Setting Stones

It’s amazing what can trigger a memory-a scent, a sight, a sound, and suddenly you find yourself in a different place and a different time. It can take a moment or two to grasp the memory, as your mind filters through different experiences and grapples to land on the right one, but instantly you do, and for a split second, it’s like you are really there, living again the memory held so dear, yet filed so deeply away, you had forgotten it was there.

A couple of evenings ago, our landlord and his family had my roommates and myself over for dinner. They are originally from Lebanon, but have lived in Bolivia for the past 24 years. The father speaks 4 languages: Spanish, Portuguese, Arabic and French. They served us a delicious Arabic meal-I would love to recount the names of each delectable dish, but only one sticks out: sarma. It was introduced to us by another name, but the tightly wrapped grape leaves, the center filling of rice, meat and spices, were unmistakable; it was sarma. And suddenly I was whisked away to 2005, happily eating lunch with my friends in our Mhrivode apartment, overlooking snow covered Sarajevo. Vaska was in the kitchen, cleaning up, while a group of hungry Americans devoured the delicious sarma she had prepared for us.

Sarma

Dinner with the Goriabs

In the Old Testament, the Israelites set stone monuments to commemorate when God moved so that in years ahead they could look back and remember what He did and be reminded of His character. Some of my memories feel like “setting stones”. During the year I lived in Sarajevo, Bosnia; through people, through experiences, through His voice, God taught me so much about who He is and He shared His heart for the nations with me. It was a turning point of which I can’t go back, nor would I want to.

What “stones” have been set in your life? What significant moments can you recall where God taught you something, where God moved, where God revealed more of Himself to you? My guess is sometimes these beautiful moments might be accompanied by the difficult. Though I look on my year in Bosnia with deep fondness, it was not an easy season. I think God is so gracious to use difficult times and circumstances to produce something beautiful in us and to reveal more of Himself and His glory to us.

In the book of Joshua, the story of the Israelites crossing into the Promised Land is recounted. After over four hundreds of year of slavery and forty years of struggling (an understatement) in the wilderness the Israelites are about to enter into what God has promised them. Their original leader, Moses, has since passed away and their newly anointed leader, Joshua, is guiding them. The only thing that stands in their way is the Jordan River. Once again, God intervenes and parts the waters so that His people may cross.

 “Now the Jordan is at flood stage all during harvest. Yet as soon as the priests who carried the ark reached the Jordan and their feet touched the water’s edge, the water from upstream stopped flowing. The priests…stood firm on dry ground in the middle of the Jordan while all Israel passed by until the whole nation had completed the crossing on dry ground…No sooner had they [the priests] set their feet on the dry ground than the waters of the Jordan returned to their place and ran at flood stage as before.” (Joshua 3:15 & 17; 4:18).

After the nation had passed through the waters, the Lord commanded Joshua to choose twelve men to each pick up one stone from the middle of the Jordan where the priests stood, and carry them to the place they were staying.

“So Joshua called together the 12 men he had appointed and said to them, ‘Go over before the ark of the Lord your God into the middle of the Jordan. Each of you is to take up on a stone on his shoulder…to serve as a sign among you'…These stones are to be a memorial to the people of Israel forever…Joshua set up the twelve stones... And they are there to this day.” (Joshua 4:4-5 & 9).

These stones served as a reminder of God’s faithfulness, provision and miraculous power. But years later, when the Israelites gazed at them and they were whisked back to a different time and place, I’m willing to bet it was not without also remembering the difficulty, the pain and the suffering. “Take up 12 stones and carry them over with you”. The stones were burdensome; they were heavy. But. The richness of God’s glory overshadowed this.

“He said to the Israelites, “In the future when your descendants ask their fathers, ‘What do these stones mean?’ tell them ‘Israel crossed the Jordan on dry ground.’ For the Lord you God dried up the Jordan before you until you had crossed over. The Lord your God did to the Jordan just what He did to the Red Sea when He dried it up before we had all crossed over. He did this so that all peoples of the earth might know that the hand of the Lord is powerful and that you might always fear the Lord your God.” (Joshua 4:21 & 24).

God desires to make Himself known; He desires that all people will love and fear Him. In His goodness, He uses our “setting stone” moments to bring about this purpose. Let us look back, let us remember, how our God has fought for us, how our God has protected us, how our God has loved us.