Mother's Day

05/08/2011 Human Observations

Happy Mother’s Day.  There are a couple of noteworthy mother’s who are remarkably spotlighted by the Holy Spirit to biblically display to believers, God’s model for the redemption of humankind.  First, there is Rahab, the gentile great grandmother of King David, who after hearing of the power of the God of Israel determined to help the two Israeli spies who had found their way into her house.  In spite of a command from the King of Jericho demanding that she …

Joshua 2:3 Bring forth the men that are come to thee, which are entered into thine house: for they be come to search out all the country.

Rahab instead determines to hide the spies from capture.

 ⁶But she had brought them up to the roof of the house, and hid them with the stalks of flax, which she had laid in order upon the roof.

Rahab tells the two spies, ⁹I know that the LORD hath given you the land, and that your terror is fallen upon us, and that all the inhabitants of the land faint because of you. ¹⁰For we have heard how the LORD dried up the water of the Red sea for you, when ye came out of Egypt; and what ye did unto the two kings of the Amorites, that were on the other side Jordan, Sihon and Og, whom ye utterly destroyed.
So all of Jericho heard about the power of the God who protected Israel, yet this woman, who was a harlot by profession, confessed:
 ¹¹for the LORD your God, he is God in heaven above, and in earth beneath.

So, a covenant was established between the harlot Rahab and the two men,

¹²Now therefore, I pray you, swear unto me by the LORD, since I have shewed you kindness, that ye will also shew kindness unto my father's house, and give me a true token: ¹³And that ye will save alive my father, and my mother, and my brethren, and my sisters, and all that they have, and deliver our lives from death. ¹⁴And the men answered her, Our life for yours, if ye utter not this our business. And it shall be, when the LORD hath given us the land, that we will deal kindly and truly with thee.

So, she hides the two men until the gates are shut for the night, then lowers them using a red rope out of a window to the ground, where they make their escape, to the mountains where they are to ¹⁶hide there three days, until the pursuers be returned: and afterward may ye go your way. 

The two men follow the instructions, return to Joshua, and report all that occurred in Jericho. 

 

I immediately notice the recurring models of the delivering hand of God.

The two who were sent determine the conditions of the inhabitants of the land went into the house of a harlot, who was clearly a gentile sinner.  Yet, found belief in the God of Israel upon their arrival; and made because of that belief made a covenant to deliver her and her father’s entire household from death … as was demonstrated in Egypt on the night of the first Passover:  ¹⁸Behold, when we come into the land, thou shalt bind this line of scarlet thread in the window which thou didst let us down by: and thou shalt bring thy father, and thy mother, and thy brethren, and all thy father's household, home unto thee.
 ¹⁹And it shall be, that whosoever shall go out of the doors of thy house into the street, his blood shall be upon his head, and we will be guiltless: and whosoever shall be with thee in the house, his blood shall be on our head, if any hand be upon him.
Again, using the red rope in the window much like the lamb’s blood on the doorway to protect the inhabitants of the house from the angel of death.  There are just so many models prophetically pointing to the Way of deliverance and redemption by our Lord: The promise of life in the “promised land” goes first to Israel, then to the gentiles, by way of a gentile female, who would become the bride of the great grandfather of the King of Israel.  The two spies hide for three days, much like Jonah was in the belly of a whale for three days, like Jesus was three days in the process of delivering the prisoners from death, before reappearing on the surface of the earth; and like the two witnesses in the book of Revelation, whose bodies are visibly dead in the street for three days before coming to life again to confirm the power of the Living God.  The (correction of the message first posted)son of Rahab follows the model, taking to himself a gentile bride, (the second mother of note in this message) Ruth the Moabite widow and daughter-in-law of Naomi, openly displaying the model for the Kinsman Redeemer and the redemption of the earth for those to whom it lawfully belongs in the Day of Jubilee.   I just love these models that encourage my heart to look forward to the day when the bride of the Messiah joins the bridegroom at the marriage supper.  See you at the partyJ