Today we are considering the second reason for which the
divine visitors had come to Abraham in
Genesis 18. The account begins in chapter 18:1 with 3 men appearing to
Abraham at his tent in Mamre (Hebron). We had seen that these 3 men were the
LORD and 2 angels, and they had come to do two things:
(i)
to
reassure Abraham and Sarah that they
would become parents even at this late age, and so fulfil the
promise given 25 years earlier in Genesis12. This miracle would now happen
within a year. (18: 1- 15)
(ii)
to
tell Abraham about a coming judgement upon the towns of Sodom and Gomorrah(18:1 -33).
The Judgment on Sodom and Gomorrah which will happen in
Chapter 19 is a weighty matter, and very relevant, particularly in our
time. You know that the word “Sodomy”
is associated with depravity and wickedness, and the word has been coined in
particular to describe the sin of homosexuality,
the sexual relationship between two
people of the same gender. This phenomenon
is described in 19:5, when the men of the city demanded to have sexual relations
with the 2 angels, appearing here since 18:1
in the form of men. We will deal with this next time, and as I said, this is a
matter that has attracted considerable attention and debate in this age. There
is a strong and extremely vocal
lobby worldwide (the so called LGBT movement) in support of
deviant sexual practices under the
protection of the so called Human Rights movement. Some theologians sympathetic to this
movement have worked strenuously to reinterpret this and other passages to justify their position.
Abraham, at this point is not aware of the further agenda of
His three divine visitors. In v. 16 we
read that the three visitors are set for their departure, Abraham accompanying
them for a while. Their eye catches the
view of Sodom, below in the plains. It is the view of
this town that
gives rise to what follows now in
the rest of chapters 18 and 19. The LORD
(YAHWEH – covenant name –here the pre-incarnate
Lord Jesus Christ) , the spokesman of the group says in vv. 17-22:
“Shall I hide from
Abraham what I am about to do, seeing that Abraham shall surely become a great
and mighty nation, and all the nations of the earth shall be blessed by him?
For I have chosen him , that he may command his children and his household after him to keep the law of the LORD by
doing righteousness and justice, so that the LORD may bring to Abraham what
he has promised him. Then the LORD said, ‘Because the outcry against
Sodom and Gomorrah is great and their sin is very grave I will go down to
see whether they have done altogether according to the outcry that has come to
me. And if not, I will know.’ So the men turned from there and went toward
Sodom, but Abraham still stood before the Lord”.
Please note: The fact that
Abraham will become a great and
mighty nation and that all the nations on earth of the earth shall be blessed
by him (v. 18), has been well
established by now. He has been chosen and called by God, to live differently
in the world. He has been called to be a testimony and a witness to the way in
which God intends families (i.e. his children and household after him) to live
in the world, and it is very different from the life of the average household
in Sodom. The end to which God
calls and saves men and women from this
world is that they may reflect His holy
and righteous character – to be holy as He is
holy [Lev. 19:1 ; 1 Pet. 1:15,16]
The dilemma was that Abraham and his future offspring
were living in a neighbourhood which was morally corrupted in every way. In
God’s words, they were living in a neighbourhood against which there had been an outcry… and their sin was very grave
(v. 20). This news about Sodom is actually not new.
Already back in Gen. 13:13 we read: “Now the
men of Sodom were wicked, great sinners against the Lord.”
Why did God not judge them back then? The answer is this: For
the same reason as Gen. 15:16 states: “Because the iniquity of the Amorites is
not yet complete”. The destruction
of Sodom, like the destruction of the Amorites later under Joshua is not a
kneejerk reaction from God. God is patient. These are sinners in the hands of a
patient God (2 Pet. 3:9). And all
this is a foreshadowing of that great Day of Judgment which is yet to come,
spoken of by the prophets and the Lord Jesus Christ.
The judgement
upon the Amorites and the
Sodomites would come because such
deliberate, willful and continuous
sinning was making the world a place in which soon no human being would be
safe from such wicked , abusive people. You may be sure that in those days, children
and women and men alike were abused in
the worst of manners[1]...
They were filling up their sins, and now the time for judgement had arrived. In
Chapter 19 the two angels sent by the LORD will experience the terrible
atmosphere for themselves. It is not as
if God needed to go down to investigate. God is omniscient. But He is doing this for Abraham’s sake and
our own sake.
The wickedness of these towns was going to be a perpetual
example of wickedness in the Scriptures[2].
Jesus used this example. He said that
the people of Chorazin and Bethsaida to whom He had ministered by word and
miracle had had far more privileges than Sodom. (Lk 10:12) So too did the apostle Paul (Rom. 9:29) and Peter (2 Pet.2:4-9) and
Jude (Jude 1:7). Billy Graham once said that if God does not judge the wickedness of our generation, then He
will have to apologize to Sodom and Gomorrah.
So this is what Abraham hears as he walks with the LORD and
his two angels. What is Abraham’s response?
ABRAHAM’S
RESPONSE (18:23-32)
While the two angels made their way down to Sodom,
Abraham continued standing before the
LORD. And Abraham knows people down in
that plain, in those towns and their vicinities. Among them are his nephew Lot and his family.
In Abraham’s mind there is also the thought of those people that may not
be of the kind of many
in Sodom, and he makes that contrast in v. 23 : “Will you indeed
sweep away the righteous with the wicked ?” What follows here is a dialogue
with the LORD – something which is known to us as prayer, and in this case
intercessory prayer, prayer that intercedes on behalf of others, and it is
wonderful to see this. Although God has
determined to judge Sodom and Gomorrah,
He allows Abraham to question Him, bargain with Him, intercede with Him,
pleading as it were for the life of the
righteous in these towns. Isn’t it
wonderful to know that God is willing to hear your prayer? He wants to hear
Abraham’s prayer. He is not going on with the angels at this point. His
attention is fixed on Abraham who has some serious questions to present to the
LORD.
What an encouragement for us, who
intercede for this city of Windhoek and for the towns of Namibia and for this
world ... “O Lord, in your wrath, remember mercy”, cried the prophet
Habakkuk (Hab. 3:2).
- Samuel promised to intercede always for Israel (1 Sam. 12:23).
- The apostle Paul always prays for his churches (Eph. 1:16; 6:18 ; 1 Thess. 1:2; 2 The. 1:11 etc.);
- Ephaphras always struggles on behalf of the Colossian Christians in his prayers (Col. 4:12).
- The Lord Jesus Himself prays for us (Jn. 17; Rom. 8:34). He always lives to make intercession for us (Heb. 7:25)
- All these expected to have the ear of God when they prayed. So must we. If we do not believe that we have the ear of God, then we will not pray. But here Abraham had the ear of God, and he made the most of it.
And we may be assured that God will never destroy the
righteous alongside the wicked. Never! And in the absence of having the exact
knowledge of men’s hearts like God always does, it is not wrong for us to present
holy arguments to God (Spurgeon) for the salvation of the souls. Here is Abraham:
“Will you indeed sweep
away the righteous with the wicked? Suppose if there are fifty righteous people
in the city? Will you then sweep away the place and not spare it for the sake
of the fifty righteous who are in it? Far be it from you to do such a thing –
to put the righteous to death with the wicked, so that the righteous fare as the wicked. Far be hat from you! Will not
the Judge of all the earth do what is just?” (vv.23-25).
Do you see Abraham’s argument? He knows the character of God so very well. After
so many years of walking with God he knows that God is good and kind and
merciful to the righteous. The righteous
Judge of all the earth can only do right. God cannot destroy the righteous
along with the wicked and remain a just and good God. He cannot sweep away the
righteous with the wicked. NEVER! So
what if there are 50 righteous people in the city, acting like salt and light
in such a dark and wicked place? Will God destroy that city? No! In that case, how many righteous are needed in a city to counteract the influence of
the wicked? 45, 40, 30, 20,10? God
will not destroy. But what if there were only one righteous man? That is the
issue. Actually, there is none righteous,
no not even one. [Psalm 14:1-3; Rom. 3:9-18]
And here we begin to see the basis of God’s justification in
the Bible. Who is righteous? Only the one whom God justifies and counts
righteous Among them were Abraham and
his nephew Lot, and so we see that Sodom will be eventually destroyed because it lacked any
righteous people in its midst.
Here is something for us to ponder.
Why is Windhoek not destroyed this very
day? The answer is that God still has
many people in this city, and for their sake God withholds his wrath. That is the reason why the God-ignoring, God
hating people of our city have not been destroyed by the wrath of God. It is the presence of
God’s righteous men and women, interceding men and women, which saves
sinners from the wrath of God at this time. God is merciful and the text in
2 Peter 3:9 applies again.
But God will not withhold his wrath for ever.
A day came when
the sin of Sodom did reach its full measure, and a day will come when the sins
of our world will reach their full measure, and when our sins will have reached
their full measure and then the wrath of God will be revealed against all
ungodliness and unrighteousness of men (Rom. 1:18ff). But even as He removed Lot and his
family from Sodom before destroying it so God will deal with the world,
removing the righteous and judging the rest. There will then be a great separation in time
to come and in that day you will need a more powerful Mediator than Abraham. You will need the greater Son of Abraham - the Lord Jesus Christ. Without his
blood covering your sin the wrath of God will fall upon you forever .
O call upon the God of mercy now, while it is still a day
of gospel mercy.
Beg Him to save you from the wrath that is to
come !
Those of you who know that He has saved you, come and
celebrate at the table now set before you. Amen!
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