My husband and I are avid campers. No, I don't mean we take a travel trailer or an RV and "camp." We tent Camp where there is no heating and no air conditioning aside from the wind the sun. So I do understand to an extent what it means to set up camp when you reach the place you want to stay and break camp down when it is time to leave. I also know what a pain it is to break everything down and fold the tent back up so it fits back in its bag neatly. I understand how easy it would have been for the Children of Israel to say, "Nope, we're good, Joshua. We've been walking too long. Our feet are tired. Our children need rest. We just got camp set the way we like it and we really don't want to break it down again and move." Yet, at the start of chapter 3, we see them lodging beside the banks of the Jordan River waiting for Joshua's word to move across the Jordan and into what God promised. Except for Reuben, Gad, and Manasseh, remember? They chose to stay outside the Promised Land instead of entering into it to live.
What would have happened if the children of Israel decided the same? What would have happened if they just stayed where they were and decided they had gotten close enough?
We see in Genesis 11:31-32 the brief account of Terah, Abram's father. He was going to take his family to the Land of Canaan, but they came to Haran and they settled there. Terah also died in Haran. In fact, the accounting states that he was 205 years old at his death. Now, Abraham lived before the Great Flood and the times of Noah. Prior to the Great Flood, the average lifespan was 850 years old, yet Terah died centuries before the average lifespan of the time. There is no report of an illness or some catastrophe that would have caused a premature death. But he died. Did he die because he did not advance on after a period of rest? Did he die because he was not to stay in Haran? I do not know. I DO know that after the death of his father in Haran, God spoke to Abram and told him to leave the house of his father, his relatives and get out of his country. God told Abram to go to the place which God would show him. Abram (not yet Abraham) had no idea where he was to go, just that he was to go. He had no idea what he would encounter. But he went.
The Children of Israel are no different in Joshua chapter 3. They received instruction from the Lord, through Joshua, to leave their camps and advance across the Jordan River into the land which was promised generations before to Abraham for his descendents. The Children of Isreal did not settle as Terah, Abraham's father did before the completion of the journey. They pressed forward following the Ark of the Covenant as the Lord commanded. They did not stop at the banks of the Jordan. They rested and prepared for the coming days.
Sometimes we run and run and push forward without ceasing. We do not take the time to stop, rest and recharge in the presence of the Lord. We do not provide our physical bodies nourishment and we do not provide our spirits time to commune with the Father. How can we be prepared for what is coming if we are worn down, hungry, or even lacking in rest? Can we be effective in the battle? Can we be overcomers?
Isaiah 40:29-31 He gives power to the weak, And to those who have no might He increases strength. (30) Even the youths shall faint and be weary, And the young men shall utterly fall, (31) But those who wait on the LORD Shall renew their strength; They shall mount up with wings like eagles, They shall run and not be weary, They shall walk and not faint.
The key is waiting on the Lord. We can only do that by stopping and resting. I don't mean we stop all activity and become complacent. There were still things for the Children of Israel to do while in camp. They had to wash their clothes (part of the sanctification process). They had to eat and feed their children. They had daily tasks that had to be completed even though they were camping by the river. They didn't sit still and just wait. They went about what they had to do, what they knew to do, every day to be prepared for what was coming. When the Lord spoke and it was time to move, they were ready.
Are you ready to move when the Lord says it is time to move? or have you settled like Terah in a place that should be a temporary stop and rest area? Sometimes all we can do is do what we know to do while we wait on the Lord to renew our strength.
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