You guessed it — another prostitute

By all accounts, Rahab was on the winning team. She grew up in the shadows of these tall Jericho walls. Yet she made a split second decision when the spies arrived at her door. And now she was lying to the local police.

She had heard the rumors. A scrappy tribe of herdsmen bringing the Egyptian empire to its knees. There was something unstoppable about these Yahwists, and she knew that to come up against their God was to face sure defeat.

“They’re gone,” she whispered to the spies. As they crawled out from the barley sheaves, she struck a deal. “I saved your life. And when your God gives you this city, you save my family.” They agreed.

They told Rahab to hang a scarlet cord in her window. I wonder in this moment if the spies were remembering their own deliverance. The tenth plague in Egypt was the slaying of the firstborn son. But the Israelites painted the red blood of a slain lamb on their doorposts, and the destruction passed over their house. By hanging this scarlet cord, Rahab was participating in her own Passover. And that day began her participation in God’s chosen people.

Several weeks later and a loud trumpet blast would melt the walls of her impenetrable home city. But just as the spies promised, Rahab and her family were saved alive.

They weren’t just prisoners of war either. They became part of God’s people, and Rahab’s spunky story of faith echoes in Jesus’ genealogy in Matthew 1. The outsider invited in. The traitor adopted. The prostitute made a grandmother of the Messiah.

—

You can read the full story of Rahab in Joshua 2 & 6. Join us at Hope this Advent season as we trace through The Mothers of Jesus: a survey of the women listed in Matthew 1. Next week: Ruth!

Watch the sermon here.