Think about the plans you had twenty years ago. Where you would live. What you would be doing. How your family would look.
How many of them worked out the way you imagined?
I had things mapped out too. Very little of it went the way I drew it up. You can probably say the same.
Proverbs tells us that making plans is wise. It also reminds us that while we plan our way, it is the Lord who establishes our steps.
That can feel unsettling. We want to know the path. We want to see the other side of the river before we put a foot in the water.
But faith has never been about seeing the whole path. It has always been about knowing who is out in front. For Israel, that was the ark of the covenant. For us, it is someone even greater.
Scripture: Joshua 3:11 — “Behold, the ark of the covenant of the Lord of all the earth is passing over before you into the Jordan.”
Additional reading: Proverbs 16:9 — “The heart of man plans his way, but the LORD establishes his steps.”
God did not simply point across the river and tell Israel to find a way. He went first.
The priests carried the ark down to the water’s edge. As soon as their feet touched the river, the water stopped and heaped up miles upstream at a town called Adam. The ark, representing the very presence of God, stood in the middle of the riverbed while the whole nation crossed on dry ground.
That was not the last time the presence of God stood in the Jordan.
Centuries later, near that same crossing, John the Baptist was baptizing people for the forgiveness of sins. Then Jesus came to him. He had no sin to confess, and John tried to refuse. But Jesus stepped down into those same waters anyway, to fulfill all righteousness.
Here is another detail that is easy to miss. Joshua 4:19 tells us Israel crossed on the tenth day of the first month. That was the very day each family chose its Passover lamb.
Jesus is our Passover Lamb. He stepped into the water first. He did not wait for us on the far bank. Later he spoke of the cross as his baptism, the moment he would be immersed in death for us. John Calvin pictured the waters piling up at Adam as if the grave itself were being opened so God’s people could walk through safely.
That is what Jesus has done. Death will never grip the heart of a believer, because he went through it first.
So we may not know the path. But we know who is leading. Where we end up is always a product of where we keep our gaze. Keep your eyes on him.
Reflect: What plan of yours has not turned out the way you expected? How does knowing that Jesus went first change the way you face the unknown this week?