Rahab - The Faith of a Prostitute - The Book of Joshua

Hey, I'm Pastor Steve Hole.

I want to empower you today to walk in your true identity as a worshiper and warrior.

Today, embrace the power of God's Word and the Holy Spirit.

Welcome to the Born for War podcast.

Well, we're in the book of Joshua church, and we are looking at an interesting story.

So we're going to get halfway through it today, and then next week we'll pick it up again.

And it's about a woman named Rahab who is a prostitute.

And can you imagine that the Bible gives a whole chapter to a prostitute?

It does.

And it gives us a glimpse into a woman's life of someone who's getting saved.

A lot of times we talk about the conversion as if it were only an event that we experience, but I think we see in Rahab's life and in this story of the nation of Israel going into the promised land that there was a process of Rahab coming to know Christ.

And it's kind of embryonic and it's a little bit hidden in the verses, and I hope I can unpack it in a way that you'll understand.

But we're in chapter 1, verse 10.

So last week we talked about the importance, the power, the anointing of being strong and courageous.

So we're going to pick it up at verse 10.

Then Joshua commanded the officers of the people, saying, verse 11, pass through the camp and command the people, saying, prepare provisions for yourselves.

For within three days you will cross over this Jordan to go in to possess the land which the Lord your God is giving you to possess.

Now, the operable phrase here is prepare provisions for yourself.

Remember that for 40 years, Israel has not had to prepare provisions.

God's given them manna from heaven.

God is giving them water out of rocks, and he's prepared them every day for all the provisions that they need.

But this is the first time they've heard.

One of the first things that Joshua does is he says, prepare provisions.

You're gonna have to have the food to eat.

You're gonna have to steward the resources around you.

Now they're on the east side right now of the Jordan River, which is where the cows of Bashin are in Scripture.

Very green grasslands, very fertile.

There is what they need there.

That's why God put them there.

It's because of the grasslands and the streams coming off the Jordan, as well as the tributaries off of that.

But he says, prepare provisions.

Now, here's what's interesting about our lives is that in our lives, you could maybe say there's spiritual adolescence.

And that's where God just kind of seems to just give you everything you pray for.

It's amazing.

Usually in those early days, as a Jesus follower, it's miracle after miracle after miracle.

You get visions and dreams.

You meet people.

It's amazing.

And then there's this ebb.

Anyone know what I'm talking about?

Okay, there's this ebb, and it doesn't seem to work out quite the way it did before.

Guess what?

God's taking you out of adolescence into adulthood.

You gotta grow up.

So God is so gracious so many times in our life when we can't quite take it, we can't quite handle it, and He just does it.

And then we think it's always gonna be that way.

And then we realize that God actually hones us best, actually, through difficulties and failure.

And that's what's about to happen to Israel.

They're gonna have to go in and prepare their own provisions.

They're gonna have to go in and they're gonna have to plow the fields, and they're gonna have to pick the vines, and they're gonna have to plant the vines.

There's gonna be a new level of adulthood in their discipleship with the Lord, and that's true in your lives, and that's true in my life.

And I remember several phases in my journey where first it was the salvation, you know, that first year of coming to know Christ at Georgia, and then first coming into the things of the power of the Holy Spirit, the power of the Holy Spirit, and the baptism of the Holy Spirit and power.

And then there was this period of just like amazing stuff.

And then it was being introduced to visions and dreams, and then God giving visions and dreams and leading us in all these amazing ways.

And now here we are today, and it's all boring.

No, that's not true.

But I will say that we now exercise a level of faith that doesn't have to have a sign and a wonder, doesn't have to have a vision and a dream, because we now have, listen, we now have enough of a library and a diary, as it were, of walking with God that we know the right thing to do.

Before you didn't know what to do.

You needed a sign.

You're always asking for anybody always asking for signs?

Quit doing that.

Okay.

We give you, it's okay for a while, but then there's a point where it's prepare provisions.

Because God's got new land.

God's got a new promised land for each of us in this room, and he says, prepare provisions for that.

Right now, it's April, it's almost April, 2025.

A year ago, we had a dream, and we talked about this black wave coming.

And then about three weeks ago, I shared more detail.

Liz then on that Sunday night shared the dream, which we decided not to post.

So many of you were asking about the posting of that meeting.

I decided not to post it because I've got a lot of enemies in Colorado Springs.

So, Antifa and some Satanists and stuff have regularly come against me personally.

I didn't need to give them any new ammunition.

Okay, if you missed it, you've been hearing about it at least for now a year.

Church, everybody look at me.

Prepare provisions.

I don't know how many times we have to say it, right?

We've had two seminars on how to prepare.

I've shared the last couple weeks to prepare.

Be ready.

There's going to be some things coming, and God is bringing a kingdom of God revolution to our country.

And it's going to be humbling at first.

There's going to be a great humbling coming.

Choose your king.

Church, choose your king.

So that's what's happening here.

Joshua is basically saying, choose your king.

Prepare provisions.

We're going to go in.

We're going to take the promised land.

We're going to possess this land.

But get ready, be prepared.

Man is not coming anymore.

The stream's coming out of rocks, not happening anymore.

Now you're stewarding with me.

When I pray at the Capitol on Friday morning, I'm going to begin with a prayer of the power and the majesty of God.

And then my prayer will be to the representatives partner with God.

Partner with God, and you will be blessed.

I don't think people will be clapping.

But thank you.

Verse 12, and to the Reubenites and the Gadites and the half-tribe of Manasseh, Joshua spoke, saying, verse 13, remember the word which Moses, the servant of the Lord, commanded you, saying, The Lord your God is giving you rest and is giving you this land.

Your wives, your little ones, your livestock shall remain in the land which Moses gave you on this side of the Jordan.

But you shall pass before your brethren armed, all your mighty men of valor, and help them until the Lord has given your brethren rest, as he gave you, and they also have taken possession of the land which the Lord your God is giving them, then you shall return to the land of your possession, enjoy it, which Moses' servant gave you on this side of the Jordan toward the sunrise.

Now, here's a little bit of background here.

Basically, what happened was when Israel came to the east side of the Jordan River.

So remember Jericho and the promised lands, the west side.

So on the east side, they're there.

It's current-day Jordan.

If you know your geography, that's where the nation of Jordan is at.

And it's the land of Bashin.

It's the land of Bashan.

And in the scriptures, the land of Bashan speaks of the fat cows of Bashan.

It was very fertile.

It was very green.

It was a beautiful farmland area, a place where you could do grazing and you could also raise livestock.

So then Reuben and Gad and the half-tribe of Manasseh came to Moses and said, We want this land.

We don't want to go in.

We don't want to go in and take that land with everybody else.

We want this land.

And Moses gets kind of ticked off at them.

Like, what are you doing?

This is, we need all 12 tribes to go in.

And they said, Well, wait, no, no, no.

We're not saying we won't go fight.

We just don't want to go there because we like what we have here.

And so there was an agreement made with the Reubenites, the Gadites, half tribe of Manasseh, that they would be given this land.

So they're sitting on the land that these three tribes have gotten.

And Joshua concerned because he wants to make sure they remember look, you guys, it's not okay to sit back and not protect the rest of the tribes of Israel as we go in.

We're going to fight together, get your men armed and ready to go.

They said, yes, that's what we're going to do.

And they're going to respond in just a second.

Here's the thing to note here.

So many times, church, the place where we're at is fertile.

And it's good.

And it's wonderful.

And yet something in your spirit knows that you're called to something more.

But the biggest enemy of our calling can often be convenience.

What's most convenient can actually be the greatest hindrance to the true calling of God.

And so that's what the Gadites are going to do.

That's what the Reubenites are going to do.

And that's what the half-tribe of Manasseh is going to do, is they're going to compromise because of convenience.

You say, well, how do you know that, Steve?

Maybe that was exactly where God wanted to be.

Because I know the rest of the Bible.

So when the Assyrians came, guess who were the first tribes that were taken captive?

The Gadites, the Reubenites, and the half tribe of Manasseh, because they weren't protected by the rest of the tribes.

Now, why is that important?

That's important right now for us.

Because I'm telling you beforehand, prophetically, things are going to happen in 2025 that are going to surprise us.

We have to stick together.

You can't be on the east side of the Jordan.

You got to be on the west side in the promised land with us in a small group with some bloodstained allies, or it's going to be hell to pay.

You need each other.

We need the church.

We need to hang together.

We need people who've got our sicks, people who've got our back.

Are you hearing what I'm saying?

I'm challenging you.

It's interesting that this is the passage we're on at this time in history.

Because we're about to enter into a new work of God in our nation.

I believe that there's going to be such a move of God, either beginning and ending or being orchestrated in 2025.

It could happen all in this year.

That they will look back and they'll say, that was before 2025.

Some say before Trump and after Trump.

I don't know.

But I believe President Trump's going to be humbled and then he's going to come out a praying man.

He's going to come out a new guy.

There's going to be a work of God.

And we're seeing, you hear it?

You see, you can feel it.

You can see it.

Whoever would come in and begin to reveal the secrets of the deep state like we're seeing right now.

I know history a little bit.

I'm not a historian.

I'm a small H historian.

But I can tell you, there have been some really, really bad stuff happening in our country since World War II.

Starting with the CIA, which was originally the OSS.

There is a deep state.

There is a move of God right now.

It's affecting media, it's affecting government, and it's going to affect the church.

That's why God's cleaning house in the church.

That's why these pastors who've been messing around are getting revealed.

That's why God's coming in, he's cleaning house.

There's going to be a new breed of pastor, there's going to be a new breed of leader, and there's going to be a new breed of Christian.

Choose your king.

So he says, prepare provisions because you're going to go in, and he's saying to the Reubenites, Gadites, and the half tribe of Manasseh, go in and fight with us.

And then I love this part.

This is so good.

Look at the very end of verse 15.

He says, Then you shall return to the land of your possession and enjoy it.

God wants us to enjoy him.

God wants us to enjoy church.

God wants you to enjoy your small group.

God wants you to enjoy the Christian life.

In Deuteronomy 28, 29, he actually condemns those who don't walk in joy.

God wants us to enjoy it, but there's a fight, there's a battle to get to that point.

Does that make sense?

You have to fight for your joy.

You have to fight for the possession that God has given you.

He's given it, but you have to cooperate with him.

You have to take dominion.

He didn't create man and woman and say, I will take dominion of the land.

He said, you take the dominion of the land.

Genesis 1, 26 through 29.

You have to take dominion.

You have to take the dominion.

And so there's a dome, dome, main, domain, dominion.

And then we have a king dome, kingdom.

So what that means is when man, created in the image of God, empowered by the Holy Spirit, begins to come into a situation and take control in the name of Christ, we're bringing the kingdom.

We're coming with the king and we're making him king, and that's what the church does is we extend, we colonize.

I know that's a bad word now, but I'm going to use it anyway.

We colonize this earth with kingdom churches, with kingdom people.

You thought you just got a job because it paid the bills.

No.

God placed you in that job to bring the kingdom.

He's taking Israel here to take possession over seven tribal nations over the next few chapters because he's bringing the kingdom there.

They're going to deal with the Nephilim.

They're going to deal with the sons of Anak.

They're going to deal with demonic spirits, demonic powers when they go in.

We'll cover that.

So he's saying, look, prepare provisions.

It's not going to be easy.

But I'll be with you.

Verse 16.

So they answered Joshua, saying, This is uh, this is the most uncomforting verse of Joshua.

So this is the people talking to Joshua.

They say this.

So they answered Joshua saying, All that you command us, we will do.

And wherever you send us, we will go.

And you know what?

Joshua's thinking, wait, I hung out for 40 years with Moses, and he wanted to kill you guys like half the time.

You're posers, you're not gonna be there when I need you.

But this is what they say next.

Just as we heeded Moses in all things, oh, what a gallant people.

So we will heed you.

Only the Lord your God be with you as he was with Moses.

Whoever rebels against your command and does not heed your words and all that you command him, they shall be put to death.

We'll kill them.

For you, Joshua.

Only be strong and of good courage.

Now, the best part of this is the very last sentence.

Only be strong and of good courage.

It's the seventh time that Moses has to be told to be strong and courageous.

Church, sometimes we think of strong and courageous as these really, really big things.

Right?

But really being strong and courageous is little things.

It's the little things that on a foggy, cold Colorado morning, you're here.

That takes courage.

It takes strength.

It's changing the tire for someone.

It's making another meal when you don't want to make a meal.

It's when you go back and you say, I'm sorry about the fight last night, and you ask for forgiveness.

That takes strength and courage.

That's what we need in leadership is we need strong and courageous leaders who do the little things well, who care about people and love people, and will try to make things right when they mess up, and we all do.

Man, Liz and I had a humdinger of a week.

I forgave her for all the mistakes she's made.

She's not here.

No, I was I was a jerk.

And I had asked forgiveness, and it took courage, okay?

It took courage in me to that, and the same in her with some things that we said and we did, and it was just dumb, and we were too busy, we're moving too fast.

You need to listen to that Simon and Garfunkel sign.

We need to be walking down the street and feeling groovy.

But we were we were moving a little too fast, and we needed to ask for forgiveness and come back together several times, not just once.

So being strong and courageous is sometimes, men and women, it's the little things that we do.

It's showing up to work on time, it's doing the job that we're asked to do with the work that we do.

It's not embezzling money, it's paying your taxes, it's tithing, it's giving, it's loving, it's being kind again and again and again when it's not reciprocated.

That takes strength and courage.

That's what they're asking of Joshua.

Be strong and courageous.

They don't say be capable like Moses or be um be the great lawgiver that Moses.

No, just be strong and courageous.

So I challenge you, be strong and courageous this week.

Don't let any fear get on you for very long.

Be strong and be courageous.

Now Joshua, the son of Nun, sent out two men from Acacia grove to spy secretly.

Now you ought to underline, spy secretly, saying, Go view the land, especially Jericho.

So they went and came to the house of a harlot named Rahab and they lodged there.

Now here's what we believe they did.

We believe that what they did is when they came out, they didn't go straight to Jericho.

That would have been too obvious.

But we think that they went up the Jordan River, and they went up the Jordan River, and they caught the trade route.

The trade route that comes down, that there's a road, a trade road that went down into Jericho.

Through the Jezreel Valley and the Jericho Valley, and it came down into there.

And so that's where they did is they went up and then they came down.

And what's interesting about this passage is this little caveat where it says to them, spy secretly.

Spy secretly.

So if you remember, Moses before chose 12 spies that were chosen by the tribes.

They came to him, they went in, they spied the land 38 years ago, okay?

30, probably 37 years ago.

They spied out the land.

They came back that we can't take.

The sons of Anak are there.

The Nephilim are in there.

Giants in the land.

We're just grasshoppers.

Remember that?

Except for Joshua and Caleb, only two.

So this time he's thinking, he's going, there is no way that I'm gonna let anybody choose who the spies are.

As a matter of fact, I'm not gonna let anybody know that I'm sending spies in.

And so he picks two, he picks two, which tactically is always wise.

You pick the leaders.

They go in, and if they're gonna come back with a bad report, nobody's gonna know.

Hear what I'm saying?

Okay?

So they go in, they come back.

Now, they go to Rahab, a prostitute.

Best place to go.

Absolutely the best place to go, because it's a very active house.

Remember, this is not, these are not believers.

This is just a tribal nation.

They're in the southern part of the promised, what we would classically call the promised land, not even that far from Jerusalem.

Only about a day's journey by horse from Jerusalem.

And it's a pretty active spot, so they wouldn't be noticed if they went to a prostitute's house.

And it was told the king of Jericho, they still figure it out though, saying, Behold, men have come here tonight from the children of Israel to search out the country.

So these guys are paranoid.

This king is paranoid.

Look at he's looking, and when you're in Jericho, you can look and see the Jordan River right there, and you can see across, and you can imagine it's like a like a thunderstorm over there.

It's like a lightning storm over there where they're at, because it is a light, it's a shining light by night that God is leading them, and they're seeing all this.

They've been hearing about them for years and years.

Now they're here.

And they're very, very concerned.

So the king of Jericho sent to Rahab, saying, Bring out the men who have come to you, who have entered your house, for they have come to search out this country.

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.

Verse 5, 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 in the stalks of flax, which she had laid in order on the roof.

Okay.

So, really interesting.

She lies.

She's actually in the New Testament, we're looking just a second.

She's actually complimented for lying and called a woman of faith.

Okay?

So she lies.

It's the principle of the good, the better, and the best.

It's the principle of sometimes God calling some of you and me, possibly in a very extenuating circumstances, where you don't tell the whole truth for a greater good to bring God more glory.

So I call it the ethics of smuggling.

The ethics of smuggling.

So in 1980, I joined a team and led a team into the Eastern European country of Hungary.

So we smuggled Bibles into Hungary.

The only way they could get Bibles at that time in 1980 was through God smuggler types like me.

So I learned in the training that I did at King's College in New York how to smuggle.

So I became a smuggler for God.

And when we came in on the Danube River with a hydrofoil into there's a big bridge.

If you look ever at pictures of Budapest, you can see the big bridge that scans the Danube River.

That's where we came in.

We came right in there.

And as we came in, the guards, military everywhere, they start talking to us about banned products and Bibles was one of them.

And I said, No, I don't have a Bible.

And then they ripped through all my stuff.

Pretty interesting.

They found my personal Bible, but none of the ones that I had built into the fabric of my backpack.

So they found that Bible, and you guys looking at it.

And he goes, he says in broken English, what is this?

And I said, It's a Bible.

And he goes, good book.

That crazy?

Communist guard at the border on the Danube, coming off a hydrofoil, closes it up, gives it back to me, we're in.

Okay?

They didn't check anybody else.

So I've always wondered, A, was it an angel?

Or B, was it actually a believer that was there that was going to be used by God to let other people in?

But anyway, we got in.

I lied.

The midwives were told by Pharaoh kill every male child.

And they lied.

And Moses was born.

Dietrich Bonhoeffer in 1943 became a double agent for the Nazis.

So he's working because his uncle is a general, got him the card for what would be considered the OSS in the U.S.

at that time, which later became the CIA.

He became a double agent working for the Nazis, but actually working against the Nazis.

So he would take Jewish men and women in his car to the border at Switzerland, use his card as a spy for the Nazis, get him through, then he would release the Jews.

He'd come back and he kept doing it again until he got caught and then he died for his faith.

So it's the ethics of smuggling.

So what's happening here is that we have this young lady.

Her name is Rahab.

And she's very interesting because we've got a whole chapter on this lady.

That's why I didn't want to cover it all today.

But look at what she's doing.

Look at this.

Parenthetically, verse 6.

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.

What's going on here?

Steve, what are you talking about?

It's just a bunch of stalks of flax.

It's very important.

Because what they did is they would take stalks of flax and they'd lay them on the roof, line them up, the sun would hit the stalks, they would split open, and it was those fibers that were within that they made rope and they made clothing.

Here's my hunch.

That's my holy hunch.

My holy hunch is that since the parting of the Red Sea 38 years before, Rahab heard about the Jews coming.

She heard about the Hebrews coming, and she heard about what God had done, and she's getting saved.

And you see what she's doing?

She's developing another stream of income.

I'm gonna go out on a limb and say that Rahab isn't the harlot that she once was.

That she has a job, that she's working that job.

It's not a she doesn't have the full faith thing yet because she hasn't met anybody, but I bet she's saying, What took you guys so long?

I believe in your God.

I believe that he's real.

Because look what she says next.

Verse 8.

Now, before they lay down, she came up on the roof and said to them, I know, I know, underline, I know.

She doesn't say, I think, or I'm hoping, I know that the Lord has given you the land, that the terror of you has fallen on us, and that all the inhabitants of the land are faint-hearted because of you.

For we have heard how the Lord dried up the water of the Red Sea for you.

Men and women, 38 years ago.

38 years ago that happened.

When you came out of Egypt and what you did to the two kings of the Amorites, who were on the other side of the Jordan, Sahon and Og, whom you utterly destroyed.

Verse 11.

And as soon as we heard these things, our hearts melted.

Neither did there remain any more courage in anyone because of you, for the Lord your God is the God in heaven above and on the earth beneath.

And this is incredible.

This sounds like the ten spies.

Remember?

The ten spies said, oh man, there's giants in the land.

They have fortified cities.

We'll never be able to take that.

We look like grasshoppers, and so we are.

We are grasshoppers compared to those seven tribal nations in the promised land.

And so the faith of the Israelites who followed the one true God just continually melted.

But what was really happening, Rahab gives us insight, is that everybody over in the area called the Promised Land, their hearts were melting.

Do you realize how powerful you are?

Men and women, do you realize with Christ in you the hope of glory?

That the power within you is greater than any power outside of you?

That demons tremble when you walk in the room in the power of the Holy Spirit?

Do you realize the promised land that awaits us?

If we'll just believe.

And they turn on each other.

I've cast out demons where it says, Well, don't cast me out, cast him out.

What's his name?

They tell me their name.

I said, You're all out.

If you know your power and authority, it's unbelievable what God can do through you.

That's a kingdom of God revolution.

And so they see this happening and their hearts melted.

She believes.

And then she says in verse 12, Now therefore I beg you, swear to me by the Lord, since I have shown you kindness, that you will also show kindness to my father's house and give me a true token and spare my father, my mother, my brothers, my sisters, and all that they have, and deliver our lives from death.

Wow.

So here she is standing alone.

Church, don't stand alone.

We have each other.

We don't have to stand alone.

Rahab stood alone.

And God's gonna write her into the annals of the New Testament Hall of Fame.

Here's what it says.

James 2, James writes, and the scripture was fulfilled, which says Abraham believed God and it was accounted to him for righteousness.

And he was called the friend of God.

You see then that a man is justified by works, not by faith only.

Likewise was not Rahab, the harlot, also justified by works when she received the messengers and sent them another way.

Basically affirming what she did.

Hebrews 11 in the great Hall of Fame, Hall of Faith chapter, she's included.

By faith, the harlot Rahab did not perish with those who did not believe, for she received the spies with peace.

So Rahab becomes the great grandmother of David.

And Rahab joins the genealogy of Jesus.

So I don't know where you've slept.

I don't know what you've done.

I don't know where you've been, but you can't out-sin, out shame, or out-rebel the long arm of God's love for you.

Rahab is a testimony to all of us in this room that God can take anyone wherever they're at.

He can bring forgiveness.

He can set you free.

And he can place you into a position, maybe even a leadership position, can save the lives of other people because of your testimony.

We need your testimony.

Don't give up.

Church, don't quit.

Be strong and courageous.

Thank you for listening to the Forn for War podcast.

We hope today's message has empowered you to make a difference in your world.

To connect with Pastor Steve's sermons, books, and blog, visit Steveholtonline.org.

God bless.