You might recall that the nation of Israel, after being delivered from slavery in Egypt, spent forty years wandering in the wilderness before finally entering the Promised Land.
Except there was a problem, they needed to cross the Jordan River before they could officially enter the land. Now most of the year, the Jordan River might best be described as a creek or a stream rather than a river, except during late spring, when it was flood season, at which time the Jordan River could stretch more than mile a wide.
Attempting to cross the Jordan River during the flood season would be a hazardous venture, not unlike attempts to the ford the river in the classic game, The Oregon Trail where the likelihood that your wagon would either flood or be swept away by the currents of the river was high.
So rather than risk such a crossing, God parts the waters of the Jordan River, so that the people can cross into the land on dry ground. It’s nothing short of a miracle, a demonstration of God’s power.
Once the people reach the other side, God tells Joshua to send twelve men back into the middle of Jordan to collect twelve rocks, one for each tribe of Israel.
The men do as Joshua tells them to do.
And then, that night, their first night in the land, while the people camped at Gilgal, Joshua stacked those twelve stones from the middle of the Jordan River as a memorial, a reminder.
Joshua said to the people, “When your children ask their parents in time to come, ‘What do these stones mean?’ then you shall let your children know, ‘Israel crossed over the Jordan here on dry ground.’ For the Lord your God dried up the waters of the Jordan for you until you crossed over…so that all the peoples of the earth may know that the hand of the Lord is mighty, and so that you may fear the Lord your God forever.”
In some sense, it seems like a strange action. But, somewhere just outside of Jericho, along the shores of the Jordan, is pile of twelve stones that are to serve as a memorial for the people. A way to remind them, and the generations that follow, that God once dried up the waters of the Jordan River. But even more, they were a reminder that God fulfilled God’s promise, a promise God first made to their ancestor Abraham that they would inherit the land that God would show them.
And so, while to some, it is indeed just a pile of stones, to the people of Israel, those twelve stones were a physical and material memorial of who God was, who God is, and who God will be.
Because now, on the right side of the Jordan, their new life can begin.
Grace and peace,
Kimmy
Comentarios