The Jordan Must Be Crossed

THE WORD

The Jordan did not part before the priests put their feet in it. God's instruction was specific and stunning: "When the soles of the feet of the priests who bear the ark of the LORD shall rest in the waters of the Jordan, the waters of the Jordan shall be cut off" (Joshua 3:13). The parting was contingent on the stepping. The miracle was on the other side of the obedient foot. Not before the foot. Not in promise of the foot. After the foot touched the water. The priests carrying the ark of the covenant had to walk into a flooding river — it was harvest season, the Jordan was at its highest and most dangerous — and put their feet in before the waters backed up. Forty thousand armed men watched the priests go first. And the priests went first. Into the flood.

What is your flooded Jordan? What is the terrifying threshold that must be crossed — that you must physically, practically step into before the waters part — between where you are right now and where God is calling you? It is the business launched before the capital is fully secure. It is the resignation letter sent before the new position is confirmed. It is the conversation you have been dreading — the confrontation, the confession, the commitment — that must happen before the road ahead becomes clear. It is the book proposal submitted before you feel like a real writer. It is the ministry started before you feel adequately prepared. God very rarely parts the Jordan from the safe side of the bank. The parting happens when your feet get wet.

Notice who had to go first: the priests — the ones carrying the ark, the presence of God. The presence of God went first into the flood. And as long as the ark was in the river — as long as God's manifest presence was in the midst of the obstacle — the waters backed up on both sides and created a dry highway through the impossible. This is the principle: where God's presence leads, the impossible yields. Your assignment is to follow the presence — into the flood, through the obstacle, toward the possession. You do not need to understand the hydraulics. You need to follow the ark.

And after the crossing, God commanded twelve memorial stones — one for each tribe — to be taken from the middle of the Jordan and set up at Gilgal. The miracle had to be memorialized. The crossing had to be commemorated so that future generations would have a tangible record that God parted the Jordan when His people stepped in. What are the memorial stones in your life — the testimonies, the documented evidence of God's faithfulness in your own Jordan crossings — that you are telling to the next generation? Do not let your miracles go unrecorded. The Jordan you crossed is someone else's reason to put their feet in.