The Book Of Joshua 2 Of 9

When I say God is a God of Grace, I am saying that God does what He does for us, not because of our goodness, but because of His goodness!

Illus: When we think about the God of Grace, we think of the man who owned the city's newspaper who had 3 sons.

He offered ownership of the paper to the son who could write the most sensational headline using only three words or less.

• The first son's headline was, "Reagan Turns Communist."

• The second son’s headline was, "Castro Becomes Christian."

• But the third son inherited the newspaper when his headline was submitted. His headline only had two words, "Pope Elopes."

He earned the newspaper company with this sensational headline.

We can all be glad we do not have to earn our spiritual inheritance by sensational works. This can clearly be seen in the life of Rahab the harlot. Today, the name “harlot” does not carry with it the stigma that it carried in the Old Testament during the days of Israel.

For example, in John 8, we see the woman that was caught in the very act of adultery. They were going to kill her by casting stones at her, had the Lord Jesus not stopped them. During the days of the Old Testament ,and when Christ was here on earth, prostitution was a capital crime.

But in a sinful society like ours, our society does not see sexual sin such as prostitution, as a capital crime. For example, we often refer to prostitutes as being the “Oldest Profession,” and as “Women of the night”!

Hollywood glamorizes prostitution by showing us gorgeous women on the streets, wearing “Skimpy” outfits, trying to seduce men with their exposed bodies, as they drive or walk by them.

But like all sins, the devil has a way of making sin look good when it is not! For example:

• They do not show women who are often beaten up in the process of practicing their trade.

• They do not show women who have lost all their self-esteem.

• They do not show women who have contracted all kinds of venereal diseases.

• They do not show women whose lives are shortened because of the lifestyle they have chosen to live.

These are some of the raw facts about prostitution we seldom hear anything about. The devil tries to keep all these dirty details covered up.

Illus: I want to read you a real story of a 31 year old prostitute that tells of the awful life that she had to live. (I have had to omit many of the details for obvious reasons).

“Jill, ran away from home at 14. After being homeless for about a month in Cincinnati, she met a man ("Bruce") who alluded to getting her "work"; he took her to an abandoned place and raped her. Jill was a virgin at the time. Over the next three years, this man held her in captivity and sold her to "clients" interested in torture, rape and bondage. When she wasn't "working," Jill spent a good deal of time gagged, handcuffed and blindfolded in a closet, with minimal food and water, or being moved around the country in the trunk of a car. When she was finally able to escape after the L.A.P.D. picked Bruce up on an unrelated warrant, she was malnourished, sick and "spooky crazy from post-traumatic stress disorder."

This is the real world of prostitution where women choose to sell their bodies for money. It is hard to believe that today we have some who are pushing for the decriminalization of prostitution. If the Lord tarries long enough, it is something that probably will take place, perhaps in our lifetime.

Now I have mentioned all these terrible things about prostitution, because the Bible says Rahab WAS A PROSTITUTE! Before you can appreciate what the Lord did for her, you have to understand how she had lived her life.

The New Testament references to Rahab clear up all misunderstanding or misinterpretation about the woman. I mention that because some try to tell us that Rahab operated an “inn” that took in guests.

They feel like you can't let someone like Rahab sneak into the genealogy of Christ, so they try to rewrite the story.

• The word in Hebrew is "zonah," which, of course, means "harlot."

• But if stretched - a long way - that word can also be used to mean "hostess," one who operates an inn. So, the early Jewish and Christian communities began to refer to her as "Rahab the Hostess."

Now, there were two problems with that.

• First of all, in the days of Joshua, there were no inns. They didn't exist. It would have been hard for Rahab to manage what simply wasn't there.