HH, Sir Godfrey Gregg D.Div
As we approach the New Year 2023 it is important to cross over with goals, with God’s presence, with urgency, with a cleanup, and without any heavy pieces of baggage. The things we carried throughout the year 2019 should be a thing of the past. This is a New Year, new life and new hope.
Let us look at a portion of God’s word in the Holy Scripture, taken from the Book of Joshua Chapter 3 and we will read verses1-17
We want to look at this process and consider where we are to the vision before us. Joshua had a difficult task in front of him. He was to lead the people across the Jordan into the promised land. He was to achieve what his mentor Moses failed to do 40 years ago. But first, he had to crossover the Jordan river.
Crossing over into a new year is an important event. We need to spend some time reflecting on the past and planning the future.
Here are 5 things we should do when we crossover into a new year. Please stay with me as we go through them one by one.
1. CROSS OVER WITH YOUR GOALS EARLY.
Joshua 3:1 – Then Joshua rose early in the morning; and they set out for Acacia Grove and came to the Jordan, he and all the children of Israel, and lodged there before they crossed over.
Never leave for tomorrow what you can do today.
Note that they were together in mind and heart. They had a new leader name Joshua and their hearts were indicted in a good manner.
Stop talking and start doing. God is waiting for you to start. Do not delay the journey because God is waiting to take you over.
Joshua 3:15-16 And as those who bore the ark came to the Jordan and the feet of the priest who bore the ark dipped in the edge of the water (for the Jordan overflows all its banks during the whole time of the harvest) that the waters which came down from the upstream stood still.
The waters stopped only when the feet of the priest touched the water. I want you to look at the process and the importance of the priests in this operation.
It is better to fail to attempt to do something than succeed in doing nothing.
There are people who failed in life but never stop trying. You may know others in your community who have been trying and failed but have never given up. Take a look at these examples.
- Thomas Edison – failed in 10,000 bulb experiments
- Bill Gates – dropped out of college to pursue his software business
- Peter – was the only man who walked on water and sunk…
So what do you think of these men and have they ever succeeded in life? Yes, they have and there are testimonies of them engraved in our homes and hearts. Where have you failed and are you still trying to be successful?
2. CROSS OVER WITH GOD’S PRESENCE
Joshua 3:3 Whenever you see the ark of the covenant of the Lord your God, and the priests, the Levites, bearing it, then you shall set out from your place and go after it. Notice it did not say go before them but after them. Someone has to lead and the problem with the church today is every member wants to be the leader without any instructions. Oh, Hallelujah, how we failed so miserable, and we are still not learning that God called His priests and made them leaders and appointed them to carry the Ark of the Covenant.
We need to be God chasers. Run after the things of God. Be passionate about the things of God. We need to run after our leaders for they have something we do not have. Look at Elisha following Elijah and that was for a very good reason. Brethren, it is time for us to stop and consider where we are and if this journey is meant for us.
In Ezekiel, there is life wherever the river flows but the water from offshoots from the river of God became stale and ended up as swamps and marshes but let us read it from the prophet.
Ezekiel 47:9 – And it shall be that every living thing that moves, wherever the rivers go will live..…for they will be healed and everything will live wherever the river goes.
Ezekiel 47:11 But its swamps and marshes will not be healed; they will be given over to salt.
God’s presence brings life. The absence of God will bring death. We know this theory very well that there is life in the light.
3. CROSS OVER WITH URGENCY
Joshua 3:4 Yet there shall be a space between you and it, about two thousand cubits, by measure.
This is a prophetic picture of the church crossing over to rule and reign with Jesus in God’s Kingdom approximately 2000 years after the first coming of Jesus. I hope you are still with me for we are going into a very important stretch of this crossing over the journey.
We are living in the last of the Last Days. Make full use of the time to achieve the purposes of God. Do not slacken your riding, move with full force with one purpose and that is to reach the other side.
Ephesians 5:15-16 See then that you walk circumspectly, not as fools but as wise, redeeming the time, because the days are evil.
- Walk carefully
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Walk wisely
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Walk consciously (redeeming the time)
I want you to understand that this mission will take us to the promised hope or we will be left along the way.
If you knew you had one year to live, what are the things you would plan to do in the last year of your life?
You can lose money today and earn it back tomorrow. However, time is something you can only lose once. Once it passes you there is no return and we either use it wisely or waste it for eternity.
4. CROSS OVER WITH A CLEANUP
Joshua 3:5 Sanctify yourselves for tomorrow, the Lord will do wonders among you.
Joshua 5:5 For all the people who came out had been circumcised, but all who were born in the wilderness on the way as they came out of Egypt had not been circumcised.
It appears Israel was not living under the covenant during the 40 years in the wilderness. Everyone was caught by surprise. A spiritual check-up will highlight light areas we need to adjust in our lives.
We may believe that going to church or setting up decor for others entitles us to the checks and balances in our lives. That is far from the requirement of God.
- Physical check-ups – Need to be done at the beginning of each year
- Cholesterol and sugar levels, cancer markers
- Make adjustments to your lifestyle
- Spiritual Checkups are needed every year
5. CROSS OVER WITHOUT HEAVY BAGGAGE
Joshua 3:10 By this you shall know that the living God is among you and that He will without fail to drive out from before you the Canaanites and the Hittites and the Hivites and the Perizzites and the Girgashites and the Amorites and the Jebusites.
All the “ites” were the hidden ghosts Israel failed to defeat 40 years ago. Our hidden ghosts often come back to trouble us.
We need to release to God “mountains” and understand that He will remove the mountains in our lives.
Joshua 4:20 Now the people came up from the Jordan on the tenth day of the first month, and they camped in Gilgal on the east border of Jericho. (20) And those twelve stones which they took out of the Jordan, Joshua set up in Gilgal.”
It is significant that this happened on the tenth day of the first month, this is exactly forty years to the day since Israel marched out of Egypt.
Leaving the edge of the river, the Israelites went to a place called Gilgal to make their camp. Gilgal was “on the eastern border of Jericho (v. 19).
Gilgal means “the reproach has been rolled away.”
God rolled away from the following things at Gilgal:
- Forty years of spiritual defeat, failure, death, and cancers.
- Forty years of wandering.
- Forty years without a vision.
It was the dawn of a great new beginning in a new land. The days of sullen refusal to respond to God under Moses were gone, complaining was ended, and hopeless wandering in the wilderness was behind them.
Joel 2:24-25 –24 And the floors shall be full of wheat, and the vats shall overflow with wine and oil. 25 And I will restore to you the years that the locust hath eaten, the cankerworm, and the caterpillar, and the palmerworm, my great army which I sent among you.
As I close this message there are some lessons we can learn from Caleb
a) Kadesh Barnea – 40 years old – Saw the vision
Joshua 14:7 I was forty years old when Moses the servant of the LORD sent me from Kadesh Barnea to spy out the land, and I brought back word to him as it was in my heart.
40 years of wandering. Everyone died except Joshua and Caleb. Caleb’s vision never died. Do you have a vision for the people of God? Oh, brethren where there is no vision the people perish. What is your vision for the church?
b) Jordan- Cross over experience
c) Gilgal – Our reproach will be rolled away ( 12 memorial stones)
d) Joshua 14:9-12 – 85 years old – Give me the mountain – Seizing the vision
Joshua 14: 9-12- 9 And Moses sware on that day, saying, Surely the land whereon thy feet have trodden shall be thine inheritance, and thy children’s forever, because thou hast wholly followed the Lord my God. 10 And now, behold, the Lord hath kept me alive, as he said, these forty and five years, even since the Lord spake this word unto Moses, while the children of Israel wandered in the wilderness: and now, lo, I am this day fourscore and five years old. 11 As yet I am as strong this day as I was in the day that Moses sent me: as my strength was then, even so, is my strength now, for war, both to go out, and to come in. 12 Now, therefore, give me this mountain, whereof the Lord spake in that day; for thou heardest in that day how the Anakims were there, and that the cities were great and fenced: if so be the Lord will be with me, then I shall be able to drive them out, as the Lord said.
Are you ready to cross over into the New Year? If you are willing and obedient to crossover you will reap the success of the land. Walk with your memorial, pick them up as you go Hallelujah. Let the Holy Spirit be your guide on this journey. God bless you.
