Rehab, now, my good woman, don’t you see the absurdity of this thing? Why?
The people of Israel are on the other side of Jordan, and there is no bridge: how are they to get over? Of course they must go up higher toward the fords; and then Jericho will be for a long time secure. They will take other cities before coming to Jericho; and, besides, the Canaanites are mighty, and the Israelites are only a parcel of slaves;
they will soon be cut in pieces, and there will be an end of them; therefore, do not harbor these spies.
Why put your life in jeopardy for such an improbability? “Ah,” says she, “I do not care about the Jordan; my faith can believe across the Jordan, or else it was only a dry-land faith.” By-and-by, they march through the Jordan dry shod, and then Faith gets firmer confidence. “Ah!” says she, secretly within herself, what she would willingly have said to her neighbors, “will you not now believe? Will you not now sue for mercy?” “No,” they say; “the walls of Jericho are strong; can the feeble host resist us? And lo on the morrow the troops are out, and what do they do? They simply blow a number of rams’ horns; her neighbors say, “Why, Rehab, you do not mean to say you believe now? They are mad.” The people just go round the city, and all hold their tongues, except the few priests blowing rams’ horns. “Why, it is ridiculous. It was quite a new thing in warfare to hear of men taking a city by blowing rams’ horns.” That was the first day;
Probably the next day Rehab thought they would come with scaling-ladders and mount the walls; but no, rams’ horns again, up to the seventh day; and this woman kept the scarlet thread in the window all the time, kept her father and mother, and brothers and sisters in the house, and would not let them go out; and on the seventh day, when the people made a great shout, the wall of the city fell flat to the ground; but her faith overcame her womanly timidity, and she remained within, although the wall was tumbling to the ground. Rehab’s house stood alone upon the wall, a solitary fragment amid a universal wreck, and she and her household were all saved.
Now would you have thought that such a rich plant would grow in such poor soil— that strong faith could grow in such a sinful heart as that of Rehab?
Let the lord of Rehab speak to you!
