Rahab lived long ago in Jericho, a great walled city just west of the Jordan river. She had not been a good woman; in fact, she had lived a very sinful life in a wicked city that God had marked out for judgment. Still God had His eye upon her; she was an object of His mercy. Jericho is a picture of this world and its wickedness, upon which the judgment of God is soon to fall; “He hath appointed a day, in the which He will judge the world in righteousness.” Acts 17:3131Because he hath appointed a day, in the which he will judge the world in righteousness by that man whom he hath ordained; whereof he hath given assurance unto all men, in that he hath raised him from the dead. (Acts 17:31). Rahab is a picture of those who are saved by grace from the wrath to come; “For by grace are ye saved through faith; and that not of yourselves: it is the gift of God; not of works, lest any man should boast.” Eph. 2: 8.
Before crossing the Jordan, Joshua, the leader of the armies of Israel, had sent spies into the land. When these two men came to Jericho they lodged at Rahab’s house. She knew they were spies and hid them up on the roof under the flax. When the king of Jericho sent men to her saying, “Bring forth the men that are come to thee,” she lied, saying that the men had already left the city under cover of darkness. They pursued after them all the way to the Jordan, but could not find them.
Rahab said to the two men, “I know that the Lord hath given you the land, and that your terror has fallen upon us, and that all the inhabitants of the land faint because of you.” She had heard of how God had brought His people out of Egypt with a strong hand, had dried up the waters of the Red Sea, and of how they had destroyed two great kings on the east bank of the Jordan. Rahab knew that Jericho was doomed, and that it was folly to attempt to fight against God.
Through faith, she saw that Israel were a poor despised people but that God was with them. And she decided that from henceforth Jehovah would be her God, and that she would cast in her lot with His people. Now she knew that her life depended upon the lives of those two men, and she asked of them a pledge. “I pray you, swear unto me by the LORD, since I have showed you kindness, that ye will also show kindness unto my father’s house, and give me a true token: and that ye will save alive my father, and my mother, and my brethren, and my sisters, and all that they have, and deliver our lives from death.”
The anxious sinner too wants a pledge that he or she will be safe in the day of judgment. God’s answer is Christ, a living Saviour, who passed through death and judgment for us, but who rose victorious from the dead and lives again forever at God’s right hand. “Who was delivered for our offenses, and was raised again for our justification.” Rom. 4:2525Who was delivered for our offences, and was raised again for our justification. (Romans 4:25).
The men pledged themselves to save Rahab’s life and her household; so “she let them down by a cord through the window,” and they escaped. But before they went they told her, saying, “Thou shalt bind this line of scarlet thread in the window,” and the lives of all who were found under the shelter of that scarlet line would be spared. However, they told her, if any ventured out into the streets, when the city fell, then they would perish.
Rahab did not wait for the armies of Israel to surround the walls of the doomed city. She bound the scarlet line in the window at once. That was her pledge of safety. She got busy too and became an ardent soul winner, persuading her father and mother, her brothers and sisters to come under the shelter of the scarlet line.
Surely, as God had said, three days later, the children of Israel, led by Joshua, crossed the Jordan and were soon marching around the walls of Jericho. “Jericho was straightly shut up.” In the midst of the men of Israel went the ark, the symbol of Jehovah’s presence, borne on the shoulders of the priests. The priests of the Lord went before the ark, blowing on the trumpets of rams horns, every blast sounding forth the notes of judgment. Once a day for seven days, they marched around the city, and on the seventh day they marched seven times around, for God is a God of mercy and gives men time to repent. At the seventh time, when the priests blew with the trumpets, the people shouted with a great shout, and those great walls suddenly fell flat, so that every man went straight up before him; “and they took the city.” Jericho was completely destroyed, and its inhabitants perished.
Yet was there one place of safety on the wall, and that was where the scarlet line hung in the window. For Joshua had instructed the two spies to go in and bring out Rahab, her father and mother, her brethren and all that she had, and they were saved, according to the Word of the Lord.
Dear friend, like Jericho of old, this world which rejects God and has put to death His beloved Son, is soon to come under His awful judgment. Then as now, there will only be one place of refuge, like the scarlet line in Rahab’s window. The blood of Christ affords a place of safety for all who come under its shelter. God tells us in His word, “When I see the blood I will pass over you.” Exo. 12:2323For the Lord will pass through to smite the Egyptians; and when he seeth the blood upon the lintel, and on the two side posts, the Lord will pass over the door, and will not suffer the destroyer to come in unto your houses to smite you. (Exodus 12:23). Do not go on with this doomed world any longer, and perish. Don’t trifle with eternal realities; but like Rahab seek at once the shelter of the blood of Christ and be safe forever. The Lord is coming!
ML 08/20/1967