They had had their faith tried in those forty years in the wilderness, and now they murmured not. There was not a word of complaint. But forty years before they would have asked, when they had got opposite Jericho: “What is He going to do? How are we going to get over? We’ve got to have a bridge or a pontoon. And even if we get over, they will see us and defeat us. They will slay us here on the bank of Jordan. Guess we had better turn around and go back.”
That is about what they would have said, what they would have tried, and what they would have done forty years before. But now Joshua tells the people that the priests are to walk out in front of them, and that the moment the priests touched the water—the moment the soles of their feet touched the water—the water was to be cut off.
There was faith for you! When those seven men took up the ark God was with them, and the moment the soles of their feet touched the water the waters were cut off, and they passed into the middle of the stream and put down the ark.
That ark represented the Almighty. He was in the ark, with the ark right there in the midst of death—for Jordan is death and judgment—right in the middle of the stream. He held that stream in the palm of His hand. And now the people pass beyond—three millions of them.
You can hear their solemn tread. Not a word said on their march through death and judgment until Joshua led them on to Resurrection Ground. After he had got them all over, he told twelve men—one from each tribe—to take each a stone and set them up where the priests stood, so that when their children asked “What mean ye by these stones?” they could tell how the Almighty brought them through dangers into the Promised Land.
Now, after they had placed their stones, the ark was brought up out of the Jordan, and the waters rolled off. Instead of moving right on at once to Jericho, the children of Israel stopped to keep the Passover. They were in no hurry. They were willing to worship God. They kept the Passover, and after that they started for Jericho. Jericho was shut off, undoubtedly, and surely the hearts of those people were filled with fear. Here the children of Israel had come to their country and their God had brought them through the Red Sea with an out-stretched arm. Surely there was a strange God among them. Jericho had no such God as that. He had defended them and led them, and had given them light and life after that.
But now Joshua just takes a walk around the walls of Jericho. God had ordered him to take it, and he must. And as he was walking around, viewing the walls of Jericho, all at once a man stood right in front of him with a drawn sword right over him, and God said: “No man can be able to stand before you all the days of your life.” And Joshua steps right up to him, and asks: “Art thou for us or for our adversaries?” The stranger answered: “I am captain of God’s host, come to lead you to victory.”
Then Joshua fell on his face, and God talked with him. How many men of the present time would have laughed at Joshua if they had been in Jericho! How much sport they would have made of him! If there had been a Jericho Herald, what articles would have come out! The idea of taking the city in that way! The ark was to come out, and the priests were to blow rams’ horns. That was very absurd, wasn’t it? Rams’ horns!
Well, the seventh day came, and they were up quite early in the morning. Here were these seven men blowing their rams’ horns, and the people going around for the seventh time. At the end of the seventh time Joshua says: “Shout, for the Lord has given you the city.” They shout, and down tumble the walls of the city. Then they went up and entered Jericho, and every man, woman and child of that city perished. God had given the order, and His commands were obeyed.