From Shame to Fame

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Good morning, CCW.

Amen.

If you're here with us today and you started the fast, it was 22 days ago now.

So you made it through.

Give yourself a hand, give God a hand.

I don't know what you fasted from.

Um, but it was a great experience.

And by the way, those of you that uh were receiving the emails, weren't those devotions amazing?

And we have some talented folks in the church, and I was blessed.

It's amazing how many people would text me or say something to me, and and something revolved around the devotion that day, or God did just talk to them about this, or they read a word here, and it was it was really neat because they were chosen very at random, and um God just gave me some words, and I gave those words to people and they ran with us.

So it was exciting, and I'm thankful to start the year that way.

Next week, I just got to tell you one thing.

Uh, this church used to, in our old building, meet every week for lunch.

And um with the the move into this building, a lot of that has shifted some, but anyway, next week is our first lunch together of the new year.

You are all welcome.

Bring some people, we'll have plenty of food.

With that, I do want you to know our missions coordinator.

A lot of you are new to the church.

Our missions coordinator's name is Deidra Brown.

Deidra is gonna be sharing about several missions trip opportunities.

We go with her, we we have several missions trips that we go and support different countries and help with her ministry and then some others.

I know the Hibs are gonna share about a summer mission opportunity that they're leading.

And so want you to know, come eat lunch, but we are gonna be talking about that so you can know some opportunities for some missions work.

One more thing, and I'm done commercials.

Okay, so we started the year burning the boats, and I want to show you we have an opportunity coming at the end of the series.

You'll be able to get some burn the boats attire, and uh, we got some hats.

People have been telling me for years I need a CCW hat.

So, anyways, we got some cool hats that are being made, and those will be available soon so that you can tell people about the church that you attend.

And I like wearing a shirt that says burn the boats because people are gonna say, What does that mean?

Okay, are you pyro?

What do you what are we talking about here?

Keep him away from the lake.

Now you get to tell him about burn the boats and what that's meant to us.

Well, turn your Bible to Joshua chapter 2.

Joshua 2 · chapter mention

You know, we're gonna jump right in.

Joshua chapter 2.

Joshua 2 · chapter mention

We're gonna be looking at the story of Rahab today.

And really it's a story that starts out with guilt and shame.

If you're a parent here, guilt and shame can be kind of comical with your children when you see how it plays out sometimes.

Callie was about six years old, I think Wyatt was four or five, and Weston was just about six months old.

And something didn't jive right with Callie.

We had a family calendar that was on the wall that had pictures every month of us.

Sounds unspiritual now that I think about it.

But there it was, our shrine to us every month.

And on the calendar, as you started flipping through the months, there was a circle drawn around Heather's head.

And I flipped to the next month, March, Heather's head circled in red or black ink pen next month.

Every month that Heather was in, her head was circled.

So I had to pull the kids together for a meeting.

And I looked at their little faces, six, four, and six months old, and I said, Who has taken a pen and circled mama's head on the calendar that we had made?

Nothing.

I got nothing.

Callie, did you do this?

Nothing.

Mm-mm.

I said, Wyatt, did you do this?

No, no, I swear, I didn't do it.

Okay, Weston, you know, so I go back and forth with them, and finally I said, Whoever does this is gonna be in trouble.

Again, I said, Callie, are you sure you didn't do this?

I didn't do it.

Why?

Are you sure you didn't do this?

I said, Well, that's it, guys.

I guess the baby did it.

Now you gotta understand, you would have had to get on a chair or the counter to get to this calendar.

All right.

I said, I guess the six-month-old baby has done it.

Well, I'm gonna have to spank the six-month-old.

And I went over toward Weston, and Wyatt said, No, Daddy, don't do it.

I'll take the spanking.

I thought, wow, how about that?

Well, come to find out, it was not Wyatt, and it was not Weston.

It was the other one.

And she was willing to let Weston get the spanking, just quiet as could be.

He wanted to know the gospel.

He talked to me the night before.

I said, Stephen, let's get this thing done right now or the phone.

He said, I want to see you in person.

He showed up at my door about 3:30 in the afternoon.

I think he had the bus from school drop him off.

I took him inside.

Now, Heather was gone, but I had Wyatt.

Well, about 30 minutes into the conversation, I forgot about Wyatt.

Just forgot that he anything about Wyatt.

Well, it hits me as Stephen's about to be saved, so I speed it up on him.

All right, let's say this.

Stephen gets saved.

I get back to Wyatt.

He's in the living room, and he has full body tattooed himself with an ink pen.

And I look at his face and I'm like, Wyatt, what have you done?

He's like three years old, and he's like, nothing.

Fool.

So when I think about that guilt and shame, he's like, What?

I want you to see the shame and guilt in this story.

That takes us to Rahab's position, where she's at, out of the gate.

Let me pray.

Father, will you help us to understand your word so that we can apply it today?

That we can use it, God, that we can leave this place having met with you.

And God, change us where we need change.

I pray, Lord, there is no reason for anybody sitting in this room just to be here.

God, if we can't walk out different, then it's it's without purpose.

So change us, Lord, in Jesus' name.

Amen.

Chapter 2, verse 1 and 2.

It says, Now Joshua the son of Nun sent out two men from Acacia Grove to 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.

We see immediately Rahab, and they make no bones about it.

They call out her position by her name attached to it, Rahab the harlot.

We see her position of failure.

By the way, Romans 3.23, church, the Bible says this for all of us, for all have sinned and fallen short of the glory of God.

Have you dealt with your birth position?

Have you dealt with your soul?

What happens when we don't deal with our sin or our shame?

Some of us, our past that comes back and tries to haunt us, what can happen?

It'll eat away.

Our past can eat away at our future.

Research indicates that guilt and shame prompt people to overeat, over-drink, and over-medicate.

Guilt says, I did a bad thing.

Shame says, I am a bad person.

Now, shame can come from a lot of different things, but here's a few.

It can come from a lack of parental affection growing up.

It can come often by comparison.

It can certainly come by past sins, trying to relive in our imagination the thing that should have happened or would have happened.

It can happen when a person is harmed by a perpetrator holding the shame.

You see, shame causes people to say, I'm not good enough, I'm not smart enough, I'm not thin enough, I am not enough.

Shame is all through the pages of this book.

In John, we see the woman at the well.

Five failed marriages, she stops to draw.

She hopes alone because she comes when the sun is at its brightest.

She hopes to be away from comments, whispers, and gazes.

Twelve years a woman has a blood problem.

She's coming to seek something that can restore her.

But she hopes she's coming quietly, indiscreetly away from comments, from gazes, from looks.

She would never think to even speak, but just to touch the hem of a thread of his garment indiscreetly, quietly, away from looks.

Everywhere she's been, she's been uncomfortable, unclean, and unfit.

A condemnation.

She wouldn't dare but speak.

A man full of leprosy fell at Jesus' feet.

He said, Lord, if you're willing, you can heal me.

You see, society outcast a leopard.

They were marginalized.

They had to yell unclean when you walked near them.

Rahab was left to prostitution.

Now I say that, it doesn't say it here, but I say she was left to prostitution.

No one ever grows up hoping one day I'm gonna sell myself.

Nobody ever has a dream as a little girl that they're going to have to be a prostitute.

Rahab was somebody's little girl.

This was desperation.

This was survival.

By the way, in this world that we live in, people prostitute themselves in all kinds of ways.

They're selling themselves out, slaves to things.

She was in a lonely place.

Her position was a lonely place.

She had been, letter A, dishonored.

Rahab had been dishonored.

She's in a bad city.

Jericho still exists today.

It's called Teles Sultan.

And it's a bad city.

She lives in a bad place with bad people, and she has a bad occupation.

Rahab's house was built.

There was an outer wall and an inner wall, an entrance wall and an inside wall, and in between there would be homes built.

And her house was a familiar place.

Strangers and foreigners knew well Rahab's place.

People were in and out often.

Everybody knew about Rahab.

I grew up and went to a Christian school.

And about eighth grade, I was going through what probably some of your eighth grade boys are going through.

Right?

We'll pray for you.

And my sister was six years older than me.

She was already in the workforce, still at home.

She had brought a dirty joke on a piece of paper.

And it went into the junk drawer.

Y'all got the junk drawer, right?

All right.

It went in the junk drawer.

I read it, and it was wrong.

I shouldn't have been laughing at it, but it was off-color, but I thought it was funny.

I took it to school, eighth grade, and I'm passing it around the row, and it's getting a stir, and my teacher goes, Let me see, what is that over there?

And I'm like, he gets the note.

He opens it up.

He actually laughs, which was bad.

He shouldn't have been laughing.

And he said, Mr.

Wright, pulled me forward.

I had to go to the office with that note.

And then I got reamed out by the principal who was also a pastor.

And he was telling me, darkness and light should not mix.

So you saved.

And I'm like, oh my God.

Like I thought I was going to hell after that note.

Like, this is, and and I got suspended from school the worst three days of my life.

It was winter, freezing cold.

My dad had me outside three days chopping wood.

I'm like, this was awful.

But let me tell you what I got out of that that was worse.

That suspension got me a reputation.

Now, everybody knows that eighth-grade boys are a mess, but I'm a mess who's been suspended from Christian school.

My dad worked in bus ministry.

I worked it with him.

I had done a lot for the Lord, not necessarily because I wanted to, but because I was.

And so all of a sudden, this note that my sister got had labeled me as something.

And for a long time I dealt with that ideology of who I am.

And I want you to hear something from me today.

You have a past.

You are not the sum of your past mistakes.

And say that again.

You are not the sum of your past mistakes.

I've lived in the shadow of shame.

I had a deacon one time pull up at a gas station, and I thought about this.

I don't know why the picture comes back to me, but he was a deacon of that church.

He knew my bad reputation.

I had some music on, kind of loud.

Okay.

Suspended boy from school.

Loud rock and roll music.

Boy from the devil.

And I'm standing there pumping my gas and he walks by me and he just shamed me.

He just shook his head with a scowl on his face.

And I thought back to that.

Listen, it's me, it's not him.

But I wonder if a deacon in the church saw me in my shame and came and put his arm around me and said a word to me, how I might have felt.

How that might have impacted me differently.

And so you never know the impact.

You don't know where somebody's at and where they're going, but I'm telling you what, I've lived in the shadow of shame.

By the way, students, that feeling of guilt, now I want to separate guilt and shame, that feeling of guilt isn't all bad.

In youth ministry, Heather and I, a lot of youth, this is just the honest truth, we've had a lot of times where students have come to us and they've engaged in premarital sex.

And I have a talk.

Here's the talk.

Listen, what you have done is not good.

Okay?

It's not good at all.

And they're going through brokenness, fear, they're scared of what's going to happen.

They're scared of telling them.

And I'm saying, listen, yes, the Bible says where sin abounds, grace does much more abound.

God, Jesus always forgives.

He will forgive you, but the feeling you're feeling, I want you to feel.

And I want you to know it.

And I want you to remember it.

Why can that be good, Pastor?

Because I don't want you to ever feel it again.

Let that feeling be a motivator so that you don't do that thing again.

Let it be a motivator.

Now, Rahab, this is what I think about the way that Jesus dealt with it.

He would forgive and then he would say, Now go and sin no more.

Don't make this mistake again.

He had all the grace we love, but do we learn from it?

And so everybody knew about Rahab.

It would take great courage for someone like Rahab to rise out of this pit.

Her reputation, but listen to me.

God knew her actions, but he also knew her heart.

You might have come here to hear this line.

God knew her actions, but he also knew her heart.

God, so often in Scripture, you see, this is interesting.

This story is much bigger, it seems, than Rahab.

But so many times in Scripture, God will leave the crowd, leave the nation, and go after one.

He didn't need Rahab for the Israelites to be saved.

Let me tell you, the miracles he does is amazing that follow these pages.

But he went after this little girl.

He often went goes after somebody.

Remember the little tax collector in a tree?

He spotted him out of nowhere and he went after him.

The demoniac, he crossed the Sea of Galilee to go after someone that was possessed.

Children.

Y'all hear me?

Children.

He says, suffer not the little children.

And he comes unto them.

There's a parable he says, There's a hundred sheep.

Who doesn't leave the 99 and go after the one?

Man, I'm telling you, church, you might be the one.

I think I was the one.

Didn't he come after you?

And so I see this situation, but he sees something.

He's going to rescue Israel and take them further, but he sees something in that little girl.

Now she was a Gentile, so it wasn't her Jewish skin.

It wasn't her status.

It wasn't her sin or her situation.

He saw her heart.

You might be here this morning and you feel far from God.

I want you to know something.

He sees your heart.

And by the way, he's not far from you.

He's today away.

What are you going to do with today?

And so Rahab was dishonored.

Well, she was not just dishonored.

Rahab was doomed.

She was doomed.

Not because she was a harlot.

Rahab was doomed the way that you and I were doomed.

Romans 5.12 says, as by one man sin entered into the world, and then death by sin.

And so we have this disease.

And Romans 6.23 said, For the wages of that sin is death.

By the way, if you have a good job, the wages of sin is death.

If you come from a good family with good people, the wages of sin is death.

If you're poor today or rich today, the wages of sin is death.

If you're good looking or not so much, the wages of sin is death.

And we all have an appointment.

We all have an appointment one day.

So if you're here today like Rahab was, doom is pending.

I went to a funeral this week.

Heather went to her uncle's funeral in Texas.

Now I don't love funerals.

Nobody loves a funeral or something's wrong with you.

But I love preaching at a funeral.

And here's why, because everybody at a funeral is thinking about what is next.

Everybody at a funeral is thinking about eternity, and they're thinking about what is most important.

And I want you to understand, Ecclesiastes says it this way.

Solomon said, it is better to go to a house of mourning than to a house of feasting.

It's better to go to a funeral than a party because your mind is thinking on what is most important.

And I believe today, church, that heaven and hell are a reality.

Rahab was doomed to go to a place called hell.

Pastors and churches won't mention hell today.

One pastor said, People already feel guilty enough.

I only want them uplifted.

You know Jesus Christ talked more about hell than he did about heaven.

He spoke about it more than anyone else in the Bible.

So if Jesus is going to talk about hell, then Pastor Rig is going to talk about hell.

And I don't like to talk about it.

But it's reality.

If you're here today and you're 12 or you're 80, I don't want you to go to hell.

Hell is horrifying.

If you believe this book, the way that it describes hell, it's horrifying.

Bible says, Mark 8, 36, and man can gain, it says, what profit a man?

He can gain the whole world but lose his soul.

You can go after everything grinding away in this life.

You can build it all up and build these earthly kingdoms to everything that it has and lose your soul.

What profit is it, he said, if you gain the whole world and lose your soul?

And let me tell you what happens when you gain the whole world.

It'll empty you.

But Jesus will fill you here and forever.

So we see Rahab's position.

The next thing I want you to see is Rahab's profession of faith.

I'm going to see her profession.

What happens in Rahab's story?

Well, I need you to know about faith.

Hebrews 11:1 gives the greatest definition, I think, of faith in the Bible.

Hebrews 11:1

It says faith is the substance of things hoped for, but the evidence of things not seen.

When you hope for something that you don't see, that's faith.

We have not seen Jesus here incarnate, so we put our hope that this is real.

By the way, you have faith.

You put a lot of faith in your weak.

Okay?

You have faith, it's where you place your faith.

It'd take a whole lot of faith for me to say, bang, everything was thrown across the atmosphere, and I, you know, I throw a watch and it turns into a Mercedes-Benz.

That takes faith for me to have that position.

So you have faith.

It's the substance of things hoped for the evidence of things not seen, which we could say is trusting.

Proverbs 3, 5 and 6 says, Trust in the Lord with all your heart, lean not into your own understanding, but all in your ways, acknowledge him, and he will direct your paths.

And so we understand that faith is putting our faith and trust in something.

We'll go back to verse 1 and we'll see how this plays out.

Two spies Joshua sends out from Acacia Grove to spy secretly.

Two spies journey from Acacia Grove to Jericho.

It's a very short journey.

I'll call it the journey of faith.

The journey of faith.

For every human is a journey from head to heart.

It's a short journey from intellectual ascent to yielding your being is a short journey.

But horrifying many will never make that journey.

You know, the Bible says that the demons believe and tremble.

A lot of people, and here we are in the Bible Belt of Alabama.

Everybody, when you grew up in Alabama, God football country, we believe in Jesus because grandmama believed in Jesus.

So I believe in Jesus.

But the Bible says the demons believe.

Here to here is a big difference.

From here to here will change the way your feet move.

And we're going to see about that in a minute.

That's a biblical term called justification by faith.

And so we see this journey of faith that begins.

You see, salvation involves intellect.

I understand.

It involves emotion.

I'm sorry for my sin.

And it involves will.

I have changed.

I was here.

I have changed.

If I don't have those three things, I may not have salvation.

From head to heart to feet.

Interestingly, Joshua sends two spies.

Well, I thought about that.

Remember when twelve spies went out?

Two came back with a good report.

Ten were over here, we can't do it.

The giants are too big, we can't get into the land.

Well, Joshua says, ain't making that mistake because sometimes the overwhelming majority is not right.

He says, I'm going to send out two because as I recall, Caleb, do you remember Caleb?

Yeah, Caleb.

Two had a good report.

Yeah, me and you had a good, let's send two and not twelve.

And so he sends out two spies on this short journey.

Hebrews 11, 6 says, without faith, church, it is impossible to please God.

To burn the boats.

We've learned for the past couple of weeks.

It takes courage, it takes the playbook.

And this week it takes faith.

You see, Rahab makes an important acknowledgement.

We're going to go down to verse 4 and 5.

We have to cover this because first, before she makes this acknowledgement, Rahab lies.

It says this.

Then the woman took the two men, the spies, and hid them.

So she said, Yes, the men came to me.

The king has asked her what's going on, where are the men?

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.

This is a lie.

Okay?

People get caught up in verse 4 and 5.

Okay?

It's a detail that people want to debate.

Rahab lies 100%.

God blesses Rahab, 100%.

God blesses lies, 0%.

Okay?

I want you to understand this.

Now to understand this lie and people want to debate it, you have to define sin.

Alright?

Most people will say sin is anything I say, think, or do that is against God or His Word or displeases God or His Word?

I would add the intents and motives of your heart.

But let me ask you a question.

Please don't leave here saying, Pastor Rick believes in lies.

Okay, I do not believe in lies.

Have you ever surprised your wife on her birthday?

Have you ever surprised your husband on his birthday?

Were you completely honest?

I am going to surprise you for your birthday.

Surprise.

You probably said we're gonna go here and here, and then you arrive back at a place that wasn't what you said.

That's a lie.

Okay?

Because y'all are liars.

Did God in heaven go, oh I can't believe it.

Worthy of damnation.

Is that what you think?

Okay, okay.

Bear with me.

Have you ever, somebody you know just had a brand new baby?

And they walked up to you with a brand new baby, and they said, look at the baby.

And they said, Isn't it beautiful?

And you said, oh, yes.

Yes, it is.

None of you, none of you ever blurted out, that is an ugly baby.

Take it away.

You know why?

Because you're all liars.

Amen.

Here's my point.

Look, I'm not, I don't know what God says about that.

But I'm glad that you're a liar in that instance.

Okay?

There's two extreme instances in the Bible.

Very extreme.

This is one of them.

Twice that I have found that a lie was accepted.

And let me explain what I think happens.

In the Bible, there are two evils.

If there are two evils that can happen, and the lesser of the evil is accepted.

Tony Evans said this, and he's got way more degrees than me, so I'm going with Tony.

He said, When two sins are on the table and there's not another option, you must choose the option that brings God greatest glory.

And so Rahab hides despise.

We're seeing this acknowledgement of her faith in a moment, and she has to tell a lie.

People go back to Corey Temboom and said when she was hiding people in her camps, should she, when they were coming to find them, have said, they're right here.

She's there doing God's work, trying to protect.

So listen, I'm not telling you the lie.

It's a very extreme circumstance in the Bible that happens two times that I know of.

But here's what I do know happens.

By the way, confirm with other scripture.

If you have doubt, confirm with that.

There's all kinds of scripture.

Paul said in Colossians that a man should not lie.

Okay.

We know do not bear false witness against your neighbor.

It's in the Ten Commandments.

Okay.

Extreme circumstance.

Rahab acknowledges God's men is the first thing I want you to see about her acknowledgement.

Okay, God's men.

In James 2.25, we'll turn there in just a few minutes.

You can go ahead and mark a place there.

We're going to look at the scripture.

But in James 2.25, Rahab is mentioned, and she calls, or the men are called messengers in James 2.25.

That's important because how does Rahab come to a profession of faith?

Messengers were sent to her.

Okay, so I want you to hold that and I want you to think about something for yourself.

What is your message?

You're a messenger.

You are heralding an important message.

Ask those who are close to you what your message is.

What do you talk about a lot?

What do you do a lot?

You've got a message for your kids, for your spouse, for your coworkers.

You've got a message.

Students, your teammates, the people in the hallways.

You have a message.

When they see you, they are reading a message each week.

How did you share the message this week, church?

How many did you share the message with this week?

Pastor Danny used to say this and quote it You are writing a gospel, a chapter each day, by the deeds that you do, by the words that you say.

Men, read what you write, distorted or true.

What is the gospel according to you?

You're a book to people around you.

What are they reading?

You're a messenger.

We uh for 18 years have been attending a camp.

You know the name of the camp?

I love it.

Go tell.

Very simple.

Go tell.

Your message is to go with you.

Your life is one big acknowledgement of something.

Why do you think in the Bible baptism is so important to God?

It's an acknowledgement that you have professed your faith and become a believer.

And so it says the next step is that we join in believers' baptism.

It's an acknowledgement of your belief.

Well, there's a debate there about the spies.

How did Rahab hear the truth?

Because she's about to talk about the truth that she hears.

Was it because the spies, which I tend to lean that way, they're called messengers in another place, or the influx of visitors.

That could be a lot of people coming in and out and telling of what they've heard, of what's happened with the people in Israel.

But I lean toward that word.

It's important that we're told it's messengers.

In Greek, in James, that word is angelos, same word for angel, one who was sent.

And so Joshua was sent by God and sent these messengers.

Well, let's look at verse 6 through 11 and see what follows about her acknowledgement.

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.

Then the men pursued them by the road to the Jordan, to the fords.

And as soon as they or those who pursued them had gone out, they shut the gate.

Now before they lay down, she came up to them on the roof and said to the men, I know, listen to this acknowledgement, I know that the Lord has given you the land, that the terror of you has fallen on us, and that all inhabitants of the land are faint-hearted because of you.

For we have heard what?

How the Lord dried up the water of the Red Sea for you 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, Sihan and Og, whom you utterly destroyed.

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

Neither did there remain any more courage in any one because of you.

For the Lord your God.

Listen to this declaration.

He is God in heaven above and on earth.

If there's ever been a declaration or acknowledgement of someone who's been saved, this is it.

If you can go to work this week and say, He, Lord above, is God of heaven and the earth, people will know where you stand.

And so we see Rahab's profession of faith.

Her profession.

She acknowledges God Himself.

She was convicted by the works of God, whether it was by the messengers or somebody else, they had heard about what God has done.

What about your testimony?

It's the works of God that come from you to other people, convict them about their own life.

Here's a practical application for you this week.

Take the testimony test.

The testimony test is this.

Every week, your test is give your testimony at least one time.

Find a way to tie in what God has done for you, and so that you can share that testimony.

You know, the Bible says faith comes by hearing, and hearing by the word of God.

And then it says, How shall they hear unless somebody preaches?

Here's the deal.

They were sent in as spies, these two messengers, but I believe they were full of God, and the message of God was overflowing from them.

You might be sent as a plumber or a photographer or a mechanic, but are you overflowing with that message?

You have a message, and people are reading it.

What is it?

Look at verse 12 and 13.

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

Let her be as this.

Rahab makes an important application.

She's acknowledged God, this profession of faith, and now she makes an important application for moving forward.

We want to see about that.

This is a new Rahab, a new kind of wisdom.

By the way, if you've been saved and you've been called by God, the indwelling of the Holy Spirit puts a new kind of wisdom in your life.

It illuminates so that you can make application.

At 16, I didn't need seminary to make application.

I didn't need weeks of discipleship.

When my life had been turned far from God to spin it back around.

You know what?

I needed just a few things.

I began to read God's word.

I began to pray daily.

And my choices, the application, my choices began to change on their own.

I didn't even say nothing to my choices.

They just started changing.

I began to read, I began to pray, I began to go to church.

My choices, by the nature of choice, I stopped certain activities.

Because of what happened in my heart.

That should happen to you.

I stopped certain places.

I stopped certain people.

My faith started taking steps that it had produced.

That's called application.

The old you shouldn't be getting the upper hand still.

You follow me, church?

I want you to look over at James chapter 2.

James 2 · chapter mention

The old you shouldn't be getting the upper hand.

James chapter 2.

James 2 · chapter mention

We're going to read 24 through 26.

I've highlighted verse 25 once already, but listen to what it says.

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

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

For as the body without the spirit is dead, so faith without works is dead also.

See, when we come to Christ, our faith should be taking steps, and it should be an evidence of what's happened in our life.

That's called application.

It produces works, or else do you really believe?

So she has faith, and we see this here as we're in chapter two.

And it's interesting, you could miss this.

What she says to these men about trying to save her and her family.

She has faith, but Rahab's still Rahab, right?

You don't lose who you are, you don't lose your personality because you become a Christian.

Okay?

So if you were, you know, stoic and kind of quiet, just because you come a Christian doesn't mean you're going to be like really outgoing.

And if you're really outgoing and bubbly and you become a Christian, you'll be a so you keep that.

So Rahab is still Rahab, and you know, she's lived a gritty life, a harlot's life, and so she hadn't learned the uh church words yet.

And I like to think the men at this point were still hanging in the basket that she was lowering the rope down, and she took her opportunity here, right?

Maybe they're hanging 10 or 20 feet.

It doesn't say that.

She had an upper hand.

She said, Gentlemen, I've hidden you and I've uh scratched your back.

Now I uh I have a request of my own.

Now listen, the streets done taught her a thing or two, right?

Brand new Christian or not, she doesn't mind to say, now I'm gonna allow this to happen and I'm gonna let this basket down and you'll be safe.

Uh but I'm gonna need to be safe myself and my family and my brothers and my sisters and my cousins and all the little babies, all of them.

We need to be safe.

That's the deal, right?

Oh, it dropped a little.

Oh, oh, hang on, hang on, hang on.

I got you, I got you, I got you, guys.

Right?

I have shown kindness.

I'm gonna need something in return.

One small request.

But we see a couple of things in her request.

Sweetness.

Maybe the little girl, the heart that Jesus sees.

She wasn't just like, save me.

She said, I need you to save my family.

Other people.

I need there's some people in my life that I want to be saved.

Her devotion is shown here.

And the man answer here with godly Christian character.

I love this statement.

They say, Our lives for yours unto death.

Our lives for yours unto death.

Man, the household of faith is so important in my life.

I pray when things go rough for you.

It's been a rough couple of weeks.

Stuff happening all over the place.

People, I'm telling you, hurting, just a lot of stuff.

Death, there's been people with disease, just a lot of stuff.

I hope that when you come to that place, you've got a church family.

Some people that'll come around you and rally with you.

And so we see that they say, When the Lord deals us the land, we will deal kindly with you.

This is what we see of Rahab.

She's an example of audacious faith.

That lady, the life that she had, had produced in her audacity.

She was bold.

Whether she was a harlot or a new Christian, Rahab was going to be used for God because she was bold and she took her step and she took her chance here.

It was her opportunity.

And look, she could have died by lying to the king earlier.

We know that she had audacity and boldness.

These men could have fought back.

She was bold.

By the way, Proverbs 28:1 says, The wicked flee when no man pursues, but the righteous are bold as a lion.

Proverbs 28:1

The wicked are back and forth.

They gotta cover lies, cover their life, cover their style, cover what they do late at night.

But the righteous go to sleep on an easy pillow, wake up.

Bold as a lion.

That takes us to the third and final thing this morning.

We see Rahab's progression of fame.

There's a picture I want you to see, a genealogy picture of Rahab.

And this is interesting.

You see from Genesis with Adam all the way to where it's pointed out in a blue that Rahab would marry a man named Salmon.

And that would produce a man named Bohas who married Ruth.

And from Bohas and Ruth, it takes you all the way through the progression to Jesus Christ.

Rahab the harlot is now in the genealogy.

Salmon was, I think, great-great-great-grandfather to David.

And so Rahab's life has a new pathway from harlotry to heaven's king, is this picture.

Letter A.

Rahab has now a new reality.

I don't know if you watch too many reality shows.

It's kind of funny to me.

Three of the top four reality shows, most money-making reality shows, what they preach is that if you win, you're gonna win big money, therefore changing your reality so it's no longer reality.

Big Brother, Survivor, and American Idol will give people loads of money who win.

And they call it a reality show.

When in reality, it's not reality at all.

Her new reality shows this an immediate change.

A native of Jericho makes a plan to side with Israelites.

When you become a Christian, your choices will reflect a new reality.

Everything should transform.

Your want to transform.

Your credit card statement transforms.

Your calendar transforms.

Your habits transform.

Your family time should transform.

Your church time should transform.

The desires of your heart, your clothing.

All kinds of things transform.

She's got a new reality.

2 Corinthians 5.17, church says, if any man is in Christ, he's a new creation.

Old things are passed away.

Behold, all things are like new.

It says, all things.

You know what that is in the Greek?

All that's all things.

In order for you and I to burn the boats and move forward in 23, your choices of faith will have to show a commitment.

Rahab's interest now, suddenly, I don't know what it looked like previous to this, but suddenly her interest is her Christian brothers and saving her family.

That's pretty good interest.

Have you ever seen someone so carried about with burdens of the world?

Maybe in the workforce, maybe in your family, and suddenly Jesus Christ gets a hold of them.

It's almost comical because all of a sudden it becomes Jesus this, worship that, Jesus this, praise the Lord this, a God thing that.

Sunday school this.

Jesus, Jesus, Jesus.

And you're like, wow.

This person's radical.

Well, I don't really believe in radical Christianity.

It's just Christianity.

That's who we should be.

It's real.

Well, Rahab had a new reality, and let her be, Rahab had a new reputation.

I talked to you about what stayed in my heart for a long time.

I went back and visited some of those people years later.

God had totally transformed what's happened in my life.

And there were still people.

This is what I took comfort in.

Jesus said, even a prophet is dishonored in his own city.

Jesus wasn't accepted.

So if Jesus didn't accept it, look, I'm probably not going back to Newark.

Bible says this though, Proverbs 22:1, a good name is better than great riches.

Proverbs 22:1

I want you to turn to Hebrews chapter 11 and see about this good name.

Hebrews 11 · chapter mention

I want you to see what the Bible calls Hebrews chapter 11.

Hebrews 11 · chapter mention

Bible calls it the hall of faith.

If you go through Hebrews chapter 11, By faith it says, and it goes over and over Abel, Enoch, Noah, Abraham, Moses, and it goes through a list of people, and right there, smack in the middle in verse 30, we find Rahab.

Hebrews 11 · chapter mention

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

A little girl growing up wanted to be something, wanted to matter.

She was audacious.

Her life sent her spiraling into a profession that is this that is looked down upon.

And now she rests in the middle of the hall of faith in the Bible.

It's interesting that they mention her profession.

Because through here, Moses was a murderer.

Just says Moses.

David was an adulterer.

Why was Rahab listed then as a harlot?

This is what I know.

David and Moses became leaders of great nations.

I think Rahab is a reminder that God can use anybody from any circumstance to do anything if they have audacious faith.

It's a picture to go back.

Yes, she was a harlot, but I used this little girl to do something great.

It became a line that led to Jesus.

Now I want you to go back to verse 21.

In verse 21, we see the scarlet thread, the scarlet cord.

Let me read it to you.

And she said, according to your words, so be it.

And she sent them away and departed.

And she bound the scarlet cord in her window.

And this was the deal she had made with them.

As long as you see the scarlet cord in my window, then when the city is destroyed, you will save the people in my household because you see the scarlet cord.

In Joshua 6, it tells the story of the scarlet cord, and that that little girl and her whole family was saved because those men went back and they saw that cord hanging from her window.

I want to tell you something this morning, church.

That all through this book, there's a scarlet thread.

From Genesis to Revelation, and we see first in Adam and Eve.

In Adam and Eve in Genesis chapter 3, we see that they tried to sow fig leaves because of their sin before God.

Genesis 3 · chapter mention

And it says that the Lord God made garments of skin for Adam and his wife, so he clothed them.

Only through the shedding of blood can man approach God.

Well, it continued after Adam and Eve.

The world had come to a violent eruption of evil, and God sent the flood.

And in Noah, in Genesis chapter 8, verse 20, it says, After the flood, Noah built an altar to God, and he took of every clean animal and of every clean bird, and he offered burnt offerings.

Genesis 8:20

And this is what God said because of that offering, I will never again curse the earth in this way.

Well, after that, God was going to test a man, a man named Abraham.

And he tested Abraham and he said to him, I want you to sacrifice your son Isaac.

In Genesis 22, verse 13, it says, And Abraham lifted up his eyes and looked, and behold, behind him a ram caught in a thicket.

Genesis 22:13

He took the blood of that ram instead.

And then we see in the book of Exodus, Moses.

The Passover was coming, and there was about to be execution of babies, and this is what was told to them the blood shall be a sign on your doorpost.

When I see the blood, I'll pass over that scarlet cord all the way through from there to there to Moses.

Well, it doesn't stop in the Old Testament, it continues through this book, and then we see it in the Gospels.

We see in the Gospels in the upper room that Jesus broke bread in front of the disciples, and he said, This shall be a picture of my body broken for you.

And then he pours out wine and says, This shall be a picture of my blood that'll be poured out in remembrance.

And then we see Matthew 27, Mark 15, Luke 23, and John 19, the picture of the cross.

The blood that was shed for every person.

Well, it didn't stop in the Gospels.

Paul said in Ephesians 2, 13, but now in Christ Jesus, you who once were afar off have been brought near by the blood of Christ.

There's no longer a distance that has to separate us from Christ.

We've been brought near by the blood of Christ.

Well, Paul wasn't finished.

He had another message he told the people of Colossae in chapter 1, verse 20, through him he reconciled all things, whether on earth or heaven, making peace.

By the blood of Jesus Christ, we were given peace.

Well, it didn't end with Paul from Genesis to Revelation.

John wrote in the end of the book this, Revelations 19, 13.

Jesus is coming again on a white horse.

He is dressed in a robe dipped in blood, and on his robe, on his thigh is a name that is written, King of Kings and Lord of Lords.

Jesus is coming again to share and save his people from their sins.

Listen, the scarlet thread starts from Genesis and runs to Revelation.

Can we give God a clap offering this morning for that blood?

Thank you.

I want to close with something that I feel like God spoke to me this week.

I'm not a poet.

Don't claim to be a poet.

I have rapped a time or two.

But I was thinking about Rahab and her story and how it weaved to the end of the Bible.

And Rahab and Salmon, Salmon, however you say it, they had a little boy named Boaz.

Boaz is a great story of itself in the Bible.

But one day Boaz would meet a lady who was in deep distress.

I guess Boaz was just raised right.

Think about the stories with Mama Rahab.

Think about the hurt from that little girl that now has a boy and wants her boy not to ever hurt a little girl.

I guess he was just raised right and knew how to treat a lady.

That lady that Boaz would marry Rahab's daughter-in-law.

Her name was one of the two women.

Books of the Bible were wrote.

Ruth.

Imagine Rahab sits down one evening with Boaz, and he'd been playing, and he pulled out this old red rope.

Rahab said, Boaz, you gotta sit down.

I gotta tell you, that's my rope, baby.

That's my rope.

Mom, what do you want with this old rope?

Baby, I need to tell you a story about my rope.

And then she reads to him this poem.

Boaz, I want to tie the scarlet thread to the window, window of my soul.

It's account of this thread, I'm reminded of a love that was shed.

My broken life, purpose, and made whole.

My home, my walls, my hurt, my past is all faintly in the distance.

But the gleam of the scarlet thread, it always glistens.

It was by this thread my Jesus bled, my life is forever new.

I hope that this thread in my soul's window will do the same for you.

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