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In our introductory study yesterday afternoon, we reminded ourselves again how it is that the book of Joshua, in spite of the fact that it was written some three thousand years ago, still speaks directly to the heart of every Christian man and woman. We saw in the first place it is because the name Jesus is one of the Greek forms of the Hebrew name Joshua, and therefore you can scarcely read about the exploits of the great captain of Israel's salvation, whose name was Joshua, but what you will immediately think, if you are a believer, of the captain of our salvation, whose name in Greek is Jesus and in Hebrew Joshua.
But the similarity between Joshua and our blessed Lord Jesus goes, of course, far deeper. It depends in great part on the similarity of function that they both carried out. Well, we reminded ourselves yesterday afternoon that Joshua it was, not Moses, but Joshua, who brought Israel at last triumphantly into their God-given inheritance, to munch their grapes, to drink, eat their honey, and to enjoy all these spectacular blessings that God had provided for them as once-time slaves, but now redeemed by the blood of their Passover lamb.
And of course, as you think of Joshua, the man who brought Israel into their inheritance, you will immediately think, I wager you will, of our blessed Lord Jesus, through whom we have been made meet, we have been qualified to take part in the inheritance of the saints in light. So yesterday we tried to put the whole thing in its deeper historical context, and we referred to Genesis chapter fifteen, where God made a covenant with Abraham and with Abram's seed, telling them that, uh, Abram's descendants would for a while be slaves in the land of Egypt.
But after some four hundred years, they would come out, and God would eventually give to them this glorious inheritance in the land of Canaan. And so, in process of time, it happened. A- A- Abraham's descendants went down into Egypt. There they were slaves, but at last God raised up Moses to be their deliverer. He celebrated with them the Passover. By his direction, they crossed through the Red Sea. For forty years, he led them across the wilderness, ever nearer to their great inheritance, when alas he died because he too had rebelled against the Lord.
And a sorry story it would have been, had it not been that God in his faithfulness raised up Joshua to fulfill at long length that glorious covenant that God had made with his ancestor Abraham. And Joshua rose up, the great captain of Israel's salvation, and brought them into the land, taking them across Jordan until all Israel were passed clean over into their God-given inheritance. And so it is written in the book of Joshua at the end of chapter eleven that Joshua brought in Israel and the land had rest.
Of course, as we think of that, then we are moved to think in the New Testament how the writer to the Hebrews comments that Joshua didn't completely fulfill all that God had in mind when he promised that great inheritance to Abram and to his seed. For, says the writer to the Hebrews in his chapter three, if Joshua had given Israel perfect and complete rest by bringing them into their inheritance in Canaan, then God would not subsequently have spoken of another rest. But he did, didn't he?
For the centuries went by after Israel was settled in the land. And then ultimately, and later on, these psalms were written, and in one of those psalms, God is heard to be speaking like this: Today, after so long a time, centuries after Joshua's time, today, if you will hear God's voice, harden not your heart, like those did in the wilderness, who disobeyed God and refused to enter into the promised land. Don't you do like that? You listen to God's voice. And says the writer to the Hebrews, the point of God's exhortation in that psalm is this, that whereas Joshua gave them physical rest in the land of Canaan, God had a rest infinitely more wonderful, infinitely greater than that la- rest in the physical land of Canaan.
He had in mind the great and eternal rest of God. He had in mind an inheritance not merely in Canaan with its grass, its cows, its flowers, its bees, and its honey. God had in mind, even when he spoke to Abram, an inheritance incorruptible and undefiled, and that fadeth not away, reserved in heaven for us. So that Joshua and his great campaign that brought Israel into their inheritance and into their rest in the Promised Land becomes for us Christians a kind of prototype of that greater captain of salvation, our blessed Lord, of that greater inheritance.
And tonight we shall begin in earnest a series of studies that will illustrate the Christian point, how it is that Jesus, our blessed Lord, brings us, his people, into our great inheritance. How he does it. And then on another night, on what terms he does it, and then yet on another night, what is his ultimate goal and intention? If you have time to do a little homework before tomorrow's study, therefore, perhaps I could ask you to read the chapters that we shall have to survey tomorrow.
They are chapters five, six, seven, and eight. Don't worry, there's not too many difficult names in it. It will make excellent bedtime reading, only don't get too comfortable in bed in case you fall asleep. But if you could, before tomorrow's meeting, read those chapters five, six, seven, and eight, you'll find it enormously helpful when you come to follow the exposition of the text. We noticed, uh, yesterday also that the book of Joshua is divided into two parts, because the conquest of the inheritance under Joshua fell into two phases.
And in these early studies this week, we shall be considering the first phase of the conquest, where Joshua, along with the united armies of Israel, went throughout the land, breaking the back of all opposition, so that Israel might enter completely into their God-given inheritance. The next phase of the conquest would be when Joshua was old and the land was subdued, and the individual tribes went off, each one in this way, that way, and the other way, to enter individually into that part of the land that had been assigned to them. But tonight and tomorrow and the third day, we shall have to be considering the first phase of the conquest.
Now, therefore, for a little bird's eye view of the first half of the book of Joshua. If you are anywhere near a sheet of these rough notes, you might care to look at it. We shall find that in the first phase of the conquest, according to chapters one to twelve, there were three major parts. In each part of the conquest, there was first of all the main objective that Joshua and God's people set out to achieve. Then in each part, there was, of course, a major obstacle against the achievement of that objective.
Then in each part there was a miracle, a miracle of divine power. You'll see throughout a great deal of this contest, con- uh, conquest, the Israelites had themselves to fight the enemy. But in each part of this first phase, there was on each occasion a divine miracle in which God's almighty and supernatural power exerted itself, quite apart from anything that the Israelites did. And finally, each of these three parts will lovingly record in detail how the projected objective was in fact achieved.
In part one, therefore, the objective was the first and foremost objective. It was to bring Israel literally into the land of Canaan, to introduce Israel into their inheritance. The, in the second part, the objective was somewhat different. It was that when Israel got into the land, as soon as possible, they were to conduct a ceremony that should serve to establish the law of God in Canaan. God told the Israelites that the Canaanites were being driven out because of their abominable sin and their wretched perversions.
And God, through Moses, sternly warned his people, I'm not casting out the Canaanites because of their abominable sin and their wretched perversions. And God, through Moses, sternly warned his people, I'm not casting out the Canaanites because of their sin, just to let you enter the land and you do the very same things the Canaanites did. For know this, Israel, said God, if you turn and live the same way as those Canaanites lived, then just as I drove them out, I shall drive you out. So when God drove out the Canaanites and brought in the Israelites to eat their honey and their milk, it was never God's idea that they should thereafter live just as they pleased, gorging themselves on the cream and the fat and the cakes and the honey, reveling in their bungalows, their wine presses and their olive presses, and boasting in their farms, and living carelessly and worldlessly as the Canaanites had done.
Certainly not. When they came into the land, one of their prime objectives would be this, to establish in that heretofore evil and wicked land, to establish the majestic and holy law of God. That, of course, they did very early on in the proceedings. And in the third part of the first phase, the objective was to put down all rule and authority. All three of these objectives were objectives that Moses in his lifetime had commanded the Israelites to seek.
But as we said earlier, Moses was very good at commanding, he wasn't always very good at carrying things out. And Moses commanded the objectives, but Moses himself was not able to achieve them. Glory to God, what Moses could not do, that Joshua did, and did triumphantly. Moses commanded in detail that when Israel went into the land, they were to put down all rule and authority. Every king, every prince, every authority in the land had to be destroyed. And we shall be told in the third part how Israel went about that great objective.
In each case, there was an obstacle, of course, as you might expect. Each time it was different. The obstacle in the first part was the River Jordan in flood. If ever Israel were to get into their inheritance, they must overcome this obstacle. In the second division, the obstacles in the way of establishing the law of God were the fortified cities of Jericho and Ai. It was only when they were captured and destroyed that the objective could be achieved. The obstacle in the third division was the two great confederacies of kings. First of all, the southern confederacy that came to attack Gibeon for making peace with Israel.
Finally, the far more sinister confederacy of the northern kings that came with their massed battalions directly to assault the people of God and in their attempt to destroy them. As I say, on each occasion, God interposed with a miracle. As you'll see in the rough notes, the miracle in the first occasion was the passage, the miraculous passage through the Jordan. The miracle in the second was the miraculous coming down of the walls of Jericho. The miracles in the third were that God himself fought for the Gibeonites, rained down stones from heaven upon their enemies, and at the word of Joshua caused the sun and the moon to stand still in the heavens.
And if we carefully attend to the text, I have given you the references so that we need not turn to it now, we shall find the text on each of those three occasions lovingly report in detail that Joshua did not cease his operation until the objective was achieved. Savor it in your heart and enjoy it now by proxy through this ancient record, as in your imagination you follow Israel and Joshua, their great captain, against all the obstacles that man and the devil could throw against them. And read it with glee in your hearts, how that when they came to Jo- to Jordan, the ark stood in the depths of Jordan until all Israel were passed clean over Jordan.
Thank God they were. The historian gets so excited that he repeats it three times over in his one narrative. So it was in the second division, on their way to establish the law, the great fortified ugly cities of Jericho and Ai stood in the way with great difficulty, in spite of the divine miracle. With great difficulty, those cities were overcome, but overcome they were. And with glee, the historian reports how that Joshua raised his hand with a javelin in his hand as a signal for Israel to begin the fight, and, says the historian, he did not withdraw his hand until the whole of Ai was destroyed.
And so it is in the third section. The Gibeonites made peace with Israel, then the southern confederacy of kings came to attack them. The record is how God commanded Joshua to come to fight to protect the Gibeonites, and then indeed miracles began to happen, for God himself fought for them, and God rained down stones from heaven upon their enemy. Then a wonderful thing happened, for Joshua, seeing the day decline, raised his eyes to the sun and the moon, and he said, sun stand still, a moon stand still. And the Lord hearkened to the voice of a man, and the sun hasted not to go down, nor the moon to go down, until Israel was avenged of all her enemies.
Oh, what marvelously exhilarating stuff it is. God set his heart on these. Moses commanded them. Moses couldn't achieve them, but all thank God for that ancient captain of Israel's salvation, Joshua, who in the power of God achieved for God's people these three glorious objectives. We shall find each one of them talk to us about our blessed Lord Jesus. And tonight, of course, we begin with the first of them. The objective, the initial and obviously elementary objective, the first thing that had to be done was actually to get the people of God into their inheritance, with their feet standing solidly in the promised land.
You say, what was there difficult about that? Really? Then you haven't read your history recently. Difficult. My, my, my. Israel had been redeemed out of Egypt, sheltering under the blood of the Passover lamb. They had been baptized to Moses in the cloud and in the sea. They girt up the loins of their bodies and of their minds, we hope, to journey to the promised Land. And would you believe it? Within a comparatively few months, they came to the border. Moses sent out spies. They went and looked round the Promised Land, and they came back and they turned up their noses to it. They said, Moses, you ridiculous fellow Moses. Goodness me, if we'd have known that came in like this, we wouldn't have bothered to come, Moses.
We remember Egypt now, they said. We remember its leeks. We remember its garlics. Their memories were like a sieve. They forgot all the other things, the taskmasters, the whips, the slavery, the toil, the weariness, the hopelessness. When they came to the borders of the promised Land, they showed themselves to be the unbelievers at heart that they had always been, and they refused to go in. Not Moses himself could drag them in. You know, that's a solemn thought, isn't it?
There is, you see, an inheritance incorruptible and undefiled that fadeth not away, reserved in heaven for us. Many there are who profess to be on their way there. But it is not always certain that they really want to go. You say, what do you mean? Well, if you'd been watching Israel going through the desert, you know, you would have come to a point where, when the manna came down from heaven, eventually Israel complained at it. They said it was boring old stuff, worse than Kellogg's cornflakes every day of the week to be fed on this manna.
I didn't care that it was angels' food, it got so boring, this manna. Why can't we have a few leeks and quails, they said? And they forgot that God was listening, for it was God that gave them the manna. And if you had been wise at the moment, you would have had a big question rise in your mind. If they weren't really interested in what God was providing them now, in the form of the manna, how would they enjoy what God would provide for them when they got into the Promised Land? Do you know, it is a point and a question we all ought to ask ourselves, isn't it?
Are you on your way to heaven, sir, madam? You say, of course. Are you sure you really want to go? You say, of course I do. Well, very good, we could test it, couldn't we? God today gives us the heavenly manner, which is Jesus Christ, his son and Lord. How, friend, do you find Jesus Christ? Marvelously appetizing. Is it so that you can't to feed yourself on that great bread of life? Then you surely, you'll find the great inheritance when you get there superbly interesting.
Did I hear you say? Well, no, you don't find Jesus Christ very, very interesting. You don't find his word entrancing. In fact, truth to be told, you find it a bit of a bore. But if that's so, would you not ponder the implication? If we are not interested in Christ now, as the manna sent down from heaven. By what kind of magic do you suppose we would suddenly be interested in Christ if this moment we were transported to heaven? Getting Israel into the great inheritance was an exceedingly difficult task.
And because they had to, they refused the first time, then they had to come in another way round. Marching first east and then north, they came at last to the banks of Jordan on the east side. And the problem was, now how did you get them into their inheritance? For see the obstacle. The first time there had been no obstacle, but this time there was. The obstacle was the River Jordan, and not only the River Jordan, but the River Jordan in flood. You'll say, of the obstacles, this is a very interesting one.
In the second division of this first phase, the obstacles will be the walls of Jericho and of Ai. They were man-made obstacles, were they not? In the third division, the obstacle is the great political confederacies of first the southern kings and then the northern kings. Once more, it is a man-made obstacle. But the first great obstacle for Israel entering into their inheritance was an obstacle put there by nature herself. It was the River Jordan. No man ever dug that river. It was the River Jordan in flood, and consider what an obstacle it was in that flat ground where the shrub grows thick.
When the river overflows, you could not have told where its banks were. It would have spread yards and yards each side of the river, all tangled up with the undergrowth. To take an army of some hundreds of thousands across that swamp and then the river, when the soldiery could not have seen where its banks were, that would have been to invite an absolute stampede, and in the end, a fearful loss of life. Death at the hands of nature. Joshua, we are told, brought Israel through that obstacle.
They didn't have to fight any man. Jericho was straightly shut up. It was no human enemy they faced. It was nature. Nature's great river of Jordan that would have spelled death to the troops if they had attempted to cross by themselves. Now they didn't have to attempt to cross by themselves, for then the great miracle was done, designed to glorify Joshua, designed to set Israel's heart aflame with the wonder of their God. God himself went through the river.
For the priests were told to take up the ark. The people were told to follow it, but at a distance, so that all eyes could be concentrated on the priests, and in particular upon that ark as it approached the river. Now, if we're going to understand the significance of it, we must start by believing what Israel believed. And I beg you to notice that at this stage in the lecture, I have not begun typology yet. Have no fear, I shall later on. But now I'm talking of an event that happened nearly two thousand— well, thirteen hundred years BC, maybe, in the literal country of Palestine, at the literal river of Jordan, and Jordan, you must understand, is in flood, and Israel are waiting to go through.
And they watched the ark picked up by the priests, they watched the ark proceed, and what Israel believed is this, that that ark was the very throne of the God, transcendent Lord, maker of heaven and earth, owner of heaven and earth. They believed that in his great mercy, the transcendent Lord had come down and presenced himself upon that ark.
Perhaps you don't believe it, but try and believe it just for the moment to see the point of the story. Here was the great barrier that nature had put, the River Jordan and its threat of death. How would Israel get through it? Oh, watch the great miracle as the God, the Lord of heaven and earth, comes seated upon the throne of his ark, and they watched until the priest's feet came to the borders of the water, and then nature, recognizing her great creator, bowed before her great creator, and the creator went through.
I don't know if the king of Jericho thought that the river Jordan being in flood was going to prove a barrier against Israel and stop Israel getting in. Whether he thought it was his first line of defense or not, I do not know. I know this, that if God is determined to bring his people into their inheritance, there is no force in the whole of nature, be it on earth or in heaven or under the earth. Nature knows no force or obstacle that can stand in the way of nature's creator.
Jordan, with its threat of death, how but Jordan bowed and allowed the creator through. At this point, having made that simple observation, we might perhaps turn immediately to the New Testament, to see what relevance this ancient story has to us, and in particular, to the question of how do we Christian folks get into our inheritance? What is the first obstacle that must be overcome? If ever we are to enter the glorious inheritance that God has given for us, not only the inheritance of this world, but the inheritance incorruptible, undefiled, and that fades not away, reserved in heaven for us.
And I am proposing to read to you from First Peter chapter one, and it reads like this: Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who according to his great mercy begat us again unto a living hope by the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead, unto an inheritance incorruptible and undefiled, and that fades not away. You notice what Peter is saying, surely. Peter is asserting that there is an inheritance. It lies in a land of fadeless day. There is no night there. Its flowers never decay.
Nothing grows old, nothing grows weary, nothing ever decays. It is an inheritance incorruptible and undefiled, and that fadeth not away. Oh, but is it merely fairy story? Tell me, friend, is it merely some old wife's tale with which we comfort ourselves when aging begins in our fragile bodies, and we like to dream of an inheritance incorruptible? This I tell you. That yes, the inheritance is real enough, but how could we men and women ever hope to be there?
Inheritance incorruptible. La. You don't have to be very wise, do you, as you look around our world to see that our world is decaying. The great sun up in the sky upon which our planet depends for its light and its heat and therefore its life. The great sun up in the sky, in a sense, is no bigger better than the coal fire you have in your hearth. You know that when your coal fire burns, it gives out heat, but at the same time it loses energy, it loses its matter, and in the end it goes out, unless you supply it with new matter. So it is with the sun up in the sky. Don't let's deceive ourselves.
That sun has been going for who knows how many centuries, but every minute the great sun up in the sky is pouring out its heat, pouring out its energy, pouring out its matter, and by that token the sun is getting less every minute, every hour, every day, every year, every century. The sun is decaying. Doesn't matter that the scientists tell us it will be a long while before it explodes. If God doesn't intervene, it will one day explode. And the day it explodes and becomes a great red giant, in that moment our little Earth will evaporate.
Planet Earth will be no more. Isn't that, boys, what the physicists tell us? Our world is run. Oh, you can come nearer home, friend. Our bodies are running down, aren't they? Well, mine is. Oh, I shan't confide in you the state secret of how old I am. The material wasn't very good, and it's been running down I some some decades now, and don't I know it, in the old bones and the muscles. We're decaying. And you know that the doctors, they don't mean to be impertinent, but they sound like it. They tell me that the cells in my brain are dying at a phenomenal rate every day, which accounts for a lot, of course.
So are yours, incidentally. And those cells are irreplaceable. Friend, we are decaying, and in front stands the great river of nature, death itself. What hope have you, what hope have I of ever seeing an inheritance incorruptible and undefiled, and that fades not away. Listen to Peter, for he has the answer. Into these decaying hearts and decaying bodies, God has instilled a hope.
He has begotten us again, not merely to new life, but to a new hope. How? By the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead, that's how. Oh, wonderful story, the biggest and best that ever decaying earth and decaying people ever heard. The gospel is this, how that Jesus Christ died for our sins according to the scriptures. He was buried, literally buried, as literally as you will be so one of these days. The gospel is this, that he was buried. But the gospel is this, that the third day he rose again, according to the scripture, and the great barrier of death was shattered for the believer forever.
The way, ah, the way into the inheritance is wide open. Not only is our blessed Lord Jesus raised, but the Bible talks like this, that if you have trusted Christ, it says you too, God has given you life along with the Lord Jesus and has ex- raised you and seated you in the heavenly places in Christ Jesus. Ponder the miracle. You'll see every body, every single human body since Adam had been going slowly to decay, and with two exceptions, had gone into the grave and gone to stinking corruption.
For the universe is running down. When the body of Jesus Christ was put in the grave, Holy Scripture tells us that that great process of decay was stopped. And even in the grave, his holy body did not go to decay. He saw no corruption. And then, miracle of miracles, God put the whole process in reverse. And that once dead body came out of the grave alive. That cornerstone miracle of Christianity has implications as wide as the universe.
For Jesus Christ was a human being, exactly as we are human beings, though he was sinless while we were sinful, but he was a real human being. His body wasn't a pretend human body, it was a real human body with the same chemistry as yours and mine. If it is true that the body of the man Jesus Christ has come out of the grave, it holds implication for every human body. From the time of Adam until the Lord comes again. I'll tell you something more marvelous. Scientists tell us, do they not, that the chemistry of the universe is uniform, right the way through, that the elements we find on Earth, you'll find them in the stars and the planets.
If the body of the real human body of the real man Jesus Christ has come out of the grave alive again, and in him God has reversed the processes of nature. It carries implications for the furthermost planet and the furthermost star in the whole universe of God. And the New Testament is not ashamed to draw the consequence and the implication. It says this, not only we who trust the Savior, when the Lord comes, will be raised from the grave, or if we're still alive, will be caught up and our bodies changed, and we have been given a body like to his glorious body.
But listen further, Holy Scripture tells us that nature, the whole great creation that groans in travail even until now, nature herself shall be delivered from the bondage to corruption into the liberty of the glory of the children of God. Oh, what a gospel message we have in a world that otherwise has literally no hope. When we go out to preach that God's promise that one day all things shall be restored, when we go out to preach all those glowing prophecies through Isaiah and Ezekiel and all the Old Testament prophets from Samuel onwards, when we go out to preach their wonderful visions of a time when the whole of nature shall be restored, we're not preaching a blind hope.
We are preaching a restoration that has already begun to happen. For Christ is the first fruit of them that slept. Oh, shout hallelujah in your hearts, do. The first fruits. It has begun to happen. A human body has come out of the grave, is glorified, and ascended into the very presence of God. First fruits of multi-millions that in a coming day shall rise to meet their returning Lord. First fruits of a whole universe restored and reconciled to God.
Barrier of death broken. We'll say, Hebrews chapter two has another comment upon the matter, doesn't it? We all remember that Hebrews chapter two quotes the glorious, uh, program laid down in Psalm eight. where the psalmist is reflecting, what is man that thou art mindful of him, or the son of man that thou visitest him? And he proceeds to detail the original plan of God, that man was to rule for God as the image of God and be over all the works of God's hand. But then sin came in, didn't it?
And with sin, death. Sin came in by the artifice of the great enemy of the human race, Satan himself, who deceived Eve and then Adam into disobedience against God in transgressing against his purpose, and landed the couple of them, and with them the whole race, into the process of gradual decay and death. And then his satanic majesty asserted himself as him that has the power of death. What a genius he's proved to be, hasn't he? For having got men and women to sin, now for them death becomes a terrible thing.
As the Bible puts it, you'll say, the sting of death is sin. It is so, isn't it? The process of dying can be unpleasant enough on occasions, though with some it's instantaneous. But however painful the process of dying, the real sting in death is in its tail. What happens after death? Oh, good madam, good sir, do allow me to remind you that to live without Christ, without God, to live unforgiven, and then to die.
Oh, who should describe the awful sting of waking up in a great eternity, unforgiven, barred from the great inheritance forever. Oh, it's no good supposing there's going to be some magic that you can live unconverted, unsaved, unforgiven, and somehow when you die, God has a magic wand or two that he can wave over you, and all will be well. It will not be so! Sin unforgiven means that death will have its sting.
The power of sin is the law, but not to all eternity will God's law or God himself say that sin does not matter. It's because of that, you know, many men and women try to think that there is nothing beyond the grave, don't they? And they think they're clever. Now we can be free, we can enjoy ourselves. Oh, how we can enjoy ourselves. There's no God, there's nothing beyond the grave, there's no hell. Yes, but if there's no hell, there's no heaven either. And they who think thus are cutting themselves off, aren't they? Even in life, as they see life go downhill, they have no hope.
Death and decay and the worms will make a mockery of their intelligence and reduce their beauty to ashes. What a great thing the devil has done as the one who has the power of death. And other folks, because they know there's going to be a life to come, then they live all their time subject to bondage, and they go through all sorts of forms and ceremonies, be it in pagan countries, be it sometimes in more civilized countries. For they ask themselves, where are their loved ones now? And they'll pay all sorts of s- t- uh, amounts of money to try and rescue their departed loved ones from this purgatory or that, all to no avail.
That's no way into God's great inheritance. Hear then the glorious gospel that our blessed Lord Jesus has broken the power of him that had the power of death. Put him out of business. How? Why, says scripture, because the children were partakers of flesh and blood, he himself likewise partook of the same, that through death he might put out of business him that has the power of death, that is the devil, and deliver them who through all their lifetime, through fear of death, were subject to bondage. You say, how has, how has our blessed Lord through his death put Satan himself out of business?
Well, in this particular, you'll see that our blessed Lord, by his dying as a man and yet as God's son, paid the great penalty of sin. You'll see, and thus can assure his followers, he that followeth me shall not see death. Believers may well see dying and all its pains, but God himself assures the believer, you will never see death. Or for a believer to close his or her eyes on this world, to be absent from the body, oh, praise God, is to be at once and immediately with the Lord.
Death has lost its sting, and we shout in triumph, oh death, where is thy sting? Oh grave, where is thy victory? The sting of death is sin. The strength of sin is the law. But thanks be to God, for our greater than Joshua, through whom God gives us the victory and breaks the barrier of death. If that be in general the kind of analogy that we are meant to draw from the Old Testament prototype to the New Testament reality, allow me finally to point out how that in the ancient story of the crossing of Jordan, three major points are made.
When you read the Old Testament, you should remember that the ancient historians don't always tell a story as we modern people would tell it. We modern people like, because we boast ourselves in our logic most of the time, we like to tell a story starting from A and working through B and C, and after that D. What comes after D? E, E and F and G and H, until we have worked with our sublime logic through to Z, and after Z comes nothing. The ancient Hebrews were more humane. They would tell you a story and carry on from one point of view from the beginning to the end, and then they start again and tell you the same story from another point of view and go right through to the end.
And if that wasn't enough, they'd come back halfway and take up the story again and once more take it through to the end from a different point of view. So it is with the story of Israel's crossing through Jordan while the ark stayed in the bed of Jordan until all Israel was passed over. And the first thing the story right teller tells you is the wonder of it. Says God to Joshua, tell Israel to be ready to cross, because today I will begin to do wonders before them, and I will magnify your name, Joshua, in their sight.
So prepare yourself now, in the closing moments of our study, sit back a moment. We're going back in history to that ancient time, thirteen BC, perhaps. What a wonder. There was Jordan in flood, Israel rising up, ready to march, and the priests told to take up the ark of the Lord of the whole earth. They had to stand back, lest they crowd the ark, for they've not passed this way before. Now are they all to be able to see a fantastic and almost incredible wonder.
The Lord of the whole earth. What's he troubling with a few square acres in Canyon for, I wonder, when the vast creations and the galaxies are all his, and how much more beside? But that land is his. Those few square miles in the Middle East are his. It's the Lord of the whole Earth coming to take his earth. Why shouldn't he have it? You say, why did he bother to come through Jordan then? If the Lord of the whole earth wanted to take his, his country of Palestine, why didn't he come direct down?
Is there no direct route down from heaven so you could come to the middle of Palestine without bothering to go through Jordan? Well, to be sure, there was. If it merely were the question of the Almighty taking the land that was his. Ah, but that wasn't just the issue. He came to take it not for himself merely, but to give it to his wayward, sinful, failing, sinful, dying people. How would he bring them in? Oh, see the wonder. As the priests took up the ark with God himself enthroned, and they march solemnly to the brink of the water, and their feet stand in the water, and then sight beyond all telling, the Lord of the whole earth goes down to the very bed of Jordan until all his people are passed clean over.
Can you believe such a wonder? However, come the thirteen centuries later, I'll show a bigger wonder. How would God get you into an inheritance incorruptible and undefiled, and that fades not away? Our friend, he needn't have come to earth at all for that. If it were merely for himself, he could have stayed where he was. But he came down, was born in a manger, and at thirty years old walked into the River Jordan and stood in the mud of the literal River Jordan beside men and women that were sinners, telling all who could see what he had come to do, namely that three and a half years later, the Lord of the whole earth went before us and approached the great river of death and went down.
This time the waters didn't f- form a wall on either side. The waters came over, and he was submerged. He tasted death's waters, dark, bitter, offensive. And for his lost sheep, he went down to the grave. Not all the long centuries of eternity will ever discover a bigger wonder than we have seen at Calvary.
The second part of the story is concerned with the sign that God gave Israel with which to remember this great event. When they passed through Jordan, they were to take twelve stones from the bed of the river and put them on the bank. That in the centuries to come, as generations of parents brought their little children to the side of Jordan, and the children would ask, what mean these stones? Then the parents would tell them that this is the memorial, how God brought our nation into their inheritance. You say, why would the children need to be told that? Well, for one good reason, to give them a sense of gratitude to the far off historical event that was the event that brought Israel into the land.
And secondly, you see, if Israel ever were to forget the great miracle of God that brought them into the land, they would be in danger of becoming just like the Canaanites, eating their grapes, enjoying their butter, spreading the old marmalade on their toast, very thick, and forgetful how they ever got there, forgetting the Lord their God and beginning to live as worldly lives as ever the Canaanites did. Save them from that disaster. God made provision that every generation would come and learn the great historical event, however many centuries before it happened.
How did God bring our nation into this great inheritance and learn forever to be grateful to God? Our blessed Lord has left us a similar memorial, hasn't he? Oh, my dear Christian friend, we have an inheritance incorruptible in one sense, we're already seated in the heavenly places in Christ Jesus. But tell me, how did you ever get in? How did I get into my inheritance? Oh, foolish heart of mine, that I could ever forget it, and forget gratitude to God, and even as a Christian begin to take all the blessings and forget the law and live a worldly life, just like the man in the street.
For that very reason, our Lord has ordained that week by week we gather to remember the great historical event that was the key to our entering our inheritance. We meet and we take bread, and we drink wine, and we remember that for us to be in the inheritance, he gave his body, and he gave his blood. Say not we need nothing of the sign. We need it still, shall need it until the blessed Lord shall come.
Finally, the third part of the story is this, the significance of it. They were to put the, uh, stones on the bank so that all the nation should know the hand of the Lord, how powerful it is. That also speaks to us, doesn't it? We can imagine ourselves standing on the bank with an ancient father and his boy, and the father explaining to the boy, see these twelve stones? They are memorial how it was brought into the land. And then he would tell the boy another thing. Son, said he, could you see down there in the swirling waters? Could you see those dark shapes? Yes, Dad, what are they?
Well, they're stones as well. Can you see them? Oh, now and again I think I can, yes. Twelve stones on the bottom of that muddy river. Yes, says the father, that's where the ark actually stood. Do you know, my boy, that once upon a time in history, the Lord of the whole earth was down there in the bottom of the river, and Israel were down with him too. In the bottom of the river they were as they marched past the ark through the bed of Jordan. Having gone through the river with him, they came up the other side. Yes, we too need to be reminded of it, don't we? It's not only true that in order to bring us into the inheritance, Christ died for us, and for us was buried.
But the other thing is true, isn't it? That we died with him and were buried with him, so that now we might walk in newness of life. So we mustn't be surprised to hear the historian record that when all Israel were passed over, Joshua said to the priests who were standing in the bottom of the river, come up, gentlemen, said he, come up. And they came up with the ark upon their shoulders. I say it to you tonight, come up, my brother, come up, my sister. You died with Christ, you were buried with Christ. Ah, but isn't it true? You're risen with Christ.
If you then be risen with Christ, live as men and women that are risen with Christ, that all the world may see the reality of the power of God that has saved you, has exalted you, has raised you with the Lord Jesus, and now, by his grace, lives within you. The Lord bless our study of his word to this practical end for his name's sake.
