Joshua Chapter 2

We are going to be jumping into Joshua, chapter 2 this week.

As we saw last week in chapter 1, Joshua has assumed command of the Israelites. He is charged by God to lead them in invading and displacing all the current residents of the promised land.

Chapter 2 starts off with a familiar theme. Joshua sends 2 spies to scout ahead of the main army and to report back on the status of the people they will soon face in battle.

If this sounds like something you might have read before, it's because it is almost identical to the strategy that Moses used when the Israelites first came to the promised land. In fact, Joshua and Caleb were a part of the original group of 12 spies that went over into Canaan.

Now, as leader of the nation, Joshua needs intelligence about their opposition. So he sends his spies to report back to him about Jericho, the first major test of their invasion.

The spies come to an inn run by a prostitute named Rahab. They were supposed to slip into the city and secretly get information on it before quietly going back to Joshua.

They failed.

As verse 2 shows, the very night they entered the city, men from the king of Jericho are alerted to their presence, and even to their very mission.

Rahab hides the men, and lies to the king's soldiers as to their whereabouts, and then helps the spies escape back to Joshua. She only asks one thing, that her family be spared when the Israealites destroy the city and everyone in it.

They agree to do so, and eventually make their way back to Joshua, where their report encourages the whole nation of Israel that God has given Jericho to them.

Notice two things. First off, Rahab is a foreigner. She is not of the nation of Israel, and God's instructions to the Israelites were to utterly destroy everything and everybody in the nations they were going to invade (Deuteronomy 7:1-2).

So why are they making deals with her? Are the spies not breaking the very commandment of the God they are serving?

In a word, no.

It would take a complete article to explain the details, but the Bible is clear that there is only one true family of God, that is the family of faith, or 'true Israel'. Genetics do not determine it, but rather the loving election of individuals by God to be a part of his family. Romans chapters 9-11 will help clear this up for you.

Rahab demonstrated, by her faith in what God had already done for the Israelites in bringing them out of Egypt and into the promised land, that God had chosen her and her family to become one with his family of faith. She did not know this, but God had already worked out the plan that would make her a direct ancestor of Jesus Christ. Awesome to think that God used a foreign prostitute to further the line from which the King of Kings would be born of.

To sum up the first point then, the spies were not 'aiding and abetting' the enemy. Rather, they were unknowingly carrying out the plan that God had in mind to save his people. For more on Rahab, see Hebrews 11:31 and James 2:25.

The second thing I saw was that faith in the sovereignty of God and faith that he will accomplish what he wills does not negate action on our part. We may not know every detail about how it will come about, but when God tells us to do something, he expects us to act in a way that honors him and seeks to do what he wants us to do.

Joshua knew that God would lead the Israelites to victory over the inhabitants of the land. God had told him this in the first moments of his new leadership. (Chapter 1:1-9)

But even knowing this, Joshua still had to send spies. He still had to form a battle plan.

God tells us things everyday. We can be comforted knowing that God will accomplish them. We can also be comforted knowing that if we seek to follow his will for our lives, and to bring about what he tells us to do, even if we don't get all the details right, God will have to power and will to 'fix' our mistakes to honor his wishes.

Praise God for his power and direction in your life today.