In Joshua Chapter 1, God made a promise to Joshua as well as giving him instructions. The promise was that God is giving land to the Israelites. The instruction was they had to go over the Jordan (a barrier) and possess it.
Within three days you shall pass over this Jordan, to go in to possess the land, which the LORD your God is giving you for your own. (Joshua 1:11) And Joshua said to the Israelites, "How long will you wait before you begin to take possession of the land that the Lord, the God of your fathers, has given you?" (Joshua 18:3)
A long time later in Joshua Chapter 18, the Israelites still had not possessed the land! Why hadn't they? What were they waiting for? What were they afraid of? They had the land, but they were afraid of the enemies on their land. So they were slack in owning it themselves. In other words, they had been given roses, but they didn't own them because they were afraid of the thorns.
Even though God had already given them the land, possessing it was a different story. Often we miss out on the roses because we are afraid of the thorns. We are afraid of a little pinch or nick or scratch. We see the beauty in roses; yet we let the little ugly thorn keep us from possessing the rose. We prefer to pass up what has already been given to us because of little inconveniences.
When we get to heaven and our live story is played back to us, we will see a whole warehouse full of things that were ours that we never possessed.
The reason:
They came with thorns.
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