DRAWING NEAR
Name one situation in your life in which you had to completely put your faith in someone or something. How did that turn out for you?
[Your Response]
THE CONTEXT
At the close of the book of Numbers, the Israelites were nearing the end of their forty years of wandering in the wilderness. They had destroyed several Canaanite armies, and the Lord’s power had become evident to the nations around them. Joshua had led the people to an acacia grove on the east side of the Jordan River, where they prepared to enter the land of Canaan. The first stronghold that stood in their way was the city of Jericho.
Joshua was a strong military leader and wanted information about Jericho prior to facing the city in battle. So, to gain that information, he sent two spies into the city to learn more about its inhabitants and their defenses. We are not told what those spies learned, because in the long run it didn’t matter. God’s plans for Jericho’s destruction did not require any military prowess or human strategies. He would use supernatural means to destroy His enemies. But He would also bring salvation to one particular person who lived in that city, and He would use the spies to reach her.
Jericho was surrounded by two walls, one behind the other. Between those walls were houses that were actually built into one or both walls, and those houses frequently had windows that opened through the city’s defensive walls. Such houses were simple and small, inhabited by the city’s poor—and worse. Their location near the city gates, for example, would be a perfect place to carry on the business of prostitution. The constant traffic of people entering and leaving the city would be good for business, especially since it would be easy to enter and exit such a house unnoticed. This element of anonymity was also useful for the spies, as it was unlikely they would be noticed entering such a house of prostitution.
In the book of Joshua we will see God work some powerful and dramatic miracles, beginning with the parting of the Jordan River. However, in this study we will witness a miracle of even greater power and drama: the Lord will redeem the life of a lowly Canaanite prostitute. In fact, He will go beyond that miracle and transform this woman of sin into a woman of God—and her descendants will include Jesus Himself.
KEYS TO THE TEXT
Read Joshua 2:1–24, noting the key words and phrases indicated below.
SPIES IN JERICHO: Joshua begins the conquest of the Promised Land by sending two spies into the strategic city of Jericho to gather information. The spies hide in the house of a prostitute.
2:1. ACACIA GROVE: This grove was on the east side of the river and was used as a base camp.
CAME TO THE HOUSE OF A HARLOT: The two spies did not visit Rahab’s house for any illicit purpose but rather because it offered a good hiding place. They were spies of a hostile army, and as such were at risk of losing their lives if caught. They probably thought that strange men entering a prostitute’s house would not be noticed. However, it was actually the Lord Himself who led them there, because He intended to rescue Rahab and redeem her.
4. HID THEM: At this point, Rahab made a risky decision from which there was no turning back. She would have been immediately put to death if the men had been discovered in her house. She had already made up her mind to join Israel and make their God her God.
5. THE MEN WENT OUT: Rahab lied in order to protect the two Israelites, and in so doing probably considered it justified during a time of war. In the Lord’s eyes, the ends do not justify the means—lying is a sin, and He never condones it. Nevertheless, God focused on Rahab’s faith and her courageous decision to help His people.
6. HIDDEN THEM WITH THE STALKS OF FLAX: Houses in those days had flat roofs that were used for many purposes, including as places to dry grains. Flax was used to make linen cloth.
TURNING TO GOD: Rahab saves the spies because she recognizes that Israel serves the only true God, the Creator of heaven and earth.
9. I KNOW THAT THE LORD HAS GIVEN YOU THE LAND: Rahab revealed her motivation in what she said to the spies. Notice that she mentioned the Lord’s name repeatedly. She recognized that Israel’s great victories were the work of God, not of men, and she wanted to make peace with Israel’s God. In this, she was far wiser than the kings of Canaan.
11. THE LORD YOUR GOD, HE IS GOD IN HEAVEN ABOVE AND ON EARTH BENEATH: This was a profound confession of faith in God. Rahab helped the Israelites because she recognized that their God was the one true God. This was the faith the New Testament writers commended, and it is a testimony to God’s grace that even a prostitute could be saved. God did not want to send judgment on the people of Canaan. The tragedy of this passage is that there were so few who repented like Rahab and so many who fought against the God of Israel to the bitter end.
12. SWEAR TO ME BY THE LORD: Rahab also recognized there was no higher oath that God’s people could swear than one sworn by His name. The spies would have brought grave dishonor on the Lord’s name if they had failed to keep their promise. Rahab already understood the Lord was faithful to keep His promises, so she knew that an oath given in His name by His people would be binding. Later, the Lord would again honor such a promise, given by the Israelites to the people of Gibeon (see Joshua 9:18), even though it would be made without consulting Him.
13. SPARE MY FATHER, MY MOTHER, MY BROTHERS, MY SISTERS: Rahab was not thinking only of herself in this time of crisis. She made it a point to also save the lives of her entire family.
THE SCARLET THREAD: The spies instruct Rahab how to save herself and her family from the coming destruction by using a scarlet thread. This thread serves to remind us of the Passover sacrifice.
15. SHE DWELT ON THE WALL: Jericho, like other cities of the time, was surrounded by two concentric walls, the inner wall standing on higher ground than the outer one. Frequently there were houses built between those walls, often with windows opening out of the walls themselves. Rahab probably dropped a rope through her window, down the front side of the outer wall, to the ground below. This was an immensely risky undertaking, as the rope and the spies would have been in plain sight. Even at night there would have been a great risk of being caught. The Lord was protecting His people from detection.
18. BIND THIS LINE OF SCARLET CORD IN THE WINDOW: There was a practical sense to the scarlet cord, as its color made it easily visible against the brown mud walls of the city. But there was also an important symbolic significance in the scarlet cord, as its blood-red color pointed ahead to the final atonement of Christ. Rahab hung the cord from her window, much as the Israelites had painted their doorposts with the blood of the Passover lambs prior to leaving Egypt (see Exodus 12). During the Passover, the Lord sent an angel throughout Egypt to slay the firstborn son of any household that was not covered by the blood of a sacrificed lamb. Anyone who was inside a house covered by the blood was safe from death—just as Rahab’s family would only be safe if they remained inside her house when God’s destruction came on Jericho.
GOING DEEPER
Read Hebrews 11:24–31, noting the key words and phrases indicated below.
BY FAITH: The author of Hebrews gives many examples from the Old Testament of people who lived by faith—and Rahab is among them.
11:24. BY FAITH: Hebrews 11 is commonly referred to as the “faith chapter” because it lists many great heroes of faith from the Old Testament. The central theme of this chapter is the fact that service to God requires faith, for “without faith it is impossible to please Him, for he who comes to God must believe that He is, and that He is a rewarder of those who diligently seek Him” (verse 6). The author of Hebrews defines faith as “the substance of things hoped for, the evidence of things not seen” (verse 1). The person of faith chooses to believe in that which is “not seen” simply because God has promised it is true.
REFUSED TO BE CALLED THE SON OF PHARAOH’S DAUGHTER: Moses had every possible blessing this world affords, as he grew up in the royal court of the world’s most powerful nation in his day. Rahab probably did not have much in terms of the world’s wealth, but she did have a secure home inside the walls of a safe and powerful city. The heroes of the faith were people who saw beyond what the world had to offer and instead fixed their eyes on eternity. Rahab knew that her city was doomed simply because she believed God had the power to bring down those city walls. Like Moses, she refused to place her faith in the fortifications of mankind, choosing instead to trust in the protection and faithfulness of God.
30. BY FAITH THE WALLS OF JERICHO FELL DOWN: As we will discuss in a later study, God would reward Rahab’s faith by keeping her and her family completely safe when He brought down the walls of Jericho. It would actually be the faith of the people of Israel that would bring down those walls, in the sense that they obeyed God’s command to march around the city each day. The Lord would use their faithful obedience to work His own powerful miracle. God’s people today are likewise called to live in faithful obedience.
Read James 2:19–26, noting the key words and phrases indicated below.
FAITH WITHOUT WORKS: James tells us how to determine whether our faith is alive or dead. A living faith is demonstrated by good works.
2:19. EVEN THE DEMONS BELIEVE: James noted that faith is not a mere mental acknowledgment of the facts concerning Christ, for even the demons believe there is one God who created the heavens and the earth—but that “faith” does not save them. True saving faith is active—being given and energized by the Holy Spirit—and transforms true believers from the inside out so that they desire to submit themselves to God and His Word. James was not suggesting that salvation is somehow based on a person’s works; rather, he argued that true faith—that which is alive and powerful—would inevitably bear fruit of repentance and righteousness in the lives of those who possess it. We see this in the story of the kings of Canaan, who believed Israel’s God was powerful and was leading His people to victory but did not allow that understanding to motivate them to submit to Him. Rahab’s actions, however, demonstrated that her faith was genuine, for she openly forsook her former gods and embraced the Lord of creation.
20. FAITH WITHOUT WORKS IS DEAD: A faith that does not lead to repentance and obedience is a “dead faith.” However, a faith that characterizes repentance and salvation is a “living faith,” as made evident by fruits of obedience. Although salvation is found in Christ alone by grace alone through faith alone, those who have been genuinely saved (having been transformed by the regenerating work of the Holy Spirit) will subsequently show evidence of their faith and love for God in how they live.
21. JUSTIFIED BY WORKS: Again, James was not suggesting that we gain eternal life and peace with God by doing good works or being good people. On the contrary, once we are saved and indwelt by the Holy Spirit, our faith compels us to do good works. After all, our hearts and affections have been changed such that we who were formerly enemies of God now long to honor Him. Abraham believed God’s promises that he would have a son, and that his son would produce as many descendants as the sands of the sea. When God commanded him to slay that son when the boy was still young, he must have wondered how God’s promises could come to pass. Yet Abraham’s faith in God’s promises gave him the ability to obey—and in this sense the genuineness of his faith was proven and made evident by his actions.
25. WAS NOT RAHAB THE HARLOT ALSO JUSTIFIED BY WORKS: In the same way, Rahab had faith that God would save her and her family, and that faith led to the action of helping the spies and placing the scarlet cord in her window. The king of Jericho assented that Israel’s God was mighty and faithful to His people, but his “faith” was dead, for it led him to run from God and to shut up the city against Israel’s approach.
UNLEASHING THE TEXT
1) Why did the spies hide in the house of a prostitute? How was this a strategic move?
[Your Response]
2) What was Rahab’s motivation in helping the spies? What did she hope to get out of it?
[Your Response]
3) Why did the spies order Rahab to bind a scarlet thread in her window? In what ways is this thread a symbol of salvation?
[Your Response]
4) In what ways was God’s hand guiding the events in Rahab’s life? What was His purpose for her? For the spies?
[Your Response]
EXPLORING THE MEANING
We are saved by faith, but that faith always leads to righteous behavior. James drew a strong distinction between genuine saving faith and mere intellectual acceptance of God’s existence. As he pointed out, the demons themselves believe in the existence of God, and they tremble at that knowledge. One might go so far as to say the devil’s understanding of God is orthodox: he acknowledges that God is one and that Jesus Christ is His Son who takes away the sins of the world. But that knowledge will not save the devil and his demons.
Mere knowledge about God is not enough to save a person. The person who recognizes that God exists and created the world does well, yet even the demons exhibit that amount of faith. The faith that saves is an active faith—a faith that leads a person to actively repent of sin and begin to enthusiastically obey the Word of God.
A faith that does not produce fruits of righteous behavior is a dead faith, because a living faith—the kind that saves—will always lead us to obey God’s Word out of a heart that has been changed and now desires to please Him. As the apostle John wrote, “Now by this we know that we know Him, if we keep His commandments. He who says, ‘I know Him,’ and does not keep His commandments, is a liar, and the truth is not in him. But whoever keeps His word, truly the love of God is perfected in him. By this we know that we are in Him. He who says he abides in Him ought himself also to walk just as He walked” (1 John 2:3–6).
God’s grace is freely available to everyone, no matter what has happened in the past. We know nothing about Rahab’s life before she met the spies, but it was obviously filled with all manner of wickedness. She was in the lowest stratum of the city—an unclean woman who quite literally lived on the outskirts of society. If anyone was unfit for the kingdom of God, it was Rahab, and yet God redeemed her. More than that, He elevated her from the dregs of society to the highest of honors: her descendants culminated in the person of Jesus Christ.
Everyone has sinned and fallen short of the glory of God (see Romans 3:23), and one sin is just as grievous as another in God’s eyes. The prostitute is no more unfit for God’s kingdom than the law-abiding citizen, for all people are equally in need of God’s forgiveness and grace. That’s the bad news. The good news is that God has made forgiveness available to everyone who believes in Him—to the worst of sinners as well as the person who has lived a “good life.”
The best news is that God’s grace is freely available and there is nothing anyone can do to earn it or deserve it. Rahab did not deserve to be saved, yet God, in His grace, chose to rescue her and her family from certain destruction. Similarly, through the cross, God has made eternal salvation available to sinners who do not deserve it. He offers it freely to all who would repent of their sins and embrace in faith His Son, Jesus Christ.
God transforms sinners into saints. As we have just stated, Rahab was a grievous sinner who deliberately disobeyed God’s commands for leading a righteous life. It was a tremendous act of grace for God to save her from judgment, but He did far more than that. He transformed her into a woman of God and placed her in the lineage of Christ.
Saul of Tarsus was also a grievous sinner. He spent his adult life persecuting the early Christian church, hunting down and arresting anyone who professed faith in Jesus. He was instrumental in putting Christians to death and assisting those who stoned them (see Acts 9:1–2). Yet God saved him, gave him a new name, and transformed him into an apostle whose writings fill the New Testament.
Our salvation is merely the first step in God’s amazing work of redemption. When we repent of our sins and embrace God’s grace through faith in Jesus Christ, we receive the inestimable gift of eternal life and also the gift of the Holy Spirit. The Spirit immediately begins the work of transformation in our lives, gradually making us more like Jesus Christ. This ultimate act of transformation exceeds even that done in Rahab’s life, for the lowliest of sinners will one day reflect the full glory of God’s Son, Jesus!
REFLECTING ON THE TEXT
5) Was it right or wrong for Rahab to lie about the spies? How might she have handled the situation without lying?
[Your Response]
6) What exactly is faith? Why is faith necessary if we are to please God?
[Your Response]
7) What is the difference between a living faith and a dead faith? How did Rahab demonstrate a living faith? How did the king of Jericho demonstrate a dead faith?
[Your Response]
8) Have you accepted God’s free gift of salvation by placing your faith in His Son, Jesus Christ? If not, what is preventing you from doing so now?
[Your Response]
PERSONAL RESPONSE
9) In what ways has the Lord transformed you since you became a Christian? What transformations is He working on at present?
[Your Response]
10) Is your faith a living one? Are you walking in obedience to God’s Word? What areas of obedience might the Lord be calling you to work on this week?
[Your Response]