Janet’s Blog

This is as ever roughly what I said…

Some of you know that I’m going to be the brownie leader after Easter, and some of you know that I’ve got a new job in the village. That new job is being the vicar, being the vicar is a very odd job because it’s so many different things, but one of the things I will be doing is sometimes coming in to school to do assemblies, and this is the first thing that I’m doing after I started my new job last night.

I wanted to tell you a story today about someone else who had just got a new job. The story is about Joshua. Joshua lived a long, long time ago in a place quite far away from here where the land is quite dry and hot most of the time.

Joshua was the assistant for a great leader called Moses. Now Moses was an absolutely amazing leader he had looked after God’s people, the Israelites for a long time. Moses had led God’s people out of slavery in Egypt. Moses talked to God on the mountain at Sinai where God gave the people his special rules to live by. Moses had looked after all God’s people for a long time, he even made water flow in the desert by hitting his stick against a rock where God told him to hit it and the water came gushing out.

Joshua was good at being Moses assistant, he liked it, Moses was the brave great leader and Joshua helped him out.

But Moses was old and one day God said to Moses “you are going to die soon”, Moses knew what he needed to do, he prayed with Joshua and asked God to make Joshua a wise and good leader.

I wonder how Joshua felt? Maybe he was a bit scared, maybe he felt he couldn’t do it, because it’s very different being the assistant and being the leader. It was all very new, and Joshua didn’t know what was going to happen.

I wonder when we last had to do something new which we didn’t know about?

I wonder if sometimes we think about what the future is going to be like and what is going to happen to us?

Something very special happened to Joshua after Moses had died,

God spoke to him, to Joshua… God said what he needed to do.

“Joshua you must lead the people across the river Jordan”.

Imagine thousands of people going across a river.

Joshua sent his assistants to tell the people, get ready to cross the river, get all you things ready, in three days we are going across the river into a new land.

So everyone started packing up and sorting out their things.

But God had to say something else to Joshua, because he was new, and perhaps a little bit worried about what was going to happen, perhaps he was anxious about what the future would hold. God said this to Joshua, “Be strong and courageous: do not be frightened or dismayed, for the Lord your God is with you wherever you go.”

I wonder if we always listen straight away when our parents tell us something? God knew that Joshua had to really remember to be strong and to trust God, because God would always be with him so God had to keep reminding Joshua. God told Joshua, not once, not twice, not three, four or five times, not six, seven or eight times, but God reminded Joshua nine times to be strong and brave because God would be with him in the future.

So what happened about the river? Well this is even more amazing. God’s people had a special box, called the ark, where they kept some of the things which reminded them that God was with them. God told Joshua get some people to hold my special box and walk with it into the river, then river dried up and all the people of God walked across to the other side, when the box was brought to the other side as well the river started to flow again.

No-one really knows how God got that to happen, but he did, and he went with Joshua and all the people, even if he had to keep reminding them to be strong and brave because he was with them.

God hasn’t changed even in all the thousands of years since Joshua was alive, he still promises to be with us wherever we are, and he still keeps reminding us to be strong and brave and not to worry about the future because he’ll be with us.

Dear God

When we are worried about what is going to happen later today, or tomorrow or next week or sometime in the future. Remind us that we need to be strong and brave, and that we don’t need to be afraid because you are with us.

Amen