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By Dean Kelly

Minister, Highland Home Church of Christ

God chose Moses to lead His people out of Egypt. Because of their unbelief, fueled by the 10 unfaithful spies, he would lead them through the wilderness for 40 years. 

Moses died after God showed Him the promised land. Then God appointed Joshua to lead the people into the land. As recorded in Joshua 3, Joshua prepared the people to enter the land of Promise. They would be led by the priests carrying the ark of the covenant. Joshua told the people to begin moving when they saw the priests with the ark moving toward the Jordan river. Just as had happened when they crossed the Red Sea fleeing the Egyptians, God would stop the River and allow them to cross on dry land.

Joshua told them, “Do not come near it, that you may know the way by which you must go, for you have not passed this way before.”

As we face life, even the dawning of a new day, we are indeed passing a way we have never passed before. As we face difficulties and sorrows, we pass a way that we have never passed before. When we begin a new life in marriage, or we hold that newborn in our hands, we are traveling a path we have never traveled before, a new path filled with the unexpected and unknown.

As we face every new path, every new day, every new life event, we need to ‘stay a good distance back” and wait on the Lord. The great prophet Isaiah said, “But those who wait on the Lord shall renew their strength; They shall mount up on wings like eagles. They shall run and not be weary” (Isaiah 40:31).

There is no better place to wait on the Lord than at the foot of the cross.