God's Great Name

What is God doing? Why is God doing this? Why is God allowing this? Where is God? Does He care? These are questions that we ask in the midst of chaos, feeling like we're in danger when things are unpredictable. And let's just be honest, as Chris just led us through very well in prayer, this is the case for our nation. Nationally, we wonder who's going to be our next leader and what that's going to come to. What's going to come of this racial tension? Will it end? How will we care for those who are different, for those who are threatened? How will we help the police do their job? We could ask the church. God, where are you? What are you doing? Why does living as saints, as called by God, as those who are supposed to be united in Christ, why is it so difficult? Why is there always a difficult situation, a relationship? We could ask about our families. Why hasn't God provided a spouse? Why hasn't God provided children? God, why have you provided me this spouse? Why is my marriage not what it used to be or what I dreamed it would be? Why don't my children obey? You can ask God the same question at work. Why is my boss so difficult? Why are my employees so insubordinate? Why does this job feel like it's a dead end? Why don't I have a job? You can ask it personally. Why do I keep battling the same sin over and over and over again? Why am I always stuck in the same rut? Why do I always fall back into the same place? These are problems we all face. These are real life problems that everybody in this room identifies at some level with. And we should be asking God, God, how is this your plan? And how can I praise you in the midst of this being your plan? Because I hope what we see today, what's happening at the forefront, is not what necessarily God is up to. He's up to something even more deeper and more specific. And it's a plan of salvation. Things are not always as they appear. What we're gonna see is that God is always up to something, and it's always good, and it's always leading to us praising him. So our thesis this morning, the one thing I want us to see this morning from Joshua 2 is this, it's long. God saves great sinners to make much of his great love so that we can rejoice in his great name. God saves great sinners, that's us, those who sin much, so that we can make much of His great love, so that He can make much of His great love, so that we can rejoice in His great name. The end of all is to praise Him for all that He's doing. Now, if you're new with us, we usually walk through books of the Bible, and last week we started Joshua. We finished Joshua 1, so this week we're going to be looking at Joshua 2. If you're using a pew Bible and if you don't have a Bible, please take that with you. It is God's word of life and salvation for you. The story we're reading is on page 178 and 179. 178, 179, and we're going to hear a story. about spies going into Jericho, about a prostitute protecting those spies, changing her allegiance from Jericho to Israel, and then those spies giving a report back. And I want you to see, as I read the story, the center of the story is the Canaanite prostitutes' confession of faith in God. Verses 9 to 14. We're gonna miss the point if we don't see that the center of this story, central to this story, is the Canaanite prostitutes' confession of faith in God. Hear the word of the Lord. And Joshua the son of Nun sent two men secretly from Shittim as spies, saying, go, view the land, especially Jericho. And they went and came to the house of a prostitute whose name was Rahab and lodged there. And it was told to the king of Jericho, behold, men of Israel have come here tonight to search out the land. And the king of Jericho sent to Rahab, saying, bring up the men who have come to you and who entered your house, for they have come to search out the land. But the woman had taken the two men and hidden them. And she said, true, the men came to me, but I did not know where they were from. And when the gate was about to be closed at dark, the men went out. I do not know where the men went. Pursue them quickly, for you will overtake them. But she had brought them up to the roof and hid them with the stalks of flax that she had laid in order on the roof. So the men pursued after them on the way to the Jordan as far as the fords, and the gate was shut as soon as the pursuers had gone out. Before the men lay down, she came up to them on the roof and said to them, I know that the Lord has given you the land, and that the fear of you has fallen upon us, and that all the inhabitants of the land melt away before you. For we have heard how the Lord dried up the water of the Red Sea before you when you came out of Egypt, and what you did to the two kings of the Amorites who were beyond the Jordan, to Sion and Og, whom you devoted to destruction. And as soon as we heard it, our hearts melted. There was no spirit left in any man because of you. For the Lord your God, He is God in the heavens above, and on the earth beneath. Now then, please swear to me by the Lord that as I have dealt kindly with you, you will also deal kindly with me, with my father's house, and give me a sure son, that you will save alive my father and mother, my brother and sisters, and all who belong to them, and deliver our lives from death. And the men said to her, Our life for yours even to death if you do not tell us this business of ours but Then when the Lord gives us the land we will do kindly and faithfully with you When she left them down by a rope through the window for her house was built into the city wall so that she lived in the wall and she said to them go into the hills or the pursuers will encounter you and Hide there three days until the pursuers have returned then afterward you may go your way the men said to her We will be guiltless with respect to this oath of yours that you have made us swear. Behold, when we come into the land, you shall tie this scarlet cord in the window through which you let us down, and you shall gather into your house your father and your mother, your brothers and all your father's household. Then if anyone goes out of the door of your house into the street, his blood shall be on his head, and we shall be guiltless. But if a hand is laid on anyone who is with you in the house, his blood shall be on our head. But if you tell this business of ours, then we shall be guiltless with respect to your oath that you have made us swear. And she said, according to your words, so be it. And she sent them away, and they departed, and she tied the scarlet cord in the window. They departed and went out into the hills and remained there three days until the pursuers returned. The pursuers searched all along the way and found nothing. Then the two men returned, they came down from the hills and passed over and came to Joshua, the son of Nun, and they told him all that had happened to them. And they said to Joshua, Truly, the Lord has given all the land into your hands. And also, all the inhabitants of the land melt away because of us. This morning I'm going to walk through a few points. The first is I just want to give a history of the spies in Canaan. There's a historical background that's very significant as we think about these spies. And then three basic points from the text itself. First, God's great name to the nations. God's great name to the nations. Second, God's great name to the unworthy. God's great name to the unworthy. Third, God's salvation by faith. God's great name to the nations. God's great name to the unworthy. And God's salvation by faith. Chapter 2 stands out as its own narrative. We see it as a self-contained unit. We need to remember that there's a previous spy campaign. 40 years earlier, Moses sent numerous spies, 12, to go into the land of Canaan to bring back a report. Well, most of those spies came back and they were terrified. Their hearts were melted. They came back and told Israel, These people are giants. Their cities are well fortified. We can't beat them. And God had told these people the same thing He had told this new generation, this previous generation. He told them, I'm going to fight for you. I'm with you. This land is yours. I'm giving it to you. And these spies came back, and they brought fear to the nation. And the nation refused to go up. And so God said, I'm going to send you in the wilderness for 40 years. So then they decided, all right, we'll go fight now. And God let them. be defeated in this fight. See, what we see here is 40 years prior, and this is in Numbers 13 if you wanna go look this up this afternoon, the people refused to go in and fight. Now, this is amazing. Think about who these people were 40 years ago. They had just seen God completely destroy the nation of Egypt through plagues. They had just stood at the Red Sea, afraid for their lives, saw the Red Sea part before them, walk on dry land, look back and see it destroy the army of Egypt. And now they're afraid of some big people with big city walls. They just saw God wipe out the greatest nation and army in all the world. They did not trust God. God orchestrated that spy campaign to show what was in these Israelites' hearts. They still didn't believe Him. They still didn't trust Him. They weren't willing to obey Him. They were not going to be God's people because they refused to worship Him. But now we have this campaign. Notice that Joshua sends two spies secretly, verse 1. He's learned from Moses, don't send a big campaign out and then let him come back and announce to everybody. He's learning, all right, we're gonna send two people secretly and you're gonna come back and report to me only, okay? We're gonna get the rumor bug out. We're gonna squash any kind of rumbling and grumbling about the people of Israel. Also see that he's designed this, this new generation, he's called them in the previous chapter, be strong and courageous. These spies are gonna go hear that the Canaanites, they also believe in God, that he's almighty and that he's gonna destroy them. Be strong and courageous. Go into the land. So Joshua 2. Let's look at our first point from the text. God's great name to the nations. God's great name to the nations. I believe this is the main focus of the story. You heard the story read. It's not really that well of a told story. It's not a great story. Most of what we see here is mere fact, right? It's kind of bland. It doesn't tell us what the spies are thinking on the roof. It doesn't kind of put us in their shoes as they're scared. It doesn't give us a lot of clarity as to what they're thinking and what they're doing. It's really just mere fact-telling almost. Until we get to Rahab. And all the words this Canaanite prostitute is given in scripture. The main point is that God said, I'm going to save this woman and her household because I'm a great God of love. I will have someone from every tribe and every people who will praise me. God is at work to save a prostitute. The spies are merely a setting. The spy campaign, merely a setting so that God can demonstrate what a great God of salvation He is. Again, the beginning and the end, it's just telling facts. Other than the end declaration of the spies to Joshua, yes, the land is ours. Let's just spend some time in the central part of the text, 9 through 13. Nine through 13. This is the key confession. Look at verse nine. And she said to them, I know that the Lord has given you the land. If you were here last week, you remember the first reason that God said be strong and courageous? Because I'm giving you the land. God says, just believe me, I've promised you the land, I'm going to give you the land. Be strong and courageous and go get it. Now this Canaanite prostitute, she has confidence, she knows it. She has faith in the God of Israel. God is giving you the land. Look at the second half of 9. And that the fear of you has fallen upon us, and that all the inhabitants of the land melt away before you. See, there's two sides of this that God has given us. He is strong and mighty. Be strong and courageous, Israel, because I am fighting for you. The inhabitants, they're fearful because they know God is fighting for Israel. She makes it clear that the inhabitants, they've heard of what God has done. That's verse 10. We've heard about your God. We heard what he did to Egypt. We heard what he did to the other kings. Our hearts have melted. The Canaanites have heard of what God has done and they believe he must be God. Here's what's sad. The previous generation of Israel, they saw what God had done and still did not believe he was God. Now this generation of Israelites, they have heard their parents speak of it. They experienced God's care and provision. They're being called and they're being encouraged by this Canaanite testimony and confession of faith, being strong and courageous. Look at her conclusion. And as soon as we heard, our hearts melted, and there was no spirit left in any man because of you, for, for the Lord your God, for Yahweh your God, the covenant name of God. What she says here is very powerful. He is the God of the heavens above and on the earth beneath. Yahweh, He's the one true God. There are no other gods. This would be the kind of declaration that most Canaanites would have attributed to Baal or some other idol. But here she's saying, no, He is a God above all gods. He is the great and mighty God. He is the only one worthy to be worshipped. He will win no matter what He seeks to accomplish. And then 12 to 13 are her requests. Please save me and my family. This is an amazing confession of faith given who it's coming from and who it's being told to. God has orchestrated that a Canaanite prostitute is going to make a very strong, clear confession of faith to Israelite military spies to go back to Israel so that they would be encouraged. So that they would see that God is giving them the land. 15 through 21 are the end kind of instructions and tie a scarlet cord in your window Whenever we see it, we will relent of any judgment on that house. And she accepts the terms of promises. They part ways. We need to realize something that as God is working, his works reverberate. God has been acting for Israel for the purpose of making sure all the nations will hear. We can go back to Genesis 12 and see, Abraham, every nation will be blessed through you. We go back and we look at Exodus 14. God says, I'm going to crush the Egyptian army so that the Egyptians will know that I'm God. Deuteronomy 4, he says, Israel, be the holy nation I've called you to be. Be obedient so that when all other nations come and see you, they'll know that I'm the God. Be a light so that all the nations will see. Remember those first spies in the rebellion of Israel, that was Numbers 13? In Numbers 14, God says this, I have pardoned according to your word, but truly as I live and as all the earth shall be filled with the glory of the Lord. God says, I will fill this earth with my glory, which means it has to run throughout all the nations, all the peoples. God's plan has always been for everyone to hear of his great works and for those he calls to himself to believe. As Israel comes to land, we see this great work of grace. His word does not return void. He saves Israel, the people, but here we see him saving this woman. And as I read those passages about Israel and Genesis, all the nations will be blessed by you. Deuteronomy, all the nations come see you. Church, we have to realize something about who we are. We're the elected people of God. Were they called out by God? Not because of our nationality, not because of our race, not because we're good, not because we're better, but because God just simply said, I'm going to love you? And God never says, I'm gonna call you to sit there and just enjoy being called. He calls us so that we will then be a people that spread his glory to other people. You're never called just to enjoy being called. You're called for a purpose, to be proclaimers of the grace and the glory and the light of God to all nations. So as we think about this, how are we as a church focused on thinking about how we are going to make sure we realize we're called for the purpose of seeing God's glory go out to all peoples? How are we going to avoid our holy huddles that keep us just focused on ourselves? How are we going to think, we as a church need to be about the business of God, and he's gonna be about saving people we don't recognize, and we will be surprised, but we should always recognize God is gonna be doing something awesome, something unexpected. We may be praying for certain folks to be saved, but God is going to bring those that are oftentimes unexpected, like a Canaanite prostitute. The church, we're called to believe, we're called to obey, and we're called to proclaim. I think the church has been weak because we simply stop at believe. The church is oftentimes weak because we simply stop at believe. We don't focus on obeying. We don't focus on proclaiming. Yes, believe in God. Faith alone and Christ alone will save you, but you cannot claim to love God if you do not keep Christ's commandments. And one of those commandments is to make me known by the way you treat one another, by the way you treat your neighbor, with the words of the gospel. So continue to think about God's great name. Let's turn to not just God's great name among the nations, among all peoples, but God's great name to the unworthy. Now, I really want to help you see the way I'm interpreting this text in that these spies are merely a setting. So here's round two. The spies are so unnecessary for what God is going to do to Jericho, they're clearly the setting. Think about it. They didn't come back to Joshua and say, well, Joshua, we looked at the walls and we think with the right cadence and acoustics, we should march around, blow trumpets, and the walls will fall down. That's how God takes down Jericho. The spies are completely unnecessary for how God is going to take this city down. God's plan has nothing to do with what the spies report. They are unnecessary for the military campaign that God is doing. They are necessary for Rahab to be saved. God didn't need spies. doesn't need us at all, but he incorporates us. And the military strategy, quite frankly, is surprising. But here we see he saves all kinds of sinners. The setting is a spies, I hope you see that. And God is about saving this Canaanite, who's a woman, who's a prostitute. We're gonna walk through those three because I want us to see that God is about saving all different kinds of people. God is about saving the woman who at this story is an insignificant person in society. Let me explain that when I get there. And then she's a prostitute. She's despised in her community. So first, God is saving all people. The Canaanites are a wicked people. They practice human sacrifice. They were not the race and the nation that God called, but God said, I want to save one. What we need to realize is that the skin color, the nationality, the language, that doesn't keep God from loving anybody. Our sin is what brings God's judgment on us. God chooses to love us despite our sin, and he wants to love all different people. Now, it's also amazing, God chose not to wipe out these people entirely, because he chose to save Rahab. Not only did he choose to save Rahab, Rahab is mentioned a number of times in the New Testament. One of them is Matthew 1.5. Those of you familiar with the New Testament, you can flip there very quickly. Matthew 1 is a genealogy, and we don't really think about those a whole lot because we don't see the importance of them, but I want you to notice something. God put a Canaanite prostitute in the line of Jesus, the Messiah. There's a scarlet thread that goes from Genesis 3 to Jesus that says, I promise son, I promise son, I promise son, born of a woman, born of a woman, born of a man, born of a man, born of Judah, so forth. And in the midst of that line, God says, I'm going to show you how great I am. I'm going to insert a Canaanite prostitute. She's not just saved, she's forever remembered. God has great love for great sinners. Now, she's saved by faith. We need to realize that being in the line of Jesus also means she's saved by Jesus. See, there is no salvation apart from Christ. Everyone who is ever saved is saved because of Christ. Because God looks at us, and he sees all of us are sinners, and being a just God, he's going to have to punish us as sinners. And so if we do not repent, if you're not a Christian, if you do not believe in Jesus, you are a sinner, you've lied, you've stolen, you've rejected God, God will punish you for your sin. Unless you look to Christ, his perfect son, who did not sin, and whom he looks at and says, I will put the sins of everyone who believes in you on you, I will judge them on you on the cross, and they're paid for, and now we can be forgiven. You're not a Christian this morning. This is what you must believe. God is holy and just. We are sinners. He has sent his son so that we can be forgiven of our sin, so that he can punish sin and yet still say, I love you and I forgive you. We must believe in Jesus. The second thing I want us to see about the story that it's important to know that God chose to save a woman. Women in this culture would have been seen as an insignificant person in society, a second-class citizen at best. And let me be very clear, God made every woman and every man with equal dignity and honor. Every man and every woman is created in the image of God. The problem with our history of sin is that men have oftentimes ignored, neglected, and outright denied the dignity of women. They were not esteemed in this culture. But that's what God said, I'm going to go and save. Think about it. Who would you go save if you could save one person in a city? Probably the king. the person with the most power of persuasion, the most authoritative and important person in the city. Maybe the priest, the most religious, the most spiritual. God says, I'm going to go save this woman. I'm going to go save this woman who feels insignificant, who's treated as insignificant, and I'm going to show her that I, God, think she is significant because I created her for the most important task in all the world, Worship me. Friends, it's really easy to battle with insignificance. We see here that God sees every human being as important with dignity. He created us for his worship. If we wrestle with this, it's because we're looking for identity and our significance in something not God. If you're not a Christian and you're wrestling with insignificance, you're seeking to make something else your God, but God says, I've made you for the most important task in all the world. If you believe in Christ, you can begin worshiping me, which is what you've been created for. Every human life has significance, and the most significant thing we can do is praise God. Finally, and even most pointedly, God saved the Canaanite, He saves a woman, she's a prostitute. She sells her body to men for sex. She's forsaken God's design for monogamous relationships. She's forsaken God's design for sex in general. She's probably even participating in idolatry. Most temples had temple prostitutes. Most prostitutes were related to some kind of idolatry. This is a sad place for a woman to find herself. She's usually despised in culture. She usually feels little self-worth. God said, I'm going to save you. The most despised, the most despicable. This is just like God. He doesn't go to the proud and the important and the powerful. He goes to the lowly. He goes to the one who needs help and he shows his great love by loving someone who's a great sinner so that we can say, your name is great. God saves great sinners. We all have to realize we're great sinners. I always like to meet new folks and ask them their testimonies. And usually they say, well, tell us your testimonies. And usually Lisa and I are together Something that always frustrates me, and sorry if I'm picking on you if this happened, it always kind of annoys me when people say to me, wow, your testimony's so great. No, it's not. You see, I'm like Rahab. I wasn't a prostitute, but I have no moral high ground to judge her by. My wife came to Christ as a very young person. She followed Christ from a very young age and did not make the foolish mistakes I made throughout my life. I came to Christ as a older person. I made a lot of foolish mistakes, and I was a horrible person. And God showed his great love by loving me, and he showed his great love by loving my wife. He is great to save all kinds of sinners, and every salvation is radical. It's just some of us have gone and rejected Christ so much and have more consequences. It's more obvious to many. Youth, I want to speak directly to you about something. You do not need to be more sinful to make much of Christ and to see his great love. You're sinful enough right now. Your rebellion against your parents, your rejection of their authority, you're not listening, you're not obeying, that's plenty of sin. Believe now that you can be saved. Believe now that Christ can wash away your sin, that He can set you on a path so that you can avoid these sinful, horrible consequences of rejecting Him. Believe now. His grace is sufficient. He will make much of His name through you. Christian, if you're caught up in sin right now, if you're beaten and need help, His grace is sufficient for you. If you believed in Christ and you're asking, how can I still love him after I know what I'm supposed to do, but I've rejected him, his grace is sufficient. Your sin does not change his love. It's not that powerful. He loved you while you were a sinner. He's not gonna stop loving you because you sinned. Your sin merely keeps you from enjoying his love. God doesn't stop loving you. Your sin merely keeps you from enjoying his love. And if you really want the help from God, you cry out for it and you get ready for something painful. Because oftentimes what we've done is we've believed in an idol, we've loved it, we've put it next to us like it's a beloved friend and God's gonna have to rip it out and it's gonna hurt. Repentance hurts, but it's getting rid of that sin that's keeping us from God. While we're focused on the great gospel of God, I wanna think about a sin problem. I wanted to assure you three basic points, and the third one is where I wanna spend some time. As we look at this story and the sovereignty of God in sending the spies to save Rahab, the whole picture of God is sovereign over all of this to bring about a great salvation, Remember, He is sovereign over my sin. Praise God, He is more powerful than my sin. He can forgive me a great sinner. He can deliver me a great sinner. He can keep me from my great sin. Second, God is sovereign over my neighbor's sin. God is sovereign over my neighbor's sin. God provides for me. He protects me. He is sovereign over all the things that are happening, and he keeps other people from being as sinful as they could be. Third, God is sovereign when people's sin seems completely out of control. That's where we are as a nation right now. It feels like it's out of control. The fear, the anger, The desire for retribution, the images we see of young men being shot, as Chris said, it isn't clear how that was justified. And sadly, it happens to black men. And it happens over and over again, and it feels scary. It feels like it's out of control, and we can feel helpless, but I want to focus you on the gospel, and this isn't the end of what needs to be said, let me assure you of that. But I want to give us a starting point. We have to believe this most basic point. We heard it all through Romans. The gospel is the power of God to save sinners. Okay, sin is hating somebody because they're different. Sin is hating somebody because they're different. Sin is being suspicious of somebody because they're different. Sin is being suspicious of somebody because they're different. We are all sinners and we all have to look to Him and His power to save us as sinners. This is the call of the church. We're supposed to be proactively promoting peace because we are the ambassadors of the King of Peace. We are supposed to be proactively promoting peace because we're the ambassadors of the King of Peace. So, first, Trust God to be the one who brings about vengeance. He's a just and holy God. Trust Him with a retaliation. Trust Him, don't take justice into your own hands. Second, know that prayer makes a bigger difference than a protest. We get to call God, who is sovereign over all things, Father. We get to entrust him with our well-being, with our safety, with the police safety, with all things. Prayer makes more of a difference than protest. We need to be praying for peace, pray for the police, pray for the racist, pray for those who are different races, especially the black people, as Chris just modeled and was helpful. It reminds me, I hope this analogy works. Sorry, I'm a theologian, so this is where I go, but Martin Luther, And the Reformation said the church's responsibility is to always defend the one doctrine that's being attacked. It doesn't matter how we think it's small or insignificant. If there's a doctrine that's being attacked, the church must be loud and defend it. Friends, if there's a people group being attacked, we must be loud and defend them. Every human is made in the image of God. If our fellow black citizens, if our black brothers and sisters feel under attack, we need to be able to proactively pursue promoting peace for them. The best way to do this is to proactively pursue them to befriend. If somebody's different, that's not a reason not to like them and to pursue them. The church needs to be a place where this happens. Church, we should ask, is there something about us that makes us predominantly white? Because this isn't supposed to be a white church. It's supposed to be a gospel church. This is supposed to be a church where we're united around one thing and one thing only, and it's that God has saved us as sinners. If there's something culturally about us that doesn't invite and welcome and make other people of other backgrounds and other colors of skin feel like they can't be here, we've gotta change something. Because the church is supposed to be of rich, of poor, old, young, black, white. That diversity of the church is supposed to be a picture that the gospel is the power of God to save sinners and bring peace to a world that does not know it. So pray, practically pursue to care, and trust God to be the judge. The last thing I want to look at is probably what we've all been waiting to hear, and that is God's salvation by faith. God's salvation by faith. And I say we all been waiting to hear because Joshua 2 is, if you take a Christian ethics course, it's usually like the paradigm of a difficult passage, like it's the bugaboo for many, right? Because Rahab, she lies about what she knows, right? She said, I don't know where they came from, I don't know where they went. She sends the spies one way, she sends the police the other. So it's a bugaboo for many people, and I wanna just be very clear about what she does, okay? Rahab committed treason. That's usually an offense sufferable by death. Rahab has committed treason. She has denied knowledge that she had to protect these spies. She misled the authorities. She rejected her people and has committed herself to Israel. She's committed treason. She has done so because she believes Israel God is a true God and Jericho has been worshiping a false God. Now, it's difficult to wrestle through, like, was it a justifiable lie? Was it a lie at all? What happened? I think we just need to look at the New Testament interpretation of what happened, okay? What we need to do is actually ask God's own interpretation of these events, what He says about them. So let's go back to Hebrews 11. Hebrews 11. Let's look and see what the author of Hebrews affirms. By faith, the walls of Jericho fell down. I'm sorry, this is on page 1008 in your pew Bible or just the bulletin. By faith, the walls of Jericho fell down after they had been encircled for seven days. By faith, Rahab the prostitute did not perish with those who were disobedient because she had given a friendly welcome to the spot. Okay, we see she's saved by faith, right? By faith Rahab did this, and that's why she trusts Christ. But that faith is highlighted by the fact that she welcomed the Spahs. She said, yes, come into my home, I will protect you, I will help you. Now, that just tells us that she was bringing allegiance to them, but merely welcoming them. James 2 is actually a little more pointed. James 2. This is on page 1012, so just a couple pages over, 1012. I'm going to begin in verse 24. You see that a person is justified by works and not by faith alone. And that same way was not also Rahab the prostitute justified by works when she received messengers and sent them out another way. He's making a particular argument. Your faith is always demonstrated by your life. Your faith isn't just a lot of ideas that you like. Your faith actually changes you to have a different behavior. And her faith has the works of receiving and sending them out. It looks as if James is actually condoning her treason. She changed her allegiance from Jericho to Israel. She's saved by her faith in God, and that faith led her to commit to the people of God rather than the people of Jericho. And this is all to make his name great. Now, you're gonna have a lot of ethical questions. You can ask those in your home groups tonight. But God does affirm, it looks like, from James 2, that treason was the right thing to do by faith because she's committing herself to God and his people. One last thing. The spies tell her to hang a scarlet cord from a window. Now, many people have made much of this scarlet cord, and I've wrestled with what this means, and I do think that this does point us to Christ, right? So, a scarlet cord, that's red, okay? It's the color of blood. If we look back just 40 years earlier, the Israelites were commanded to take the blood of a sacrificed lamb, to wipe it over the door mantle, and that blood, that scarlet color, was a testimony for every household. So that when the judgment of God went over the households of Israel, He passed over them. They were saved because that color red from the lamb was assigned to God. This is a household committed to God. The judgment will pass over them. The scarlet cord functions the same way. It's a scarlet red color. It's in the window, and it's a symbol the judgment of God will pass over this home. The judgment of God will not fall on this home. The judgment of God is going to pass over them. She'll be saved. And if we broaden out, we know that the Lamb, the blood of the Lamb always points us to Christ. We know Rahab is saved. We know that no one is saved apart from the blood of Christ. You see, when Jesus Christ died on the cross for her sins, He died for the sins of Rahab, for her prostitution, for every lie she ever told. He died for her, just like He dies for us. No one is saved apart from Christ. And if you're not a Christian, when the judgment of God comes, it's not going to pass over you, it's going to fall on you. Unless you believe in Christ, and let His blood not just cover you, but it washes away your sin. It shows God you've believed in Him, and it now makes you a beloved child of God. As we conclude, God is always up to something. We rarely see it on a face value, but when we do hear of it, we praise him because he's always in the work of salvation. He's always good and trustworthy. He's always making much of his name by saving sinners so that we know his great love. Will you pray with me? Father, we praise and we thank you for your kindness. We thank you for this story of Rahab that we as sinners can identify with her. We're not Israelites. We're not born in the right family. We're insignificant. We're despised. We've rebelled against you. We've rejected you. And yet you have said, I will love you. I will save you. Help us to make much of your great salvation by praising your great name. In Jesus' name we pray, amen.