Hebrews 11:31

By faith Rahab the harlot perished not with them that were disobedient, having received the spies with peace.

The moral reason for God's destruction of Jericho and the dispossession of the kingdoms of Canaan and their being supplanted by Israel is apparent in this verse. It was not from any perfection in Israel, nor as a capricious favor to them apart from a benevolent purpose for all mankind; but it was because of the moral corruption, decadence, and sin out of control in those cities described here as "disobedient."

GOD'S DESTRUCTION OF CITIES

This is an appropriate place to study a phenomenon in divine revelation which gives a great deal of concern to some Bible students, and which, if improperly understood, leads to very unwholesome thoughts regarding the all-wise and benevolent Creator of mankind. In the verse before us, it is categorically revealed that the citizens of Jericho were consigned to death, the reason of their sentence appearing simply as their "disobedience." That disobedience on their part must not be understood as merely an occasional lapse, or some intermittent outbreak of lustful wickedness, common to all people, Israel also, in that sense, being disobedient; but it was a state of reprobacy in which they had fallen through long practice of shame and debauchery, a terminal condition of utter rebellion against God, which had resulted in the depravity of the people, making them, in effect, a cancer upon the body of humanity, and requiring, as a means of preserving the race itself, that those reprobate and depraved people be not partially, but absolutely, cut off.

In the analogy of a cancer, people readily accept this principle for a human body, even their own; and it is not intelligent to deny the justice of God's acting upon the same principle where the total body of the human race is concerned. Near Moffatt Tunnel through the continental divide in Colorado, where the great switchbacks once carried the transcontinental trains over the vast mountains, one may still see those impressive tracks with a DERAIL device at the apex of every turn. That derail device was to enable the operator to destroy any train that got out of control on the deadly slopes of the great mountain; because, once out of control, a train was doomed anyway, and its destruction was the only hope of saving the entire system and the village below. At various times in human history, cities or nations have become terminal in their sins, and God has thrown the derail switch for them in order to preserve man himself as a race upon the earth. The cities of Canaan, dispossessed by the Jews, are an example of this. Other examples are the generation that perished in the flood, the cities of Sodom and Gomorrah, and Tyre, Babylon, and Nineveh, to name only a few. In all of such examples there was the same pattern of excessive sin, reprobacy, judgment, and destruction; nor was Israel itself exempt from the same righteous judgment. Matthew 22:6,7 reveals that the destruction of Jerusalem in 70 A.D. was a judgment of God upon that people for their rejection of Christ. (See further discussion of this in Commentary on Matthew.)[38]

It is the fashion of some to write off the historical judgments of God upon depraved peoples as pertaining to a less enlightened age, and to assume that no such judgment is possible for our present "enlightened" (!) generation of godless rebels against God; but the hand of God may be suspected as having a part in the destruction of Germany within our own day; and the record of God's past dealings with nations gives the strongest assurance that he will at last punish those societies that reject his holy sovereignty.

THE FAITH OF RAHAB

As a citizen of a doomed city, Rahab rose to unprecedented heights of faith, believing in the God of Israel, and furnishing the most amazing demonstration of it, as recorded in Joshua 2 and Joshua 6. Her faith is the first mentioned after the author of Hebrews skipped the entire period of the wilderness wanderings, finding for that entire forty years no special example of Israel's faith to be cited. That this Gentile harlot was included with the immortals of faith may be viewed as an earnest of God's loving concern for the Gentiles as well as for the Jews, and of his ultimate purpose of redeeming all human beings.

Bruce said:

There can be little doubt that she is the Rahab who appears in Matthew 1:5, as the wife of Salmon, prince of Judah, the mother of Boaz, the ancestress of King David, and therefore also of our Lord ... Clement of Rome recounts the story of Rahab to illustrate the virtues of faith and hospitality, and makes her a prophetess to boot, since the scarlet rope by which she let the spies down from her window on the city wall, and by which her house was identified at the capture of the city, foreshadowed that "through the blood of the Lord all who trust and hope in God shall have redemption."[39]

Spurgeon said of this eleventh chapter that it "recites the victories of faith";[40] and then he goes ahead to enumerate Enoch's victory over death, Abraham's over natural affection, Sarah's over infirmity, Moses' over wealth and glory, etc. It would seem that the faith of Rahab overcame practically everything. It was truly a triumph: (1) over sin, her occupation being one that would not predispose her to righteousness; (2) over patriotism, her own city and race being rejected as a consequence of her decision; (3) over fear of death, a death she must have viewed as inevitable, no matter what happened, from her own people, perhaps, if her act became known, and from the wreckage of the city if the walls fell, her house being located on the wall, and from the possibility that Israel would not honor the commitment they had made to her (Could she really count on the Israelites not to kill her, no matter what they promised?); (4) over unpopularity, the cause of Israel being anathema to all the people of Jericho; (5) over meager information, because no prophet had appeared to teach her the truth; her information consisted only of rumor, and some of that forty years old; yet she believed! (6) over the religious convictions of her loved ones, or over their irreligion if that was their state; and (7) over wild alarm. Think of it. Her covenant required her to remain in the house; and as the entire complex of city walls came tumbling down, what must have been her basic urge to flee? In the presence of such violent and alarming danger, she remained exactly as she promised, within her house. She believed!

Certain characteristics of Rahab's faith are commendable: (1) It was stable in spite of many temptations to waver, as, for example, when the Israelites were marching for days around the city with no visible result. (2) It was evangelistic, leading her to reach out for the salvation of others, all of her loved ones being saved through her efforts. (3) It was redemptive and elevating, regarding her character, because she did not continue as a harlot, but as a wife of a prince. (4) It was sacrificial, because, in the fall of Jericho, which she aided, there was the loss of everything that she had.

How strange that Jericho's harlot should be such a singular example of faith, and that the entire preceding generation of the wandering Israelites, except Caleb and Joshua, should have provided nothing to compare with it. Christ found the same incredible paradox in that "the publicans and harlots" were nearer to God's kingdom than the religious leaders (Matthew 21:31).

[38] James Burton Coffman, Commentary on Matthew (Abilene, Texas, ACU Press, 1968), chapter 22.

[39] F. F. Bruce, op. cit., p. 329.

[40] Charles Haddon Spurgeon, Spurgeon's Sermons (New York: Funk and Wagnalls Company), Vol. 3, p. 269.