In Exodus and Joshua we find the two great parts of the work of Christ
typified; the one, by the Red Sea; the other, by the Jordan. In one, we
have Christ’s dying for us; and in the other, we have our dying with
Him.
Where does the crossing of Jordan bring us? Exodus 15:17 tells us.
“Thou shalt bring them in, and plant them in the mountain of thine
inheritance, the place that thou, Jehovah, hast made thy dwelling, the
Sanctuary, Lord, that Thy hands hast prepared.” In the epistle to the
Colossians the Red Sea and the Jordan coalesce. We are brought to God,
but there is another thing, and one which we have practically to learn,
even that we have died with Him.
In Colossians 2:20, we have “died with Christ from the elements of the
world.” We have ended our history, and practically we have a new place.
His death puts us outside everything. His death for us removes all
between God and us; our death with Him removes all between us and God.
At the Red Sea the enemy’s power was completely broken. In Jordan I
have died with Him, I am free from Satan and the flesh where they both
are, and I am introduced into a new scene.
There is not a thing against me; all was ended in the cross of Christ.
I am clear of every single thing that barred me from the presence of
God. A person says, “I do not feel it”; I am not asking you to feel it,
but to believe it. The thief on the cross, a man who was a scandal to
the Jew, an offscouring to society, was taken from the lowest depths of
shame and misery, and put into the brightest and most blessed place in
company with Christ that day; he was in the new place that “day.”