Joshua 1:11

Then here he says: "Prepare for yourselves provisions for the way." And today, if you would hear, Jesus says to you: if you follow me, "prepare for yourself provisions for the way." For the provisions are the works which accompany us to the way that is to come, like a faithful viaticum. Let us see, however—since it is not fitting to read the divine writings carelessly and as it were in passing—whence he bids them "prepare provisions" who have no grain: for manna was their food. But when we have now crossed the banks of this river, "the manna ceases"; and therefore, unless each one "prepares" for himself "provisions," he will not be able to follow Jesus as he enters the land of promise.

The question arises of knowing how, after the Lord had spoken to Joshua Ship, exhorting him and confirming him and promising him that he would be with him, Joshua himself sent the people through the scribes to prepare provisions, because after three days they would cross the Jordan , when in fact many more days passed before they passed the Jordan. After having sent this to the people, Joshua sent spies to Jericho, because, past the Jordan, it was the nearest city. They left to go to the home of the prostitute Rahab, who hid them. The king looked for them and could not find them. She let them escape through a window and advised them to hide for three days in the mountains. In all these events, four days may have been used (Cf Jos 2,3-6). So, after the spies told how the situation was around them, Joshua started tomorrow's march with the whole town from where he was. When he reached the Jordan, he withdrew and stayed there. The people again receive another harangue to prepare themselves to cross the Jordan after three days, leading the Ark of the Lord to the front. From this it is deduced that it was a human disposition by means of which the people were ordered to prepare provisions, as if they were going to cross the mentioned river after three days. Joshua could, indeed, hope, as a man, that all this could be done, if the spies had returned soon. But, taking them, although the Scripture does not say it, it is understood that the other things were fulfilled by divine disposition, so that Joshua began to be held in great esteem before the people and to show that the Lord was with him how he had been with Moses. For when he was about to cross the Jordan, the following is said as it is written: And the Lord said to Joshua, "On this day I will begin to exalt you before all the children of Israel, so that they may know that, as I was with Moses, so shall I be. also with you (Jos 3,7).” And it should not seem incredible to us that those with whom God spoke wanted to do something by human decision, in which they trusted that they had God for guidance and that the decisions they had made had been changed by the providence of God, who guided them . Because even Moses himself, naturally as a man, had thought that he should judge the causes of the people in such a way that it would not be of benefit to himself or to the people themselves bearing an unbearable weight.…