I love the story in Joshua chapter 4 where God rescues the Israelites. They are being pursued and He leads them to the Jordan River. Just when it looks like they’ve reached the end of their road and that their enemies would overtake them, the ones carrying the Ark, set foot in the water. At that moment, God dries the river bed and they cross the river on dry ground. Just as God promised, He delivered them. As they cross, God directs Joshua to have one man from each of the 12 tribes of Israel take a large stone out of the river bed, take it to the other side of the river, to the place where He delivered them to, and leave it as a memorial, a sign for their children as a reminder of all that God had done for them.

I turned 32 this year. It feels like a crossroads of sorts. Almost like we’re on the side of a river like the Israelites. Crossroads are a good place to pause and think about where you are, how you got there and where you are going next. We’ve spent a lot of time reflecting on the path that God has led us down since we both graduated high school in 1997. One thing that I know about me is that it’s easy to get caught up in the here and now but forget the story that got me here. But the story is essential to appreciating the destination. If you ask me how we got to Alabama two weeks ago, I’d say by airplane. But Alicia would tell you what time we got the airport, where our connecting flights were, how we drank Jamba Juice in Charlotte, and how we rented a car that was pre-wrecked but wasn’t recorded as such when returned by the previous renter, thus we’re responsible for it. I’m good with managing present day facts, but I’m awful at remembering the details.

Three years ago, God started a process of stretching us and preparing us for some changes. He began to awaken and stir some things inside of us that had always been there but were never clear. So we’ve been praying through it and processing it over time and it’s becoming clearer where God is leading us. Anyone else glad that God is into early warnings?

I don’t really know how to unpack a 14 year journey and explain how we got to where we’re at. Honestly, I’m not even sure that I fully understand it or can make all of the connections. Even the most recent 3 years of this journey is a lot of ground to cover. So, I’m going to take a “memorial stones” approach to sharing how God has taken us to the other side of our Jordan, from where we were to where we are. Like those stones left by the side of the Jordan, I want to answer the question “what do these stones mean to you?” It’s important for me to do this, mostly for our kids to have something to look back on, but also for friends and family that are looking in from the outside.

We don’t want anyone to look on from the outside and see the destination of where we are without the supporting story. Again, the destination can’t be fully understood or appreciated without the journey.  Imagine when the patriarchs of the 12 tribes of Israel were telling war-stories to their children and grandchildren about being delivered from their enemies, it would have been really easy to say “we were being pursued by the bad guys but it all worked out and here we are”. But they would have been robbing future generations and outsiders of a great story of God’s provision. In fact, the whole outcome is less meaningful and powerful without the details of the story. The stones that God had them leave as a memorial were a way of forcing them to slow down, take time, and explain how it all went down. I would love to hear this story told by some of the other people that were on the scene. I’m sure everyone involved looked back at the 12 stones and had different details and memories and stories about how God delivered them.

So for the next few days and weeks or however long it takes, I want to use this space to lay some written stones as a memorial of God’s faithfulness and tell our story. Our kids are too young to understand the journey that we’re on. When they’re older, I really want to be able to take them to a place where we can look back together and see how God moved in our family.

So the first stone that I want to talk about is a recent trip to Alabama. It’s not the first stone chronologically, but it’s a keystone that provides context for the other stones to build around. And I’m really looking forward to sharing that part of the story with everyone in the next post!

(Yes, I know the blog needs a facelift. It’s in process, just not a top priority.)

1 When all the nation had finished passing over the Jordan, the Lord said to Joshua,2 ”Take twelve men from the people, from each tribe a man,3 and command them, saying, ‘Take twelve stones from here out of the midst of the Jordan, from the very place where the priests’ feet stood firmly, and bring them over with you and lay them down in the place where you lodge tonight.’”4 Then Joshua called the twelve men from the people of Israel, whom he had appointed, a man from each tribe.5 And Joshua said to them, “Pass on before the ark of the Lord your God into the midst of the Jordan, and take up each of you a stone upon his shoulder, according to the number of the tribes of the people of Israel,6 that this may be a sign among you. When your children ask in time to come, ‘What do those stones mean to you?’7 then you shall tell them that the waters of the Jordan were cut off before the ark of the covenant of the Lord. When it passed over the Jordan, the waters of the Jordan were cut off. So these stones shall be to the people of Israel a memorial forever.” – Joshua 4:1-7

I took a long time off from blogging. I found the pressure of trying to find something important to say frustrating. When something comes naturally, it’s great, but I felt like I was forcing topics and just writing to write. Every post felt incomplete. And it all felt shallow. So I stopped blogging. But I’ve been thinking about making a comeback for a while. And here’s why:

1. I like the exercise of writing. It takes work to take a thought in your brain, digest it, translate it, and contextualize it into words that people can relate too.
2. I like the discussion. I don’t have an audience like Seth Godin does, but I’m ok with that. It’s not about the traffic to me anymore, it’s about the conversation. And you can’t have a conversation with the masses.
3. I like telling stories. Looking back through the comments on older posts, generally, the posts that generated the most discussion weren’t the ones that I thought were thought provoking or inspirational. The most popular posts were the ones that shared candid bits of our lives and were birthed out of real life happenings. It was the posts that brought readers into the story of our life that people were engaged in.

Alicia and I have spent a lot of this past year in a reflective state of mind. So many of our conversations this year have revisited the course of the last decade that we’ve shared together. At the core of every discussion, is this overwhelming sense of God’s faithfulness in our lives. We could never have orchestrated the lives that we have now. We are not the conductor of our lives, He is. We’re just the musicians trying to follow the leader. And really, that’s what life is. And so that’s what I want to invite people to be involved in with the Faction in 2011.

There are 2 things that I think most people love. A comeback and a story. Put them together and you get a comeback story, and those are magical. So in 2011, The Rath Faction is making a comeback. And it’s going to be focused on our story (past, present, and future).

Talk to you soon!

Ben