MY JERICHO - IT'S BEYOND ME!

Just lately, I've heard a few sermons about the battle at Jericho.  I think the Lord is trying to teach me something.  I'm a bit hard of hearing, but I'll share what I'm learning.

For us today, Jericho can represent  an insurmountable problem that we can't change or fix or move.  It's often a long-term thing, something overwhelming and apparently impenetrable and immovable.  A chronic illness, a difficult relationship, a stronghold, an addiction, a burden, a major grief, or a few major things that combine to keep us hanging our heads, dragging our feet, becoming increasingly tired, becoming stagnant, losing our joy, losing our way.

https://www.freebibleimages.org/illustrations/moody-joshua-jericho/

I have a Jericho and it's apparently not shifting, nor changing any.time.soon.  Or is it?  I don't know.     I can't see or hear the walls shaking or cracking.    I've thrown myself at that wall more times than I can count and it ain't budging.   I've become very aware that I need a new strategy.   All my previous strategies have caused injury, despair and sheer frustration.

This Jericho is too big to ignore, to pretend like it isn't there.   Some days, it's all I can do to put one foot in front of the other.    Sometimes, I just sit in its shadow and worship the Lord, often with tears.    So, now I've asked for perspective, asked for prayer, asked for counsel.   

Last week I was counselled to 'Stop looking at what you can see, Kath.'     Stop looking at what I can see?   That makes no sense at all!    What?   How?   

How do you stop looking at what you can see?   It's right in front of you and all around you.  You live it, breathe it, feel it, you know it intimately.   How do you stop looking at it?    

The answer that has come to me more than once is this:   look BEYOND it.  

That makes more sense.   I can't un-see my Jericho, that insurmountable problem that I can't move or solve or fix.    It's right there.   When it's not front and centre, it casts a long shadow over  my everyday life.  It changes the way I do life, now and potentially into the future.  I don't know when it's going to change.  

But I can stop looking AT it.   I can stop focusing ON it.     

God is calling me to look BEYOND it - to Him.   

HE needs to be a bigger, ever-present reality in my life than these walls.   It's not that He isn't big and present and real.  It's just that I don't know that, don't know His power and grace like I know the struggle, like I've known the struggle.

But I need to.    I need to know Him as bigger than the problem, bigger than the walls, bigger than my earthbound reality.   I need to know the depth and height and width and breadth of His love, more than I know every minor detail of my Jericho.  

I need to intentionally magnify Him, not the problem, not the struggle, not the length of the journey, nor the many details that need to change.   Is that why God instructed the Israelites to march around their Jericho in silence?   So that they didn't magnify the problem?    

I will bless the Lord at all times;  His praise shall continually be in my mouth.   My soul shall make its boast in the Lord;   the humble shall hear of it and be glad.   Oh, magnify the Lord with me,  and let us exalt His name together.  Ps 34:1-4

I need to practise His presence, intentionally, daily, even hourly, when I'm drowning in the details, the whatifs, the right-nows of it, or the thought of the future in its shadow.  

What I need to know more, and rehash more and rehearse more and repeat more, are the details of His character, the riches of His grace, the reality of His help.

I need to plumb those depths, to search out those riches, to understand His perspective, to remember His faithfulness, to seek His face, to know Him as Redeemer, Helper, Healer, Banner, Life, Bread of Life, Truth, Peace, Strength, Provider, Father, Restorer, Faithful One - to follow His presence around these darn walls.  And I need to declare those truths, out loud, instead of the reality of these walls.   

God is our refuge and strength, a very present help in trouble.  Ps 46:1

For I know that my Redeemer lives, and He shall stand at last on the earth.  Job 19:25

And my God shall supply all your need according to His riches in glory by Christ Jesus.  Phil 4:19

Your mercy, O Lord, is in the heavens; Your faithfulness reaches to the clouds. Ps 36:5

Surely God is my helper; the Lord is the Sustainer of my soul.  Ps 54:4

You have hedged me behind and before, and laid Your hand upon me.   Such knowledge is too wonderful for me; It is high, I cannot attain it.   Ps 139:5,6

Show me Your ways, O Lord; teach me Your paths.   Lead me in Your truth and teach me,  for You are the God of my salvation; on You I wait all the day.   Ps 25:4,5 

I need to take those truths and just choose to believe them until I can see them, until they become my reality, until I know them as much as I've known the struggle.   And I need to speak those truths out loud, not the problem.   Because before I know the victory, like I've known the struggle, comes the choosing to believe in what is BEYOND what I can see in front of me.   It's called faith.

Now faith is the substance of things hoped for, the evidence of things NOT  seen.  Heb 11:1

We live by faith, not by sight.  Faith in a God who sees beyond, who is beyond, my present 'reality' .  He isn't stuck in time or place and He isn't stuck working within my understanding.    He sees beyond, because HE IS beyond, and His power and understanding are way beyond mine. 

“For My thoughts are not your thoughts, nor are your ways My ways,” says the Lord.

“For as the heavens are higher than the earth, so are My ways higher than your ways,

And My thoughts than your thoughts.  Isa 55:8,9

Joshua was facing Jericho.   He had to lead God's people beyond it, beyond that impenetrable, intimidating, impassable obstacle.    If you want to understand the size of what he was facing, you can find info here.   It wasn't a little obstacle.

When I went back to re-read the story, I was drawn to this very important prelude to the battle, at the end of Joshua Chapter 5, which so many preachers don't mention.   And it struck a deep chord in me, and I have found myself doing the same today, even before I finished writing this post.   

13 Now when Joshua was near Jericho, he looked up and saw a man standing in front of him with a drawn sword in his hand. Joshua went up to him and asked, “Are you for us or for our enemies?”   14 “Neither,” he replied, “but as commander of the army of the Lord I have now come.” Then Joshua fell facedown to the ground in reverence, and asked him, “What message does my Lord have for his servant?”

15 The commander of the Lord’s army replied, “Take off your sandals, for the place where you are standing is holy.” And Joshua did so.

I found it interesting that the commander of God's army didn't say he was for or against Joshua.   If I was Joshua, I would have really appreciated hearing that he was for me, for us.   

Instead, Joshua is told to take off his sandals, because he's standing on holy ground.

I have the same sense.  Holy ground.  Again.    Today, I knelt on holy ground, not holy because of its location, but because it was a holy time and space before Him.   And I realised, in that time and place, that this is way beyond me and my Jericho.    This is about what HE is doing in my life, through my life, and beyond my life.   

This is about HIM.  It's about His plans, His purposes, His promises - to me, yes, but beyond me and my comfort and my health.   This is so beyond me.  This is about Him being glorified so that others will know that He is God and that He is good!    This is holy ground, His holy ground.    My Jericho, my struggle, is His holy ground and I have to remember that!

The works of His hands are verity and justice; all His precepts are sure.    They stand fast forever and ever, and are done in truth and uprightness.     He has sent redemption to His people; He has commanded His covenant forever:    Holy and awesome is His name.  Ps 111:7-9

So, if it's about Him and His glory and goodness, then it has to be done HIS way.   Not mine.   My entitled, first-world mindset needs to remember that.   What needs to be front and centre is not me, nor my Jericho.   What needs to be front and centre is Him, because He is my ever-present help, right now, right here.  Just like the Israelites were commanded to follow His ark around those walls, I'm being asked to follow His holy presence around mine.   

And He won't forget or ignore me in the process.  Just like He didn't forget or ignore the Israelites in the wilderness, on the way to the Jordan River, or heading into the land of promise, into the fulfilment of their identity, in Him.   

He is beyond me, and beyond these walls, but He is definitely not beyond reach.   He is my Shepherd.  

The LORD is my Shepherd, I shall not want.  So many times over the last few months, He's brought me back to this truth.   But, what I've failed to recognise till just this week is that this verse starts with 'The LORD'.  He is just that - the LORD, holy, to be honoured as holy, to be revered, to be followed around the walls until it's accomplished, until He says it's done, until He says it's time.   I don't want to forget that I am His, that this battle is His (the battle is the Lord's), and the glory will be His.  

“For you are a people holy to the Lord your God. The Lord your God has chosen you to be a people for His treasured possession, out of all the peoples who are on the face of the earth.   Deut 7:6

This holy God is holy in ALL His ways towards me.  Holy in His understanding of my needs, holy in His goodness to meet them, holy in His discipline, holy in His plans to go well beyond what I need, to bring glory to Himself, and in so doing, to use my story of redemption to reach others.    I want this story to reach well beyond me, to bring hope to those in despair, to those sitting in the shadow of their Jerichos.  

When I realise that He has not forgotten me in the battle that is also beyond me, I can more easily bring Him my very real needs, again and again and again.  And each time, I discover anew that He can and does meet me there, at my point of need, and strengthens me and fills me, again and again and again.  

So, instead of looking at what I can see, I will look BEYOND the walls of my Jericho, as high and overbearing as they are, and look to Him.    And I will praise Him in the waiting, worship Him on holy ground, and find joy in His presence, again.

Sing praise to the Lord, you saints of His, and give thanks at the remembrance of His holy name.  For His anger is but for a moment, His favour is for life;  Weeping may endure for a night, but joy comes in the morning.  Ps 30:4,5

This song has been on repeat all week.  

As I walk into the days to come

I will not forget what You have done

For You have supplied my every need

And Your presence is enough for me

Doesn't matter what I feel, doesn't matter what I see

My hope will always be In Your promises to me