Joshua 3 explained: Crossing the Flooded Jordan River

Follow the ark (vv. 1-4)

The ark was a gold-covered wooden chest holding the stone tablets of God's law, and it stood for God's own presence with Israel. The people were to stay about half a mile behind it, out of reverence and so that everyone could see it leading them on a route they had never taken.

Get ready (v. 5)

Joshua told the people to make themselves holy, meaning set apart for God, probably by washing and preparing as Israel had done at Mount Sinai. It readied the whole people to witness what he said God would do the next day.

Joshua as the new Moses (vv. 6-8)

Moses had died, and the people needed proof that God was with his successor, so the priests were told to carry the ark ahead and stand in the river. The event is presented as that proof, echoing how the sea opened for Moses when Israel escaped Egypt.

Joshua's announcement (vv. 9-13)

Joshua says the stopped river will show that the living God is among them and will drive out the seven peoples already living in Canaan. That promise sets up the wars the rest of the book describes, and the twelve men chosen here get their job in the next chapter.

The river stops (vv. 14-17)

In spring the Jordan ran full and fast from melting snow, yet when the priests' feet touched it, the water piled up far upstream at a town called Adam, and the people crossed opposite Jericho on dry ground. The text presents this as God's doing, and Christians later often read the crossing as a picture of baptism or of passing through death into God's promised home.

Key verse: Joshua 3:17

Where Christians differ

Christians differ on whether to read the crossing as a literal miracle, as a natural event such as a landslide upstream that God timed, or as a story told mainly to show that God was with Israel and Joshua.

Something to think about

When have you had to step into something unfamiliar before you could see how it would turn out, and what made it possible to take that first step?