Home at Last

Joshua 4:1-5:12

            When Israel crosses the Jordan, they cross a significant boundary: they are no longer nomads in the desert; rather, they are home. Three things happen in quick succession. First, even as they are crossing the river, Joshua instructs them to gather stones—kind of big ones, carried on the shoulder—for a memorial. We’ve seen this before and we’ll see it again—various standing stones and rock piles to commemorate the actions of God in their midst, reminders for them of the Lord’s gracious faithfulness and sometimes a reminder that He is that way in spite of their own behavior.

            Humans need those reminders. We keep pictures and mementos of life-shaping events. We celebrate birthdays and anniversaries. We build memorials. In the church, this work is carried on regularly. The whole service is a weekly reminder of who God is, who we are, and what He has done for us. The thing begins in the name of the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit, a weekly reminder of our Baptism. We hear the stories of God’s faithfulness read out loud and exposited. We receive a Supper that is specifically ‘in remembrance.’ The shape of our calendar does the same work, especially Advent through Easter, recounting the key moments in Jesus’ saving life. Christians need those refreshers.

            Second, the nation is circumcised. Joshua tells us that none of the fighting men in the current generation had been circumcised in the wilderness. Unfortunately, it doesn’t tell us why they hadn’t been circumcised on the eighth day in the wilderness. Here is an example of a phenomenon we have to think about: we know what the Lord commanded in Exodus, Leviticus, Numbers, and Deuteronomy; we know a lot less about how Israel actually obeyed those commands. That leads to something else they did on the banks of Jordan, namely, celebrating the Passover. Now, again, why hadn’t they done that for the last forty years?

            This could have been willful disobedience, that they just neglected the commands of God. That seems unlikely to me because it feels like Moses would have called that out in either Numbers or Deuteronomy, where he called out a lot of bad behavior. More likely, the whole wilderness experience seems to have been an extraordinary pause in God’s purposes, a sort of limbo. The Lord intended to bring them right from Sinai to the Promised Land so that after the Passover at Sinai they would have celebrated the next one in the Land. But there was the rebellion in the wilderness, so no marks of the covenant until they were ready to finally finish the task.

            Finally, we have the note that as soon as they crossed the Jordan, the manna stopped. They were in the land. They no longer needed that extraordinary gift. They were in a land of milk and honey.