In this sermon, the speaker reflects on the journey of the Israelites as they finally reach the promised land after 40 years of discipline. However, they face a great obstacle in the form of the overflowing Jordan River and the armed inhabitants of the land. The speaker draws a parallel between the Israelites' struggle and our own spiritual journey. He shares his personal experience of realizing that he was too focused on himself and wanting to be in the forefront, but through studying Galatians 2:20, he understood that he needed to let Christ be his life. The speaker emphasizes that we are not meant to improve our old selves, but rather to recognize that we have been ended at the cross and to surrender to God's intentions for us.

We turn to Joshua 3, 1-2, Joshua 3, 1-17. And Joshua rose early in the morning, and they removed from Shittim and came to Jordan. He and all the children of Israel lodged there before they passed over. And it came to pass after three days that the officers went through the host. And they commanded the people, saying, When ye see the ark of the covenant of the Lord your God, and the priests, the Levites bearing it, then ye shall remove from your place and go after it. Yet there shall be a space between you and it, about two thousand cubits by measure. Come not near unto it, that ye may know the way by which ye must go, for ye have not passed this way heretofore. And Joshua said unto the people, Sanctify yourselves, for tomorrow the Lord will do wonders among you. And Joshua spake unto the priests, saying, Take up the ark of the covenant, and pass over before the people. And they took up the ark of the covenant, and went before the people. And the Lord said unto Joshua, This day will I begin to magnify thee in the sight of all Israel, that they may know that as I was with Moses, so I will be with thee. And thou shalt command the priests that bear the ark of the covenant, saying, When ye are come to the brink of the water of Jordan, ye shall stand still in Jordan. And Joshua said unto the children of Israel, Come hither, and hear the words of the Lord your God. And Joshua said, Hereby ye shall know that the living God is among you, and that he will without fail drive out from before you the Canaanites, and the Hittites, and the Hivites, and the Perizzites, and the Gergesites, and the Amorites, and the Jebusites. Behold the ark of the covenant of the Lord of all the earth, passes over before you into Jordan. Now therefore take you twelve men out of the tribes of Israel, out of every tribe of man. And it shall come to pass as soon as the souls of the feet of the priests that bear the ark of the Lord, the Lord of all the earth, shall rest in the waters of Jordan, that the waters of Jordan shall be cut off from the waters that come down from above. And they shall stand in one heap. And it came to pass, when the people were moved from their tents to pass over Jordan, and the priests bearing the ark of the covenant before the people, and as they that bear the ark were come unto Jordan, and the feet of the priests that bear the ark were dipped in the rim of the water, for Jordan overfloweth all his banks all the time of harvest. That the waters which came down from above, stood and rose up upon a heap, very far from the city Adam, that is beside Zaretan. And those that came down toward the sea of the plain, even the salt sea, failed and were cut off. And the people passed over, right against Jericho. And the priests that bear the ark of the covenant of the Lord, stood firm on dry ground in the midst of Jordan. And all the priests, sorry, and all the Israelites passed over on dry ground, were passed clean over Jordan. And it came to pass that all the people were clean passed over Jordan, that the Lord spake unto Joshua saying, Take you twelve men out of the people, out of every tribe a man, and command ye them saying, Take you hence out of the midst of Jordan, out of the place where the priest's feet stood firm twelve stones, and ye shall carry them over, and leave them in the lodging place, where ye shall lodge this night. Then Joshua called the twelve men whom he had prepared of the children of Israel, out of every tribe a man. And Joshua said unto them, Pass over before the ark of the Lord your God in the midst of Jordan, and take you up, every man of you, a stone upon his shoulder, according unto the number of the tribes of the children of Israel, that this may be a sign among you, that when your children ask their fathers in time to come saying, What mean ye by these stones? Then ye shall answer them, that the waters of Jordan were cut off before the ark of the covenant of the Lord. When it passed, when it passed over Jordan, the waters of Jordan were cut off, and these stones shall be for a memorial unto the children of Israel for ever. And the children of Israel did so as Joshua commanded, and took up twelve stones out of the midst of Jordan, as the Lord spake unto Joshua, according to the number of the tribes of Israel, and carried them over with them unto the place where they lodged, and laid them down there. And Joshua, isn't it interesting, set up twelve stones in the midst of Jordan, presumably taken from the wilderness side, in the place where the feet of the priests which bear the ark of the covenant stood, and they are there unto this day. Yes, they are there, still there, under the waters. For the priests which bear the ark in the midst of Jordan, for the priests which bear the ark stood in the midst of Jordan until everything was finished. And the story is told how when they came up out of Jordan, the waters rolled back again. Now this morning we come to our second study of the ark, and we see something of its history. We come to the story of how the ark of the covenant, of the Lord of all the earth, went right into that obstructing river Jordan, and stood still in the midst of Jordan, until all the people were passed clean over Jordan. Now that's the authorised version. It sounds like 20th century slang. Clean over Jordan! And I promised myself one day to write a little book, and the title is going to be, Clean Over Jordan. And that can be your experience and mine, as we shall see. Now Moses had said, in the book of Deuteronomy, reviewing as to how far they'd got, that the Lord had brought them out from this, that miserable life in Egypt, that he might bring them into the land promised to their fathers. He brought them out with one express purpose, to bring them in. It wasn't only a negative salvation that God purposed for Israel, but a positive one. They were to be brought in to a large land, a good land that flowed with milk and honey. We all know that they did not immediately enter into that land, after being brought out of Egypt. We all know that they remained for no longer than, no less a time than 40 years, in the wilderness, for various reasons which we're not going to go into now. They remained there until all that unbelieving generation had died out, and their children, as grown people, then were able to enter in. The 40 years has been completed. Years of sad discipline, in which years nonetheless God had been faithful to them, and never failed to guide them with the pillar of cloud, and never once had that manner failed to fill them. And now at last they come up on the east side of Jordan, and there across Jordan is this fair land, which they've been dreaming about for so long, and to enjoy which was the whole purpose of them ever being brought out of Egypt. But at last, it was to discover there was a great obstacle to them entering into that land. Not only were the inhabitants armed and mighty within the land, but there before them lay, ran, the river Jordan. And at that particular time of the year, Jordan overflowed all its banks. It was an obstacle indeed, which humanly speaking they wouldn't know how to come over. Now all this is a picture of ourselves. What Moses said to Israel about God's intention of bringing them out, is true of us. He brought us out from there, that he might bring us in. Once we were in the world. Some may yet be in that spiritual condition. Fulfilling the desires of the flesh and of the mind, and whereby nature the children of wrath, even as others. What a life it is. People live when they're in what we call the world. Of course you must understand what I mean by that. In a sense we're all living in time. But the Bible talks about living in the world away from God. Fulfilling the desires of the flesh and of the mind. But thank God for many of us, and maybe some of whom it's not yet true, but I trust it will be before the week's out. He has, grace has brought us out from this horrid life. And all that, that we might be brought in to a positive glorious land. Ours is not a negative salvation. We've been brought out from that old life, but we are brought into a new one, into a land that flows with milk and honey, the spiritual counterpart of Canaan. And that Canaan is none other than Jesus, and the fullness of Jesus, enjoying the riches of grace and blessing that are in there for us which fill us up until we run over. Now that is God's purpose, he brought us out. That he might bring us in, no matter where you may be or how you feel, tell yourself that Jesus you brought me out from this. That you might bring me in, you purposed it. It isn't I only who desire it, and have to plead with you, he wants to bring us in. His purpose is to bring us out of the world, that we might live in the spirit. But the trouble is, some of us haven't been living in the spirit. Perhaps we have known what it is, but right now we're not living in the spirit. We are living in the flesh, as the scriptural phrase is. The flesh in Paul's writings is not the body, it's that fallen self-life, that egocentric principle in our lives, which on one hand tries by its own efforts to be a good Christian, and on the other hand, expresses itself in the very opposite way, in the most self-centered manner you can conceive. And remember, self is the heart of every sin. The central letter of the little word sin is I. And although we were brought out of the world to live in the spirit, all too much of our time is spent living in the flesh. Paul, in 1 Corinthians 2 and 3, tells us there are three sorts of places where we can live, or three sorts of people that we can be. He talks there about the natural man. The natural man receiveth not the things of the Spirit of God, the natural man. And that's a condition of some people, they are natural. I would like to spend more time to go into the full meaning of that word, but we must press on. Then in contrast to the natural man, Paul talks about the spiritual man. And he sees that's the main contrast. Are you a natural man or a spiritual man? The natural man is, so to speak, living in Egypt. The spiritual man is living, so to speak, in Kenya. But having made this great big distinction, he then comes up with a third in between the two. The carnal man. The man living in the flesh. And I brethren, he says, could not speak unto you as spiritual, but as unto carnal. People presumably who have been brought out of Egypt, but not living in Kenya, but they're living in the flesh, trying their best and always doing the very opposite. And that may well be our condition. Maybe for a long time you've been there. Maybe you've been brought out and never known what it is to be brought in. Or maybe you've been brought in, but that was long ago. And right now, some of us, like any of us can be, in the wilderness. But it may well be that this is your hour, in coming to South Wales, to survey the land of Kenyan again. And to see that Jesus, in his fullness, taking control of that life and filling it, and living it through you, is indeed your Kenyan. And you and I have unique opportunity of being brought in, in a way perhaps not experienced before, or once experienced, but we've slipped away from it. So this is the exciting possibility of any such time that we spend here. But alas, between us and that which is going to satisfy us, cause us to live that life that he's got for us, there's a hindrance. Jordan is blowing. By that I think of how you feel about yourself. You're so weak. You're so vacillating in your determination to be what you ought to be. You've tried before, you've failed, and you say frankly, I can't! All right, there's your Jordan. I can't. That's a big Jordan. I can't! And that I can't is based on many a futile effort to do. And you're settled down, there's a Jordan. Others can talk of being satisfied and having cups full and running over, but I can't. But it isn't only that. There are specific things that may represent our Jordan. Things that have happened way back, or only yesterday, and to this day they separate us from God. Your sin always separates. Things that have happened, very often, in the realm of our relationship with others. Sin is not only to be thought of as to do with our relationship to God. It also concerns our relationship to one another. And that which goes wrong between us and another goes wrong between us and God. And I know what would be my Jordan that would seem to impede me getting any further. However, I know something as much as any of reactions of jealousy and resentment and mental arguments with other people where I think they've wronged me. And when I have these mental arguments, sometimes lying awake, argue it out, I win every argument. I'm always right. Quarrels! Hidden sins! And though you may not be committing them right now, the separation which they bring still exists! And sin has erected a great Jordan between us and our promised land. But listen dear brother, you're going to go through that Jordan. Nonetheless, no matter how long it's flowed between you and the Lord, no matter how deep it is, or no matter how much it overflows its banks, and you're going to go through it. By the same Saviour by which you came out of Egypt, and by the same work of the cross which availed for you then, it's going to avail for you and me once again. And this is what this passage gives us in pictorial form. The ark as we saw yesterday is a beautiful and very complete picture of the Lord Jesus Christ. And this is the great thing that happened. They had various encouragements to their faith, to expect it, notably the sending of those spies. And those spies were so encouraged by the testimony of Rahab. You know, they believed more in Israel's victory over Jericho than Israel did. She was absolutely certain they were finished. And that so heartened those spies, they came back and said, boys, we've got it! The Lord's already delivered them, they're panic-stricken! Well, that was a great encouragement to faith, and they'd need some faith for the next episode. And they were prepared for it. They were told to get ready for that day they were going to pass over Jordan. Not told, first of all, how, until it was actually explained, but they were ready for anything, with such a God as theirs. And so, the priests were told to carry the ark. Remember those staves? There they are, carrying it upon their shoulders, all in their proper array. And that ark was to make way for that obstructing river. And there was to be a space between that ark and them, 2,000 cubits. So they could see it, see which way they were going to go. Because that which was going to be done, was going to be done by the ark alone. They were to have the benefit, but the ark was to be separated. And right alone, that ark went toward the Jordan. And so, of the Lord Jesus Christ, that which is going to be done, is going to be done by Him alone. You can't share in it. No screwing up your mind in a communion service helps one little bit. He does it objectively, Himself alone. In the days when I was in the Young Life campaign, we used to use this hymn book. Geoffrey Percival resurrected this copy. I lived with this for 20 years until I, oh, I always knew it backwards. I was glad to have a change. But it was a beautiful hymn. It was alone. The Saviour prayed in dark dissemination. Alone He drained the bitter cup. He suffered there alone. The chorus alone. Alone. He bore it all alone. Alone He gave Himself to save His own. He suffered, bled and died alone. But He's done it. And just as Israel got the benefit of what the ark did, so do we. His the blessing, sorry, ours the blessing, but His the curse. And so it was when that ark at the feet of the priests, as they touched the brink of the water, something marvellous happened. The waters were cut off. And those coming down accumulated and accumulated and formed a mighty big wall of water stretching far above them while those going down were cut off. And the ark of the covenant of the Lord of the earth went into Jordan with this extraordinary effect. And those waters were held back until all the people were passed. Clean over Jordan. They didn't have to swim. They did it on dry ground. Without any effort of their own other than the faith that dared to follow when the ark had gone. And this is what the Lord Jesus has done. He's gone right into the water of Jordan, the waters of sin and their suffering alone. By the mighty value of the blood that He shed at Calvary He holds back the waters of judgment which you and I rightly and properly deserve. So that even you and me who may well regard ourselves as failed saints may yet pass over on dry ground without swimming, without effort out of that old wilderness, unhappy experience into the canyon of freedom and joy in Him into the freedom of just having Christ in all His fullness. I want to tell you Jesus, by His blood is the way through every last Jordan that sin has erected between you and the promised land. It's already been done. It hasn't got to be repeated. It's available to us there. I care not what it is. Is that a difficult situation? Oh, I know the other person may be wrong but the thing that's obstructed you is your wrong reactions to their wrong. Could you but say that's the trouble. That's the trouble! And acknowledge it's the trouble. And that you've caused it or at least contributed to it. Take the place of the wrong one and your eyes are open then to see that Jesus has already done it and He's the way through every Jordan. And no matter how often a Jordan may appear before your way Jesus has anticipated that Jordan and there's a way through into the fullness of the Lord Jesus Christ into the life that satisfies where your heart is at rest where you've got something for others. Let's tell ourselves that no matter what that Jordan is it's been anticipated and dealt with and parted by the Lord Jesus when He suffered there alone. Only acknowledge what it is. Stop struggling and saying Lord I'm just going to be honest. I'm just going to tell you how I feel, how poor shape I am. And you start going down the list. Is there any more? And He says please don't try and be better. Just go on telling me. This, that and the other. So restful. You know sometimes you haven't got any faith and you start trying to get faith. Don't try and get faith. Haven't got any love for all the servants. Don't try and get it. Just tell Him you haven't got it. We don't put ourselves in the place where we can see the finished work of Christ. We try and answer our own prayers as we're praying them. If you're asking Him, then it's Him you're asking. Don't try and think how you can be more loving or more this, that and the other. True repentance is about the most restful thing in all the world. And many a time the Lord says don't try and get even from me the things you left. Just tell me you haven't got them. And go a little deeper. What else? And what lies at the bottom of it? And then your eyes are lifted to see Jesus and His finished work. And the work has already been done. And the next moment by the mighty power of that blood you are in Canaan rejoicing in Him. I want to compare verse 11 and verse 17. Verse 11 in this chapter 3 Behold the ark of the covenant of the law of all the earth passeth over before you into Jordan. That was the first thing. The ark passed over before them into Jordan. But then in verse 17 And the priests that bear the ark of the covenant of the law stood firm on dry ground in the midst of Jordan until the people who were clean passed over entering into Jordan and then standing in the midst of Jordan. Entering into Jordan and then standing in the midst of Jordan until the people were clean passed over. And that brings this to my heart. Jesus didn't only go into Jordan at Calvary into death, into judgment on my behalf. But He stood still there. And you know He's still there. Not way back on Calvary but out of heaven. Still there holding back the waters of judgment that I so rightly and properly deserve. And the way kept still open. I turn to Hebrews 9 Verse 34 24 rather For Christ is not entered into the holy places made with hands which are figures of the true but into heaven itself now to appear in the presence of God for us. And what's He doing there? Making intercession for me. And what is His intercession? I don't think it means a lot of pleading for me. He shows His wounds. He spreads His hand. In fact He's in heaven that taught His intercession. Sinners can't stand there. And Jesus took the sinner's place. That which released Him from that death and raised Him from the dead and gave Him access back to glory was the mighty power of the blood He shed. It availed for Him first before it availed for anybody else. For He was brought again from the dead by the blood of the everlasting covenant. The fact that He's there at all is proof. It's enough for all the sins for which He took responsibility. And if it's enough for Him to be there, it's enough for me. And He's so to speak in glory. Standing still in Jordan holding back the rivers of judgment until all His people are passed clean over Jordan into Kenya. The way is all the time available. Therefore all the time you may at any given moment enter. If something goes wrong, the way is still there. Your Jesus is there anticipating the thing that's gone wrong and presenting the blood before God's eyes as the answer to what has happened. And the way through Jordan is all the time open. And listen, this is the only way not only by which we may enter into fuller blessing but it is the only way by which we may remain saved. Now, there is a summary of an important doctrine in one phrase. Once saved, always saved. And some people sometimes ask me, do I believe? Once saved, always saved. And I say, of course I do. Grace wouldn't be grace if my salvation was on one day and off the next according to my behavior. But it's true not in a mechanistic way. So I made a decision, Karl. Made a decision way back. Now I'm saved. Doesn't matter, I know I can't live after it but I'm going to be saved nonetheless. This doctrine reduced to a wretched mechanistic formula which is metallic. And little wonder that some have reacted against such a mechanistic formula. I'm saved. But only because everything, every moment depends on Jesus. But for Him in the midst of Jordan but for Him in that life those waters of judgment which have been accumulating there would cut me off and I will lose my salvation. I'm absolutely dependent on the current contemporary activity of the Lord Jesus right now for me in heaven to remain saved at all. I was really shaken some time ago when I was reading afresh with new eyes Psalm 106 verse 23. This is talking about Israel in the wilderness and how God more than once said He was going to destroy that people and how Moses more than once interceded for them. Verse 23 Therefore God said He would destroy them had not Moses His chosen stood before them in the breach to turn away His wrath lest He should destroy them. I want to tell you that nation would have been slaughtered. God knows as a discipline many did die in the wilderness at the hand of God but the whole mother would have been destroyed had not Moses, God's chosen stood before God in the breach and claimed the promises of God on behalf of His people claimed that the honor of God was bound up with His people and were told had not Moses stood in the breach there would have been nothing to turn away the wrath of God and you know that shook me. I saw that God had more than once virtually I know this is putting it in a human sort of way if you like that did what He did to Israel so that far needs to be finished. He needs to be cut off had not Jesus stood before Him in the breach. I owe the fact that I am saved today only because of innumerable occasions when my heavenly advocator stood before God in the breach and turned away God's wrath from me and this I want to tell you is no just or pious thing I can name the things, one, two, three which were quite enough on any ground you like for me to forfeit my salvation but He has never failed and He never will. Once saved, always saved only because of the current activity of Jesus for us which He will never fail to perform and it really helped me I regarded those things I was so prone to play with things that weren't pious with a fear not forgotten of the fact that I might lose my salvation and I knew my Jesus wouldn't fail to do that but the fact that He had to there were specific issues lest you think that this gives you the picture of a loving Jesus persuading an angry God I remind you it's God Himself who's appointed Him to be my High Priest The Lord swear and will not repent thou to priest forever for sinners and failing saints after the order of Melchizedek and we're told that Jesus is faithful to Him that appointed Him not faithful to you so much as faithful to the one who appointed Him I'm never going to fall down on the job you've appointed me to do for sinners but my dear friends you are saved by the skin of your teeth it talks about the righteous being scarcely saved you are only in any relationship to God because of the mighty power and merits of Jesus and His blood He stands in you holding back the war David once said when he was freed from Saul there's but a step between me and death and we can say there's nothing between me and the believer and death but Jesus I want to tell you literally nothing between you now after years of servitude you and hell but Jesus does that make you feel insecure? you don't know your Jesus He's faithful to Him that appointed Him but that's the underground and so He stands virtually so to speak in the midst of Jordan but up there in heaven and because of that the way through every Jordan is open to us and now I want to pass on to have a look at those stones twelve stones were taken out they come in the next chapter Joshua, Joshua 4 twelve stones were borne on the shoulders of twelve men out from the bed of the river and erected as a memorial on the canyon side and at the same time twelve stones were taken from the wilderness side and put in the bed of the river and when that river returned to its course it covered those stones and we are told there they are to this day have you realized that Israel had the experience of two river crossings there was first of all that extraordinary miraculous river crossing when they crossed the Red Sea by means of which they came over Egypt then forty years later there was another river crossing that through Jordan by which they got into Canaan and there are great points of similarity and I believe they picture for us two aspects of the work of the cross of Jesus on our behalf that by which we come out of Egypt and that by which we come into Jordan as I say there are all sorts of points of similarity between them but there is one big difference who was left under the waters at the end at the Red Sea Pharaoh and his hosts were left under the waters drowned and at Jordan Israel in type was left under the waters those twelve stones from the wilderness side represented the old Israel who showed what they were like by their wanderings in the wilderness and they were put in the bed of the river and they were under the waters and this reveals the two aspects of the cross will you turn to Galatians 6.14 Galatians 6.14 but God forbid that I should glory save in the cross of our Lord Jesus Christ by whom the world is crucified unto me and I unto the world this is that work of the cross by means of which I came out of Egypt and here I am told the world is crucified to me it's the world, it's Pharaoh, it's that whole world system which is on the cross in which I lived for so long and when you're born again the world is crucified to you it's dead to you and you're treated as a dead thing if you don't it's doubtful if you've been born again the real thing if you still love the world, if you're still part of it and all your interests and all your friendships are in the things of the world and in association with men away from God and that's where your heart is your profession may have been an unreal one the real thing always leads a man to look at the world by that I mean the world away from God it's society as dead to him it always involves separation separation from the world is not some extra thing after conversion it's implied when we first come to Jesus you are no longer of the world you no longer belong to that old association you're not better than them necessarily you're utterly different they can see, they know it oh he's one of them is he they look upon you differently and you look upon them things that once charmed you, dead of course the world returns the comparable if you treat the world as dead, they'll treat you as dead and you'll find you're left out of some things not invited to some parties you willing for that? if you treat the world as dead, then they may pass you by and take no account of you well, that's alright on us we've got Jesus, what want me more? so that's the first aspect of the cross but the second aspect of the cross is in Galatians 2.20 in the same book, chapter 2 I am crucified or more literally, I have been crucified with Christ nevertheless I live, yet not I but Christ, but Christ liveth in me now, it isn't the world on the cross it's me on it itself on it this is all implied in going through Jordan and of course self, as I've said, is our great problem this fuller egocentric principle all the time intruding with wrong motives and wrong reactions even into holy things and expressing itself in the most horrid self-centered ways and self-centeredness, as I've said, is the heart of everything and we've been so worried about self, the flesh we say, oh Lord, I want to be like this, I'm supposed to be a Christian and you and I have tried so often to improve self to make him more Christ-like and more dedicated and nicer but you find, what the Bible leads you to expect you're incapable of changing his character it is not subject to the law of God, says Romans 8 neither indeed can be just when you're hoping you're improving, then something happens and that old self acts in the old way again here's the message Jesus Christ didn't only die for me on the cross but he died as me he not only bore my sins, he wore my likeness he became in the likeness of sinful flesh and the moment he took that place, God judged him but God wasn't judging the Son as the Son so much he was judging the Son as you dare see the end of you in the flesh what God thinks of you in that terrible, derelict form of Jesus in other words, this means that you and I are ended and not mended as far as God's intentions are concerned he's no intention of mending that old I he's ended you at the cross this means in turn that you are relieved of the painful necessity of trying to improve that man God says, I'm not expecting any good out of him he's ended as far as I'm concerned you can give up trying to mend him and you can then possess the Lord Jesus Christ as your life Christ, who is our life that's the picture of the other stone out of death, Christ, my life Jesus doesn't help me, he supplants me there's only one victorious Christian life in the world and that's the life of a victorious Christ I've given up expecting any good from myself and I'm called upon to accept that judgment of me at the cross I say, now Lord Jesus, you take over the only good thing about the Christian is Jesus your old man is no different from anybody else's old man but you have Christ but how easy, forget that fact, not see the fullness of it and to be working hard on the old man but the cross at Jordan shows you, you're ended and not mended now this is not an experience so much as a historical fact it happened already, 1900 years ago you died with Jesus Christ to which historical fact you may go back to again and over again to accept yourself to be no better than what the cross declares to agree with God about yourself and not only have cleansing and forgiveness but to hand over to one mightier than you who lives in you yes, it's a historical fact, I love that phrase there they are to this day there am I, there is that old man to this day that's why it's more accurate not I am crucified as in the authorised but I have been, as in the revised something already done and remember how this meant a great turning point in my own life as a young Christian I was, I'd been to crusader camp I was an officer, as they called it in charge of a tent and I saw other Christians, other tent officers being used of God to the blessing of boys more than I was and I found jealousy in my heart I struggled with it and tried to turn away from it but it wouldn't lie down and I decided when I got back home and had more time I would really face this up with God, and I did and one morning I was led to Galatians 2.20 I saw that my trouble was I I was an eye specialist I wanted to be out front and there I saw, it had already been dealt with I had been judged by God on the cross and Christ was to be my life and I'd been taught at that time through some writing that I just wasn't to wait for feeding but take God at his word and even go further to add the word of faith to the belief of my heart and at a meeting later I testified this was my new stand I'd taken God at his word Christ was my life whatever I felt, I was on the cross already I knew new release and you know one brother who since has become a world known evangelist and bible teacher, dear friend of mine rushed up to me and said Roy, that's exactly what happened to me three days ago and in that part of north west London among our crusader classes, among the seniors there took place something of a little revival we were so released and I tell you, it was then that I began to see the rivers of living water flowing it wasn't me trying to win souls he did it, I was on there again and again I went back to that great historical fact again and again I appropriated Jesus and he did not fail so these two river crossings are really two, not two experiences necessarily you could say it was a first blessing and a second blessing I believe it's better to say two aspects of the cross may come as a second blessing to you my last word is this it is not once for all for the very people who went through Jordan in such splendid fashion and who later possessed the land because they turned away from the Lord and refused to return back to him were taken captive and scattered throughout Asia Minor indeed as we know today throughout the whole world and the people who enjoyed going through Jordan needed later to be brought back again to that land and indeed that's exactly what grace promised them the very prophets who told them that this was inevitable their judgment because of their sin and their unwillingness to repent always saw beyond that judgment a yet more glorious day when they would be humble when they would have been disciplined when they would have learned and when grace would work be operative on their behalf again oh I love those yet more glorious days which the prophets always see beyond the veil of tears for Israel and so you've got such a passage in Jeremiah 23.7 therefore behold the days come saith the Lord that they shall say no more the Lord liveth which brought us and our children out of Israel and out of the land of Egypt and even into Canaan but a new testament the Lord liveth which brought up and which led the seed of the house of Israel out of the north country and from all the countries whither I had driven them and they shall dwell in their own land and so you see revival for them needed to be revived and though because of the way things went after they got in they were scattered God purpose they're going to come back grace is going to bring them back and they're going to have a new testament well they're always talking about their conversion experience how they came out of Egypt but how they've been brought up from these other bondages out of the north country a bit chilly up there where we've been scattered back to Jesus back into the foot I call that revival and that was my experience too after all those fruitful experiences I've just mentioned and it was worked out in years of fruitful evangelism as we walk this way I and some of my friends in the National Young Life Campaign we were ablaze something went wrong for me I lost what I got I lost that easy power of the spirit it was easy it was grace I didn't know what had gone wrong and so I resorted to trying more praying longer preparing my sermons more carefully preaching more vehemently all to no avail until God sent to cross my path brothers who told me the old gospel once again the story of Jesus and his blood and I saw that I'd been striving instead of repenting and was blind to the blood of Jesus Christ and he began to show me what I needed to repent of and I began again and my testimony is not only what I've given you how I first learned how to cross Jordan but I praise him that many a time since grace has brought me back from the north country where I've been scattered back to the land that flows with milk and honey let us pray