Introduction

The stories in this book are my “stones of remembrance.” They are a record of the struggles and victories I have gone through, the insights and teachings I have gleaned along the way, and my personal testimony to the amazing grace of God.

In the Old Testament, the Israelites stacked stones as a reminder for current and future generations to always remember the miracles God had wrought on their behalf. They were markers of the events of their journey to the Promised Land.

When they arrived on the bank of the Jordan River, the Israelites were on the brink of witnessing one of His greatest promises coming to pass—a promise given way back in Abraham’s day—that they would be freed from the confines of slavery and take possession of the Promised Land. Now God’s message to them was, “Remember!”

The Lord instructed them to set up two stacks of stones, one in the middle of the river as they passed over into the Promised Land, and the second one at Gilgal, after the crossing.

Then Joshua set up twelve stones in the midst of the Jordan, in the place where the feet of the priests who bore the ark of the covenant stood; and they are there to this day (Joshua 4:9 NKJV).

Now the people came up from the Jordan on the tenth day of the first month, and they camped in Gilgal on the east border of Jericho. And those twelve stones which they took out of the Jordan, Joshua set up in Gilgal. Then he spoke to the children of Israel, saying: “When your children ask their fathers in time to come, saying, ‘What are these stones?’ then you shall let your children know, saying, ‘Israel crossed over this Jordan on dry land’; for the Lord your God dried up the waters of the Jordan before you until you had crossed over, as the Lord your God did to the Red Sea, which He dried up before us until we had crossed over (Joshua 4:19-23 NKJV).

The monument at Gilgal was a reminder that God had opened the river for them, just as He had opened the Red Sea for the previous generation to cross to safety as they escaped the Egyptians. The one in the river hidden beneath the water was a reminder that their past lives were now buried and gone.

The stories in this book are my stone stacks. I share them in the hope that perhaps something I have gone through may, in turn, give hope and encouragement to another, and that they too will come to know the God I know—not a religion but a Person, Jesus Christ.