Friday, March 12, 2010

Gilgal

Something I shared with my small group last Tuesday was how God recently reminded me of a passage that I studied several years ago. The particular passage comes from Joshua 3-4, when the Israelites cross the Jordan into the "Promised Land," where they were about to confront the Canaanites and fight many wars in order to claim the land God promised them.

I studied this passage in college as part of Beth Moore's "Believing God" series, and shortly after I completed that series, I started this blog. One significant detail in that passage, to me, is the name of the town where the Israelites camp after crossing the Jordan: Gilgal. In Hebrew, this word is a variant of the word that means "wheel" or "circle."  That particular translation was relevant to me last week when I came across this passage, but I also realize it is relevant even in me writing in this blog. I started this 3 years ago (or so), because I wanted to chronicle my walk with God and the ways I was "believing Him" to lead me and guide me. Now, I am writing to publish what he has taught me and is teaching me. I don't post often, but I keep coming back.

I won't go into many details here in public forum, but 3 years ago when I studied this passage, I was getting ready to have a difficult conversation with someone in my life. I was nervous about it. I didn't know what to do or say, but I knew I needed to confront the person and hear his side of the story. So I did. And I got through it! It wasn't easy, but it wasn't nearly as difficult as I expected it to be. Earlier this month, I was getting ready to have another, fairly similar, difficult converation with the same person. I just happened to be reading through Joshua at the time. I was reminded of this passage, and then the time in my life when I studied it. It encouraged me to look back and remember how far God brought me. Again, the conversation was not easy, but I got through it. It wasn't as difficult as I expected it to be.

As I was reading this time, though, a new connection developed in my brain. I thought about the story of the Israelites crossing the Red Sea (Exodus 14) and compared/contrasted with when they crossed the Jordan. Some interesting stuff is there. I won't blab on and on about it, but feel free to look it up and leave comments if you want to make this a discussion. Be encouraged today, I am.

1 comment:

Unknown said...

you are invited to follow my blog