Article: Forgotten For A Season? | Pr. Robin Rajan, Australia
One day, a few children were playing on the banks of river Jordan, close to Gilgal. Among them was a little girl – quite sharp and perceptive. While playing, she noticed a bunch of stones arranged in a certain manner not far from where they were playing. It sparked her curiosity and she decided to go and enquire.
She went up to the stones and asked, “Hey stones, what are you doing here? You don’t look like the other stones around here?”. Amused at the little girl’s question, the stone at the top answered, “You are right, we are not like the other stones around. I must admire your keen senses.” The stone then proceeded to explain their story.
“You see, we were once lying scattered under this river Jordan. We were in darkness, and for years the river flowed over us. Purposelessness and ignorance were the emotions we always carried. We thought we were completely forgotten. However, one day, things changed. Something happened that we never imagined would happen even in our wildest dreams.”
“Oohhh, what happened, what happened?” squealed the little girl. The stone laughed at the little girl’s excitement and continued, “Well, the river Jordan which was always flowing over us suddenly stopped flowing and was divided. For the first time we saw the open heavens above us, the flying birds and all the beautiful trees around us. While we were deeply engrossed in the new happenings around us, we heard heavy footsteps approaching us. A large group of men, women, children and livestock crossed over the dry land. There were also some handsomely dressed people carrying on their shoulders what looked like a golden box, so radiant and glorious. Soon some people who seemed important picked us up carefully from the riverbed and carried us all the way across the Jordan. They then assembled us stones in an orderly manner in Gilgal.”
“We later came to know that these people who crossed over were a nation called the Israelites and the box they were carrying was the Ark of the Lord of Israel. The men who carried us were the chiefs of the tribes. That was the happiest day of our life, and how could we not be happy? We were scattered once, but now we are assembled; we were forgotten, but now we stand as a memorial of a miracle; we were rejected once, but now we are objects of honour. Little girl, so that’s our story on who we are and where we have come from.” The little girl hastily said thank you and ran from there excitedly to tell her friends what she had discovered that day.
Dear brother and sister, this testimony is precisely what these stones would have shouted, had they the power to talk. You can find their testimony in the book of Joshua chapter 4. It is similar to what our good Lord Jesus said when he was riding on a donkey to Jerusalem, “If the people keep quiet now, then these stones will start crying out.”
Did you feel that your life was being echoed here in their testimony – rejected, seemingly without purpose, under darkness and scattered? Let me encourage you that the waters flowing over you are only for a season. During that season many things flowing with the river might hit you or bruise you. You might have questioned the delay in your prayers or the extreme struggles. What you might not have realised was that the Lord was preparing you, making you smooth through all those knocks.
When the Lord’s time comes, he will carry you into the next season, where you will be a vessel of honour and a testimony of the great miracles of the Lord. If you patiently endure the season of being built up, then the Lord is faithful to carry you into the next season of fruitfulness. Remember you might be unnoticed by most people but not to the Lord God who called you by name. So, while today’s experience may seem like a mystery to us, they are not without purpose and are orchestrated by a Master architect.
You were never forgotten in any season. After all, God never intended you to look like the other stones around!
-ADVERTISEMENT-