Follow the Ark! Part 1

Greetings, friends and new listeners, and welcome to The Sound of Faith. I'm Sharon Ottz thanking you for joining us today because we know faith comes by hearing and hearing by the Word of God.

Today's message is a good word of encouragement and direction. Follow the ark. When you've been in the wilderness and God is leading you out into a large place of fulfilled promises, it can be both exciting and uncertain. Because there may be a raging Jordan River between you and your promised land. It's then you must be of good courage and follow the ark. When you've been in the wilderness and God is leading you out into a large place of fulfilled promises, it can be both exciting and uncertain. Because there may be a raging Jordan River between you and your promised land. It's then you must be of good courage and follow the ark. Today's message is really mostly from the book of Joshua, the first couple of chapters.

We won't read the whole thing, but we'll read what I feel is pertinent that we need to refresh our minds on. And not only that, the wording is very important in these chapters because whenever you are reading in the Bible about a great miracle that God is about to do, really pay attention to the wording. Because it is significant. Because we can see the things that lead up to a miracle. Amen.

Because God sets the stage for miracles. And you may be in a waiting time in your life. You know, as our air travel in America becomes more and more congested, it is a little scary when they show you on television what those controllers up there in the tower are seeing on their screens. I mean, it's just covered with all these little green dots. And some of them look like they're on top of each other. And every one of those represents a plane that is ready to take off or go out or something and you surely don't want them to overlap. And you see all of this and you think, wow, I mean, how can they control who's coming, who's going and it's extremely important that they don't mess up.

Amen. And you know, sometimes they have to put some airplanes in a holding pattern. Sometimes the ones that are on the runway that need to take off to begin the journey are told to wait. And if you're sitting there and sometimes you can wait a half an hour before they even allow the plane to leave the tarmac because they're waiting for an open sky.

Amen. And even though you may be a little fretful because you've got places to go and things to do, you need to just sit there and be quiet and let's say let them take as long as it takes so that when they finally take off, we got a clear pathway. And when they come to land, sometimes when a plane is going to land, again, the runways are congested. So they'll put that plane that's coming in a holding pattern and they'll be kind of like just circling around a little bit. And you're just hoping they have enough gas. That's all you need to worry about.

Don't matter how long it takes. Just have enough gas and when we finally get a runway, we're going to land. And you may feel in your life like you're stuck on that tarmac or you may feel like that you're in that holding pattern and you're anxious to move on to the next place you've got to go. But you just need to trust the Lord. Amen. Because he is in control and he doesn't make mistakes. And the only time that mistakes happen is when people that have that as the job or for whatever reason that they are, maybe they're having a bad day, they didn't get enough sleep, they didn't get enough rest, they got a headache.

Oh God, I hope they don't have a hangover. Amen. And when these things occur, it's human error that someone wasn't communicating with the other person or another, you know, and they both gave the same directions for the same airplane. And you know, we have to trust the Holy Spirit and know that our God is able to bring us through and out of every situation where we are. And if you're in a holding pattern and if you're in a waiting time, you need to trust in the Lord and wait on the Lord and be of good courage. And now we're going to talk about the children of Israel and you talk about a waiting time.

They had been waiting for 40 long years to enter into the promised land. And that's where we'll take up our story in Joshua, the first chapter. I'm not going to read everything, but some things are very special, so we'll read the first nine verses.

After the death of Moses, the servant of the Lord, it came to pass that the Lord spoke unto Joshua, the son of Nun, Moses' minister, saying, Moses, my servant, is dead. Now therefore arise. Go over this Jordan, thou and all this people, unto the land which I do give to them, even to the children of Israel. Every place that the sole of your foot shall tread upon, that have I given unto you, as I said unto Moses, from the wilderness and this Lebanon, even unto the great river, the river Euphrates, all the land of the Hittites, and unto the great sea toward the going down of the sun shall be your coast. There shall not any man be able to stand before thee all the days of thy life.

Wow, what a promise. As I was with Moses, so I will be with thee. I will not fail thee nor forsake thee. Be strong and of good courage, for unto this people shall thou divide for an inheritance the land which I swear unto their fathers to give them. Only be thou strong and very courageous that thou mayest observe to do according to all the law which Moses, my servant, commanded thee. Turn not from it to the right hand nor to the left, that thou mayest prosper whithersoever thou goest. This book of the law shall not depart out of thy mouth, but thou shalt meditate therein day and night, and that thou mayest observe to do according to all that is written therein. Then thou shalt make thy way prosperous, and then thou shalt have good success. Had thy not commanded thee, third time, be strong and of good courage. Be not afraid, neither be thou dismayed, for the Lord thy God is with thee whithersoever thou goest.

You talk about a pep talk. I mean, the Lord, he knew that he had the right person. He chose Joshua a while back, and Joshua had been Moses' minister. You know, one of the times when Moses was up for 40 days in the mountain with God, do you know that Joshua stayed at the bottom of the mountain all by himself those same 40 days? Think about a place of being in limbo. He wasn't up on the mountain with Moses, with God, where all the action and excitement was happening, and he wasn't with the family and friends and the people of Israel having natural family fellowship.

He was in the middle all by himself. Have you ever been in that place? Have you ever felt like you're not on the mountain right now, and yet it seems like in the natural you're not even enjoying the natural ties and the natural life that you have?

You feel like somehow or another you're in limbo, you're in that waiting period? But Joshua was faithful. He stayed there. There's nowhere in Scripture that I have seen or read where he was told to stay there, where he was commanded by God or Moses to stay there. My feeling and observation is he stayed there by his own choice because he wanted the things of God.

Amen? And even though he was not allowed and was not ready to go up on the mountain with Moses, he had decided to separate himself unto God with no promise at this time and no future, and no thus sayeth the Lord, thou shall be a great man that will take the people in. At this point, none of that was in the picture that God had revealed. But God saw that man. He saw Joshua's heart. He saw that he was willing to be faithful and to serve in the least and be alongside of God's servant Moses. And so now God said, Moses, my servant, is dead.

Now, this was not new information. If you look at the last chapter of Deuteronomy that precedes Joshua, we find out that he had been dead for 30 days at least because the children of Israel stopped and mourned for Moses for 30 days. This was not a newsflash, my servant, Moses is dead. But what he was saying is God was making a point. Hey, guys, Moses is dead.

You got to let go of the past. It's time to rise up and cross over this Jordan into the land which I give to thee that you started on the journey 40 years ago. Well, at least your parents did. They didn't because all those people were dead. These are the children and grandchildren, amen?

But he's saying to them, you know what? There is a time to mourn, but there's a time to move on. And some people get stuck in the mourning process. They mourn over what was, what used to be, amen? Or what could be, but it's not because this happened or that happened.

And, you know, sometimes things come in your life. If you lose a loved one, you're going to mourn. And God expects you to mourn because he created you, and that's part of the human grieving process to mourn when we lose someone close to us. But if you mourn, if you continue to mourn and mourn and you stay in that place of mourning, then you're going to miss the blessings that God has for you and you're digging yourself into a pit of despair. There's a time to mourn, and some of you had losses in your life. You know, when you, if maybe your marriage ended in divorce and you didn't think that was going to happen, but it happened. And now you're mourning over the loss of that marriage.

Or maybe you didn't get married, but you thought you were going to marry somebody and the engagement broke off or it didn't go the way you thought. And now you're mourning over that and you're stuck in that mourning position and you don't know what God's got for you around the corner because instead of you rising up and moving on, you're getting stuck in the muck. Amen. Don't get stuck in the muck. Rise up. If you lost the job that you thought was your dream job or you didn't get the job you thought would be your dream job, if something of great disappointment has come in your life and it's really knocked you off your feet and you didn't, you just feel discouraged about it, you can sit there and mourn for the next year or next two years and life is moving on and blessings of God are being forfeited that God would have you to receive.

There's a time to mourn, but there's a time to move on. And God said, every place, every, every place the sole of your foot shall tread upon have I given to you. Amen. God said, I've already given it to you.

That's past tense. I've given it to you. He told them back 40 years ago, Moses and their parents, I've given you this land, but you've got to go in there and put your foot on it. You've got to walk the land. You've got to claim your land. You've got to possess your possessions.

There's a scripture in one of the minor prophets, I can't remember which one, but it says, and Jacob possessed his possessions. See, God gives you promises. Some of you have had prophetic words and God says, I'm going to give you a mate. I'm going to give you a job.

I'm going to give you a ministry or whatever it may be. And wow, that, you're holding on to that. But you're still sitting in the same place.

You haven't got up and put your foot anywhere. Sometimes God says, I have a mate for you. I have the perfect wife or husband for you.

And you're thinking, praise God, one day magically, the doorbell's going to ring and I'm going to open the door and there she stands or there he stands, my knight in armor. And so in the meantime, I'm just, I'm not going to go on any dates. I'm not going to fellowship with, with other, you know, Christian women or men of the opposite sex that are unmarried and eligible and all those, you know, things.

Okay, we've got all that taken care of. I'm not telling you to go out there and get sinners, for goodness sakes. Don't go out dating sinner people. Don't say Sister Sharon said I got a date. So you go out there and date a bunch of sinners. Okay, get all of our criteria together. Be not unequally yoked with unbelievers.

Amen. And make sure that they're not already married. So you have got to cooperate with God. You got to get out there and put your foot on that dating territory or whatever it may be. Does it mean that the very first person you date is going to be the one? Probably not.

Probably not. Well, how are you going to know who you like and what you like? Doesn't mean you have to go out on serious, serious, serious dates.

You can go out with groups of people. Amen. And the Holy Spirit, if he's got someone for you, he's going to draw you together. He's not going to tell you Susie's the one for you and Susie cannot stand anything about you. I mean, Susie's like I love you brother in the Lord and that's as far as it goes.

If Susie's the one, Susie's going to like you too. Amen. How many see what I'm saying?

You got to get your foot out there. You got to get up, stop crying, stop lamenting, stop mourning, stop having a pity party. Everybody's but me.

This one but me and all but me. You've got to get up and get moving. And God said, as I was with Moses, I will be with thee. I will not fail thee. I will not forsake thee. Now I think it's quite important that we take note of the fact that he said three times, be strong, be of good courage.

In fact, one time he added very courageous, very courageous. Now this to me infers that God is trying to prepare them for a big, big deal. Now remember, these people had not crossed the Red Sea. We understand that because when they disobeyed God and murmured after the 12 spies came back that Moses had sent into the land and 10 of them had a bad report and only two.

Joshua and Caleb had a good report. And when they began to murmur and complain, remember God was so angry, he said, you will not go in. You will not go into my land. I'm going to let you walk around this wilderness until you all die off and your offspring will go in.

The offspring had never been at the Red Sea miracle. And God was getting ready to prepare this new generation of only two people Joshua and Caleb had any experience to rely on. All the rest had to go by the stories. And they had been living on 40-year-old stories.

Do you hear what I'm saying? We moved in this church here at 2422 West Patapsco Avenue in August 1973. Now somebody tell me how long ago that was.

How long? 40 years. And some people are still living on 40-year-old stories of what God did on William Street. Oh, I heard how God did this on William Street and God did that on William Street. And yes, God did.

He did those things on William Street. And I have to say things were very different in the world, morally, politically. And we did not have all of the digital things we have now, social media, no, I mean most people, you had to go get your dime out and go to the telephone and call your boyfriend or girlfriend up and stand there in the cold and shiver while you talk for an hour. Amen?

That's how it was 40 years ago. So what I'm saying is they had been living off of 40-year-old stories and God knew that he had to prepare them for this great thing that was about to happen. They had to cross. They had gone as far as they could go. They were now at the Jordan River and they could not go any further until they got over that river. Amen? And this was going to be a big thing to them. How are we going to get over this river?

Yeah, I heard what they said about, you know how Moses, he went out there with this rod and God, he divided the Red Sea and they walked over on dry ground and wow, that was something, but you know, I don't know. I don't know if God would do that for us. And so the Lord says, be of good courage. Be very courageous. Be strong. Be ready. Don't be dismayed. Don't be afraid. And he actually said, don't be afraid, don't be dismayed because dismay is an ultimate state of fear.

You have fear and fright, but dismay means to be overwhelmed with fear to the point that you cast away your hope, to the point that you're losing it. Amen? Have you ever been there? So what is the answer? What is the remedy? You've got to say to your soul, soul, be of good courage. Take courage. Be strong. The Lord said, I'll be with you like I was with Moses. The Lord said, I will not leave thee. I will not fail thee if you will be strong.

Amen. There's a scripture that I love. Some of my favorite verses that are actually in, keep your place in Joshua, but in Isaiah, the 41st chapter, verse 10 and verse 13. I like to give this scripture to people when I know they're going through a battle because they helped me so much. Fear thou not, for I am with thee. Be not dismayed.

Don't be overwhelmed with fear. For I am thy God. I will strengthen thee.

Yea, I will help thee. Yea, I will uphold thee with the right hand of my righteousness. Verse 13, For I, the Lord thy God, will hold thy right hand, saying unto thee, Fear not, I will help thee. And you know, there's another little verse in this chapter that I love.

And just back up to verse six, and it says they helped everyone, his neighbor, and everyone said to his brother, Be of good courage. Turn around and look at somebody and say, brother, sister, whatever it may be, be of good courage. We've got to encourage one another.

Turn around and tell somebody else. Be of good courage. Be not dismayed. Don't be afraid. The Lord said, I will take you by the hand.

I will help you. Amen. If you've got to stand in the mirror and you don't have anybody else to do it, stand in the mirror. Look at yourself and say, the Lord said, be of good courage. Look at your own face in the mirror when you say it.

And I tell you, it works. When you see your own face saying, be of good courage, and you see that something inside of you is going to witness and agree. Amen. So we've got to be of good courage in how we do that. As we go back to Joshua, we have to speak the word of God.

Verse eight told us, this book of the law shall not depart out of thy what? Thy mouth. The mouth is so important because we believe with the heart, but we confess with the mouth. Whatever is in the heart, the abundance of the heart, the mouth is going to speak. If you're full of fear and doubt and dismay, that's how you're going to talk.

So you know what to do when you're full of doubt and fear and dismay. Be quiet. Be quiet. Don't say that negative thing.

Don't say that doubtful thing. Get in the word of God. Get some scripture.

Get Isaiah 41, 10 and 13. Then open your mouth and speak the word of God. This is how you get out of fear.

This is how you get out of trouble. He said it should not depart out of thy mouth, but meditate therein day and night. Now the word meditate means to mutter.

M-U-T-T-E-R. In other words, it means to talk to yourself. How many here ever talk to yourself?

You know what? You are very intelligent people. You are very intelligent. It's a fact that people that talk to themselves are intelligent.

They're not crazy. I not only talk to myself, I answer myself. Amen. Because you have the spirit of God and you have the word of God in your belly and God's spirit is in there.

Let me tell you what comes out of your mouth is going to help you. It's going to strengthen you. It's going to encourage you because faith comes by hearing and hearing by the word of God.

Amen. So you've got to meditate. You literally got to speak out loud the word of God. And you know that's one of my favorite messages of all.

And I don't have time to go there. But we know that the Bible tells us that as part of the whole armor of God, we must take the sword of the spirit, which is the word of God. And we know that Hebrews tells us the word of God is alive and active, alive and powerful, sharper than any two-edged sword. It's able to divide us under the soul and the spirit, which is very hard to divide and separate.

Amen. That's why you can't go to carnal, unregenerate doctors and therapists and all of those because they don't know how to separate soul and spirit. They only know how to talk to the soul.

They only know how to help you with your emotional things, going by their experience and their learning. But what do they know about the spirit of God? What do they know about the born-again spirit? Amen.

If they're still dead in their trespasses and sin, they can't understand the things of the spirit. Amen. But oh, God's word is the best counselor. It's the best psychiatrist.

It's the best psychologist. God's word will speak the diagnoses. God's word will not only tell you the diagnosis, it'll give you the prognosis. And it'll say, it's going to be all right.

It's going to be all right. He said, you've got to open your mouth because God's word is like a sharp two-edged sword. I need somebody now who knows the message to help me preach. Now the first edge of that sword is created when?

When God speaks that word to you. In the Greek, it's Rhema, R-H-E-M-A. I'm speaking now of Hebrews 4-12. The word, the sword in the Greek is Rhema. Rhema simply means a spoken word.

Any word you speak, it's Rhema and in contrast to a red word. Amen. The first edge of that sword is created when the Holy Spirit highlights in your spirit a scripture.

You know that scripture since forever, but for some reason today, you know it in a different way. It's very personal. It's very customized.

It's very specified. It is right there hitting the nail on the head of what you need to do for where you are at that moment. And when God speaks that word to your spirit, it creates the first edge. But in order for the second edge to be created, you've got to open up your mouth and you've got to speak the word of God.

And then the second edge is created. Amen. So he said you've got to let this word be in your mouth and you cannot let it depart. And if you will do this, we read it all, you're not going to have a problem with fear.

You won't have a problem with dismay and you're going to prosper and have good success. And I'm going to be with you wherever you go. And so this was the word of God to Joshua. Amen. And so now Joshua has this promise.

He's able to rise up. And as it were, step into Moses shoes and not be afraid as Moses is dead and he's not coming back. Amen. So so now, Joshua, you better get a move on because you not only got to walk for yourself, you've got these what, two to three million people looking up to you. Amen. Amen.

I hope you're encouraged by today's motivating message. Follow the ark. Joshua was a fearless fighter and leader in the troops of Israel, serving faithfully under Moses. But when Moses died, the mantle of leadership fell upon him. Now Moses had led them through the Red Sea.

What a spectacular event. Eternally etched in the minds of the Israelites. But now it was time to leave the 40 year trek in the wilderness and enter into the promised land. But first, they must cross the Jordan River. By comparison, the Jordan River was nothing like the Red Sea. But while God miraculously divided the Red Sea and they crossed over on dry ground, he instructed Joshua to send them through the waters of the Jordan.

And at springtime, it was a raging torrent as the melted snow from the northern mountains overflowed its banks. You see, every generation must have its own Red Sea experience. And these Israelites were born in the wilderness and had not experienced the Red Sea. But God had a different plan. He told Joshua to send the priests bearing the Ark of the Covenant on their shoulders into the raging waters. And he told the people, follow the ark, follow the presence of God. They had to step out in faith. God said, as soon as the soles of your feet rest in the waters, the Jordan will roll back.

So if you're facing a Jordan River experience in your life, don't fear. Just follow the ark, the emblem of the presence of God, which contained the words of God. This message, follow the ark, can be ordered on CD for a love gift of at least $10 for the radio ministry. Request offer SK173.

That's SK173. Mail to Sound of Faith, P.O. Box 1744, Baltimore, Maryland 21203. Or go online to SoundOfFaith at RGHardy.org, where you may also order on MP3. That's RGHardy.org. But to order by mail, send a minimum love gift of $10 to P.O. Box 1744, Baltimore, Maryland 21203. Until next time, this is Sharon Nazi, Maranatha.