What Must You Do to be Saved

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06 Oct 2024

What Must You Do to be Saved

Passage Joshua 2:1-24

Speaker Chris Steynor

Service Evening

Series Joshua: Receive your Inheritance

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Passage: Joshua 2:1-24

Then Joshua son of Nun secretly sent two spies from Shittim. ‘Go, look over the land,’ he said, ‘especially Jericho.’ So they went and entered the house of a prostitute named Rahab and stayed there.

The king of Jericho was told, ‘Look, some of the Israelites have come here tonight to spy out the land.’ So the king of Jericho sent this message to Rahab: ‘Bring out the men who came to you and entered your house, because they have come to spy out the whole land.’

But the woman had taken the two men and hidden them. She said, ‘Yes, the men came to me, but I did not know where they had come from. At dusk, when it was time to close the city gate, they left. I don’t know which way they went. Go after them quickly. You may catch up with them.’ (But she had taken them up to the roof and hidden them under the stalks of flax she had laid out on the roof.) So the men set out in pursuit of the spies on the road that leads to the fords of the Jordan, and as soon as the pursuers had gone out, the gate was shut.

Before the spies lay down for the night, she went up on the roof and said to them, ‘I know that the Lord has given this land to you and that a great fear of you has fallen on us, so that all who live in this country are melting in fear because of you. 10 We have heard how the Lord dried up the water of the Red Sea for you when you came out of Egypt, and what you did to Sihon and Og, the two kings of the Amorites east of the Jordan, whom you completely destroyed. 11 When we heard of it, our hearts sank and everyone’s courage failed because of you, for the Lord your God is God in heaven above and on the earth below.

12 ‘Now then, please swear to me by the Lord that you will show kindness to my family, because I have shown kindness to you. Give me a sure sign 13 that you will spare the lives of my father and mother, my brothers and sisters, and all who belong to them – and that you will save us from death.’

14 ‘Our lives for your lives!’ the men assured her. ‘If you don’t tell what we are doing, we will treat you kindly and faithfully when the Lord gives us the land.’

15 So she let them down by a rope through the window, for the house she lived in was part of the city wall. 16 She said to them, ‘Go to the hills so that the pursuers will not find you. Hide yourselves there for three days until they return, and then go on your way.’

17 Now the men had said to her, ‘This oath you made us swear will not be binding on us 18 unless, when we enter the land, you have tied this scarlet cord in the window through which you let us down, and unless you have brought your father and mother, your brothers and all your family into your house. 19 If any of them go outside your house into the street, their blood will be on their own heads; we will not be responsible. As for those who are in the house with you, their blood will be on our head if a hand is laid on them. 20 But if you tell what we are doing, we will be released from the oath you made us swear.’

21 ‘Agreed,’ she replied. ‘Let it be as you say.’

So she sent them away, and they departed. And she tied the scarlet cord in the window.

22 When they left, they went into the hills and stayed there three days, until the pursuers had searched all along the road and returned without finding them. 23 Then the two men started back. They went down out of the hills, forded the river and came to Joshua son of Nun and told him everything that had happened to them. 24 They said to Joshua, ‘The Lord has surely given the whole land into our hands; all the people are melting in fear because of us.’

New International Version - UK (NIVUK)

Holy Bible, New International Version® Anglicized, NIV® Copyright © 1979, 1984, 2011 by Biblica, Inc.® Used by permission. All rights reserved worldwide.

Transcript (Auto-generated)

This transcript has been automatically generated, and therefore may not be 100% accurate.

Thanks, Ali. Good evening, everyone. It's great to see you, particularly if you're new here tonight. My name's Chris. I'm one of the ministers here.

Really glad you're with us to worship this evening. Why don't we pray before we dive in? Dear Lord God, we thank you that as we worship here and listen to your word here in Linfield, we join with millions upon millions across the world who are part of your worldwide church family, who are worshipping you, Lord, some in the comforts of their villages and towns and cities, and others under great persecution. But, Lord, we thank you that your church prevails, that your spirit is working to turn hearts to you. And, Lord, we pray that right now, in this place, you would turn our hearts to listen to what you have to say to us, Lord, to be encouraged to be convicted, that we might be your followers, your faithful followers in this world.

Amen. Amen. Well, good evening. We've just started. Last week we started a journey for the Old Testament book of Joshua, and Steve started us off, and we're going to head there in a second, but I want to take some time to set this up a little bit.

It first, in March, I went up to London, I went up to the West End not to watch a show, but to watch two blokes chatting for about an hour. The two blokes were Justin Brierly, who is a christian podcaster and a historian called Tom Holland. I'm sure many of you have heard of him, but if you haven't, Tom Holland is a very famous historian. He's got a very widely listened to podcast. And Tom Holland has had a particular focus over the last few years on helping the wider culture think about how Christianity has impacted western culture and how even though, even though in many, many ways, western culture has rejected Christianity, the way we think, the way we understand the world is still thoroughly christian.

And the intriguing thing about Tomorrowland is even though he's writing all these things, he knows so much about the history of the christian faith, and he's writing about how Christianity has impacted the world for good, and particularly western culture. He's not a Christian. He's not a Christian. And so at this conference, there was a Q and A, and we had one of these apps where you can write in questions, you can upvote other people's questions as well. And somebody wrote, tom, why aren't you a Christian?

And everyone was, upvote, upvote. Why isn't Tom Holland a Christian? And what I'm going to show you now, to help us. Just think about our subject for tonight. This was Tom Holland's answer.

Thanks, Max. I don't think that. I mean, I think all this kind of five proofs of the existence of God. I don't think it ultimately, I think it's wasted effort. I think you either.

I think the best reason for believing in God is because you have an experience of transcendence that opens your eyes to the possibility of it. Against that there is reason which says that this is a chemical reaction, that everything is material, that the human brain is programmed to believe in supernatural. And this is why over the course of history, the human brain has generated so many gods. And I guess, speaking personally, the thing that plunges me back into unbelief is thinking how culturally contingent Christianity is, that it is just one among many, many explanations of the supernatural and why human beings are on the face of the earth. Human culture has generated.

And I think, why am I drawn to Christianity? Why, you know, why did I feel moved going to the church in Sinjar and not say to the shiite mosque or to the Yazidi temple, which were equally trashed? And the answer to that is that I've been raised in a christian tradition. And so perhaps my experience of the transcendence for that reason is died christian. And if there is a christian God, why should people raised in the christian tradition have that privilege?

I mean, what about Muslims or Jews or Hindus or people in the middle of the Amazon who've never met any Christian? I mean, it seems a bit unfair. And this is obviously something that haunted Christians right from the beginning. I mean, what about people who'd existed before the coming of Christ and couldn't be saved? And so that has always been the biggest block for me.

Is it that then is preventing you from going the full cs Lewis and converting? Well, as I say, I essentially have to cut myself off from reason. If I'm inhabiting the dimension of reason, then I don't believe. If I surrender myself to our dimension of myth and poetry and transcendence, then I can believe. Can I interrupt here?

Because my apologetic side of me is going. Yeah, sorry, sorry. If you want to hear what Justin Brierly said, just google Licc Tom Holland. It's around 1 minute 14. 1 hour 14.

In fact, Christianity is just one among many human cultures generated lots of gods. I'm just drawn to Christianity because of my culture. Christian God. Isn't that a little bit unfair? It's a good question, and it's not just an intellectual question, and I want to speak particularly to young people, because young people, you are going to feel this more.

More keenly, particularly when you go to college, when you go to university. Earlier this week, I spoke to one of our ex young people called Hannah. Most of you know Hannah Easley, many of you if you don't. She's the daughter of Antonia, who's leading our service tonight, and Matt, who has led our eleven to 14 group since the time of Joshua, probably.

And Hannah was every bit the sort of solid christian child like, you know, we wouldn't believe. But then lower 6th. Lower 6th form, her faith fell off a cliff. And part of that, she went to Vaand College. Part of that was a very, very aggressive philosophy teacher that just wanted to have christians for breakfast.

Philosophically, philosophical breakfast. But there was something more elemental than that. And that was as she came out of the sort of Linfield bubble, where Christianity felt very kind of fitting. There's something about Linfield and Linfield culture, and particularly all Saints culture. It just.

Just. Christianity just feels like it kind of, kind of fits here. But you go to another place and start to mix with the people who seem to be doing quite well without Christianity, and all of a sudden believe different things. And Christianity starts to feel a little bit like the Linfield hobby, you know, fine, but it's. But it's a hobby, right?

And if it's a hobby, it's certainly not something to be sacrificed for and certainly not something to impinge in other people. And what happened as she went into another culture where Christianity just felt less plausible, was her vision of God got smaller and smaller? And maybe you've had this question, you know, don't you think you're just a Christian because your parents were Christian? You need to know the answer to this question. Is the God of the Bible the God of the whole world?

Is the God of the Bible the God of the whole world? And what signs do we have from scripture that he really can make that claim? And we're going to look at this question tonight through possibly one of the worst stories you could possibly think of going to. You're going to Joshua, which on the face of it looks like God investing himself in a particular ethnic group and telling them to go and annihilate another ethnic group. And surely, could there not be more evidence than that, that the God of the Bible is a tribal God?

Well, last week, Steve went somewhere in helping us to explain this. We learned how Joshua, the name literally means Jesus. Really? They should have just called the book Jesus and the character Jesus. Joshua is a prototype Jesus.

This is a particularly unique part in israelite history, that this Old Testament journey is a prototype, a model working of how God is going to go on to save the worldwide church through Jesus. And also last week, Steve said, just wait till you get to the Rahab story, then that will make it clear. And here we are just the next week. And it is worth pointing out that the passage which Ali read out to us, Joshua chapter two, you could take this chapter out of the Joshua story. And actually, the Joshua story would make just as much sense.

Take out Joshua two, take out the references to Rahab a little later on in Joshua six. And actually, the story still does what it's meant to do. But chapter two is here. It's been given us, it would seem, for the sole purposes of saying, if you think that this is all about an ethnic God, that's not what's going on, and that's what we're going to see through the story of Rahab. And so at the start of chapter two, it kind of starts with a little bit of an espionage kind of feel.

You could read it with a bit of a background, actually. Guys, do we have Max, have you got any background music for us, just so I can narrate this with the appropriate field? There it is.

Excellent. Okay, so at the start, we read, Joshua wants to send spies into Canaan to see if they're going to actually be able to scout out the line. So Joshua sends spies. The spies sneak into the city, and somehow they end up at the house of Rahab, a prostitute. We don't know why, the Bible doesn't tell us, but that's okay.

But the king hears about this, and the king sends men to go and find these spies, and Rahab says, I'm going to hide. You hide on my roof. And then when the spy. When the king's men come and they say to Rahab, where have you hidden them? People have said, they're in your house.

He said, no, no, no. I sent them away. Go out into the hills, go out of the city, and the king's men go out to the city, and then the gate is shut. And then there was a bit of tension because we don't know how the spies are going to escape. And then there's some chitchat, some chitchat, which in action movies is irrelevant.

Not here. We're going to come back to the chitchat. But later on, we find out they have to come down through out the window. Rahab helps them escape. And so there's this little bit of an espionage bit about chapter two.

But that's not the point of Joshua, chapter two. It's all quite action movie stuff, but it's not here to tell us an ancient version of Jack Reacher or mission impossible. The point of the passage is in verses nine to 20. And that's where we're going to spend our time tonight, thinking about our response to this idea about the God of the Bible's claim to being the God of the world. And we're going to see Max.

Can I have live clicking? That'll be grand. Thank you. This is Max's first time. You're doing absolutely great.

I'm chucking a lot of stuff at you. It's still not. Oh, there we go. Yes, we are. Okay, we're going to see the God of the Bible works like no other.

The God of the Bible sees like no other, and the God of the Bible saves like no other. So let's delve into this passage. This is where the spies that have been sent by Joshua are talking to Rahab. Before the spies lay down for the night, she went up on the roof and said to them, I know that the Lord has given you this land and a great fear of you has fallen on us, so that all who live in this country are melting in fear because of you. We have heard how the Lord dried up the water of the Red Sea for you when you came out of Egypt and what you did to Sihon and Og, the two kings of the Amorites east, the Jordan, whom you completely destroyed.

When we heard of it, our hearts melted in fear and everyone's courage failed because of you four. The Lord your God is God in heaven above and on earth below. This is Rahab's confession. A pagan prostitute who's possibly among all of them. Like, you know, she has a right to say, hey, isn't this a bit unfair that he's your God, if he's the God of the world?

And yet she says, the Lord your God. She recognises the Israelites. God is the God in heaven above and the earth below. Not just the God of one tribe, but the God of everyone. This is Rahab's verdict.

Question. What is the basis of her confession? Is it in Tom Holland's words, she believed because she had an experience of transcendence that opened her eyes to the possibility of it? Or would she not just see her confession maybe just a result of chemical reactions in her brain, giving her the feelings of godliness? Is it Tom Holland's explanation?

No.

She believes because of the history, she believes because she has heard the news. She believes, because she has seen and heard of this goddess acting in history. She's heard about how this God has brought the Israelites out of Egypt. She's heard about what she has done through them. She has heard about the acts of God.

I've skipped a page somewhere, but that's okay. I'm going to just improvise this. No, I haven't. Okay. No.

There we go. We've got it. Okay. We're all right.

And indeed, the whole point of the plagues of Egypt was not that they were arbitrary, but they were specifically showing that this God of the Israelites was dominant over all of the other gods. Right? There was a God in Egypt that looked like a scarab beetle, so there was a plague of flies. There was a God of the Nile, and so the water turned to blood and so forth. She did not believe because of some abstract spiritual experience, detached from history, detached of the world.

And as any Christian will tell you who's been a Christian for a while, if your faith runs off the fumes of how you feel about the existence of God at any given point, your faith will not last for very long. What do we stand on as believers? What do we stand on? We stand on the works of God in history, and specifically the death and resurrection of Jesus Christ. And the apostle Paul is clear on this.

If Jesus is not raised, none of this matters. Right? This is our Lumfield hobby. But if Christ is raised, it matters for everyone and it matters for the whole world. And there is no other claim I have seen in other faiths that comes close to the claims of God intervening in human history like this.

There is a reason why our dates are dated BC and ADHd. The God of the Bible works like no other, and this pagan prostitute could see it. Secondly, the God of the Bible sees like no other. I want to put it to you that in this small section, we not only see the verdict of Rahab about God, but we see the verdict of the God. And the Bible on the hearts of all of humanity, is vindicated as right and true.

Let me explain that. You think about this accusation that maybe God is acting in a way that is a little bit unfair. Well, let's think of a kind of arbitrary God that thinks of right or wrong roughly like we do, that kind of awards good works and punishes bad works. There's many things we could say about that. But is there not still a question of fairness?

Is there not still a problem of fairness? Is there not the possibility that somebody that has done a lot of bad things in their life. May have done them because they had sort of a bad upbringing, that they were taught badly, that there was bad luck and they were deceived. Is there the possibility that those who've done good works may have just been influenced by a very good set of circumstances that taught them well? How do you actually.

How would you actually determine what is deserving and what isn't? You actually need a God who sees the heart, right? You need a God who actually declares what is and isn't fair.

Is it true that human beings are generally good, but it's society that corrupts them? That's the conclusion of the french philosopher Jean Jacques Rousseau. No, the God of the Bible. The verdict we read in scripture is that there is no one who is righteous. Not even one.

There is no one who is righteous. Not even one. Which means it's not that the Canaanites were not righteous, but Israelites were. No one is righteous. It's the most equalising verdict there is.

The Bible presents the whole of humanity as addicts to selfishness. And the nature of addiction is that the problem becomes the solution. The problem becomes the solution. A number of years ago, we had a guy called Justin Reece Larkin come and share his testimony here at all Saints. And he was on the front news of a newspaper because he had lost 750,000 pounds to gambling.

And he talked about his journey through gambling addiction. And he got the impression of a man who was entirely slave to his sins, slave to his passions, and yet never once blamed anyone else except himself. He was entirely enslaved and yet entirely culpable. And the Bible's verdict is that we are all spiritual addicts. We're unable to escape our selfishness and sin without intervention.

And yet we are guilty of what we have done. And it is true that some addictions are curbed by the accountability of the culture around us, better or less. It's not a pleasant thing to believe, but does it match up with reality? Last week, Steve mentioned the practises of the Canaanites. Among the gods they worshipped was one called Molech who demanded child sacrifice.

There's the historian Plutarch, who was around between 46 and 120 ad. He writes this about the sacrifices to Moloch. It says, with full knowledge and understanding, they themselves, themselves offered up their own children. And those who had no children would buy little ones from poor people and cut their throats, as if they were so many lambs or young birds. Meanwhile, the mother stood by without a tear or moan.

But should she utter a single moan or let fall a single tear. She had forfeit the moment and her child was sacrificed. Nonetheless.

You see, we read of the context in Joshua. The conquests in Joshua. Banish from your minds the equivalent picture of some aggressive, misguided crusaders going off to attack a group of decent Muslims who were minding their own business. These were people that had utterly lost their humanity and were in a spiral of addiction. Now, how do we know they were in a spiral of addiction?

Because let's let verses nine to eleven sink in again. I know that the Lord. This is Rahab's testimony. I know the Lord has given you this land and the great fear of you has fallen on us so that all who live in this country are melting in fear because of you. We've heard how the Lord dried up the water of the Red Sea for you when you came out of Egypt and what you did see on an Og, the two kings whom you completely destroyed.

When we heard of it, our hearts melted in fear and everyone's courage failed because of you. We are melting in fear because they have seen the works of goddess. What could they have done? What could they have done? They could have repented.

They could have repented when they heard of this. Just like Nineveh repented later on in the book of Jonah. They could have repented. They could have prayed to God. They could have gone out and said, you know, pray to your God for us, to the Israelites, what must we do to be saved?

But they didn't. And it wasn't for a lack of evidence or for a lack of fear, is because they were addicted to their sin. And the Bible says, deep down, same is true of you and me if we're left alone to our own devices. And the wonder isn't why doesn't God save more people? The wonder is that he saves anyone.

The God of the Bible works like no other. The God of the Bible sees like no other. And the verdict of the God on the Canaanites is the same verdict he placed on you and me. No one is righteous. Not even one.

But praise God. The God of the Bible also saves like no other. Could you advance me, Max? That would be great. Thank you.

Oh, hello. There you go. There it is. We've heard Rahab's confession of faith. You are the God of the world.

Your God is the God of the world to the Israelites. And now we read Rahab's evidence of faith. She appeals to mercy. This is verse twelve. Now, the men said to her, this oath you made us swear will not be binding on you.

Unless when we enter the land, you have tied this scarlet cord in the window through which you led us down. And unless you have brought your father and mother, your brothers and all your family into your house. Rahab doesn't claim save me because I'm not like the others. She appeals on the basis of her good, not she appeals. She doesn't appeal on the basis of her goodness.

But I need kindness. This is all I have. And the sign which the spies give her is curious. They ask her to tie this scarlet cord through the window so that the whole house may be saved. And this is, without a doubt bringing in the symbolism of what happened to the Israelites in the Exodus and those who know the story.

There were ten plagues in Egypt. But the last plague was different. All the other plagues, the plagues came upon the people of Egypt. They were judgement on the plagues of Egypt. But the last one, the death of the firstborn, was the angel of death coming over the whole land and nobody was safe.

The same judgement came on the Egyptians and the Israelites. But the Israelites were saved by the blood on the doorposts. The blood on the doorposts. And this scarlet cord, as the spies hand it to Rahab. What are they saying?

They are saying, rahab, you are going to be saved by the same way that we are saved. Not through our works, but by faith. And the New Testament writers, they tell us this. This is Hebrews by faith. The prostitute Rahab, because she welcomed the spies, was not killed with those who were disappointed in the same way.

Was not Rahab, the prostitute, considered righteous for what she did when she gave lodging to the spies and sent them off in a different direction. How was Rahab saved? By her confession of who God was. And that she threw herself in trust and faith on God's kindness and mercy, rather than appeal to any of her own goodness. And that too, is the way everyone is saved, whether they were before Christ or after Christ.

Because that blood on the doorpost, the image of the red. The red ribbon, it points us towards the blood of Jesus Christ, shed for us on the cross. Everyone who is saved is saved through Jesus. There is no other way. The Israelites were saved through Jesus, by faith.

Rahab was saved through Jesus by faith. And we too, if we throw ourselves on the mercy of God, we are saved by faith, through Jesus. This is a God who saves like no other God. And because of this, we see God saving throughout the world today in a way that no other God does. If we take a big view.

We take a big view. You see that all the other belief systems out there, they are tied to cultures. So Islam, if you want to be a good Muslim, you have to read the Quran in its original language. It's very much centred on the Middle east, and it doesn't really stray much further from there. If you think about Hinduism, Hindus believe that if you want to reach salvation, reach Nirvana, you need to be reincarnated as an indian man.

It's very much tied to the culture of India and all these other belief systems. You look at the big picture and they're cultural. Except Christianity. Christianity is the one that migrates. It started in the Middle east.

It was a Middle eastern religion. It's gone to South America, it's gone to Europe, it's gone to North America, it's gone to Korea. And the church is growing all over the world in China and in all sorts of places where we wouldn't expect it to. We have a God who works like no other. We have a God who sees like no other.

We have a God who saves like no other. And so what do we do to encourage ourselves when it feels like our God is small? We do what Hannah did because I said to Hannah, what made the difference for you? What brought you back to faith in the Lord? And she said, what brought me back was when I went abroad and I found other Christians that were worshipping, but it wasn't Linfield, because all of a sudden that expanded.

Okay, this is a worldwide God. This is a worldwide God. And I would love to spend. I'm out of time tonight, but I would love to spend more time, you know, talking about how Muslims have been coming to Christ through dreams and visions for decades. I messaged Simon Lunt.

He's one of our mission partners. I said, have you got any stories recently? He said, yeah, I spoke to a guy last week who was from a muslim background, became a Christian. Jesus appeared to him in a dream. I'd love to talk about the fact that there are christian believers attending church in China.

There were more of them than in all of so called Christian Europe. That this past Sunday, more Anglicans attended church in each of Kenya, South Africa, Tanzania and Uganda than did Anglicans in Britain and Canada and Episcopalians in the United States combined. That nearly half the christian believers who have ever lived are alive now. We have a God that works like no other, that sees like no other and saves like no other, and friends, there are rahabs being saved all over the world. This is the God of the Bible, finally revealed in Jesus Christ, who is winning hearts and minds from tribes and nations all around the world.

His purpose cannot be stopped. The gates of hell will not prevail against his church. He truly is the God of the world and he calls us to trust him and to tell others about him. Let's pray.

And so, Lord God, give us confidence in your word. Lord, give us confidence that you are gaining an inheritance for yourself from every tribe and nation. And Lord Jesus, for those of us that trust in you this evening we praise and thank you that we can obtain that inheritance through you. Lord Jesus, we thank you that you died, that many would be saved. We thank you that it is your heart that none that be lost.

And, Lord, you call us to take part in your mission here on earth. Lord, help us to trust and help us to keep that big vision of who you are and what you are doing. Amen.

Then Joshua son of Nun secretly sent two spies from Shittim. ‘Go, look over the land,’ he said, ‘especially Jericho.’ So they went and entered the house of a prostitute named Rahab and stayed there.

The king of Jericho was told, ‘Look, some of the Israelites have come here tonight to spy out the land.’ So the king of Jericho sent this message to Rahab: ‘Bring out the men who came to you and entered your house, because they have come to spy out the whole land.’

But the woman had taken the two men and hidden them. She said, ‘Yes, the men came to me, but I did not know where they had come from. At dusk, when it was time to close the city gate, they left. I don’t know which way they went. Go after them quickly. You may catch up with them.’ (But she had taken them up to the roof and hidden them under the stalks of flax she had laid out on the roof.) So the men set out in pursuit of the spies on the road that leads to the fords of the Jordan, and as soon as the pursuers had gone out, the gate was shut.

Before the spies lay down for the night, she went up on the roof and said to them, ‘I know that the Lord has given this land to you and that a great fear of you has fallen on us, so that all who live in this country are melting in fear because of you. 10 We have heard how the Lord dried up the water of the Red Sea for you when you came out of Egypt, and what you did to Sihon and Og, the two kings of the Amorites east of the Jordan, whom you completely destroyed. 11 When we heard of it, our hearts sank and everyone’s courage failed because of you, for the Lord your God is God in heaven above and on the earth below.

12 ‘Now then, please swear to me by the Lord that you will show kindness to my family, because I have shown kindness to you. Give me a sure sign 13 that you will spare the lives of my father and mother, my brothers and sisters, and all who belong to them – and that you will save us from death.’

14 ‘Our lives for your lives!’ the men assured her. ‘If you don’t tell what we are doing, we will treat you kindly and faithfully when the Lord gives us the land.’

15 So she let them down by a rope through the window, for the house she lived in was part of the city wall. 16 She said to them, ‘Go to the hills so that the pursuers will not find you. Hide yourselves there for three days until they return, and then go on your way.’

17 Now the men had said to her, ‘This oath you made us swear will not be binding on us 18 unless, when we enter the land, you have tied this scarlet cord in the window through which you let us down, and unless you have brought your father and mother, your brothers and all your family into your house. 19 If any of them go outside your house into the street, their blood will be on their own heads; we will not be responsible. As for those who are in the house with you, their blood will be on our head if a hand is laid on them. 20 But if you tell what we are doing, we will be released from the oath you made us swear.’

21 ‘Agreed,’ she replied. ‘Let it be as you say.’

So she sent them away, and they departed. And she tied the scarlet cord in the window.

22 When they left, they went into the hills and stayed there three days, until the pursuers had searched all along the road and returned without finding them. 23 Then the two men started back. They went down out of the hills, forded the river and came to Joshua son of Nun and told him everything that had happened to them. 24 They said to Joshua, ‘The Lord has surely given the whole land into our hands; all the people are melting in fear because of us.’

New International Version – UK (NIVUK)

Holy Bible, New International Version® Anglicized, NIV® Copyright © 1979, 1984, 2011 by Biblica, Inc.® Used by permission. All rights reserved worldwide.

This transcript has been automatically generated and therefore may not be 100% accurate

Thanks, Ali. Good evening, everyone. It’s great to see you, particularly if you’re new here tonight. My name’s Chris. I’m one of the ministers here.

Really glad you’re with us to worship this evening. Why don’t we pray before we dive in? Dear Lord God, we thank you that as we worship here and listen to your word here in Linfield, we join with millions upon millions across the world who are part of your worldwide church family, who are worshipping you, Lord, some in the comforts of their villages and towns and cities, and others under great persecution. But, Lord, we thank you that your church prevails, that your spirit is working to turn hearts to you. And, Lord, we pray that right now, in this place, you would turn our hearts to listen to what you have to say to us, Lord, to be encouraged to be convicted, that we might be your followers, your faithful followers in this world.

Amen. Amen. Well, good evening. We’ve just started. Last week we started a journey for the Old Testament book of Joshua, and Steve started us off, and we’re going to head there in a second, but I want to take some time to set this up a little bit.

It first, in March, I went up to London, I went up to the West End not to watch a show, but to watch two blokes chatting for about an hour. The two blokes were Justin Brierly, who is a christian podcaster and a historian called Tom Holland. I’m sure many of you have heard of him, but if you haven’t, Tom Holland is a very famous historian. He’s got a very widely listened to podcast. And Tom Holland has had a particular focus over the last few years on helping the wider culture think about how Christianity has impacted western culture and how even though, even though in many, many ways, western culture has rejected Christianity, the way we think, the way we understand the world is still thoroughly christian.

And the intriguing thing about Tomorrowland is even though he’s writing all these things, he knows so much about the history of the christian faith, and he’s writing about how Christianity has impacted the world for good, and particularly western culture. He’s not a Christian. He’s not a Christian. And so at this conference, there was a Q and A, and we had one of these apps where you can write in questions, you can upvote other people’s questions as well. And somebody wrote, tom, why aren’t you a Christian?

And everyone was, upvote, upvote. Why isn’t Tom Holland a Christian? And what I’m going to show you now, to help us. Just think about our subject for tonight. This was Tom Holland’s answer.

Thanks, Max. I don’t think that. I mean, I think all this kind of five proofs of the existence of God. I don’t think it ultimately, I think it’s wasted effort. I think you either.

I think the best reason for believing in God is because you have an experience of transcendence that opens your eyes to the possibility of it. Against that there is reason which says that this is a chemical reaction, that everything is material, that the human brain is programmed to believe in supernatural. And this is why over the course of history, the human brain has generated so many gods. And I guess, speaking personally, the thing that plunges me back into unbelief is thinking how culturally contingent Christianity is, that it is just one among many, many explanations of the supernatural and why human beings are on the face of the earth. Human culture has generated.

And I think, why am I drawn to Christianity? Why, you know, why did I feel moved going to the church in Sinjar and not say to the shiite mosque or to the Yazidi temple, which were equally trashed? And the answer to that is that I’ve been raised in a christian tradition. And so perhaps my experience of the transcendence for that reason is died christian. And if there is a christian God, why should people raised in the christian tradition have that privilege?

I mean, what about Muslims or Jews or Hindus or people in the middle of the Amazon who’ve never met any Christian? I mean, it seems a bit unfair. And this is obviously something that haunted Christians right from the beginning. I mean, what about people who’d existed before the coming of Christ and couldn’t be saved? And so that has always been the biggest block for me.

Is it that then is preventing you from going the full cs Lewis and converting? Well, as I say, I essentially have to cut myself off from reason. If I’m inhabiting the dimension of reason, then I don’t believe. If I surrender myself to our dimension of myth and poetry and transcendence, then I can believe. Can I interrupt here?

Because my apologetic side of me is going. Yeah, sorry, sorry. If you want to hear what Justin Brierly said, just google Licc Tom Holland. It’s around 1 minute 14. 1 hour 14.

In fact, Christianity is just one among many human cultures generated lots of gods. I’m just drawn to Christianity because of my culture. Christian God. Isn’t that a little bit unfair? It’s a good question, and it’s not just an intellectual question, and I want to speak particularly to young people, because young people, you are going to feel this more.

More keenly, particularly when you go to college, when you go to university. Earlier this week, I spoke to one of our ex young people called Hannah. Most of you know Hannah Easley, many of you if you don’t. She’s the daughter of Antonia, who’s leading our service tonight, and Matt, who has led our eleven to 14 group since the time of Joshua, probably.

And Hannah was every bit the sort of solid christian child like, you know, we wouldn’t believe. But then lower 6th. Lower 6th form, her faith fell off a cliff. And part of that, she went to Vaand College. Part of that was a very, very aggressive philosophy teacher that just wanted to have christians for breakfast.

Philosophically, philosophical breakfast. But there was something more elemental than that. And that was as she came out of the sort of Linfield bubble, where Christianity felt very kind of fitting. There’s something about Linfield and Linfield culture, and particularly all Saints culture. It just.

Just. Christianity just feels like it kind of, kind of fits here. But you go to another place and start to mix with the people who seem to be doing quite well without Christianity, and all of a sudden believe different things. And Christianity starts to feel a little bit like the Linfield hobby, you know, fine, but it’s. But it’s a hobby, right?

And if it’s a hobby, it’s certainly not something to be sacrificed for and certainly not something to impinge in other people. And what happened as she went into another culture where Christianity just felt less plausible, was her vision of God got smaller and smaller? And maybe you’ve had this question, you know, don’t you think you’re just a Christian because your parents were Christian? You need to know the answer to this question. Is the God of the Bible the God of the whole world?

Is the God of the Bible the God of the whole world? And what signs do we have from scripture that he really can make that claim? And we’re going to look at this question tonight through possibly one of the worst stories you could possibly think of going to. You’re going to Joshua, which on the face of it looks like God investing himself in a particular ethnic group and telling them to go and annihilate another ethnic group. And surely, could there not be more evidence than that, that the God of the Bible is a tribal God?

Well, last week, Steve went somewhere in helping us to explain this. We learned how Joshua, the name literally means Jesus. Really? They should have just called the book Jesus and the character Jesus. Joshua is a prototype Jesus.

This is a particularly unique part in israelite history, that this Old Testament journey is a prototype, a model working of how God is going to go on to save the worldwide church through Jesus. And also last week, Steve said, just wait till you get to the Rahab story, then that will make it clear. And here we are just the next week. And it is worth pointing out that the passage which Ali read out to us, Joshua chapter two, you could take this chapter out of the Joshua story. And actually, the Joshua story would make just as much sense.

Take out Joshua two, take out the references to Rahab a little later on in Joshua six. And actually, the story still does what it’s meant to do. But chapter two is here. It’s been given us, it would seem, for the sole purposes of saying, if you think that this is all about an ethnic God, that’s not what’s going on, and that’s what we’re going to see through the story of Rahab. And so at the start of chapter two, it kind of starts with a little bit of an espionage kind of feel.

You could read it with a bit of a background, actually. Guys, do we have Max, have you got any background music for us, just so I can narrate this with the appropriate field? There it is.

Excellent. Okay, so at the start, we read, Joshua wants to send spies into Canaan to see if they’re going to actually be able to scout out the line. So Joshua sends spies. The spies sneak into the city, and somehow they end up at the house of Rahab, a prostitute. We don’t know why, the Bible doesn’t tell us, but that’s okay.

But the king hears about this, and the king sends men to go and find these spies, and Rahab says, I’m going to hide. You hide on my roof. And then when the spy. When the king’s men come and they say to Rahab, where have you hidden them? People have said, they’re in your house.

He said, no, no, no. I sent them away. Go out into the hills, go out of the city, and the king’s men go out to the city, and then the gate is shut. And then there was a bit of tension because we don’t know how the spies are going to escape. And then there’s some chitchat, some chitchat, which in action movies is irrelevant.

Not here. We’re going to come back to the chitchat. But later on, we find out they have to come down through out the window. Rahab helps them escape. And so there’s this little bit of an espionage bit about chapter two.

But that’s not the point of Joshua, chapter two. It’s all quite action movie stuff, but it’s not here to tell us an ancient version of Jack Reacher or mission impossible. The point of the passage is in verses nine to 20. And that’s where we’re going to spend our time tonight, thinking about our response to this idea about the God of the Bible’s claim to being the God of the world. And we’re going to see Max.

Can I have live clicking? That’ll be grand. Thank you. This is Max’s first time. You’re doing absolutely great.

I’m chucking a lot of stuff at you. It’s still not. Oh, there we go. Yes, we are. Okay, we’re going to see the God of the Bible works like no other.

The God of the Bible sees like no other, and the God of the Bible saves like no other. So let’s delve into this passage. This is where the spies that have been sent by Joshua are talking to Rahab. Before the spies lay down for the night, she went up on the roof and said to them, I know that the Lord has given you this land and a great fear of you has fallen on us, so that all who live in this country are melting in fear because of you. We have heard how the Lord dried up the water of the Red Sea for you when you came out of Egypt and what you did to Sihon and Og, the two kings of the Amorites east, the Jordan, whom you completely destroyed.

When we heard of it, our hearts melted in fear and everyone’s courage failed because of you four. The Lord your God is God in heaven above and on earth below. This is Rahab’s confession. A pagan prostitute who’s possibly among all of them. Like, you know, she has a right to say, hey, isn’t this a bit unfair that he’s your God, if he’s the God of the world?

And yet she says, the Lord your God. She recognises the Israelites. God is the God in heaven above and the earth below. Not just the God of one tribe, but the God of everyone. This is Rahab’s verdict.

Question. What is the basis of her confession? Is it in Tom Holland’s words, she believed because she had an experience of transcendence that opened her eyes to the possibility of it? Or would she not just see her confession maybe just a result of chemical reactions in her brain, giving her the feelings of godliness? Is it Tom Holland’s explanation?

No.

She believes because of the history, she believes because she has heard the news. She believes, because she has seen and heard of this goddess acting in history. She’s heard about how this God has brought the Israelites out of Egypt. She’s heard about what she has done through them. She has heard about the acts of God.

I’ve skipped a page somewhere, but that’s okay. I’m going to just improvise this. No, I haven’t. Okay. No.

There we go. We’ve got it. Okay. We’re all right.

And indeed, the whole point of the plagues of Egypt was not that they were arbitrary, but they were specifically showing that this God of the Israelites was dominant over all of the other gods. Right? There was a God in Egypt that looked like a scarab beetle, so there was a plague of flies. There was a God of the Nile, and so the water turned to blood and so forth. She did not believe because of some abstract spiritual experience, detached from history, detached of the world.

And as any Christian will tell you who’s been a Christian for a while, if your faith runs off the fumes of how you feel about the existence of God at any given point, your faith will not last for very long. What do we stand on as believers? What do we stand on? We stand on the works of God in history, and specifically the death and resurrection of Jesus Christ. And the apostle Paul is clear on this.

If Jesus is not raised, none of this matters. Right? This is our Lumfield hobby. But if Christ is raised, it matters for everyone and it matters for the whole world. And there is no other claim I have seen in other faiths that comes close to the claims of God intervening in human history like this.

There is a reason why our dates are dated BC and ADHd. The God of the Bible works like no other, and this pagan prostitute could see it. Secondly, the God of the Bible sees like no other. I want to put it to you that in this small section, we not only see the verdict of Rahab about God, but we see the verdict of the God. And the Bible on the hearts of all of humanity, is vindicated as right and true.

Let me explain that. You think about this accusation that maybe God is acting in a way that is a little bit unfair. Well, let’s think of a kind of arbitrary God that thinks of right or wrong roughly like we do, that kind of awards good works and punishes bad works. There’s many things we could say about that. But is there not still a question of fairness?

Is there not still a problem of fairness? Is there not the possibility that somebody that has done a lot of bad things in their life. May have done them because they had sort of a bad upbringing, that they were taught badly, that there was bad luck and they were deceived. Is there the possibility that those who’ve done good works may have just been influenced by a very good set of circumstances that taught them well? How do you actually.

How would you actually determine what is deserving and what isn’t? You actually need a God who sees the heart, right? You need a God who actually declares what is and isn’t fair.

Is it true that human beings are generally good, but it’s society that corrupts them? That’s the conclusion of the french philosopher Jean Jacques Rousseau. No, the God of the Bible. The verdict we read in scripture is that there is no one who is righteous. Not even one.

There is no one who is righteous. Not even one. Which means it’s not that the Canaanites were not righteous, but Israelites were. No one is righteous. It’s the most equalising verdict there is.

The Bible presents the whole of humanity as addicts to selfishness. And the nature of addiction is that the problem becomes the solution. The problem becomes the solution. A number of years ago, we had a guy called Justin Reece Larkin come and share his testimony here at all Saints. And he was on the front news of a newspaper because he had lost 750,000 pounds to gambling.

And he talked about his journey through gambling addiction. And he got the impression of a man who was entirely slave to his sins, slave to his passions, and yet never once blamed anyone else except himself. He was entirely enslaved and yet entirely culpable. And the Bible’s verdict is that we are all spiritual addicts. We’re unable to escape our selfishness and sin without intervention.

And yet we are guilty of what we have done. And it is true that some addictions are curbed by the accountability of the culture around us, better or less. It’s not a pleasant thing to believe, but does it match up with reality? Last week, Steve mentioned the practises of the Canaanites. Among the gods they worshipped was one called Molech who demanded child sacrifice.

There’s the historian Plutarch, who was around between 46 and 120 ad. He writes this about the sacrifices to Moloch. It says, with full knowledge and understanding, they themselves, themselves offered up their own children. And those who had no children would buy little ones from poor people and cut their throats, as if they were so many lambs or young birds. Meanwhile, the mother stood by without a tear or moan.

But should she utter a single moan or let fall a single tear. She had forfeit the moment and her child was sacrificed. Nonetheless.

You see, we read of the context in Joshua. The conquests in Joshua. Banish from your minds the equivalent picture of some aggressive, misguided crusaders going off to attack a group of decent Muslims who were minding their own business. These were people that had utterly lost their humanity and were in a spiral of addiction. Now, how do we know they were in a spiral of addiction?

Because let’s let verses nine to eleven sink in again. I know that the Lord. This is Rahab’s testimony. I know the Lord has given you this land and the great fear of you has fallen on us so that all who live in this country are melting in fear because of you. We’ve heard how the Lord dried up the water of the Red Sea for you when you came out of Egypt and what you did see on an Og, the two kings whom you completely destroyed.

When we heard of it, our hearts melted in fear and everyone’s courage failed because of you. We are melting in fear because they have seen the works of goddess. What could they have done? What could they have done? They could have repented.

They could have repented when they heard of this. Just like Nineveh repented later on in the book of Jonah. They could have repented. They could have prayed to God. They could have gone out and said, you know, pray to your God for us, to the Israelites, what must we do to be saved?

But they didn’t. And it wasn’t for a lack of evidence or for a lack of fear, is because they were addicted to their sin. And the Bible says, deep down, same is true of you and me if we’re left alone to our own devices. And the wonder isn’t why doesn’t God save more people? The wonder is that he saves anyone.

The God of the Bible works like no other. The God of the Bible sees like no other. And the verdict of the God on the Canaanites is the same verdict he placed on you and me. No one is righteous. Not even one.

But praise God. The God of the Bible also saves like no other. Could you advance me, Max? That would be great. Thank you.

Oh, hello. There you go. There it is. We’ve heard Rahab’s confession of faith. You are the God of the world.

Your God is the God of the world to the Israelites. And now we read Rahab’s evidence of faith. She appeals to mercy. This is verse twelve. Now, the men said to her, this oath you made us swear will not be binding on you.

Unless when we enter the land, you have tied this scarlet cord in the window through which you led us down. And unless you have brought your father and mother, your brothers and all your family into your house. Rahab doesn’t claim save me because I’m not like the others. She appeals on the basis of her good, not she appeals. She doesn’t appeal on the basis of her goodness.

But I need kindness. This is all I have. And the sign which the spies give her is curious. They ask her to tie this scarlet cord through the window so that the whole house may be saved. And this is, without a doubt bringing in the symbolism of what happened to the Israelites in the Exodus and those who know the story.

There were ten plagues in Egypt. But the last plague was different. All the other plagues, the plagues came upon the people of Egypt. They were judgement on the plagues of Egypt. But the last one, the death of the firstborn, was the angel of death coming over the whole land and nobody was safe.

The same judgement came on the Egyptians and the Israelites. But the Israelites were saved by the blood on the doorposts. The blood on the doorposts. And this scarlet cord, as the spies hand it to Rahab. What are they saying?

They are saying, rahab, you are going to be saved by the same way that we are saved. Not through our works, but by faith. And the New Testament writers, they tell us this. This is Hebrews by faith. The prostitute Rahab, because she welcomed the spies, was not killed with those who were disappointed in the same way.

Was not Rahab, the prostitute, considered righteous for what she did when she gave lodging to the spies and sent them off in a different direction. How was Rahab saved? By her confession of who God was. And that she threw herself in trust and faith on God’s kindness and mercy, rather than appeal to any of her own goodness. And that too, is the way everyone is saved, whether they were before Christ or after Christ.

Because that blood on the doorpost, the image of the red. The red ribbon, it points us towards the blood of Jesus Christ, shed for us on the cross. Everyone who is saved is saved through Jesus. There is no other way. The Israelites were saved through Jesus, by faith.

Rahab was saved through Jesus by faith. And we too, if we throw ourselves on the mercy of God, we are saved by faith, through Jesus. This is a God who saves like no other God. And because of this, we see God saving throughout the world today in a way that no other God does. If we take a big view.

We take a big view. You see that all the other belief systems out there, they are tied to cultures. So Islam, if you want to be a good Muslim, you have to read the Quran in its original language. It’s very much centred on the Middle east, and it doesn’t really stray much further from there. If you think about Hinduism, Hindus believe that if you want to reach salvation, reach Nirvana, you need to be reincarnated as an indian man.

It’s very much tied to the culture of India and all these other belief systems. You look at the big picture and they’re cultural. Except Christianity. Christianity is the one that migrates. It started in the Middle east.

It was a Middle eastern religion. It’s gone to South America, it’s gone to Europe, it’s gone to North America, it’s gone to Korea. And the church is growing all over the world in China and in all sorts of places where we wouldn’t expect it to. We have a God who works like no other. We have a God who sees like no other.

We have a God who saves like no other. And so what do we do to encourage ourselves when it feels like our God is small? We do what Hannah did because I said to Hannah, what made the difference for you? What brought you back to faith in the Lord? And she said, what brought me back was when I went abroad and I found other Christians that were worshipping, but it wasn’t Linfield, because all of a sudden that expanded.

Okay, this is a worldwide God. This is a worldwide God. And I would love to spend. I’m out of time tonight, but I would love to spend more time, you know, talking about how Muslims have been coming to Christ through dreams and visions for decades. I messaged Simon Lunt.

He’s one of our mission partners. I said, have you got any stories recently? He said, yeah, I spoke to a guy last week who was from a muslim background, became a Christian. Jesus appeared to him in a dream. I’d love to talk about the fact that there are christian believers attending church in China.

There were more of them than in all of so called Christian Europe. That this past Sunday, more Anglicans attended church in each of Kenya, South Africa, Tanzania and Uganda than did Anglicans in Britain and Canada and Episcopalians in the United States combined. That nearly half the christian believers who have ever lived are alive now. We have a God that works like no other, that sees like no other and saves like no other, and friends, there are rahabs being saved all over the world. This is the God of the Bible, finally revealed in Jesus Christ, who is winning hearts and minds from tribes and nations all around the world.

His purpose cannot be stopped. The gates of hell will not prevail against his church. He truly is the God of the world and he calls us to trust him and to tell others about him. Let’s pray.

And so, Lord God, give us confidence in your word. Lord, give us confidence that you are gaining an inheritance for yourself from every tribe and nation. And Lord Jesus, for those of us that trust in you this evening we praise and thank you that we can obtain that inheritance through you. Lord Jesus, we thank you that you died, that many would be saved. We thank you that it is your heart that none that be lost.

And, Lord, you call us to take part in your mission here on earth. Lord, help us to trust and help us to keep that big vision of who you are and what you are doing. Amen.

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