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The scriptures. May God bless the reading of His holy word.
By faith Moses’ parents hid
him for three months after he was born, because they saw he was no ordinary
child, and they were not afraid of the king’s edict.
By faith the prostitute
Rahab, because she welcomed the spies, was not killed with those who were
disobedient.
Hebrews 11:23, 31
This ends this reading
from God's holy word. Thanks be to God.
After Joseph died, things
really started getting bad in Egypt. We know this because as we leave the Book
of Genesis and begin the Book of Exodus, we find this edict issued by Egypt’s
supreme leader, Pharaoh, at the end of the first chapter:
Pharaoh gave this order to all his people: “Every
Hebrew boy that is born you must throw into the Nile, but let every girl live.”
v. 22
As chapter 2 opens, we read
about a marriage that had taken place between a Hebrew Levite man and woman. Later
in this book, we find that the man was named Amram and his Levite wife was
Jochebed (Exodus 6:20). After they had consummated their relationship through
dedicated sexual devotion to one another, Jochebed became pregnant and gave birth
to a son who she concealed for three months for she saw him as a “fine child”.
Given Pharaoh’s command and not wanting to see her son killed, she got a
papyrus basket and coated it with tar and pitch before putting the baby within
and setting him afloat among the reeds along the banks of the Nile (Exodus
2:1-3).
There is no question that
this was a risky endeavor and I can’t imagine how difficult it must have been
for Jochebed to send off her only son in such a way. It required a great faith
in God, believing that He would protect the baby and deliver him safely into
someone’s care. That faith was rewarded when Pharaoh’s daughter, who had gone
to the river to bathe, saw the basket in the reeds and sent her servant to
retrieve it. She had to be amazed to open the top only to find a crying baby
within. Immediately identifying the child as Hebrew and having compassion for
him, she arranged for Jochebed to nurse her child until he became older at
which time she gave him to Pharaoh’s daughter and he became hers. She then gave
the boy his name, Moses, because she had drawn him up out of the water (Exodus
2:5-10).
As we live life, we learn it
is far from risk-free. The older and older we get, the more we understand the
importance of stepping out on faith and trusting God, just like Peter did when
he stepped out of the boat and walked on water toward Jesus.
In the Old Testament, we find
another example of faith in action while someone was at risk. The central
character in this story is a prostitute by the name of Rahab and we find her
story in the second chapter of Joshua.
Then Joshua son of Nun secretly sent two spies from
Shittim. “Go, look over the land,” he said, “especially Jericho.” So they went
and entered the house of a prostitute named Rahab and stayed there.
The king of Jericho was told, “Look, some of the
Israelites have come here tonight to spy out the land.” So the king of Jericho
sent this message to Rahab: “Bring out the men who came to you and entered your
house, because they have come to spy out the whole land.”
But the woman had taken the two men and hidden them.
She said, “Yes, the men came to me, but I did not know where they had come
from. At dusk, when it was time to close the city gate, they left. I don’t know
which way they went. Go after them quickly. You may catch up with them.” (But
she had taken them up to the roof and hidden them under the stalks of flax she
had laid out on the roof.) So the men set out in pursuit of the spies on the
road that leads to the fords of the Jordan, and as soon as the pursuers had
gone out, the gate was shut.
Before the spies lay down for the night, she went up
on the roof and said to them, “I know that the Lord has given you this land and
that a great fear of you has fallen on us, so that all who live in this country
are melting in fear because of you. We have heard how the Lord dried up the
water of the Red Sea for you when you came out of Egypt, and what you did to
Sihon and Og, the two kings of the Amorites east of the Jordan, whom you
completely destroyed. When we heard of it, our hearts melted in fear and
everyone’s courage failed because of you, for the Lord your God is God in Heaven
above and on the earth below.
“Now then, please swear to me by the Lord that you
will show kindness to my family, because I have shown kindness to you. Give me
a sure sign that you will spare the lives of my father and mother, my brothers
and sisters, and all who belong to them—and that you will save us from death.”
“Our lives for your lives!” the men assured her. “If
you don’t tell what we are doing, we will treat you kindly and faithfully when
the Lord gives us the land.”
So she let them down by a rope through the window, for
the house she lived in was part of the city wall. She said to them, “Go to the
hills so the pursuers will not find you. Hide yourselves there three days until
they return, and then go on your way.”
Now the men had said to her, “This oath you made us
swear will not be binding on us unless, when we enter the land, you have tied
this scarlet cord in the window through which you let us down, and unless you
have brought your father and mother, your brothers and all your family into
your house. If any of them go outside your house into the street, their blood
will be on their own heads; we will not be responsible. As for those who are in
the house with you, their blood will be on our head if a hand is laid on them. But
if you tell what we are doing, we will be released from the oath you made us
swear.”
“Agreed,” she replied. “Let it be as you say.”
So she sent them away, and they departed. And she tied
the scarlet cord in the window.
When they left, they went into the hills and stayed
there three days, until the pursuers had searched all along the road and
returned without finding them. Then the two men started back. They went down
out of the hills, forded the river and came to Joshua son of Nun and told him
everything that had happened to them. They said to Joshua, “The Lord has surely
given the whole land into our hands; all the people are melting in fear because
of us.” Joshua 2
Rahab went out of her way to
ensure the two Israelite spies were not discovered and killed, first concocting
a false narrative that they had already while concealing them on her rooftop
and then allowing them to escape by powering them down from her window which
just so happened to be on the city wall. Following her recommendation, the men
hid in the hills for three days until the Jericho search party had returned and
then and made report to Joshua about what had happened. This included the
goodness of Rahab and their promise to ensure that she and her family would not
be harmed when the Israelites attacked. To designate her home apart from the
rest of the city, she tied a scarlet cord to her window.
Fast forwarding ahead to
Joshua, chapter 6, we read this:
Now the gates of Jericho were securely barred because
of the Israelites. No one went out and no one came in.
Then the Lord said to Joshua, “See, I have delivered
Jericho into your hands, along with its king and its fighting men. March around
the city once with all the armed men. Do this for six days. Have seven priests
carry trumpets of rams’ horns in front of the ark. On the seventh day, march
around the city seven times, with the priests blowing the trumpets. When you
hear them sound a long blast on the trumpets, have the whole army give a loud
shout; then the wall of the city will collapse and the army will go up,
everyone straight in.”
So Joshua son of Nun called the priests and said to
them, “Take up the ark of the covenant of the Lord and have seven priests carry
trumpets in front of it.” And he ordered the army, “Advance! March around the
city, with an armed guard going ahead of the ark of the Lord.”
When Joshua had spoken to the people, the seven
priests carrying the seven trumpets before the Lord went forward, blowing their
trumpets, and the ark of the Lord’s covenant followed them. The armed guard
marched ahead of the priests who blew the trumpets, and the rear guard followed
the ark. All this time the trumpets were sounding. But Joshua had commanded the
army, “Do not give a war cry, do not raise your voices, do not say a word until
the day I tell you to shout. Then shout!” So he had the ark of the Lord carried
around the city, circling it once. Then the army returned to camp and spent the
night there.
Joshua got up early the next morning and the priests
took up the ark of the Lord. The seven priests carrying the seven trumpets went
forward, marching before the ark of the Lord and blowing the trumpets. The
armed men went ahead of them and the rear guard followed the ark of the Lord,
while the trumpets kept sounding. So on the second day they marched around the city
once and returned to the camp. They did this for six days.
On the seventh day, they got up at daybreak and
marched around the city seven times in the same manner, except that on that day
they circled the city seven times. The seventh time around, when the priests
sounded the trumpet blast, Joshua commanded the army, “Shout! For the Lord has
given you the city! The city and all that is in it are to be devoted to the
Lord. Only Rahab the prostitute and all who are with her in her house shall be
spared, because she hid the spies we sent. But keep away from the devoted
things, so that you will not bring about your own destruction by taking any of
them. Otherwise you will make the camp of Israel liable to destruction and
bring trouble on it. All the silver and gold and the articles of bronze and
iron are sacred to the Lord and must go into his treasury.”
When the trumpets sounded, the army shouted, and at
the sound of the trumpet, when the men gave a loud shout, the wall collapsed;
so everyone charged straight in, and they took the city. They devoted the city
to the Lord and destroyed with the sword every living thing in it—men and
women, young and old, cattle, sheep and donkeys.
Joshua said to the two men who had spied out the land,
“Go into the prostitute’s house and bring her out and all who belong to her, in
accordance with your oath to her.” So the young men who had done the spying
went in and brought out Rahab, her father and mother, her brothers and sisters
and all who belonged to her. They brought out her entire family and put them in
a place outside the camp of Israel.
Then they burned the whole city and everything in it,
but they put the silver and gold and the articles of bronze and iron into the
treasury of the Lord’s house. But 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—and she lives among the Israelites to this day. Vv. 1-25
Rahab didn’t have to do what
she did. She could have turned in the two spies and would have been hailed as a
hero by Jericho’s king but by faith, she knew the God of Israel was far greater
in power than any human king. And so, with faith she aided and abetted the
spies in defiance of her own people and in return, God delivered and rescued
her and her family.
What does faith bring?
In this message, the twelfth in
this series, we learn that our faith helps us take risks when we trust that God
is present while leading and guiding us through those situations. When we do
this, we discover what Jochebed and Rahab did, that God makes good on His
promise to bring His believers through whatever He brings them to, no matter
how difficult and perilous it may seem.
Amen.
In Christ,
Mark
PS: Feel free to leave a
comment and please share this with anyone you feel might be blessed by it. Send
any prayer requests to TheChristianWalkPrayers@gmail.com.
