As a writer, there
are lots of things to keep in mind as a story progresses. Characters, plot,
setting. The longer the story the more characters and settings there will be,
and they somehow have to tie into the plot in a smooth way. However, that’s not
all: theme and symbolism also play a huge role. These are ultimately what makes
the story more than just another story; they are what keep a story around for
several generations, or ultimately what constitute a classic. However, though there
are many other things that go into a good story, pace is what I want to focus
on today. The speed at which the story is told is important. It can be used to
build suspense, or it can be used to mitigate suspense. It causes the reader to
say, “Hurry up already and get to the point,” which keeps them turning the page
until they reach a conclusion. Or it can cause a reader to say, “I just didn’t
really get into it, because it was all over too quickly.” In the same way, our
historian is a master of pacing, as our text today will prove.
Our historian writes,
“Joshua started early the next morning and left the Acacia Grove with all the
Israelites. They went as far as the Jordan and stayed there before crossing.
After three days the officers went through the camp and commanded
the people: ‘When you see the ark of the covenant of the LORD your God carried
by the Levitical priests, you must break camp and follow it. But keep a
distance of about 1,000 yards between yourselves and the ark. Don’t go near it,
so that you can see the way to go, for you haven’t traveled this way before.’ Joshua
told the people, ‘Consecrate yourselves, because the LORD will do wonders among
you tomorrow.’ Then he said to the priests, ‘Take the ark of the covenant
and go on ahead of the people.’ So they carried the ark of the covenant and
went ahead of them. The LORD spoke to Joshua: ‘Today I will begin to
exalt you in the sight of all Israel, so they will know that I will be with you
just as I was with Moses. Command the priests carrying the ark of the
covenant: When you reach the edge of the waters, stand in the Jordan.’ Then
Joshua told the Israelites, ‘Come closer and listen to the words of the LORD
your God.’ He said: ‘You will know that the living God is among you and
that He will certainly dispossess before you the Canaanites, Hittites, Hivites,
Perizzites, Girgashites, Amorites, and Jebusites when the ark of the
covenant of the Lord of all the earth goes ahead of you into the Jordan.
Now choose 12 men from the tribes of Israel, one man for each tribe.
When the feet of the priests who carry the ark of the LORD, the Lord of
all the earth, come to rest in the Jordan’s waters, its waters will be cut off.
The water flowing downstream will stand up ⌊in⌋ a mass.’ When the people
broke camp to cross the Jordan, the priests carried the ark of the covenant
ahead of the people. Now the Jordan overflows its banks throughout the
harvest season. But as soon as the priests carrying the ark reached the Jordan,
their feet touched the water at its edge and the water flowing downstream stood
still, rising up ⌊in⌋ a mass that extended as far as
Adam, a city next to Zarethan. The water flowing downstream into the Sea of the
Arabah (the Dead Sea) was completely cut off, and the people crossed opposite
Jericho. The priests carrying the ark of the LORD’s covenant stood firmly
on dry ground in the middle of the Jordan, while all Israel crossed on dry
ground until the entire nation had finished crossing the Jordan.”
So by this point the
spies have just returned to Joshua. They had spent three days in the mountains
after speaking with Rahab. Joshua had told Israel in chapter 1:11 that they
would be moving in three days. With that knowledge, it is time for the people
to move again. After a focus on the spies for three days, it is now time to
zoom out and look at the whole nation again. Through the use of expert
narrative pacing, our historian wants to show us that God is faithful to keep
His promises, and that He is present with His people. He shows us this through
the use of multiple speeches.
But before getting
to the first speech, we read in verses 1-2, “Joshua started early the next
morning and left the Acacia Grove with all the Israelites. They went as far as
the Jordan and stayed there before crossing. After three days the
officers went through the camp.”
For convenience
sake, let’s say that the spies entered Jericho on Sunday. They would have
returned to Joshua on Tuesday night. Wednesday morning they all left the Acacia
Grove and set up a new camp on the eastern shore of the Jordan River. After
three more days, action happens.
The first speech
is given by the officers to the people in verses 3-4, “When you see the ark of
the covenant of the LORD your God carried by the Levitical priests, you must break
camp and follow it. But keep a distance of about 1,000 yards between
yourselves and the ark. Don’t go near it, so that you can see the way to go,
for you haven’t traveled this way before.”
So, to keep the
convenient time scale going, the officers go throughout the camp three days
after the Wednesday march. Sometime on Friday the officers go throughout the
camp and tell the people what they need to be watching for. They tell the
people that the ark of the covenant of Yahweh their God being moved by the
Levitical priests is their sign to move out. However, in telling them this,
they also give a boundary. They say that the people must not come within 1,000
yards—literally 2,000 cubits—of the ark because the ark is their guide. One
commentator says, “The distance of 2000 cubits was approximately that of the
outer bank of the Jordan to the inner bed.”[1]
The people were to have faith and follow the ark, and they were not to
pridefully think that they were wiser than God; their faith was to be shown in
humble following at a distance of more than half a mile.
So, before moving
on, I must ask us, do we trust God humbly? Or are we insistent on always
saying, “God, I know what’s best for me, and You need to do it for me”? Do we
follow too closely in a prideful—God can’t lead me best—mindset? Of course God
wants us to follow Him, and to follow Him closely—possible only through
Jesus—but we must be humble in our following and not insist that we know better
than God. If we act in that way, we really aren’t following God, we’re telling
God to follow us, which is the height of sinful pride.
There is another,
very real sense in which the people were told to follow at that great distance
simply for their own safety. Second Samuel 6 tells the story of a man being
struck dead for touching the ark. God wants us to follow Him because He knows
best and because He wants to protect us. When we say, “God, You’d better do
what I want You to do,” we’re ultimately saying, “I want pain and sorrow to
come to me, because I know better than the one who works everything out for my
good.” This is why many times our prayers seem like they are not answered. God
does not want to harm us, so we need to humbly trust and follow Him like the
Israelites were called to do on the shores of the Jordan.
The second speech
is given by Joshua to the people in verses 5, “Consecrate yourselves, because
the LORD will do wonders among you tomorrow.” Joshua tells the people to
consecrate themselves for the next day: Saturday (for our convenient calendar
of events). He says that the reason they need to consecrate themselves is
because God would do wonders among them the next day. This makes me think: how
often do we miss the wonders of God that He is doing in our own lives because
we are not consecrated? How often do we expect His wonders to look like a
parted body of water, when His greatest wonder of all occurred on a bloody
cross? The greatest wonders of God occur in everyday moments when our hearts
are prepared to experience them. This is why we should never pridefully tell
God that we know better than Him, but rather humbly follow Him even when it
looks like the odds are totally against us.
The third speech
is given by Joshua to the priests in verse 6, “Take the ark of the covenant and
go on ahead of the people.” This looks like it takes place the next day. Joshua
orders the priests to move out ahead of the people so as to get the 2,000 cubit
separation in place. The priests response is recorded at the end of verse 6: “So
they carried the ark of the covenant and went ahead of them.” The priests obey
immediately, showing respect for their new leader. As of this point there has
been no disrespect shown to Joshua. The tribes all agreed on moving out after
three days, including the ones who would eventually move back east of the
Jordan after the conquest. The spies did their job and returned with a positive
report. The people all set out from the Acacia Grove and were now camped at the
edge of the Jordan. This fact leads well into the next speech.
The fourth speech
is given by Yahweh to Joshua in verses 7-8, “Today I will begin to exalt you in
the sight of all Israel, so they will know that I will be with you just as I
was with Moses. Command the priests carrying the ark of the covenant:
When you reach the edge of the waters, stand in the Jordan.”
Yahweh wants
Joshua to know that He chose him. He wants Joshua to know that He will be with
him. He tells him that today Joshua will begin to see explicit proof of it. He
tells Joshua more that Joshua relays to the people in verses 9-13, which
ultimately form the main point today, but God primarily wants Joshua to know
that He is with him. God wants Joshua to know that he can trust Him, so that
Joshua can be a godly leader who exemplifies trust in God. If Joshua follows
God like the people were commanded to follow God, then the people would be much
more likely to follow God, especially if God could be visibly seen to be with
their leader.
Before Joshua
speaks God’s words to the people, God gives him some words for the priests,
which likely means that this conversation occurred before the priests left in
verse 6. Not only were they to go ahead of the people, but they were to stand
in the water when they got there. The priests obeyed, as verse 6 demonstrates.
As the priests
march towards the Jordan, Joshua gives the final speech of our passage to the
people in verses 9-13, “‘Come closer and listen to the words of the LORD your
God.’ He said: ‘You will know that the living God is among you and that
He will certainly dispossess before you the Canaanites, Hittites, Hivites,
Perizzites, Girgashites, Amorites, and Jebusites when the ark of the
covenant of the Lord of all the earth goes ahead of you into the Jordan.
Now choose 12 men from the tribes of Israel, one man for each tribe.
When the feet of the priests who carry the ark of the LORD, the Lord of
all the earth, come to rest in the Jordan’s waters, its waters will be cut off.
The water flowing downstream will stand up ⌊in⌋ a mass.’”
He tells the
people to listen up to God’s Word. God had a message for His people. This
God—their God—is named Yahweh in verse 9, and in verse 13 He is described as
the “master of all the earth.” The God who is in a personal covenant with
Israel is the God who rules the whole earth. This is mind-blowing. What’s even
more mind-blowing is what He says next: Israel would know that God was present
with them, and they would know that God was going to give them victory over the
inhabitants of the land when “the ark of the covenant, the Lord of all the
earth,”[2]
went into the Jordan. Howard writes, “If the Hebrew is correct as it stands,
then the ark is identified all that much more closely with God himself, that
is, the ark (or the covenant) is equated with the Lord himself.”[3]
God’s presence is located in the ark. This was why the people were called to
humbly respect the ark by keeping a certain distance from it. (Verse 12, about
twelve men, is a parenthesis that heightens suspense, but since it isn’t
mentioned again until chapter 4, I will bring it up next time.) God explains,
through Joshua, the sign that would prove that He was with them and giving them
the land would occur when the priests went into the water: “When the feet of
the priests who carry the ark of the LORD, the Lord of all the earth, come to
rest in the Jordan’s waters, its waters will be cut off. The water flowing
downstream will stand up ⌊in⌋ a mass.”
Finally, we see played
out in detail in verses 14-17 what was previewed through the speeches in 3-13,
“When the people broke camp to cross the Jordan, the priests carried the ark of
the covenant ahead of the people. Now the Jordan overflows its banks
throughout the harvest season. But as soon as the priests carrying the ark
reached the Jordan, their feet touched the water at its edge and the water
flowing downstream stood still, rising up ⌊in⌋ a mass that extended as far as
Adam, a city next to Zarethan. The water flowing downstream into the Sea of the
Arabah (the Dead Sea) was completely cut off, and the people crossed opposite
Jericho. The priests carrying the ark of the LORD’s covenant stood firmly
on dry ground in the middle of the Jordan, while all Israel crossed on dry
ground until the entire nation had finished crossing the Jordan.”
Before explaining
in detail, let’s read a more literal translation. Howard translates verses
14-16,
And it happened—when the
people set out from their tents to cross the Jordan, with the priests carrying
the ark of the covenant before them, and when those carrying the ark came as far
as the Jordan, and [when] the feet of the priests carrying the ark were dipped
into the edge of the waters (now the Jordan overflows all its banks all the
days of the harvest)— that the waters coming down from above stood! They
rose up [in] one heap, a very far distance away, at Adam, the city that is
opposite Zarethan, and the [waters] coming down upon the Sea of the Arabah,
the Salt Sea, were completely cut off. And the people crossed
opposite Jericho.[4]
It’s quite a mouthful. The author
wants to draw out the suspense as long as possible. Starting with, “and it
happened,” the author proves that God’s word came true. “The people set out” is
a loaded phrase. This was not a small band of friends. According to Numbers 26,
there were 601,730 men over twenty years old. Assuming for a moment that every
man twenty years old has a wife (which is a semi-safe assumption back then) and
at least one child, we’re easily looking at a number of 1,805,190 people—male
and female—of all different ages. We must also keep in mind that this count
does not include any of the Levites, of whom it is safe to assume that there
were at least 20,000 men over twenty years old, which means at least 60,000
more people, bringing the total to at least 1,865,190 people about to cross a
flooded river (cf. 3:15).
When this crowd
saw the ark set out, they broke camp, which must have been a sight to see.
Think about the noise from this throng of people. It’s no wonder the people of
Jericho were shaking in their boots at the thought. The priests were in the
front with the ark. When the ark reached the flooded bank of the Jordan it
happened: the water stopped. When they crossed the Red Sea forty years earlier,
it was a still body of water, the parting of which was described as, “the
waters ⌊like⌋ a wall to them on their right and
their left” (Exodus 14:22). Here, they are crossing a river which flows south.
It is described as, “the water flowing downstream stood still, rising up ⌊in⌋
a mass that extended as far as Adam, a city next to Zarethan. The water flowing
downstream into the Sea of the Arabah (the Dead Sea) was completely cut off.”
Our historian tells us that the waters stood up at Adam, which is next to
Zerathan. “Adam . . . on the eastern shore of the Jordan . . . about sixteen
miles north of Jericho.”[5]
I point this out because verse 16 says that the people crossed opposite
Jericho. The water stood up sixteen miles north of them, and then south of them
flowed into the Dead Sea until there was nothing left to flow into the Dead
Sea. This was quite the miracle! God could have done anything, such as parted
the water so two or three people could cross at a time, but instead He dried up
the whole southern section of the river, including sixteen miles north of them,
and said, “Cross!”
Verse 17 is huge! “The
priests carrying the ark of the LORD’s covenant stood firmly on dry ground in
the middle of the Jordan, while all Israel crossed on dry ground until the
entire nation had finished crossing the Jordan.” The ark stayed in the middle
of the river while the people crossed. The 2,000 cubit distance was kept,
because they had multiple miles of dry ground on each side of the ark. But the
point is that not only does God lead His people, but He goes with His people
and stands in the midst of their trouble until the last one of His people is
through. We must humbly follow our God because He humbly leads us, even though
He could powerfully smash any of us at any moment, and be perfectly just to do
so.
You see, not one
of us deserves to have God in our midst. And at the same time, since God is the
Master of all the Earth, He is everywhere and thus always in our midst. For
this reason every breath we take is grace. God could have denied you that last
breath because you’re sinful. You’ve lied, stolen, cheated, idolized something,
etc. However, not only is God the Master of all the Earth, but Jesus Christ is
too. Instead of clinging to that title though, He shed it and lived amongst us
and our trouble 2,000 years ago. He was unjustly condemned and nailed to a
cross even though He did nothing wrong, and He hung there on the cross for 6
hours until every last sin of every person who would ever place their faith in
Him was paid for. Then He died. The wrath of God covered Him like the Jordan
River refilled its valley after the people were safely across. However, after
three days in the tomb, Jesus rose from the grave, emerging from the River
victorious to show that death had no hold over Him.
Just like God
didn’t cross the river immediately, but stayed in it until His people came
through safely, Jesus didn’t think about Himself first either. He gave His life
for each and every one of His people. He enables us to do the same for those in
our lives. And He urges us to trust Him fully and follow Him even when nothing
makes sense because He is with us.
If you’ve never
trusted Jesus before, please do so today!!
So the Bible has
suspenseful sections contained in its pages. In fact, while the book of Genesis
covers 2,000 years and the book of Exodus covers 400 years, the book of
Leviticus maybe covers thirty days. The time focus alone in that example shows
us that Leviticus is a key focus from the Bible’s point of view since the pace
almost slows to a stop. However, in much the same way that we often stop
reading when we get to Leviticus, when the pace slows anywhere in the Bible we
decide its boring, instead of doing what we do in other reading, where we say, “I
gotta get through this so I can get answers.” The “boring” parts are part of
the story too—a necessary part. Let’s repent of our judgment of them and follow
God humbly, accepting all of His Word as worthwhile, rather than pridefully
just enjoying the parts that interest us.
Solus Christus
Soli Deo Gloria
[1]
Marten H Woudstra, The Book of Joshua,
NICOT (Grand Rapids, MI: Wm. B. Eerdmans, 1981), 81.
[2] David M. Howard, New American
Commentary – Volume 5: Joshua, (Nashville, TN: Broadman & Holman,
1998), WORDsearch CROSS e-book, 127.
[3]
Ibid. Rather than translating it, “the ark of the covenant of the Lord of all
the earth.”
[4]
Ibid., 129.
[5]
Trent C. Butler, Joshua, WBC (Waco,
TX: Word, 1983), 48.
