Words of Encouragement

The priests who carried the ark of the covenant of the LORD stood firm on dry ground in the middle of the Jordan, while all Israel passed by until the whole nation had completed the crossing on dry ground. – Joshua 3: 17



Walking over on dry ground. God is in the deep, part 1. The priests walked into the deepest end of the Jordan, right in the middle and stood firm. As they stood firm, the people walked completely across the Jordan on dry ground to the other side. Let us look at this for a moment, before all the people crossed over, the priest with the ark were already in the middle waiting for them to reach them. This is a reminder for us that before we even reach the deepest end of our situations, the darkest hour, or the most difficult place, God is already their waiting to see us safely through.

When you're in the deep end, God is there. And as the priest stood firm, you can stand firm in the depth of your situations. God will continue to be in our situations until we have made it to the other side. And you don't have to be even slightly touched by the waters. They walked on dry ground. We can walk on dry ground. We don't have to be heavy from the waters taking us over. Have you ever tried to walk in wet clothes? It takes a long time for them to get dry and they can be quite uncomfortable. We'll they didn't have to reach the other side and be held down by the load. They reached the other side, free. So can we. We can be free as we go through to the other side of our situations.

Remember that when the floods of this life would seem to be over taking you, you can still be "dry" and get to the other side, to the finish of the problem. I am praying for us this week that we hear the steps God has for us to find the victory he has for us. We must listen to him. That means we must come away from the distractions and come and here him alone. We must be willing to follow even those instructions we find strange. Then we must move to carry them out. We then have to move by faith and trust that God is already in the midst preparing our safe journey to our victory.



When thou passest through the waters, I will be with thee; and through the rivers, they shall not overflow thee: when thou walkest through the fire, thou shalt not be burned; neither shall the flame kindle upon thee. For I am the LORD thy God, the Holy One of Israel, thy saviour: I gave Egypt for thy ransom, Ethiopia and Seba for thee. Isaiah 43:2-3



Walking over on dry ground. God is in the deep, part 2. This week, I gave the steps for walking through on "dry ground". Today’s scripture reinforces that message. I love how God's word will say something over and over again. Why? God’s word will reinforce itself so that we get the message. This scripture is reminding us of whom we can trust in. It's a scripture of comfort. It let's us know that yes, we will have to go through some things, but God is in control. He is able to handle everything we face.


When we pass through the water, He's with us. So when the "floods" of life come, we can get through it, because He is with us. Have you ever seen a raging river? When the waters are flowing, people have been sweep away, because they underestimated the force of the water. Sometimes that's what happens to us in this life, we underestimate the force of the raging rivers in our lives. But even in those situations, God says he will keep us from getting sweep away. He's able to pick you up out of the raging rivers and place you on a safe, dry ground.


When life turns up the heat on you, you don't have to get burned! Why? God is in control. Not only can He keep you from getting burned, he can keep back the smell of the fire off you. Think about the Hebrew boys in the furnace. They were in the midst of the fire, but they were not burned, and they were not loss, why? Because God was in the midst. Not only did they come out of the furnace, but also the Lord kept the flame from kindling them (or scorching their clothes). So we can go through life’s "fires" but we can come out FREE. Why? God is in control.

I don't have to walk around with anger, hurts, or anything that holds me in bondage, because I can come out of those fires, without even the scent of every having been in it.


WHY? Because the Holy One, the Savior, the LORD, GOD is in control. Praise His Holy Name! When you go to worship this week, know that victory is ahead of you. No matter what your situation is, God is already in the midst of it, waiting for you so he can see you through. God praising him for what he is already doing in you and what he will continue to do.

Words of Encouragement

When thou passest through the waters, I will be with thee; and through the rivers, they shall not overflow thee: when thou walkest through the fire, thou shalt not be burned; neither shall the flame kindle upon thee. For I am the LORD thy God, the Holy One of Israel, thy saviour: I gave Egypt for thy ransom, Ethiopia and Seba for thee. Isaiah 43:2-3

Walking over on dry ground. God is in the deep, part 2. This week, I gave the steps for walking through on "dry ground". Today’s scripture reinforces that message. I love how God's word will say something over and over again. Why? God’s word will reinforce itself so that we get the message. This scripture is reminding us of whom we can trust in. It's a scripture of comfort. It let's us know that yes, we will have to go through some things, but God is in control. He is able to handle everything we face.

When we pass through the water, He's with us. So when the "floods" of life come, we can get through it, because He is with us. Have you ever seen a raging river? When the waters are flowing, people have been sweep away, because they underestimated the force of the water. Sometimes that's what happens to us in this life, we underestimate the force of the raging rivers in our lives. But even in those situations, God says he will keep us from getting sweep away. He's able to pick you up out of the raging rivers and place you on a safe, dry ground.

When life turns up the heat on you, you don't have to get burned! Why? God is in control. Not only can He keep you from getting burned, he can keep back the smell of the fire off you. Think about the Hebrew boys in the furnace. They were in the midst of the fire, but they were not burned, and they were not loss, why? Because God was in the midst. Not only did they come out of the furnace, but also the Lord kept the flame from kindling them (or scorching their clothes). So we can go through life’s "fires" but we can come out FREE. Why? God is in control.
I don't have to walk around with anger, hurts, or anything that holds me in bondage, because I can come out of those fires, without even the scent of every having been in it.

WHY? Because the Holy One, the Savior, the LORD, GOD is in control. Praise His Holy Name! When you go to worship this week, know that victory is ahead of you. No matter what your situation is, God is already in the midst of it, waiting for you so he can see you through. God praising him for what he is already doing in you and what he will continue to do.

Words of Encouragement

The priests who carried the ark of the covenant of the LORD stood firm on dry ground in the middle of the Jordan, while all Israel passed by until the whole nation had completed the crossing on dry ground. – Joshua 3: 17

Walking over on dry ground. God is in the deep, part 1. The priests walked into the deepest end of the Jordan, right in the middle and stood firm. As they stood firm, the people walked completely across the Jordan on dry ground to the other side. Let us look at this for a moment, before all the people crossed over, the priest with the ark were already in the middle waiting for them to reach them. This is a reminder for us that before we even reach the deepest end of our situations, the darkest hour, or the most difficult place, God is already their waiting to see us safely through.

When you're in the deep end, God is there. And as the priest stood firm, you can stand firm in the depth of your situations. God will continue to be in our situations until we have made it to the other side. And you don't have to be even slightly touched by the waters. They walked on dry ground. We can walk on dry ground. We don't have to be heavy from the waters taking us over. Have you ever tried to walk in wet clothes? It takes a long time for them to get dry and they can be quite uncomfortable. We'll they didn't have to reach the other side and be held down by the load. They reached the other side, free. So can we. We can be free as we go through to the other side of our situations.

Remember that when the floods of this life would seem to be over taking you, you can still be "dry" and get to the other side, to the finish of the problem. I am praying for us this week that we hear the steps God has for us to find the victory he has for us. We must listen to him. That means we must come away from the distractions and come and here him alone. We must be willing to follow even those instructions we find strange. Then we must move to carry them out. We then have to move by faith and trust that God is already in the midst preparing our safe journey to our victory.

Words of Encouragement

Now the Jordan is at flood stage all during harvest. Yet as soon as the priests who carried the ark reached the Jordan and their feet touched the water's edge, the water from upstream stopped flowing. It piled up in a heap a great distance away, at a town called Adam in the vicinity of Zarethan, while the water flowing down to the Sea of the Arabah (the Salt Sea) was completely cut off. So the people crossed over opposite Jericho. – Joshua 3:15-16

Walking over on dry ground. Step out in the water. The scripture pauses in the telling of this story to tell us about the condition of the waters. The water is at a flood state. In other words, the water is high and often not contained by the shores. Yet, this is the water they are told to walk across. How can this be, the water is too high? They simply must step out into the waters. They must step in faith knowing the waters will be cut of (we walk by faith, not by sight).

Isn't in interesting that the water didn't stop first? Why do you think that was? I believe it was because God wanted the people to trust Him. So they had to start walking right into what seemed to be an impossible situation. Well that's what God wants us to do. We sometimes try to run or hide from our situations. Sometimes we just wish they would go away. (Well most times). But the Lord wants us to trust Him and walk after Him, even when our situations look like they will over take us.

There are some situations in our lives at time that seem impossible to cross, but God has given us instruction to come and listen to his word. When we do we are given detailed information on what to do and how to proceed. It is interesting to note that God’s instruction was not for them to run away from this impossibility, but to travel toward it. God’s instruction for us is the same. He does not tell us to run away from the impossible situations in our lives but to walk toward them. He tells us to move out of our comfort zone and go towards that which seems impossible. He doesn’t tell us to go alone, however, because he goes before us.

When we come face to face with that thing, he then tells us, step out. He does not move the situation first, he test us to see if we will trust him. When we step out into the waters that seem to be uncontainable, he then shows us he can contain them. God piled the waters up so that the children could step into the water and touch the dry ground.

God will pile up; stop the water from coming in and flooding us so that we can walk through the impossible situations on dry ground. I pray for us this week so that we can know that God has our victory just ahead.

Words of Encouragement

Now then, choose twelve men from the tribes of Israel, one from each tribe. And as soon as the priests who carry the ark of the LORD -the Lord of all the earth—set foot in the Jordan, its waters flowing downstream will be cut off and stand up in a heap." So when the people broke camp to cross the Jordan, the priests carrying the Ark of the Covenant went ahead of them. – Joshua 3:12-14

Walking over on dry ground. Set the instruction to actions. In the 12th verse of Joshua it reads, "Now then, chose twelve men from the tribes of Israel, one from each tribe." Here Joshua gives the people instructions. First they listened, now they have to set in order those things that need to be in place. When we are going through something, we have to listen and then follow what the Lord tells us, even when we don't understand the reason why. We also have to follow Him exactly as He tells us to. We are not to change the instruction at all.

The people could not wait for God to do first and then move, they were instructed to set out and when they did, then God would move. This setting the instructions of the Lord into action is a call to living faith. We speak about having faith in God, but how often do we make it a living faith? How often do we say we believe God’s word to be true and act as if we do?

When the people were ready to move and follow what God had told them to do, they broke camp and the ark went before them first. Some of us have gotten too comfortable in our “camps” and we are not ready to break the relationship or attachments with those “camps”. Those camps are places where we have gotten comfortable and all our creature comforts are being meet. Yet, the instruction from the Lord is calling us to come from those creature comforts, to break out of those strongholds and move in the way he is instructing us.

When we move forward from those places, God promises to go before us. He promises us that he will walk before us so that we will know what way to go. I pray for us today that we would set out against that which is holding us stationary and follow the instructions of the Lord. When we do, we set out to find our victory.

Words of Encouragement

Joshua said to the Israelites, "Come here and listen to the words of the LORD your God. This is how you will know that the living God is among you and that he will certainly drive out before you the Canaanites, Hittites, Hivites, Perizzites, Girgashites, Amorites and Jebusites. See, the ark of the covenant of the Lord of all the earth will go into the Jordan ahead of you. – Joshua 3:9-11

Walking over on dry ground. Listen to God’s instruction. This is an old writing from several years ago, but I felt it was worth sharing again. It's from the book of Joshua 3:9-17. I have it listed in my journal as "Spiritual steps to walk over on Dry Land".

In verse 9 Joshua tells the children of Israel, "come here and listen to the words of the Lord your God". The first thing we must do to get through our problems is listen to the instruction of the Lord. It's when we don't that we make our situations worse. We will never know how to handle things if we don't go to the source (God) and find out what it is and what's the correct way to move.

It is in the time of going aside, or coming to listen that we are encouraged about the journey ahead. Joshua tells them they will know that the living God is among them because he will drive out the Canaanites, Hittites, Hivites, Perizzites, Girgashites, Amorites and Jebusites. This is their proof that God is in the midst of them, he will remove all the different forces that would stand against them coming in and possessing what is for them. God wanted to eliminate these other nations because they were the worshippers of many other gods. The Hittites called their pagan gods, “the thousand gods”.

If we look at the history of the people of Israel we will see that some of these nations were not removed, not because God could not do it, but because they went back and intermingled with them. They married themselves to some of these nations and therefore lost the purity of what God wanted to be in them.

What does that tell us today? God is calling us to come and listen to how to walk through this life to the other side. He wants us to know that he is before us, just as the ark was before the children of Israel. He also wants us to know that he will remove all the spiritual forces that would want to come and dwell among his people. We however must not go back and intermingle with these forces or we will allow the enemy to have a stronghold on our lives.

I pray for us today that we would set ourselves aside so that we can hear the words of God. We will not be able to make this journey until we do the first thing, which is to hear the word of the Lord and what his instruction for us is. This is step one to walking over on dry ground.