Charles Spurgeon
1857
Hebrews 11:31
I shall have some things to say this morning concerning this notable victory of faith over sin, such as I think will lead you to see that this was indeed a super-eminent triumph of faith. I will make my divisions alliterative, that you may recollect them. This woman’s faith was saving faith singular faith, stable faith, self-denying faith, sympathising faith, and sanctifying faith. Let no one run away, when I shall have expounded the first point, and miss the rest, for you cannot apprehend the whole power of her faith unless you remember each of those particulars I am about to mention.
Oh! what a mighty thing faith is, when it saves the soul from going down to the pit! So mighty is the ever-rushing torrent of sin, that no arm but that which is as strong as Deity can ever stop the sinner from being hurried down to the gulf of black despair, and when nearing that gulf so impetuous is the torrent of divine wrath, that nothing can snatch the soul from perdition but an atonement which is as Divine as God himself.
Ah! but you cannot tell what a great thing it is to save a soul. It is only our Lord Jesus Christ who can tell you that, for he is the only one who has ever been the Savior of sinners. And remember, you can only know how great a thing faith is by knowing the infinite value of the salvation of a soul.
Now, “By faith, the harlot Rahab was delivered,” That she was really saved in a gospel sense as well as temporally seems to me to be proved from her reception of the spies which was an emblem of the entrance of the word into the heart, and her hanging out of the scarlet thread was an evidence of faith, not inaptly picturing faith in the blood of Jesus the Redeemer. But who can measure the length and breadth of that word — salvation?
I ask no man to-day to come to Christ, and then continue his sins. If so, I should ask him to do an absurdity.
But mark, Rahab’'s faith was a singular faith. She and she alone was delivered, a solitary one amongst a multitude. Now, have you ever felt that it is a very hard thing to have a singular faith? It is the easiest thing in the world to believe as everybody else believes, but the difficulty is to believe a thing alone, when no one else thinks as you think; to be the solitary champion of a righteous cause when the enemy mustereth his thousands to the battle. Now, this was the faith of Rahab. She had not one who felt as she did, who could enter into her feelings and realize the value of her faith. She stood alone. Oh! it is a noble thing to be the lonely follower of despised truth.
To be good we must be singular. Christians must swim against the stream.
Furthermore, this woman’s faith was a STABLE faith, which stood firm in the midst of trouble.
This woman'’s faith was A SELF-DENYING faith. O men and brethren, trust not your faith, unless it has self-denial with it. Faith and self-denial, like the Siamese twins, are born together, and must live together, and the food that nourisheth one must nourish both.
This woman’'s faith was a SYMPATHISING FAITH. She did not believe for herself only; she desired mercy for her relations.
The spirit of proselyting is the spirit of Christianity, and we ought to be desirous of possessing it.
Unless we desire others to taste the benefits we have enjoyed, we are either inhuman monsters or outrageous hypocrites; I think the last is most likely.
One more head, and then we have done. Rahab'’s faith was a sanctified FAITH. Did Rahab continue a harlot after she had faith? No, she did not. I do not believe she was a harlot at the time the men went to her house, though the name still stuck to her, as such ill names will; but I am sure she was not afterwards, for Salmon the prince of Judah married her, and her name is put down among the ancestors of our Lord Jesus Christ.
The faith that will save you is a faith which sanctifies.
The world has been trying all manner of processes to reform men: there is but one thing that ever will reform them, and that is, faith in the preached gospel.
© Becky Laney of Operation Actually Read Bible
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