SUNDAY, OCTOBER 14
Scripture: Joshua 2:2-24

In Joshua 2:2-24 the spies went into Rahab’s house. While there, the King of Jericho apparently had informants in the neighborhood. He sent to Rahab and said, “Bring out the men who have come to you, who have entered your house, for they have come to search out all the country.” All of a sudden, not only the mission but the life of the spies was on the line. Whatever Rahab decided to do was going to determine the outcome of this war against Jericho. Verses 4-6 tell us what she did. “Then the woman took the two men and hid them. So she said, ‘Yes, the men came to me, but I did not know where they were from. And it happened as the gate was being shut, when it was dark, that the men went out. Where the men went I do not know; pursue them quickly, for you may overtake them.’ But she had brought them up to the roof and hidden them with the stalks of flax, which she had laid in order on the roof.” Rahab saved the spies and then because she lived on the wall of the city, she helped them escape by lowering them down the wall with a rope through a window. She also made them promise that they would save her and her family when Israel made its attack. So they made an oath. Verses 17-18 state, “So the men said to her: ‘We will be blameless of this oath of yours which you have made us swear, unless, when we come into the land, you bind this line of scarlet cord in the window through which you let us down, and unless you bring your father, your mother, your brothers, and all your father’s household to your own home. So it shall be that whoever goes outside the doors of your house into the street, his blood shall be on his own head, and we will be guiltless. And whoever is with you in the house, his blood shall be on our head if a hand is laid on him.’” Rahab’s belief in Israel’s Mighty God and her treatment of the spies gained the salvation of her entire house. Rahab knew that her whole city was afraid of the Israelites and she related that information to the spies. Rahab not only provided safety and shelter but she also told them exactly what to do to successfully escape. The testimony of the two spies as they returned to Israel’s encampment inspired great faith in Joshua and in the whole army.