The Woman Who Gambled and Won | Previous Challenge Entry

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TITLE: The Woman Who Gambled and Won | Previous Challenge Entry
By Rosie Foshee
04/21/16
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She lived in the town of Jericho in the land of Canaan, a single working business woman. Her home was built in the wall of Jericho, toward the top. Flax was an important crop to her livelihood. After the stalks were gathered from the fields, she would have placed the stalks in water and allowed them to partially rot for a few days. Then she spread them on the roof of her house to dry. Once the stalks were dried, she would separate the stems, and the plant fibers once separated, gave her coarse yarn to make twine, rope and her work clothing. The fine yarns would have been spun into sexually stimulating clothing. Because of her trade, she would dress in a way to garner attention to herself, to draw men to her and ultimately into her home and into her bed for pay. She was a harlot or prostitute of Jericho.

Her people worshiped false gods and idols, but at the first mention of her in God's Word, we find out that she had heard of the one true God. It was written of her, by the rabbis, or religious teachers of God's people, that she was one of the most beautiful women in the world. I believe these writings, that were passed down, may have been as much, if not more so, about her inner beauty, as it may have been about her outward beauty. What she had heard of the one true God changed her life forever.

We first read about the life of this woman in the book of Joshua, chapter 1. Moses, in the previous writing, in Deuteronomy, had died, and Joshua was the new appointed leader to lead God's people into the land God promised them. Joshua appoints two spies to enter the land, to see what they would be up against as they made their entrance.

As the spies came near to Jericho, the house near the top of the wall, would have provided a way of quick escape, if they needed to turn back. And once inside the woman's lodging, the news of the men spread to the hearing of the king of Jericho. The kings sends his men to request of the woman to bring the men forth, that they had come to search the land out. But the woman had sent the men to the roof to hide under the flax. And she sent the king's men away, saying she didn't know who they were, and that at dark, they had left, and she didn't know where they went. Then suggested the kings men go after them, to overtake the two spies.

Then the moment she was waiting for. It was her opportunity to share of this one true God, the news that was bottled up inside of her, ready to spill out. Open your Bibles to the book of Joshua, chapter 2, and begin reading in verses 9-13, her testimony of the Lord God before God's men.

She acknowledged that she knew the Lord had given His people the land. She recognized the land belonged to the Lord to pass on as He pleased.

She acknowledged that she heard how the Lord dried up the Red Sea for His people as they came out of Egypt. She recognized the Lord as having all power, beyond that as of man.

She acknowledged the omnipresence of the Lord God, His presence above and in the earth beneath. This was not the presence she knew of as man with man.

When she bound her line of scarlet thread in the window, she acknowledged her faith in the Lord God and His saving grace.

This woman, whose name is revealed as Rahab, (also pronounced Rachab), we find her name again in God's Word in the book of Matthew 1:5, in the genealogy of our Lord and Savior. She is spoken of again in the book of Hebrews 11:31, in the hall of fame of the heroes of faith. In the book of James 2:25, it was spoken of Rahab, her faith shining brightly, when she acknowledged what God wanted to do for His people, and she joined God in His work to bring it about.

Rahab gambled her livelihood away and laid her life on the line, but she won the greatest winnings of all. God did not forget her throughout His Word. She paved the way for outsiders, or Gentiles, those who are not Jews, to enter our Lord God's hall of fame of the heroes of faith.

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