Day Thirty five  -  A Character study on Rahab

Hebrews 11:31 By faith the harlot Rahab perished not with them that believed not, when she had received the spies with peace.

                  Rahab is an unlikely candidate as an illustration of faith.  She was a prostitute who lived in the pagan city of Jericho.  Rahab needed grace because she was a sinner,  and yet  we are all sinners and we are all saved the same way that Rahab was saved.  We were just as lost as she was.  We are all saved “by grace through faith.”  Her salvation is a clear indication of her faith. 

Rahab was rebelling against the religion,  the culture,  and the philosophy of her people.  She saw serious flaws in their belief system.  Her testimony reveals,

Joshua 2:10  For we have heard how the LORD dried up the water of the Red sea for you, when ye came out of Egypt; and what ye did unto the two kings of the Amorites, that were on the other side Jordan, Sihon and Og, whom ye utterly destroyed.

11  And as soon as we had heard these things, our hearts did melt, neither did there remain any more courage in any man, because of you: for the LORD your God, he is God in heaven above, and in earth beneath.

She heard the reports of the power of the God of Israel.  She must have seen the weakness of her own gods and came to the conclusion that Jehovah, the God of Israel, was the God in heaven and the God on earth.  Some of her works that showed the depth of her faith included:

1. Receiving the spies

2. Hiding them

3. Protecting them from the king who heard that they had come

4. Letting them down from the roof with a scarlet cord

5. Asking for the salvation of herself and her family

We know from the genealogy of Christ that she married a man by the name of Salmon and their son was the Boaz in the book of Ruth,  the great grandfather of King David.  God blessed her faith.  She was once a sinner,  but became a testimony of God’s greatness by grace through faith.

An Exercise to increase our Faith:  Read Joshua 1 and 2.  Underline the words and deeds of Rahab that showed her faith in the LORD God.  What is amazing about her faith compared to the faith of the people of Israel?  Of all the people alive in Israel after the conquering of Jericho,  only two are mentioned as men or women of faith,  Joshua and Rahab.