I tell the story of Rahab a lot. I preach it, I tell it often to individuals, and I even did a Rahab series on my YouTube channel. Her story is told in Joshua 2 and 4. And in Matthew. Here is why I call it the Rahab Jesus story.  

Rahab was a pagan prostitute who ended up in the genealogy of Jesus. It happened because she believed that God would enable His people to win the battle of Jericho.  She believed it so much that she helped protect the spies who checked out the city before the battle. She made a deal for her family to be spared from the destruction that was coming.  

I am not going to tell the whole story here—just read it for yourself. But I am going to share why I tell this story. It is a valuable resource for church leaders to use. I guess that is why it showed up in the Bible.

This is a great story for those who think they are not good enough for Jesus.  Not good enough to be part of our church. The ones who say… 

“If I came in the church building, the roof would cave in.”   

“If you knew the things I have done…”

“If you knew the real me…”

This is the story for them: how a prostitute became an ancestor of Jesus.  

Faith is the key, not how good we are. Rahab was not delivered because she was good, but because of her faith. That is why our past does not matter. That is why we are welcome in church, and even welcomed back into church. Faith is the key. That is how prostitutes become part of the family of God.

You can re-write your story. It does not have to end the way it looks now. Rahab re-wrote her story for a different ending. She changed her life—no longer a prostitute but a part of God’s family. God enabled her to do that because of her faith. She was spared in the battle, brought out of the city into the camp of God’s people. There she meets and marries an Israelite. And they have a child, who has a child, who has a child, who has a child, all the way down to Jesus.

So if Jesus’ great-, great-, many greats-grandmother was a prostitute who changed her story, then we are all certainly welcome in his church.

Rahab and Jesus.

That is a story worth telling.