not lead you. He will never ask anything of you without providing all
you need to follow Him faithfully.
So I ask you again, what is the new land toward which God is
leading you? What are you going to do about that hunger in your heart to know
Him more? When are you going to respond to the call of God to move on into
the new thing He has for you? The time has come. It’s time to cross
over.
“So consecrate yourselves, for tomorrow the Lord will do amazing things among you.”
