Shelach/Send out!
Numbers 13:1-15:41
Joshua 1: 1-24
Let me start at the ‘end’ so we can appreciate the ‘beginning’:
Salmon and Rahab were the father and mother of Boaz. Boaz and Ruth were the father and mother of Obed. Obed was the father of Jesse… Matthew 1:5
It was by faith that Rahab the prostitute was not destroyed with the people in her city who refused to obey God. For she had given a friendly welcome to the spies. Hebrews 11:31
(I just thought I would add a little note here, which you may have already processed in the torah portion: The “bad report” isn’t that there are “giants in the land”, the “bad report” is what we often do in our personal lives: we forget what the Lord has said: “I have given you the land”. I don’t mean to insult us with the obvious, but I need to fill my mind with what God has said; and be less distracted with the circumstances surrounding me that try to testify against what God says.
Obviously much has been written and could be written about this section of Numbers and there is much of course to learn from it. The haftorah is also one of those chapters that has gotten a lot of attention, so what I’m going to say may be obvious if not worn out by others, so please bear with me. We have these ‘spies’ who really are more like prophetic characters that get to prepare the people for what God is about to do for His holy people. The first clue that God is at work, is that He sends them to someone who really knows what’s going on in the land. Someone who speaks to the mighty and powerful and the common: a prostitute! He is so ‘clever’! They get confirmation of what the Lord had already said, so just to make sure, she prophesied to them:
10 For 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 the two kings of the Amorites who were on the other side of the Jordan, Sihon and Og, whom you utterly destroyed. 11 And as soon as we heard these things, our hearts melted; neither did there remain any more courage in anyone because of you, for the Lord your God, He is God in heaven above and on earth beneath.
Considering she just confirms what they already know, there must be another reason they are here: It’s preparation for the coming Messiah! Wait a minute, how could God insert something that seems so far off and unconnected, into a moment that could be life and death for the Children of Israel? Doesn’t He realize that this prostitute could negatively affect the reputation of these servants of God? I just love God’s economy; He cares about this woman! So, He sets up her ‘salvation’ and that of her entire household! He is also so efficient! Then He does something, I believe to even speak to us today; He puts her in the lineage of Jesus the Jewish Messiah (maybe a little Jew and Gentile foretaste also). Spend some time here and you will mine riches that I don’t have time to explore, but how about this week we take some time to look at some of the people in our lives or families, that could play the part of Rahab. Have we judged them or avoided them; have we been afraid of “casting pearls before swine” and never showed them any tenderness or care? Are we worried about “what it would look like if we were seen speaking to them”? What if they have something to say to us? We are exactly like those spies, in the land of promise if we allow ourselves to see it. Our lives can be full of adventure without even going somewhere else! Father, open our eyes to see the ‘Rehabs’ all around us, so we can experience the exhilaration of being ‘spies in the land’! by john eisner
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