Preparing to Cross the Jordan – Some Thoughts on the Life of a Church

 In the Sunday School class I’m teaching at church, we are studying the Book of Joshua.  The title for this study is “Joshua: Leading Into the Promised Land”.  In the past two weeks, we’ve read chapters 3 and 4 about how the Israelites crossed the River Jordan.  As we read these passages, the thing that struck me was the way Joshua approached this event – with reverence and intentionality.  To really grasp the significance of what is happening, I think it’s helpful to understand that when you read the first four chapters of Joshua, you are witnessing an event from several different viewpoints.

 In Chapter 1, verse 11, God tells Joshua that within 3 days, they will cross the Jordan – “so prepare provisions for yourselves”.  In Joshua 3:2-5, we pick up the story again at the start of this third day of preparations.  Joshua explains how the priests will carry the Ark of the Covenant, and every one will follow about 2,000 cubits behind.  This works out to be a distance of six tenths of a mile – the distance a Jew is allowed to travel on the Sabbath.  Furthermore, the people are to spend the day before the crossing in prayer.  As one reads Joshua 3:5, the people are instructed:

 Consecrate yourselves, for tomorrow the Lord will do wonders among you.

 Much of Chapter 4 explains the actual crossing of the Jordan, a boundary marking a transition or “baptism” into the new life the Children of Israel would enter into upon setting foot in the Promised Land.  What caught my eye as we studied this chapter was Joshua 4:19:

 Now the people came up from the Jordan on the tenth of the first month and camped at Gilgal on the eastern edge of Jericho. 

 This is a significant day!  From Exodus 12:3 we read that this is the first day of the Passover week – the day when each family would have selected a lamb for sacrifice on Passover.  In the Christian calendar, we memorialize this day as Palm Sunday.

 As I reflect on this story, I can’t help but think about the efforts my church is taking to be dismissed from our denomination – and the importance of approaching this process with reverence and intentionality.  As I write this, our Session is preparing to formally petition the governing body of our denomination to hold a vote of the congregation to seek dismissal.  We know that they will want a significant portion of our congregation to participate – at least 50% of a 1,300 member body.

 Realistically, the only time to hold such a vote is on a Sunday, as people are coming to or leaving worship.  We will be asking our governing body that we be allowed to conduct the vote on the weekend of November 14 and 15 – and because of the decision process we must go through, we won’t have an answer until about two weeks before the requested date.   This places a great deal of pressure on us to adequately inform and prepare our congregation for that vote – assuming we receive permission to proceed.

 One last thought that God has impressed upon me as I read of the crossing of the Jordan in Joshua Chapter 4 is that this vote is not just about the membership of our church.  There are many people who are not members of our church who depend on the community ministries God has called us to provide.  These range from child and adult day care, to K – 7^th grade school, to language training for Burmese refugees, to sports ministry outreach, to global missions.  As a result, this vote is not simply a vote for us as church members, but for the world we reach for Christ.

 And that is the connection I find at the end of Joshua Chapter 4, a connection that says that as we go through this process, what we do has an impact on the wider community of people who are watching what we do, who, though they cannot vote, are praying for us.  In Chapter 4, verses 23-24, we read:

 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. 

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