STONES AND BONES is directed toward encouraging us to establish mnemonic devices that will help us prepare for church services & stay focused on our personal covenant with God. A secondary purpose is to serve as an encouragement to not dispose of our hope in God’s promises.
THE STONE OF SHECHEM
The stone of witness
The massive crowd had arrived, the culmination of many days of journeying. One more trip for many who had traveled under the cloud and the pillar of fire. This time they had to pack food, the angel manna wasn’t along this time. The weariness of war was for many displaced by the joy of finally having a home. They did not know the details, but were very keenly aware of what would happen soon, the day of convocation. The day when their loved and venerated leader for over two decades, Joshua, would perform his final act as leader of the new nation.
It could have been a day to pay homage to Joshua, perhaps in part should have been, but it was not. The aged warrior champion who had begun his career with God as a water boy had one more challenge to face. Somehow he must instill into the hearts of the entire population the motivation to stay true to God. He had been among the first of his people to see this land flowing with milk and honey, had endured the rigors of the wilderness along with them, and the demands of being Moses’ lieutenant. Joshua had convinced the people to use the most outlandish war strategy of all time to topple Jericho, and had wept with them at the shocking sin-based defeat near Ai. He had comforted them in the loss of the larger than life Moses, kept them together crossing the Jordan, and had been their military guru in conquering the land. How now would he conquer this last stronghold of the true enemy of Israel, and win the real war? The enemy of idolatry must be attacked. What put the ‘Promise’ in Promised Land was staying true to their God.
Joshua renewed the covenant, rehearsed their history, and gave a stirring message, these would be expected. But then,
He did the un-obvious. He set up a stone.
Joshua 24: 26 And Joshua recorded these things in the Book of the Law of God. Then he took a large stone and set it up there under the oak near the holy place of the LORD. 27 "See!" he said to all the people. "This stone will be a witness against us. It has heard all the words the LORD has said to us. It will be a witness against you if you are untrue to your God."
Joshua chose a stone, something that would not change over time, something that would endure, and give the same message each time it is seen to each passer by. The Tent of Meeting and the trappings of the Tabernacle would have to be refreshed or replaced, Even the great oak mentioned would eventually die, but the Stone- and the stone altar near by-- would be perpetually there.
With the stone, the details were set, ‘set in concrete’, if you’ll endure my pun. We have a saying used when all our details have not yet been worked out, or when the agreement has not quite been reached, “it is not set in stone”. For Joshua and the people that day, it was literally set in stone. He had the renewed covenant written in ‘the Book’. Then, the bible says, he set up this one great stone. Certainly massive in size, and possibly unique in shape, yet the stone’s physical appearance was not what made it great. The greatness came by the symbol it was, the message it conveyed, and the significance it held for the ‘other’ witnesses.
DO YOU HAVE WITNESS STONES IN YOUR LIFE? PERHAPS YOU SHOULD.
Notice from the passage where the stone was set, near the entrance to the Holy Place- the place where they met with God, the place of His Presence. One purpose of the stone was to be a tool to remind people on their way to the Tent of Meeting of just Who it is with whom they are meeting. A thing to prepare them before going into the Presence.
Do you have any witness stones in your life?
Something to remind you of your covenant with God, to prepare you before you go into His Presence?
Something bigger than you, that won’t change with the seasons, the styles and fads? Something that will outlast the ‘stages’ of your life, or even the whims and moods of your emotions? Perhaps you should re-visit the altar place where you first knelt and poured your heart out to God. Some of us need to just go, sit and have devotional in the baptismal tank-where you were baptized, and remember that this was a covenant with God. It is a witness stone in your life.
There is a current fad of a garden trinket, the weather stone. Have you seen them? With some type of rhyme etched in it to this effect, when the stone is hot, then you’ll know the sun is shining bright, and when it is wet, the stone is ‘forecasting’ rain or snow, etc…
This stone was not that. It was a silent witness.
Do you have any witness stones in your life? Maybe you do.
Btwfyi (by the way, for your information) When Joshua said this and for many years after, some have scoffed, and even challenged the authority and accuracy of the bible, saying-Rocks cannot hear. We have learned recently that everything absorbs some degree of sound. Rocks are, in fact (chromium), actually used in the production of audiotape.
Some of you may be a bit skeptical right now, thinking that this stone idea is too trite, quite a ‘poetic license’ with this passage; an almost pre-historic idea that has no real impact on where I am today.
What type of witness stones do you have?
Ladies in the room, please take a look at your hands. Do any of you have jewelry on your hands? Would there be any stones in those rings? Don’t they witness to something? A grandmother’s gift, a hope ring, an engagement ring. Did you take your engagement ring off after you were married? Probably not. It’ part of the witness. An enduring witness to the covenant. After all the jeweler DeBeers reminds us,
”a diamond is forever” Maybe they got the idea from Joshua.
Pick some stones in your life, to remind you of your covenant with God, and to prepare you as you come into His presence. You should perhaps choose a building –a public building or church building-that you pass on your way to our church meetings. That building could be the deadline for the Sunday morning clothing & hair arguments. Can’t argue anymore after you pass it-because you are on your way to meet with God. To others, it’s just FILL IN THE BLANK church. To you it is a witness stone.
Pick another spot, a rock outcropping or a hopefully fixed roadway intersection. You can’t get to church any earlier from that spot, really, regardless of how fast you drive and how frustrated you are. So let it be a witness stone. After you pass it, you no longer watch the clock to see if you are going to be on time, just drive. It’s a witness stone that your covenant is to meet with the God of the church service, not the structure of the schedule.
(by the way, a little hint for the chronically late. ‘discipline yourself’ this way, for each five minutes I am late this week, I must get up 5 minutes earlier next Sunday, and go to bed 5 minutes earlier the nite before. It is a great cure)
Another spot could be the place where you even pause or shut down conversations, and start to verbalize praise to the Holy One- a witness stone preparing your entrance into God’s Tabernacle.
Do you have a witness stone? If not you should. A place you can go, or a thing you can see that reminds you when you lose your temper, or tell that same lie again, or repeat that ‘besetting sin’ or see that all too familiar temptation coming—a stone of witness to remind you that you made a covenant with your God, and you need to keep it. Could be a ring on your finger, or in your ear, or a painting on your wall. How about the steering wheel of your car? A good device to remind you Who should really be steering your life? Again, maybe your altar of salvation. If you don’t have one of those, then you really need one. God is longing for your repentance and rebirth.
Remember, the significance of the Shechem stone was in the story. To the hapless passer-by the stone might be an odd, out of place thing. Not cut, not decorated, no plaques or words. Just there…always there. But to those who had been at Shechem that day, it served as a brilliant witness from General Joshua.
We don’t know for sure, but maybe Joshua got this idea from something God had told him to do many years earlier. Another one-of-a-kind time, when God told Joshua to get a pile of rocks…
THE 12 STONES OF JORDAN
JOSHUA 4:5 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 a stone on his shoulder, according to the number of the tribes of the Israelites, 6 to serve as a sign among you. In the future, when your children ask you, ’What do these stones mean?’ 7 tell them that the flow of the Jordan was cut off before the ark of the covenant of the LORD. When it crossed the Jordan, the waters of the Jordan were cut off. These stones are to be a memorial to the people of Israel forever."
The river stones were A MEMORIAL of Who God is and what God does. A memorial of God, to the people, not the other way around. I must make the point of what was left out, and how this was intentionally laid, that it is not a memorial of what God has done FOR ME.
The 12 stones, representing everyone-What God has done for all of us to some degree, but Who God IS (character): the covenant maker, deliverer, provider, director, caretaker and leader, and what GOD DOES: makes a way for you to be part of what He is doing.
Do you see them the way I do, children climbing on a pile of rocks, that seem to not match anything around, and are placed, not fallen happen-stance. Climbing around on them, the children come to the realization of a pattern and purpose in the rocks, and ask, “what do these stones mean?”…
There were people that day hearing Joshua’s speech in Shechem, who had been there at the Jordan 20 years before, maybe some or all of the 12 who had been chosen to get the stones. They were on the mountains that day the stone was set up, and perhaps had already seen their own children playing on the rocks beside the Jordan.
Like the river stones, THE SHECHEM STONE WAS A MEMORIAL of Who God is and what God does. You and I today need stones like that.
Perhaps Joshua had been given insight into an overarching principle:
q People behave in a manner consistent with what they believe.
q What you do is ultimately an extension of who you are.
q Character in leadership is essential.
Joshua knew that day at Shechem that the people would no longer be following a single leader. They were in effect moving into an ‘adolescent era’ of a greater degree of self-management. He knew he must instill something in them that would help them stay focused and true to their cause, for they would ultimately reproduce their core selves. The stone could serve as a reminder that they must remain unchanged by their environment in order to keep from becoming “untrue to your God”.
[some more stone references are at the end]
FROM STONES TO BONES
There is a Design in the detail of Joshua 24…
Josh 24:32
And the bones of Joseph, which the children of Israel brought up out of Egypt, buried they in Shechem, in a parcel of ground which Jacob bought of the sons of Hamor the father of Shechem for an hundred pieces of silver: and it became the inheritance of the children of Joseph.
Was the writer here simply finishing a story, and completing the lore about Joseph, or is there another reason that he brings up Joseph at this time?
The bones of Joseph had made it through a very long pilgrimage, from burial and a repose in Egypt of almost 400 years, through the Red Sea and the wilderness travels of over 40 years, until the death of a generation, the crossing of Jordan, and the approximate 20 years during the wars of conquest. And now, finally after these (+-460) many long years Joseph’s bones are buried. They have not been lost or broken all this time- his mummy is apparently intact at the time of his burial in Shechem. What motivated these people to keep up with this one ‘artifact’ for such a long time?
Gen 50:25
And Joseph made the sons of Israel swear an oath and said, "God will surely come to your aid, and then you must carry my bones up from this place." 26 So Joseph died at the age of a hundred and ten. And after they embalmed him, he was placed in a coffin in Egypt.
Exo 13:19
Moses took the bones of Joseph with him because Joseph had made the sons of Israel swear an oath. He had said, "God will surely come to your aid, and then you must carry my bones up with you from this place."
JOSEPH’S BONES EMBODIED HOPE IN GOD
DO YOU HAVE ANY OLD BONES?
Different from skeletons in your closet, these are preserved and prepared bones. If you have skeletons in your closet, that is, embarrassing or hurtful things you have privately killed and tried to hide, get them out by confessing your sin to Jesus, asking for, and receiving His promise of forgiveness.
SO, DO YOU HAVE ANY OLD BONES?
BONES & STONES STIR YOUR FAITH & GIVE YOU PERSPECTIVE.
The bones of Joseph did not become some cult thing, or an object of worship, but they probably kept the people going at times in that wilderness.
Can’t you see the scene, dust in your mouth-nothing around but desert. Just rocks and brush and wind and dirt, an occasional critter. You ate the same thing for breakfast again for the 1302nd time, and you already know what the other meal of the day will come from, (manna and quail). Just another day in anti-paradise, but it’s your turn to carry the litter. It reminds you that Joseph had days like this, and he got through them. The little squeaky sounds of the coffin on the litter, one of the other guys stumbles a little, and you hear the mummy inside bump up against the wall of the coffin. You remember you are doing this because of a promise, not a feeling. A word of allegiance sworn to people now departed, but still pregnant with hope-we will reach the promised land. What God has promised will come true, and I want to be a part of that! And so, you move on, not trudging, but carrying the hope of the people. Somehow, the day is better. You remember the goal, your eye is on the prize. We will get to feel and see and smell what was promised the land Joseph remembered, the land of promise.
JOSEPH’S BONES BECAME A REPOSITORY OF PROMISE
With no special power of their own, what they represented to generations was far more than one person could see or understand.
Heb 11:22
By faith Joseph, when his end was near, spoke about the exodus of the Israelites from Egypt and gave instructions about his bones.
Joseph’s covenant with the elders, if you will, was not rooted in some heartfelt sentiment about the dirt of the homeland, some national connexion to the motherland, it was a prophetic promise of a sure thing that would come. To Joseph, Israel returning to Canaan was a destined fact, the only wait was for the right time-God’s time.
The writer of Joshua’s book tells us in one statement a n extremely powerful principal:
DON’T BURY BONES OF PROMISE, UNTIL THE PROMISE IS FULFILLED.
Why did those bones move around for almost 500 years? Why weren’t they buried 20 years earlier when the Israelites first entered Canaan? Because the promise had not been fulfilled-The promise was that they would inherit, or inhabit the land.
Now, here at Shechem, they could bury the bones.
Dan 8:26
"The vision of the evenings and mornings that has been given you is true, but seal up the vision, for it concerns the distant future."
I can think of another time when bones were the storehouse of a promise, and became an unexpected promise fulfilled:
The bones of Elisha, the prophet, who had been promised a ‘double portion’ of Elijah’s anointing from God.
2 Ki 13:21
Once while some Israelites were burying a man, suddenly they saw a band of raiders; so they threw the man’s body into Elisha’s tomb. When the body touched Elisha’s bones, the man came to life and stood up on his feet.
So, do you have any bones? Promises and prophecies received that you have written down. Tapes you have kept where someone recorded what was a special message to you. Sermons on CD that by the power of God’s Spirit sunk deeply into your soul? Video of your wedding day, photos of when you were baptized. Parts of the bible you have underlined and marked.
Some of us have buried our bones of promise too early-before the promise is fulfilled. Don’t’ you think those Israelite guys got tired of carrying those bones? Don’t you think they wanted to just go ahead and bury them and get it over with? Sure, but they kept going. They kept rattling the bones until the day the promise was made real.
Heb 10:36
You need to persevere so that when you have done the will of God, you will receive what he has promised.
Some of us need to get our bones out, carry them for a little bit, and let them stir up some faith, remind us of some promises, refresh and renew our hopes.
You and I can make use of our stones & bones to help us stay true and stoke a fire-level fervor. Like Joseph’s bones and Elisha’s bones, we need reminders of the power in the Promises of God for our lives. In this moment, decide to start keeping up better with the promises of God, or to visit your own bones of promise. Some of us this morning need to do some digging, to pull out those bones of promise that we buried too soon. Right now, take the time to set up some stones in your life, to remind you of who God is, what He does.
Reflect on the covenant promises you have made before God. Choose some places that can help prepare you when you are coming to enter His Presence. If you have skeletons in your closet, confess your sins to God and get cleaned up by the forgiveness and grace of Christ. Hiding is not necessary, and really won’t help. Christ forgives and cleanses.
=========ADDENDA:
OTHER STONE PASSAGES TO CONSIDER:
Deu 27:5
Build there an altar to the LORD your God, an altar of stones. Do not use any iron tool upon them.
Josh 4:3
and tell them to take up twelve stones from the middle of the Jordan from right where the priests stood and to carry them over with you and put them down at the place where you stay tonight."
STONES MARK THE SPOT OF MIRACLES (Jacob’s ladder)
Josh 4:7
tell them that the flow of the Jordan was cut off before the ark of the covenant of the LORD. When it crossed the Jordan, the waters of the Jordan were cut off. These stones are to be a memorial to the people of Israel forever."
Josh 8:31 ALSO AT SHECHEM, YEARS EARLIER-AFTER AI, AT THE ESTABLISHMENT OF THE ALTAR OF GOD.
as Moses the servant of the LORD had commanded the Israelites. He built it according to what is written in the Book of the Law of Moses--an altar of uncut stones, on which no iron tool had been used. On it they offered to the LORD burnt offerings and sacrificed fellowship offerings.
UNCUT STONES: YOU COME TO THE ALTAR, THE PLACE OF CHANGE-JUST AS YOU ARE, NOT DRESSED UP.
Josh 8:32
There, in the presence of the Israelites, Joshua copied on stones the law of Moses, which he had written.
REMINDERS LEAD TO RENEWAL
1 Ki 18:31
Elijah took twelve stones, one for each of the tribes descended from Jacob, to whom the word of the LORD had come, saying, "Your name shall be Israel."
Luke 19:40
"I tell you," he replied, "if they keep quiet, the stones will cry out."
OTHER BONE SCRIPTURES TO CONSIDER:
Ezek 37:4
Then he said to me, "Prophesy to these bones and say to them, ’Dry bones, hear the word of the LORD!
Ezek 37:5
This is what the Sovereign LORD says to these bones: I will make breath enter you, and you will come to life.
Ezek 37:6
I will attach tendons to you and make flesh come upon you and cover you with skin; I will put breath in you, and you will come to life. Then you will know that I am the LORD.’"
Gen 2:23
The man said, "This is now bone of my bones and flesh of my flesh; she shall be called ’woman, ’ for she was taken out of man."
Gen 2:24
For this reason a man will leave his father and mother and be united to his wife, and they will become one flesh.
[the following passage merits yet another sermon]
1 Kings 13: 29 So the prophet picked up the body of the man of God, laid it on the donkey, and brought it back to his own city to mourn for him and bury him.
30 Then he laid the body in his own tomb, and they mourned over him and said, "Oh, my brother!"
31 After burying him, he said to his sons, "When I die, bury me in the grave where the man of God is buried; lay my bones beside his bones.
32 For the message he declared by the word of the LORD against the altar in Bethel and against all the shrines on the high places in the towns of Samaria will certainly come true."
