When we are filled with doubt and discouragement, when we don't think God is answering anymore, when we feel the heavens are brass we need to have memorial stones we can touch so that we can remember, "Yes, these stones came from the middle of the overflowing river. We brought them out of the river to remind us that God is faithful even in the most impossible situations."
Children have many endearing qualities about them. Perhaps one of the most engaging is their tendency to ask questions no one can answer. As a matter of fact, I am not sure there are any answers for some of their questions. I have a lot of answers, but somehow my answers rarely seem to coincide with my children's questions! "How high is up?" "How far is there?"
Perhaps you have heard the story of the little boy who asked his father, "How tall is the Eiffel Tower?" His father said, "I don't know, son; I don't have any idea." The boy said, "How far is it from here to China?" His dad said, "I just don't know, son." "Well, how deep is the deepest part of the ocean?" His father said, "I really don't have any idea." The little boy said, "Daddy, how--oh never mind." His dad said, "That's all right, son. Ask questions. It's the only way you can get answers!"
We recognize that our children are naturally inquisitive. It is the way they learn. Someone once asked Isidor Rabi, the well-known physicist and Nobel Prize winner, what he attributed his inquiring spirit to. His response was that each day when he came home from school his mother would ask him, "Isidor, did you ask any good questions today?"
I am convinced that the naturally inquisitive spirit children have is designed by God to lead them into a knowledge of the truth. And we parents have an opportunity to be primary agents in that process.
God didn’t create the earth and the people to populate it and then walk away and yell out over his shoulder, "Best of luck!" No, that’s not the kind of God we have. Our God is Yahweh, I AM. He’s involved with us; he’s personally present, providing all the resources we need to live this life.
The parents' responsibility is to teach each generation with three generations in view to praise the Lord; to teach them of the strength and of the wondrous works of the Lord; and to teach them to put their confidence in God so their children will put their confidence in God, so their children will put their confidence in God, and so on down through the ages until he comes again.
We are to set them free from this "Me" society that cannot see beyond today, this society that thinks that when it dies the whole world dies with it. Our children are living testimony to the fact that God has given us a very significant part to play in his plan of redemption throughout the ages.
My righteousness in God's strength in my generation will have a tremendous effect on my grandchildren whom God already knows by name and by ministry.
When we talk about teaching our children all these things, the question, Where can we Christian parents get time to do this in view of the constant interruptions our modern world is forcing upon us? Sometimes I think we’ve embarked on new careers when we have children: full-time taxi driver!
How in the world can we teach truth to our children when all we do is race home from work, run down to a fast food chain (because there's no time to cook dinner), gobble up some food that's absolutely no good for us and take off again to football practice, baseball practice, riding practice, swimming practice? And not only do you have to take your children there, you've got to go pick them up and bring them home again. You spend your whole day looking at your watch.
How are we going to communicate spiritual truth to this generation that will affect the next three generations in this three--ring circus world we're living in? Well, our beautiful Lord gives us wisdom on how to live in this three--ring circus. You see, all those times when we're going back and forth with our children are just loaded with teachable moments, incredibly rich moments that we can buy up by the wisdom that God gives us.
Children give us leads all day long and we have to buy them up. And these don't have to be long sermons. (I remember the day my children said to me, "Is this going to be a long one?")
One of the most beautiful illustrations of a teachable moment is found in chapter 4 of the Book of Joshua. In this story we have our Lord's instructions to us on how to use one of those moments. The story has three movements:
(1)
Stones on the West Bank (verses 1-8);
(2) Stones in the middle of the river (verse s 9-18);
(3) Stones in Gilgal (verses 19-26).
(Joshua 4:1-8 NIV) When the whole nation had finished crossing the Jordan, the LORD said to Joshua, {2} "Choose twelve men from among the people, one from each tribe, {3} and tell them to take up twelve stones from the middle of the Jordan from right where the priests stood and to carry them over with you and put them down at the place where you stay tonight." {4} So Joshua called together the twelve men he had appointed from the Israelites, one from each tribe, {5} and said to them, "Go over before the ark of the LORD your God into the middle of the Jordan. Each of you is to take up a stone on his shoulder, according to the number of the tribes of the Israelites, {6} to serve as a sign among you. In the future, when your children ask you, 'What do these stones mean?' {7} tell them that the flow of the Jordan was cut off before the ark of the covenant of the LORD. When it crossed the Jordan, the waters of the Jordan were cut off. These stones are to be a memorial to the people of Israel forever." {8} So the Israelites did as Joshua commanded them. They took twelve stones from the middle of the Jordan, according to the number of the tribes of the Israelites, as the LORD had told Joshua; and they carried them over with them to their camp, where they put them down.
Two million people of the second generation of those who left Egypt crossed into the Promised Land, and two people of the first generation, Joshua and Caleb, crossed, because they did not sin against God. Joshua stands watching all the people come across totally amazed at what God has done. Meanwhile, his enemies five miles up to the west are standing on the walls of the city of Jericho, watching in horror, fear and disbelief, as two million people cross over on the now dry river bed.
Then they see this strange sight: Joshua instructs twelve men, one man from each of the twelve tribes of Israel, to go into the Jordan and pick up stones and place them on their shoulders and bring the stones to a place where the Israelites will lodge that night. Let this be a sign among you, Joshua tells them.
These stones were to serve a fourfold purpose:
1. That the Israelites had just crossed on dry land from the wilderness, a place where their fathers lived in unbelief. Joshua is saying, "We do not have to live that way any more. These stones will be a sign that as we go to the Promised Land and take hold of all that God has for us, we will know that although the River Jordan was in flood, yet God overruled that impossible situation in the most amazing way."
2. The second sign they would serve was that their children would ask, "What do these stones mean?" That is the nature of children. We need to work diligently to present to our children truth through memorial stones in our lives so that when they see them and touch them we can tell them about how God has worked. Those are the teachable moments we need.
3. Joshua says, "We will know that these stones are here because the waters of the Jordan were cut off before the ark of the covenant of the Lord." For seven hundred years, ever since the days of Abraham, the nation of Israel had waited for this moment. Finally, two million people walked on dry land into the land of promise. Are you willing to live your life so that your descendants, seven hundred years from now, can enjoy the blessings that God has prepared for them?
Our struggle is that we can't think in terms of seven days, much less 700 years. We have lost our sense of history, our sense of reality from God's perspective. We have bought the world's system, the "Me" society. I beg of you to make the choice to get out of it and be set free to see who you are in God's sight.
4. Joshua says that the stones would become a memorial to their sons forever. You see, God doesn't change. What he accomplished at the Jordan, where he invaded time and space and overcame apparently impossible circumstances, he can accomplish again. He can divide the waters and march us into this new land.
When we are filled with doubt and discouragement, when we don't think God is answering anymore, when we feel the heavens are brass we need to have memorial stones we can touch so that we can remember, "Yes, these stones came from the middle of the overflowing river. We brought them out of the river to remind us that God is faithful even in the most impossible situations."
We are human beings, made of flesh and blood. We need to have things to touch that we can relate to events, and so that our children too can touch them.
When my wife and I first got married, materially, we had nothing. But we didn't care. What is it about being young and married? I guess it's that you have no sense. But you have a lot of fun! That seems to be the key. And you have a lot of faith, a lot of optimism.
When we moved into our first apartment after graduation, we didn't need a U-Haul van or a bunch of friends to move us. We slept on 7 blankets stacked on the floor, ate off an old card table, had two chairs in the living room my grandparents had given us, and we listened to an 8-track stereo system we received for free for joining one of those record/tapes clubs……but it was home.
Then someone gave us a mattress, someone else brought a spring, and someone gave us a bed-frame, then a couch. Soon afterwards some good friends of the family were moving out of state and we went to help them load their belongings on the moving truck. They didn’t have room for an old dresser and a mirrored night table….and they gave it to us. I have never forgotten those days, because, as far as I was concerned, God had provided in the most impossible situation.
You can see that dresser in my home today. You could not buy it from me. Every night I look at it and remember how God provided in the most marvelous way. We need to have those stones, those rock piles for our children to touch.
(Joshua 4:9-18 NIV) Joshua set up the twelve stones that had been in the middle of the Jordan at the spot where the priests who carried the ark of the covenant had stood. And they are there to this day. {10} Now the priests who carried the ark remained standing in the middle of the Jordan until everything the LORD had commanded Joshua was done by the people, just as Moses had directed Joshua. The people hurried over, {11} and as soon as all of them had crossed, the ark of the LORD and the priests came to the other side while the people watched. {12} The men of Reuben, Gad and the half-tribe of Manasseh crossed over, armed, in front of the Israelites, as Moses had directed them. {13} About forty thousand armed for battle crossed over before the LORD to the plains of Jericho for war. {14} That day the LORD exalted Joshua in the sight of all Israel; and they revered him all the days of his life, just as they had revered Moses. {15} Then the LORD said to Joshua, {16} "Command the priests carrying the ark of the Testimony to come up out of the Jordan." {17} So Joshua commanded the priests, "Come up out of the Jordan." {18} And the priests came up out of the river carrying the ark of the covenant of the LORD. No sooner had they set their feet on the dry ground than the waters of the Jordan returned to their place and ran at flood stage as before.
Three things happened here. After Joshua had the twelve stones set up, he
personally walked out to where the priests were standing the rniddle of the
river and gathered up twelve more stones and
placed them in the middle of the Jordan. Then he told the priests to come up on
the bank, and as soon as they did so the water came down again and went back to
its natural flow.
Now what is the point of all this? Well, in the future, when children asked their fathers why the stones were placed at the Israelites lodging place, parents would have an opportunity to share about the time when, in a seemingly impossible situation, God took them across the dry river bed.
Some children, of course, would respond. "Sure, dad. How do I know you didn't just put those rocks there and make up that story?" Then the father could say, "No, I didn't make up that story, and to prove it, look out in the middle of the river. Do you see that other pile of rocks? How do you think they got there? We put them out there after God dried up the flooded river. They are there to this day to remind you that we walked across that river and don't you forget it. God can provide in the most impossible circumstances. Those rocks are proof of that."
We humans are so skeptical; so unbelieving. That is part of our make--up. Our sons too will say that the miracles worked by God in our lives did not happen if we do not remind them that God is indeed working in similar ways today!
The second thing that's happening is described in verse 12:
And the sons of Reuben and the sons of Cad and the half--tribe of Manasseh crossed over in battle array before the sons of Israel, just as Moses had spoken to them;
The background to this event is in Numbers chapter 32. These three tribes got to the eastern bank of the Jordan and found that the grass was so good (they being cattleman) that they told Moses, "Go ahead without us. We'll stay here." Moses said, "Do you want to be like your fathers who went to spy out the land which God was giving us and came back and discouraged the people? God let all of the first generation perish because of that kind of attitude."
So these men had a meeting, and afterwards they said to Moses, "How about if we build cities here for our children and pens for our livestock? We will arm ourselves and go before the sons of Israel, and we will not return to our homes until every one of them has possessed his inheritance." Moses agreed with that plan, and now 40,000 of these men equipped for war cross the Jordan.
The third thing that happened is that
On that day the Lord exalted Joshua in the sight of all Israel; so that they revered him,
Joshua is one of the most amazing characters in Scripture. I hope you will become familiar with his life story. His name means, "Jehovah is salvation" (the Hebrew word for Jesus). Joshua never wanted to be leader of the Israelites but God anointed him, and God said he would be with him.
When Moses died, I'm sure the first generation must have said, "What will we do now without our leader?" But God said, "You don't do anything. I'm in charge. It's my program. I'm the one who's doing the redeeming. I chose the nation of Israel. Whoever gave you the vote? There is no decision-making involved here. Your only decision is to follow me. I'll provide the leader and I'm going to choose Joshua."
You can imagine their response to that news: "Joshua? But he's afraid of his own shadow. He doesn't want to be a leader. " When Moses died, however Joshua was the leader chosen by God. We don't have to worry about who is in charge. God is running the program of redemption.
Now the people came up from Jordan on the tenth of the first month and camped at Gilgal on the eastern edge of Jericho. And those twelve stones which they had taken from the Jordan, Joshua set up at Gilgal. And he said to the sons of Israel, "When your children ask their fathers in time to come, saying, 'What are these stones'' then you shall inform your children, saying, 'Israel crossed this Jordan on dry ground.' For the Lord your God dried up the waters of the Jordan before you until you had crossed, just as the Lord your God had done to the Red Sea, which He dried up before us until we had crossed; that all the peoples of the earth may know that the hand of the Lord is mighty, so that you may fear the Lord your God forever."
The tenth day of the first month was the very day the Israelites celebrated Passover. They could have left Egypt just after the first Passover and been in the Promised Land for the second one, but because of the sin of unbelief they spent 39 Passovers in the wilderness of unbelief. Joshua, however, is now starting all over again with this new generation. He wants them to walk by faith, trusting Yahweh for the fruit of his promises.
By setting the twelve stones up in Gilgal, Joshua wants the Israelites to remember three things. He reviews the message of the stones for them: "Listen, children, I know it's hard to believe, but we did cross the Jordan River, on dry land. That's the first thing."
The second thing Joshua wants them to remember is "that all the peoples of the earth may know that the hand of the Lord is might'" (verse 24).
The Canaanites were held captive by Satan, by their idols, by superstition and by fear; they were held captive by gods who could not answer their requests. God is telling the Israelites, ''I want your children to see that these stones are a representation of my mighty hand which can overcome all apparently impossible circumstances. All we have to do is tell God what the circumstances are. He will divide the waters and we will go through on dry land "
Joshua wants the people to know that the hand of the Lord is mighty because at the very moment they were trying to figure out how they were going to get across the river, a woman up in Jericho, Rahab, had become a follower of Yahweh. Those are two of the reasons God brings teachable moments into our lives--to show our children how God has worked in our own lives, and to show them that the mighty hand of God is extended to all the peoples of the earth.
The third reason Joshua set the memorial stones in Gilgal is. "So that you may fear the Lord your God forever."
"I don't want you to fear your enemies, the fortified cities, the mighty armies, or the idols of Canaan," Joshua says. "I don't want you to fear anyone but Yahweh, the only true living God. When you get discouraged in the days ahead as you face 32 kings in your attempt to conquer this land, I want you to come back and touch these stones. God is just as real as these stones, and he will work in our lives."
God has left Christians some memorial stones to commemorate his overcoming impossible circumstances.
· In the Lord's supper we remember that he died and was buried and rose again, according to the Scriptures.
· Another memorial stone he left with us is baptism--physical baptism, representing our new life in Christ and our identification with him. We all know someone right now of whom we can say, "I can't believe God will ever save that person!" Guess what? That's a pushover for God. It's as easy as crossing a river in flood. We need to rest in that and depend upon God to work.
1. In your life what are some of the physical, emotional and spiritual memorial stones representing apparent impossible circumstances where Yahweh rolled back the waters so that you could walk over on dry land and begin to enjoy the fruit of his promises which he has given to us in Christ Jesus?
2. What are the circumstances in your life by which the world can recognize that the hand of the Lord is mighty and that our hearts are filled with respect for him?
3. What are some of the "physical" stones we have on display so that our children seeing them and touching them can ask, "What do these stones mean?"
We are to teach that to our children. We are to teach it out of our own experience, and we are to teach it verbally. I am sure that not too long after this event, a little child walking beside the river Jordan saw that pile of stones out in the middle of the river, and said to his father, "Father, how in the world did those stones get out there?" And his dad said, "Sit down, son, and let me tell you." And he began to tell of his own experience in passing through the Jordan on dry ground, and discovering the newness of life in the land. He was teaching right out of his own experience. And the Scriptures call us back to this time and time again. As parents we are not only responsible to act upon the truth, but we also have a responsibility to instruct our children. It is both a responsibility and a privilege.
This principle is stated again and again throughout the Scripture. As we shall see as we go through the book of Joshua in the next few weeks, there were a number of these memorials erected throughout the land, which children would notice and comment on, and which therefore would become an occasion for further teaching.
Now let's turn back to Deuteronomy 6, because the same principle is stated there in slightly different form. This is the bedrock statement of Jewish faith, the basis of all their understanding of the nature of God, verse 4:
"Hear, 0 Israel! The Lord is our God, the Lord is one! And you shall love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your might. And these words, which I am commanding you today, shall be on your heart...."
This is where we all must begin as parents-by loving the Lord with all our heart, and by taking the Word itself to heart. We are to respond to the truth in obedience. Now, none of us ever acts perfectly, but that is to be our heart's intention.
Then there is a second responsibility:
...and you shall teach them diligently [literally, "incisively, sharply, precisely, to the point"] to your sons and shall talk of them when you sit in your house and when you walk by the way and when you lie down and when you rise up. And you shall bind them as a sign on your hand and they shall be as frontals on your forehead. And you shall write them on the doorposts of your house and on your gates.
I encourage you parents to start diligently arranging your lives so that your children can indeed see and touch such memorial stones in your homes. Thereby you can share your life, share how God overcame the most impossible situation and set you and your loved ones free to walk across a flooding river on dry land.
I encourage you to use those teachable moments to prepare the next generation and the next generation and the next generation to follow Yahweh, Jesus Christ, our Lord and wonderful Savior.