The Grace of Redemption
Montie Klecker | Director of A/V Ministries
It's kind of cool when you get into biblical scholarship, there are terms that just get thrown around like everyone's supposed to know them, and they get used incredibly frequently when you're studying the Hebrew literature.
Hebrew authors are extremely poetic, and if you ever listen to rabbis talk today, you kind of get a sense of how poetic they really are.
They used one form of poetry in scripture called a chiasm. Chiasms are really neat; they are an A-B-C-B-A type of poem where the As are both tied together, the Bs are tied together, and the C is what they want you to understand from the scripture.
a. “I know that the Lord has given you this land
b. and that the terror of you has fallen on us, and everyone who lives in the land is panicking because of you.
c. For we have heard how the Lord dried up the water of the Red Sea before you when you came out of Egypt, and what you did to Sihon and Og, the two Amorite kings you completely destroyed across the Jordan.
b. When we heard this, we lost heart, and everyone’s courage failed because of you,
a. For the Lord your God is God in heaven above and on earth below.
In Joshua 2, we see that verse 10 is the center isolated point that we're supposed to grab onto.
It's kind of a tough passage, actually.
Joshua 2:10 (CSB) says
For we have heard how the Lord dried up the water of the Red Sea before you when you came out of Egypt, and what you did to Sihon and Og, the two Amorite kings you completely destroyed across the Jordan.
This passage actually shows that it was the actions of Israel that revealed God to Rahab.
I want to make sure you understand this today; this is the big point:
our actions matter.
Rahab only knew who God was because the Israelites acted in faith.
And when we say they acted in faith, I mean they did things that you would only do if there was a God backing you up.
They escaped slavery in Egypt. They crossed the sea that only dried up when you took a step in it. And then they defeated the kings at the Jordan.
Rahab saw God work through their obedience. That's what Joshua 2:10 is showing us today.
Jericho knows who God is because of the actions of Israel.
What separates Rahab from the rest of Jericho is that she knows who God is and placed Him as Lord.
You see, it's God's grace received by faith that changes us.
And I want to be incredibly clear about something right now: our actions matter.
But our actions are not about us; our actions are not for us.
Our actions heavily impact those around us. We find in the Book of James that our works are not done apart from faith but done in faith. They are not done instead of faith, but they are done because of faith.
We read this in James 2:14-19 (CSB),
What good is it, my brothers and sisters, if someone claims to have faith but does not have works? Can such faith save them? If a brother or sister is without clothes and lacks daily food, and one of you says to them, 'Go in peace; stay warm and be well fed,' but you do not give them what the body needs, what good is it? In the same way, faith by itself, if it is not accompanied by action, is dead. But someone will say, 'You have faith; I have works.' Show me your faith without works, and I will show you my faith by my works. You believe that God is one; good. Even the demons believe that, and they shudder.
James is saying that our faith is backed by our actions.
Our salvation doesn't come from the things we do, but our actions are informed by our faith. =
And that faith is worthless unless it's acted out.
Warren Wiersbe explained it this way: true saving faith involves the whole personality. The mind is instructed, the emotions are stirred, and the will then acts in obedience to God.
You see, Rahab has so much importance in our Christian faith. She has so much legacy.
Matthew 1:5 lists her as one of Jesus's ancestors. She was actually the great-great-grandmother of King David.
Hebrews 11:31 lists her as one of the great examples of faith.
James talks about her as one of the great examples of how to act out your faith.
In Joshua 2, we see that Rahab saved the lives of the spies. She saved the mission and the lives of many Israelites.
And we see that the spies, in response, make the promise to spare Rahab and all who belong to her.
We see that in Joshua 6, her life and the lives of all those who belong to her were spared because of her faith and her faithfulness.
James continues to explain Rahab's faith, obedience, and faithfulness coming to fruition through her actions in James 2:25-26 (CSB), which says,
You see that a person is justified by works and not by faith alone. In the same way, wasn't Rahab the prostitute also justified by works in receiving the messengers and sending them out by a different route? For just as the body without the spirit is dead, so also faith without works is dead.
I think it's vital that we understand the central point:
anyone who responds in faith to God's gracious overtures can and will be saved.
You see, Rahab's past did not determine her future, and thankfully, neither do ours.
Rahab was a prostitute and is an ancestor of our King Jesus.
You see, sin separates us all from God, but God's grace will reorient and restore us to Him.
Rahab was a sinner; she was a prostitute for a living and found grace to restore her to God.
that required the faith to act rightly, the grace to lie while she was seeking redemption, and the grace to find forgiveness and righteousness.
Everyone reading this is a sinner. (Feel called out? We still love you!)
We all, at some point, miss the point.
But we are given the grace to seek redemption. We all miss the point; we all fall short of the glory of God. So God gives us grace freely when we just ask for it.
What this means, as Dusty often says, is that no one can out-sin the grace of God. Our potential for failure is immense; I have seen good people do evil things.
But the potential for God's grace is so much greater.
You see, we all have this ability to be incredibly evil people. But God reserves the right to love us anyway.
This means that we, as Christians, cannot get stuck in someone's past when determining if they deserve God because, hands down, no one deserves God.
Not one person is good enough for God. That means that we don't get to decide who deserves God.
We are called to share the gospel, not decide who gets it.
And this means that we should not and cannot, as good and faithful Christians, be gatekeepers of the faith. As Christians, we are called to be a community with all people and tell all people of the grace of Christ.
And this list includes, but is not limited to, atheists, Christians, Muslims, Mormons, Catholics, Republicans, Democrats, gay, straight, male, female, sinners, saints, K-State fans, and even the most evil and twisted of KU fans or Mizzou fans (pray for them, honestly).
Whatever qualifier you want to identify someone by is secondary to what God identifies them by.
You see, God calls us all creation, once more, creation created in His great and beautiful image.
But this creation is filled with fallen people who have fallen prey to the human condition of sin, where our goals are no longer aligned with God's.
And that's why we must remember that anyone who responds in faith to God's gracious overtures can and will be saved.
And that includes you and me.
You see, our goals must be secondary to God's, and if they aren't, we are choosing separation from God.
Rahab understood that the Lord must be who we look to, our hope, and she acted on that.
She found redemption and acted in faith.
I’ll confess today. I’ll be honest.
I am jaded and bitter. I am incredibly critical of how Christians act today.
I have seen how Christians have made enemies of those who surround us.
There's this expectation that the world acts like us before we will ever share Jesus with them, and it's evil.
I think that Christianity has been represented in many ways that are unbecoming of Christ, and many times, these actions are smearing the name of the bride of Christ.
Worst of all, this is all done with this air of self-righteousness that pretends to represent our humble Jesus.
So how often do your words speak in ways that your actions don't follow?
Are your actions good news for the broken, the orphans, and the widows?
Do you act in a way that makes people curious about who you serve or who you believe in, or do they see you and want to avoid everything you stand for?
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