JESUS'GRANDMOTHERS - RAHAB

Transcript

SPEAKER_00 0:01

Hello everyone.

SPEAKER_01 0:03

This is Pastor Dean Thompson with a word of hope.

SPEAKER_00 0:10

Jesus' grandmothers. Rahab.

SPEAKER_01 0:18

Let us be honest about who Rahab was and what she did. Because sanitizing her story robs it of his power. Rahab was a zona, the Hebrew word used in Joshua 2, verse 1, most directly translated as harlot or prostitute. She did not simply live in a questionable neighborhood. Many scholars and rabbinic commentators believed she operated a brothel, an inn that provided paid sexual services to travellers. Her house was built into the city wall of Jericho, which would have been a prime location for such a business, easily accessible to men passing through the gate. When the two Israelite spies arrived in Jericho, the text says they lodged at Rahab's house. But the Hebrew word used here, Shakab, is striking. In its most common usage, usage throughout the Hebrew scriptures, Shakab means to lie down for sexual relations. This is the same word used repeatedly in Leviticus to describe sexual intercourse. It is used when Lot's daughters lay with him, when Shechem lay with Dinah, when David lay with Bathsheba. Whatever the arrangement when these men first arrived at Rahab's house, they came through her door the same way other men came through her door. And here is where it gets even more remarkable. How did Rahab discover these men were Israelites? Because they were spies, they were well disguised. The Bible does not explain the moment of recognition, but there is a long-standing and historical historically grounded tradition that answers the question plainly. The Israelites practiced circumcision, and the men of Canaan did not. In the intimate context of Rahab's establishment, the discovery would have been unavoidable. Now I know many of us would be disturbed considering this because we are we'll be looking at at we'll be reading this too little to the eyes of a 21st century Christian-minded person. But these men were living almost maybe about 3,000 years ago, and their culture was different, and everything was different. And so in even though they are doing God's work, many times they do things, wrong things.

SPEAKER_00 3:52

In their thinking. And here is where it gets even more. All right.

SPEAKER_01 4:27

A woman who had learned to read men very quickly. She could put it put things together. Rehab hid them under stalks of flocks on her roof and lied to the king's messengers, sending them on a false trail. This was treason, if discovered. She would have been executed. She was risking everything. What made Rahab willing to risk her life for these two strangers from a nation that was about to destroy her city? When we listen to her words, she said, I know that the Lord has given you this land. 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 the two kings of the Amorites. When we heard it, our hearts melted, and everyone's courage failed because of you. For the Lord your God is God in heaven above and on earth below. Joshua 2 verses 9 to 11. Rahab heard of had heard about the God of Israel, and she believed, not half believed, not politely acknowledged, she fully believed. She believed to the point of staking her life on it. The woman who had made her living out of the weakness of men, no placed her trust in the only one who could not be bought or manipulated. She negotiated a covenant with the spies. She lowered them by a rope through her window in the city wall. She tied a scarlet cord in that same window as a mark of salvation, a crimson sign that would spear her household when Israel's army came. A prostitute with a scar scarlet cord in her window, a symbol of God's protection. One of the most powerful images of grace in the entire Old Testament. When Jericho fell, when the walls came crashing down and the city was consumed, one household was peered, Rahab's house. The brothel on the wall was the only building left standing. God honored the faith of the most unlikely woman in the city. Rahab was brought out with her entire family. She was grafted into Israel, not as a servant, not as a charity case, but as a full member of God's covenant people. She married a man named Solomon, a prince of the tribe of Judah, according to some traditions. She bore a son named Boaz. The same Boaz who would later redeem Ruth and become an ancestor of King David. Rehab the prostitute become became the mother of Boaz, the grandmother of Obed, the great-grandmother of Jesse, and the great-great-grandmother of King David. She's named in Matthew 1 in the genealogy of Jesus. She's named in Hebrews 11, the great hall of faith, alongside Abraham, Moses, and Gideon. She's the only person in that entire chapter identified by her former profession. And God left that identification in place permanently. Not to shame her, but to make a point that no one could miss. By faith, the prostitute Rahab, because she welcomed the spice, was not killed with those who were disobedient. Hebrews 11, verse 31. God did not erase Rahab's past when he transformed her. He left the record of what she had been so that every generation would know what his grace can do. He did not need to have her, he did not need her to have a clean history. He needed her to have to have faith. And that faith was enough to change her eternal address, her earthly legacy, and the entire trajectory of her family line. The woman who once opened her door for money, opened it one night for two strangers, and that act of faith landed her name in the bloodline of Jesus Christ. No profession, no history, no reputation is beyond the reach of God's grace. The very thing that marked your past, God can leave it in the record and use it as a testimony. Faith is the only credential God requires. Everything else he provides. When God redeems you, he does not just save you, He repositions your entire family line. Oh God, thank you for your grace. We are amazed why all your grace reached this woman, Rahab, and changed her from her life of prostitution, and made her a great grandmother of Jesus. Oh Father, this gives us hope because we know that we all have our stories, we all have our past, our history, we all have some secrets that we don't want anyone to know about what happened in the past. And we are happy to know that it matters not where we are from or what we have done when we receive your grace.

SPEAKER_00 10:42

Grace change us and make us into people who are useful to you.

SPEAKER_01 10:54

Thank you, Lord. May your grace continue to abound towards us and transform us to your name's honor and glory. Amen. God bless you, brothers and sisters.