Joshua Spares Rahab by Gustave Dore
We ended the last piece in this series on the people of faith in Hebrews 11 with Moses, who was commended for faithfully instituting the Passover. If you remember, the Israelites, who were slaves in Egypt, followed Moses’s Passover instructions—instructions he received from God—and they escaped the tenth plague God inflicted on the nation of Egypt.
In this plague, all the firstborn sons in Egypt died on a single night—all of them, that is, except for those in the homes of the Israelites, who faithfully followed the Passover instructions. This was God’s last plague on Egypt, because after this one, Pharaoh finally did what Moses had been telling him to do all along: He allowed all the people of Israel, along with their flocks and herds, to leave. So the Israelites packed up quickly and God led them out of Egypt toward the Red Sea.
Meanwhile back in Egypt, Pharaoh changed his mind. Now he regretted letting the Israelites leave. Who, he thought, would do all the hard work if there were no Israelite slaves? He readied his army—chariots, horses, horsemen, and soldiers—and led them out to round up the Israelites and force them back into service in Egypt.
This bit of background sets the scene for one of the most dramatic episodes in Old Testament history, and also for the next commendation in the Hebrews 11 hall of faith. Imagine it: The Israelites were camped beside the Red Sea when they saw the Egyptian army marching toward them. They were boxed in between the waters of the Red Sea and the advancing army of Pharaoh, and they panicked.
They cried out to the Lord, which is always the right thing to do when we’re scared, but they also blamed Moses for bringing them out of Egypt in the first place (Exodus 14:11-12). They had already forgotten, it seems, that it was the Lord himself who had brought them out, and it was the Lord who had led them to this place.
But despite their doubts and complaints, God protected them. The pillar of cloud that had been leading them as they travelled moved behind them as a barrier between them and the Egyptian army. Then Moses stretched his hand out over the Red Sea, and “the Lord drove the sea back with a strong east wind and turned it into dry land,” and the Israelites crossed the sea safely between two walls of water (Exodus 14:21-22).
According to the author of Hebrews, it was “[b]y faith the people passed through the Red Sea as on dry land (Hebrews 11:29 NIV).” It took faith for the Israelites to cry out to the Lord when they saw the Egyptians chasing them down, and it took faith for them to move forward into the sea at his command. Walking between those walls of water must have been almost as terrifying as facing their pursuers would have been. But even though they didn’t know exactly how God would save them, they trusted that he would, so they obeyed him.
“[B]ut,” continued the author of Hebrews, “when the Egyptians tried to [cross], they were drowned (Hebrews 11:29 NIV).” Pharaoh’s forces followed the Israelites right into the sea, but the Lord fought for his people. While the army was crossing, he threw them into a panic (Exodus 14:24). They tried to turn back, but with all the mayhem, it wasn’t easy, and they were too late. Moses stretched his hand out over the sea again; the water returned to its place; and Pharaoh and his men drowned. In one miraculous act, God rescued the Israelites and judged their enemies.
Like the Israelites, the first century readers of the letter to the Hebrews were afraid of what their enemies might do to them. The story of the Israelites’ faith at the Red Sea reminded them that if they were persecuted again for following Jesus, they could trust God to care for them. Even if they were eventually martyred for their faith (Hebrews 12:4), the Lord could still be trusted. He would bring them safely to their promised heavenly home. And in the end, they would triumph over their enemies when God judged all those who had harmed them.
The destruction of Pharaoh and his army was only one of many battles God fought for his people. After the Israelites crossed the Red Sea and then wandered around the wilderness for forty years, God led them across the Jordan River into Canaan—the land he had promised would be theirs. But before they settled in Canaan, God commanded them to drive out the people who lived there.
They started their conquest of Canaan with the walled city of Jericho. God gave them their battle plan, and it was a strange one. He instructed them to march once around the city for six days in a row, and then, on the seventh day, to march around it seven times. Next, God said, the priests should blow their trumpets and all the people should shout. Then the walls of Jericho would fall and they would be able to capture the city and destroy it.
The Israelites trusted God enough to follow his unorthodox military strategy—and it worked. “By [their] faith,” wrote the author of Hebrews, “the walls of Jericho fell, after the army had marched around them for seven days” (Hebrews 11:30). Obviously, God didn’t need their marching to bring down the walls of the city, but he chose to wield his mighty power in response to their faith, which they demonstrated by following his command to march around Jericho.
This chapter in Israel’s history is a reminder that God often accomplishes things in ways that, from our perspective, seem foolish. Think of the early Christians to whom Hebrews was written. They had already suffered some persecution and were anticipating more—and worse. Don’t you think they considered persecution a threat to the survival of the church? And humanly speaking, it was. But under God’s management, their suffering actually contributed to the spread of Christianity. God also worked through their trials to make their faith stronger. One day they would see—perhaps not in this life, but certainly in the next—that God used their faithfulness in suffering to accomplish his (and their) final victory.
The next person commended in Hebrews 11 is Rahab, who is part of the Jericho story. She was a prostitute who was spared when the others who lived in Jericho were killed. Here’s what the text says about her:
By faith the prostitute Rahab, because she welcomed the spies, was not killed with those who were disobedient (Hebrews 11:31).
When spies were sent to scope out Jericho before the Israelites entered Canaan, Rahab hid them from the authorities and then helped them escape (Joshua 2:1-21). She risked everything for their safety, and in return, they promised that she and her family would not be harmed when the Israelites destroyed Jericho.
Why did Rahab help the Israelite spies? She did it because she already believed in Israel’s God. Everyone in Jericho had heard of Israel’s conquests, including their defeat of the Egyptian forces at the Red Sea. Rahab understood that they won these battles because their God, who she believed was “God in heaven above and on the earth below” (Joshua 2:11), fought for them. She knew her only hope was with this God—the one true God—so she aligned herself with him and his people.
When the Israelites took the city of Jericho, “Joshua spared Rahab the prostitute, with her family and all who belonged to her, because she hid the men Joshua had sent as spies to Jericho” (Joshua 6:25). Because she was loyal to him and his people, God gave her a home among the Israelites, and rewarded her with an Israelite husband, at least one Israelite son, and a place in the lineage of Jesus (Matthew 1:5).
Did you notice that the author of Hebrews still called her “Rahab the prostitute”? The apostle James referred to her this way, too (James 2:25). Why did these New Testament authors bring up her sordid past hundreds of years after she died? Why wouldn’t they let people forget it? It certainly wasn’t because they wanted to demean her or sully her reputation. After all, both writers hold her out as an example to follow. They saw her as a hero.
Perhaps it’s because her never-forgotten label serves as a permanent reminder that a sinful past doesn’t disqualify someone from God’s forgiveness or his reward. God’s mercy is for anyone who will receive it, even a Canaanite prostitute. Yes, God gave her a whole new identity. She left her past loyalties behind and became a true Israelite. But because she is still remembered by her old title, she is also a witness to the gospel—the good news of the way of the salvation that Jesus, her descendant, opened for anyone who believes, including someone with a sordid past. I don’t think she minds that we know her as “Rahab the prostitute.”
It’s this same gospel—the one that both her old name and her new faith testify to—that the Hebrew Christians were in danger of losing because they were afraid of the consequences of continuing to identify with Jesus. They must be more like Rahab, who was willing to risk her life by aligning herself with the one true God. She knew with whom her hope lay. Did they? Their only hope—and ours, too—is to stick with Jesus even when it makes life difficult, because he is the only Savior. There is no other way.
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