SEA
SEA, THE
RIVER
RIVER
RED SEA
RED SEA, PASSAGE OF
EXODUS
RED SEA
I. The Bitter Lakes region
II. The Gulfs of Suez and Aqabah
JORDAN
I. Archaeological sites
II. Topographical features

The promise of the inheritance given to Moses was confirmed in detail to Joshua.

Our promised inheritance today is the kingdom of God.

The Israelites were instructed to follow God’s instructions! Courageously!

Courage and character are required to stand up for God amidst an unbelieving world.

The people needed to take supplies with them for the initial journey.

We prepare ourselves by absorbing and acting upon God’s Word.

The people were 100% behind Joshua.

The greater our sacrifice now, the greater our eternal kingdom rewards.

The invasion was properly planned.

Our plans are to be in accordance with God’s will, through the guidance of the Holy Spirit.

The people had to wait, receive their instructions and prepare themselves.

We need to prepare ourselves and wait upon His timing.

God told the people, through Joshua, what he was going to do.

We are required to build godly character to fully inherit the kingdom.

The first step in claiming the ‘Promised Land.’

We must take step out in faith and be subjected to trials and testings, in order to inherit the kingdom.

Of what God had done for them.

The Cross of Jesus is the living memorial of our faith.

As the Ark left the river, the waters started flowing again.

God is all-powerful and to be feared. We can only enter into His almighty presence through the lifeblood Jesus sacrificed for each one of us on the Cross. God’s requirement is ‘a life for a life’.

Again to be circumcised, a process that had lapsed during the time in the desert.

We are to be ‘circumcised’ from the world through our different behaviour, reflecting the character of Jesus.

The first step in the possession of the land God had promised.

We become mature, fully inheriting the kingdom, through developing the character of Jesus as set in the Word and by being obedient to the personal will of the Father for our lives, as communicated through the Holy Spirit.

“‘Then you crossed the Jordan and came to Jericho. The citizens of Jericho fought against you, as did also the Amorites, Perizzites, Canaanites, Hittites, Girgashites, Hivites and Jebusites, but I gave them into your hands. 12 I sent the hornet ahead of you, which drove them out before you—also the two Amorite kings. You did not do it with your own sword and bow. 13 So I gave you a land on which you did not toil and cities you did not build; and you live in them and eat from vineyards and olive groves that you did not plant.’ (Joshua 24:11-13)

Remarkably, God repeated the pattern He established with Moses and Joshua, with Elijah and Elisha.

We have an amazing God!

I never cease to be amazed how events that happened so long ago can still be of relevance to us today! How they can provide guidelines, indeed instructions for, what we are to do in the 21st century.

God is simply amazing!

Jerusalem Fashioned For A King

Long before the threshing floor of Araunah was ever purchased by David or the Temple of Solomon had ever become a twinkle in Solomon's eye, Jerusalem had long been strategically set apart in the providence of an Almighty God as the city of the great King. Not until the foundations of the great Temple of Solomon were being laid was there even the slightest glimpse of the wealth of resources available below the ground level of the magnificent city of Jerusalem.

Jerusalem's Geological Formation

One amazing fact is that the hills upon which Jerusalem was built lies in a very interesting geological formation. When glancing at the surface there is a very hard layer of limestone, but beneath this brittle surface there lies another layer, a deep bed of beautiful white limestone, and mysteriously soft before it is exposed to the air. This would make the task of building a beautiful palace or temple much easier for masons who could, without much difficulty, cut out perfect blocks.

Underneath this deep deposit of limestone is a third layer, also of limestone, but much harder and impervious to the action of water. This may not seem interesting at first glance but when you think about the lack of underground springs of water in Jerusalem and all of the times that Jerusalem was under siege, you can easily see the providential reason in the mind of God for this. The people living there could hew out tremendous cisterns in the soft second layer of limestone and the third layer of impervious rock would make a perfect bottom. In no other way could the city hold such a tremendous population that it has. In fact Jerusalem was literally honeycombed with massive cisterns that hold millions of gallons of rain-water.

One interesting note is that the famous Pool of Hezekiah, where Christ did a miracle, is actually just a huge cistern and can be seen there today.

Another important reason for seeing God's providence in the geological formation of this city is that the middle layer of rock, the soft white limestone, was a relatively easy place to create vast quarries that could run underground far beneath the surface where, as mentioned in the Bible, no sound of mallet or chisel could be heard in the place where the great blocks of limestone were being hewn into exact shape.

Source: http://www.bible-history.com