Blogging and Faith is the Victory #3

I've been reading everyone's blogs today - trying to catch up with everything going on. I finally was able to get all the web addresses. Some very interesting tidbits out there.

I'm still reading Faith is the Victory and remember now why it was life-changing. It was the first book that I read that explained to me that the Promised Land is not heaven and crossing the Jordan River is not death. All those songs we sing are not out of the Scriptures. Pretty scary, huh?

The Promised Land was full of enemies and war. It was full of giants and walled cities. But also filled with milk and honey and the juciest grapes you've ever seen. It was the land that God gave to Abraham for an inheritance for ever. And from Abraham down to Isaac and then on to Jacob and his 12 sons. For ever. They just had to take it back from the enemies. Or, well, let God give it back to them.

Crossing the Jordan River was an act of faith. It wasn't a really wide river but it must have been deep because there was concern about getting across it when Israel (after 40 years) was finally ready to follow Joshua and Caleb. Just like the Red Sea, God opened it up and they walked across on dry land. 12 men stopped in the middle of it to place stones as a memorial as to what God had done for them. When they were across, the waters covered that memorial. (I'd like to swim down there to see if the stones are still there). Then those same men placed 12 stones again to make another memorial so that when their children asked what that memorial stood for, they would tell them how God brought them out of the wilderness and gave them back Abraham's land.

All they had to do was believe and it was theirs. Faith? Believe? How hard can that be?

You tell me.