NEVER PASSED THIS WAY BEFORE

Joshua 3:4 – However, there shall be a distance between you and it (the ark) of about two thousand cubits by measurement. Do not come near it, so that you may know the way by which you shall go, for you have not passed this way before.

This is quite an interesting scripture, “you have never passed this way before”. The children of Israel were about to begin a whole new season in their lives. This nation had just experienced forty years of supernatural provision and supernatural guidance. There had been daily manna, quail, water from the rock, and a cloud by day and fire by night to guide them. Supernatural had been there normal but they were about to step into a whole new supernatural kind of normal. Those forty years were great but something new was about to begin, they were being led to a place they had never been before. This is where the body of Christ finds herself today, we are passing out of one season into the next, we must be willing to follow the ark of His presence closely because what got us by before will not sustain us in this new day. Here is how Matthew Henry describes this.

“For you have not passed this way heretofore. This had been their situation all the way through the desert; they followed an untrodden path. But this one through the Jordan was even more so. While we are here on earth, we must expect and prepare for unusual events, and expect to travel by ways that we have not traveled by before, and much more when we go to the next world. Our way through the valley of the shadow of death is a way we have not gone before, which makes it all the more formidable. But if we have the assurance of God’s presence, we do not need to be afraid. His presence will give us such strength as we have never had before, because we are coming to a work we have never done before.”

We have seen two great moves of God in America in the last fifty years, for that I am extremely grateful. I believe we are now entering into a season none of us are familiar with, we are going somewhere none of us have ever been. Our solution is to follow the ark of God, follow His glory. We will see challenges and victories beyond what we can imagine, the Jordan River is parting and we are entering in to our promised inheritance.