PASSING OVER JORDAN

Now the priests bearing the ark of the covenant of the Lord stood firmly on dry ground in the midst of the Jordan and all Israel was passing over on dry ground until all the nation finished passing over the Jordan. Joshua 3:17

When I tread the verge of Jordan, Bid my anxious fears subside;
Death of death and hell’s destruction,
Lead me safe on Canaan’s side. #918 Guide Me, O Thou Great Redeemer

Are you still looking forward towards “The Perfect Place”? Or has the world beaten hope out of you? Have you sunk into the depths of despair? Have you given up your vision, your goals and their pursuit? Despair for the Christian is probably the worst of all sins. It’s a step beyond unbelief. This morning I beg you to recapture the hope of a child. Children have a certain innate hope which is why I suppose St. Paul often speaks of “child-like faith. Children are resilient and more easily retain such lofty goals. I think of a Saturday morning cartoon I watched as a child with Yogi Bear singing:

We’re on our way to the perfect place, the perfect place.
The skies are blue, fields are green,
water sparkles, air is clean.
It’s the prettiest place you’ve ever seen.
It’s the perfect place.

The story was about Yogi Bear and his friends trying to find a perfect place to live, far from pollution, litter, smog, and trash. Week after week the song would go on, the propeller would appear on the centre mast of the ark like boat and off they would go. I don’t know of any child, myself included who tired of the endless quest for the “Perfect Place” or ever doubted that they would find it.

The children of Israel were also seeking the perfect place in the Promised Land. The truly spiritual among them, and I’ve got to believe on the basis of Scripture that there were some, knew that God was leading them to the Perfect Place via the Promised Land. And the Promised Land was pretty good. It was going to be a foreshadowing of heaven. They had the faith and hope of Abraham, who generations before Joshua also

who went to live in the land of promise, as in a foreign land, living in tents with Isaac and Jacob, heirs with him of the same promise. 10 For he was looking forward to the city that has foundations, whose designer and builder is God. (Heb. 11)

But among the children of Israel were adults. Adults whose experiences living the long meandering reality of desert travel and tempting corrupting morality and sher end of the Canaanites, the Hittites, the Hivites, the Perizzites, the Girgashites, the Amorites, and the Jebusites and the seemingly uncrossible Jordan River made them give up hope of ever reaching the Promised Land or their Perfect Place.

We too often join their sad sinful perspective. The way is hard. We see obstacles in our path. The Israelites saw the River Jordan. . In front of them rolled the muddy rapid, swollen torrent of waters, overflowing its banks from the melting snows of the Lebanon Mountains. Beyond the river they could see or hear about the high impenetrable walls of Jericho. There were also reports of Giants. We see a River of Sin separating us from God. Beyond the river we can sense the wrestling against the spiritual forces in heavenly realms. We can see the chart of polemically opposed morals we want to uphold as Christians against a secular world.

The list goes on and the river of sin, as the River Jordan seems all the more impossible to cross. We want to be a true Spiritual Israel finding emancipation from the slavery of sin, and journey to the farthest shore that St. John the Divine describes “along the glassy sea” – that Heaven is Our Home. But there’s someone saying “Grow Up”! Be a Realist! Its all hopeless. And we would have good reason to sink into that sin of despair and sink to the depths …

Except.

Except for the fact of the Redeemer’s Presence.

The Blessed Redeemer was present in Joshua’s Day. He is powerfully present now.

Yes, the Redeemer was present. I noticed that in our new hymnal this hymn once known as “Guide Me ever Great Jehovah” has opted for another title “Guide Me ever Great Redeemer”. I’m not sure of the motives for the change, but from a theological perspective it was a good one. The Redeemer as the Son of God was active in Old Testament times also. Job said and so we often sing “I know that my Redeemer lives”. God himself was present via the ark carried by the priests. What great power it contained. Personally I like the story where there were two irreligious priests Nadab and Abihu. They didn’t respect God or the Holy Things and so fire came forth from the ark and they died – Judged with fire (Leviticus 10).

But here, the ark is carried under orders from God through his prophet Joshua to stop the waters. It’s kind of a repeat miracle to the better known miracle of Moses parting the Red Sea. But here the presence of God is visible. And the specifics concerning that presence are fulfilled in Christ.

Take a look at the ark. It looks like an ordinary box but its covered in gold. The top, with the cherubim are really connected to the lid. They too, are made of gold. The space between is known as the mercy seat or the propitiatory. That’s how Young’s literal translation puts it “the propitiatory”.  In years to come, the high priest would sprinkle this area with sacrificial blood. Now the New Testament writers, especially as they spoke to people reared in Judaism and the Old Testament rituals would certainly grab their attention with Romans 3:25, one of the central texts of the whole Bible:

Being justified freely by His grace through the redemption
That is in Christ Jesus: whom God hath set forth to be a propitiatory through faith in his blood, to declare His righteousness for the remission of sins that are past.

The word “propitiatory” is the same word translated as “mercy seat” in Hebrews 9:5. Romans 3 therefore declares that the gospel God presents Christ before us as the fulfillment of the mercy seat on that ark of the covenant!

As the priests stepped into the waters with the ark -- the presence of the Redeemer, foreshadowing the event we celebrate today – Our Lord Jesus’ stepping into the Jordan River to save us from our sins. In that river, he fulfills all righteousness. In that river, he identifies with all of us that he might come to save all of us. In that river he foretells his own death and resurrection and applies it in our own baptism. In that river he gives us cause to believe that we shall cross the Jordan to the Promised Land and the Perfect Place!

And so, at every baptism where we pray Luther’s “Flood Prayer” we re-iterate this teaching by praying:

Through the Baptism in the Jordan of Your beloved Son, our Lord Jesus Christ, You sanctified and instituted all waters to be a blessed flood and a lavish washing away of sin.   LSB page 269

The Israelites were passing through the waters with the Redeemer. We, and the believers among the Israelites then as now pass through the deep waters of sin and hells destruction by means of the Blessed Redeemer. We pass by because his blood is a propitiation for our sin. In baptism, the blood of Jesus is applied to our souls. It is applied solely by His grace.

What does it mean? It means that we immediately enter into the safety of the Ark of the Church. Jesus as the fulfillment of the Ark the priest carried brings us safely into the Ark of the Church. And so we come and sit in the nave, which is a nautical term for this place. And from this Church Militant we have hope to cross over to the Church Triumphant to the Perfect Place – Our Heavenly home!

In the Ark of the Church we are to be regularly feed Word and Sacrament. The lavish benefits of baptism we are reminded of every time we make the sign of the cross! Powerful! Powerful! Powerful a these holy things are!

We have hope to overcome the obstacles of sin and discouragement before us. What is discouragement? I suppose it’s a polite way of saying “sin of unbelief”. Sin, and the powers of hell and death and Satan are real. We should not underestimate the power of the Dark Side. See the giants, see the walls of Jericho, behold the evil and despair of your own power. Let Jesus through the waters of Holy Baptism lift you up and you shall live. And not just live. You shall conquered!

I’m just waiting for “Teletoon” to start airing Yogi’s Ark Lark again. They’ve done Superman, Batman, Rocket Robinhood. It’s only a matter of time. And when they do, and Yogi Bear starts to sing about the Perfect Place I pray that God makes me as a child with childlike faith so I shout with the rest of the children and sit in rapt attention, never discouraged and never dissuaded from hope saying, maybe even singing

Yes, indeed! We’re on our way to the Perfect Place,

 the perfect place.
Skies are blue, fields are green,
water sparkles, air is clean.
It’s the prettiest place you’ve ever seen.
It’s the Perfect Place.

May eternal hope rest in your heart today.

Amen!