GOD CAN USE ME!
The Book of Joshua #2
Pastor Dennis Clanton
Woodland Church
Wednesday, May 14, 2025
(Joshua 2:1-7, NLT) “Then Joshua secretly sent out two spies from the Israelite camp at Acacia Grove. He instructed them, “Scout out the land on the other side of the Jordan River, especially around Jericho.” So the two men set out and came to the house of a prostitute named Rahab and stayed there that night. But someone told the king of Jericho, “Some Israelites have come here tonight to spy out the land.” So the king of Jericho sent orders to Rahab: “Bring out the men who have come into your house, for they have come here to spy out the whole land.” Rahab had hidden the two men, but she replied, “Yes, the men were here earlier, but I didn’t know where they were from. They left the town at dusk, as the gates were about to close. I don’t know where they went. If you hurry, you can probably catch up with them.” (Actually, she had taken them up to the roof and hidden them beneath bundles of flax she had laid out.) So the king’s men went looking for the spies along the road leading to the shallow crossings of the Jordan River. And as soon as the king’s men had left, the gate of Jericho was shut.”
1. Joshua sends two spies, men of faith
2. The spies are hidden by Rahab, a prostitute
(Matthew 1:5, NLT) “Salmon was the father of Boaz (whose mother was Rahab).”
(Hebrews 11:31, NLT) “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.”
a. Rahab believed in her heart and confessed with her mouth that Yahweh (the God of Israel) was the one true God.
(Romans 10:9, NLT) “If you openly declare that Jesus is Lord and believe in your heart that God raised him from the dead, you will be saved.”
b. Rahab reveals the faithlessness of the ten spies.
(Joshua 2:9–11, NLT) “I know the Lord has given you this land,” she told them. “We are all afraid of you. Everyone in the land is living in terror. For we have heard how the Lord made a dry path for you through the Red Sea when you left Egypt. And we know what you did to Sihon and Og, the two Amorite kings east of the Jordan River, whose people you completely destroyed. No wonder our hearts have melted in fear! No one has the courage to fight after hearing such things. For the Lord your God is the supreme God of the heavens above and the earth below.”
(Numbers 13:31–33, NLT) “We can’t go up against them! They are stronger than we are!” So they spread this bad report about the land among the Israelites: … Next to them we felt like grasshoppers, and that’s what they thought, too!”
c. When I take God at His Word, my obstacles are small
d. Challenges are measured by the power of the cause that meets the difficulty
GROWTHWORK
1. Lost people do not understand life in the body of Christ
2. Be bold expressors of God’s love and welcome to the lost
3. God often uses lost people to encourage his people
4. God is at work in the world whether we are or not
5. Celebrate what God is doing in the world
6. First impressions are important; but getting to know someone is more important
7. See people as God sees them, on a journey
8. Work together with lost people on common needs
9. Rahab represents us
(1 Corinthians 6:11, NLT) “Some of you were once like that. But you were cleansed; you were made holy; you were made right with God by calling on the name of the Lord Jesus Christ and by the Spirit of our God.”
10. Appreciate God’s grace to me