God's Will Be Done

 Joshua 3-4     Proverbs 13     Hebrews 5

Joshua brings the people of Israel to the banks of the Jordan and spend three days preparing the leaders and the people for the journey ahead. He challenged them to dedicate themselves before the Lord. God provides a way for them all to be able to quickly cross the Jordan on dry ground. The priests will take the ark of the covenant to the middle to the river and stop. As they do this the flooded waters of the Jordan valley are held back, the people cross over. Then before the priests complete the journey across the river to join the people Joshua sends twelve men, representing the twelve tribes of Israel, and they bring from the middle of the river to the banks a stone to build a memorial to remind them what God did in this place. Joshua goes to the middle of the river and places twelve stones there as a memorial as well. This will be covered over by the river after the priest complete the journey across and the river once again begins to flow.

The reading today from Proverbs is a teaching in the contrast by being righteous, what God calls us to be, and those that choose to be what they want to be contrary to the Word of God. It is clear that the Lord expects us to act with integrity and justice and those that choose to live by fraud and deceit will be held accountable for their actions. We are responsible for seeking truth even when it is not what we want to hear, and it is on the bases of truth we will be judges. We are to teach our children this principle, hold them accountable and expect to be held accountable on how we do this.

In Hebrews we find the early church being challenged to see that every high priest was appointed by God to offer the gifts and sacrifices on behalf of the people. They were able to deal gently with those that didn’t know and understand the ways of God because even the priest is the same. The obligations of the people are the priest obligations as well. The only one that can represent God as the priest or pastor is the ones called by God to that role. Jesus, the ultimate high priest, made perfect and became the source of eternal salvation.

If we are going to be teachers, we need to make sure we are teaching God’s way and not what we want the way to be. We will be held accountable by God for how we compared to how he demanded we live rather than the desires and laws of humans. If you are going to teach on God’s behalf, you need to be sure you are ready to eat the meat of truth and not the mild of the babes of the faith. The mature have had their senses trained to decern good from evil.

On this day after Easter, resurrection Sunday, we are reminded that a faith journey is like those that set out to claim the promised land and walked away from the empty tomb to become the church. The story of the people of God has always been to listen to God, through His voice, Jesus and the Holy Spirit and then to do what God asks of us. Throughout history few are willing to set aside their own will to share and perform God’s will.