Scripture Daily

Context No. 1412 of 4322 · Joshua

Context · Reflection

Joshua 2:1-13: in context

1Joshua the son of Nun secretly sent two men out of Shittim as spies, saying, “Go, view the land, including Jericho.” They went and came into the house of a prostitute whose name was Rahab, and slept there. 2The king of Jericho was told, “Behold, men of the children of Israel came in here tonight to spy out the land.” 3Jericho’s king sent to Rahab, saying, “Bring out the men who have come to you, who have entered into your house; for they have come to spy out all the land.” 4The woman took the two men and hid them. Then she said, “Yes, the men came to me, but I didn’t know where they came from. 5About the time of the shutting of the gate, when it was dark, the men went out. Where the men went, I don’t know. Pursue them quickly. You may catch up with them.” 6But she had brought them up to the roof, and hidden them under the stalks of flax which she had laid in order on the roof. 7The men pursued them along the way to the fords of the Jordan River. As soon as those who pursued them had gone out, they shut the gate. 8Before they had lain down, she came up to them on the roof. 9She said to the men, “I know that the LORD has given you the land, and that the fear of you has fallen upon us, and that all the inhabitants of the land melt away before you. 10For we have heard how the LORD dried up the water of the Red Sea before you, when you came out of Egypt; and what you did to the two kings of the Amorites, who were beyond the Jordan, to Sihon and to Og, whom you utterly destroyed. 11As soon as we had heard it, our hearts melted, and there wasn’t any more spirit in any man, because of you: for the LORD your God, he is God in heaven above, and on earth beneath. 12Now therefore, please swear to me by the LORD, since I have dealt kindly with you, that you also will deal kindly with my father’s house, and give me a true sign; 13and that you will save alive my father, my mother, my brothers, and my sisters, and all that they have, and will deliver our lives from death.”

Joshua sends two spies into Jericho, and they lodge in the house of Rahab, a prostitute. When the king's men come demanding she hand them over, Rahab hides the spies under the flax on her roof and sends the pursuers off on a false trail. Then she tells the spies why: I know the LORD has given you the land; the fear of you has fallen on us; we heard how the LORD dried up the Red Sea and defeated the kings of the Amorites, and our hearts melted, for the LORD your God is God in heaven above and on earth beneath. And she asks them to spare her family when the city falls.

Rahab is a striking figure of faith, and the New Testament will praise her for it. She was an outsider in every way, a Canaanite, a woman, a prostitute, with nothing to commend her; yet she is the one in Jericho who heard the reports of what God had done and believed them, while the rest of her city heard the same reports and only hardened in fear. The whole city had heard how the LORD dried up the sea and defeated the Amorite kings; the same news reached everyone. But Rahab drew from it the conclusion of faith, the LORD your God is God in heaven above and on earth beneath, and she acted on it, throwing in her lot with God's people at great risk to herself, while her neighbors' hearts simply melted in dread. The difference was not the information but the response to it. Faith, this story suggests, is not reserved for the respectable or the insider; it is the response of a heart that hears what God has done and believes, and it can appear in an unlikely person while it is absent in those who should have had it. Rahab, the outsider and the sinner, believed and was saved and was woven into the very line of Christ, while a whole city that heard the same things perished in unbelief. God welcomes the faith of an unlikely person, and the hearing that leads to belief is open to anyone.

Have I, like Rahab, let what I have heard of God lead me to believe and act, throwing in my lot with him, or do I hear the same things and only harden, and do I believe that God welcomes the faith of an unlikely person, even me?

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