Fire from Heaven (Genesis 19)

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Sermon preached on September 12, 2021. Genesis 19 is a chapter filled with acts of utter depravity. From attempted homosexual gang rape to incestuous pregnancy, it is a narrative that spares very little in regard to the sordid details. But in the midst of the sinful narrative, we have the fiery judgment of God to remind us that the wicked will not escape His wrath.

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I invite you to take out your Bible and turn to Genesis chapter 19, and hold your place at verse 24.
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I'm going to give a few preliminary words before we read the text.
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As many of you know, we preach verse by verse here as much as possible through books of the Bible, and that is a blessing to be able to study whole books of the Bible together.
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But that also comes with it a difficulty at times, because there are chapters that we might rather skip.
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At least in our mind we think, boy, this is going to be tough to talk about.
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And I got to thinking about the fact that we're family integrated worship, which means that we invite our children not to leave the service, but to stay and to be here.
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And today the subject matter is so sorted that I had to consider my words carefully as I began to prepare for what we are going to talk about.
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I do think that it is my responsibility to be honest about what the text says, but we don't have to be graphic.
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We have imaginations.
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We know what's being said, and so I want to be fair.
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And there'll be times where I say, you know what this means, and you'll know what it means.
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And I want to remind us again where we are in Genesis, because many of you haven't been here.
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Some of you've only been coming for a little while.
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Some of you maybe today is your first day.
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We have been studying through Genesis now for a couple of years.
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We're only now to chapter 19.
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We took a lot of time in the first 11 chapters, and now we're sort of trying to go whole chapters at a time if possible, because we don't want to be in Genesis until the Lord comes.
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Well, if he comes tomorrow, that would be great.
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But we don't know when he's going to come, but we'd like to eventually move to another book.
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And so we're kind of taking longer sections now.
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As the narratives draw longer, we're going to be looking at longer texts.
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And today, I mean, honestly, this text is one I'd rather get through in one day.
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It begins with an attempted gang molestation and ends with incest.
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It's very, very, I'd just like to get it behind us.
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To be honest, it's a lot of stuff to get through.
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But I want to remind you what brought us here.
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You will remember that Abraham is the key figure in Genesis beginning in chapter 12.
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And he will really remain the key figure of Scripture, because even in the New Testament, Abraham has a place of importance.
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We who have been brought into the family of God by faith in Jesus Christ, the Bible says we have been made sons and daughters of Abraham.
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So this figure in Genesis is not just important in a few chapters, he's important throughout the whole of redemptive history.
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But if we go back to chapter 12, we learn there's also someone else that's important in Abraham's life, and his name was Lot.
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Lot was Abraham's nephew.
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He was the son of Abraham's brother.
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And Abraham loved Lot.
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After they came back from Egypt, when they had went away for a famine, when they came back, Lot's servants and Abraham's servants were arguing with one another.
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And Abraham said, we can't let this continue, we have to separate.
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You pick which way you want to go, and I'll go the other way.
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So Abraham gave deference to his nephew.
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When Abraham was the...
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He was the one who was in the position of superiority, but he humbled himself and he said, you go where you want to go.
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And in Genesis 13 verse 11 it says this.
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You don't have to turn there, I just want you to be reminded of this.
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It says, so Lot chose for himself all the Jordan Valley, and Lot journeyed east.
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Thus they separated from each other.
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Abraham settled in the land of Canaan, while Lot settled among the cities of the valley, and moved his tent as far as Sodom.
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King James says he pitched his tent toward Sodom.
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I like that phrase, he's looking toward Sodom.
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And it says this in verse 13 of chapter 13.
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It says, now the men of Sodom were wicked, great sinners before the Lord.
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So that's where Lot went.
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He went to this city where he was in proximity with some of the greatest sinners in the world who had gathered themselves together in this city called Sodom.
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Wasn't too many years later that that city fell under attack by the five kings.
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You remember we studied that in chapter 14.
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The five kings came in to take over Sodom, and they took the people as spoils of war.
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And one of the people that they took was Lot.
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Abraham grabbed his 300 men, and they ran after, and they went after, and they captured and killed those kings, and they took Lot back.
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Abraham loved his nephew.
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He loved Lot.
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And he saved him, and he brought him back.
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But notice Lot didn't come back to Abraham's house.
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You would think maybe that he would.
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This man loves me.
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Maybe now this will be the point that joins our people together, and we can come back and live in harmony.
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No, Lot goes right back to Sodom, right back to the wicked people.
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Then we come to chapter 18, and the Lord appears to Abraham by now.
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And he says to Abraham, I'm going to destroy Sodom.
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The cry of their wickedness has reached my ear.
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I've sent two angels into Sodom to investigate this cry.
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And Abraham said, Lord, if you were to find 50 righteous, would you spare the city? And the Lord said, if I find 50 righteous, I'll spare the city.
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And they need 45, and 40, 30, 20, and 10.
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But you know why Abraham was interceding for Sodom.
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At least I hope you understand why Abraham cares so much for Sodom.
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Because he knows in the heart of the city, he knows that among the village of Sodom, among this city, is a house.
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And in that house is his nephew whom he loves.
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And he's asking God, will you not spare the righteous? And will you not even spare the wicked on account of the righteous? And God said, if I find 10, and perhaps Abraham...
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I was talking to brother Mike about this last week.
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Perhaps Abraham was counting in his mind.
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Well, we've got Lot, his wife, he's got two daughters, they've got two husbands, and they've got in-laws.
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Maybe that's where he came up with the number 10.
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We don't know.
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Maybe that's where he kind of figured, maybe we have 10 righteous people, and we'd save the whole city.
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Well, as we know, because we're familiar with history, God's judgment did befall Sodom.
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And it befell Sodom in such a way that Sodom would then become the example throughout biblical history of what it looks like when God's unfettered wrath falls upon a people.
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And that's what we're going to look at today.
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So let's stand.
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We're going to read verses 24 and 25, giving honor and reverence to God's word as we stand.
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This is the point of God destroying the city.
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It says in verse 24, Then the Lord rained on Sodom and Gomorrah sulfur and fire from the Lord out of heaven.
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And he overthrew those cities and all the valley and all the inhabitants of the cities and what grew on the ground.
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It was all destroyed.
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Father in heaven, as we seek to open your word today and understand what it means, I pray that you would keep me from error.
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I pray that you would keep me in the center of your will.
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I pray that you would give me boldness, that you would hold my tongue, that I would not say anything that would be in opposition to your word, but at the same time, Lord, that I would not be afraid to say whatever your word says.
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In Jesus name.
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As I said earlier, throughout the Bible, when we look at historical narratives, we often see Sodom come up as the symbol of wickedness.
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Anytime Sodom comes up after this story, after this narrative, it's almost always to point back to this narrative and say, look what God does to the wicked.
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It's a picture of what God does to the wicked.
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Sodom is mentioned seven times in the, rather, excuse me, seven books of the Old Testament.
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So out of 39 Old Testament books, seven books mention Sodom.
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And in the New Testament, out of 27 books, six books reference Sodom.
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So Sodom is mentioned throughout the Old Testament and throughout the New Testament as a picture of God's judgment.
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It's a picture of wickedness.
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Sodom is a picture of man's depravity on display.
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God having given them over, as it were, to a debased mind to do what ought not to be done, Sodom is the picture of that.
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In fact, don't we still use that today? I mean, we talk about cities like Vegas or Atlantic City or whatever.
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We look at these cities that have, you know, prostitution and all these different things that are just legal and available at any moment.
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We say that's a modern example of Sodom.
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It's a modern Sodom and Gomorrah.
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That's the example we often use.
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Because we know the depravity for which this city was named.
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And God constantly points us back to that.
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I was reading all the passages in all the books that reference Sodom this week as I was preparing for the sermon.
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And the fingers were always pointing back, but it was always, look at yourselves, look at Sodom, and know that you're in danger because you're like them.
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In fact, sometimes Sodom was used as almost a better example.
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Think of what Jesus said to Corazon and Bethsaida.
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Woe to you, Corazon and Bethsaida, for if what had been done in you had been done in Sodom, they would have repented how wicked they were, and how much more wicked you are than they.
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Sodom is the fourth major judgment that we find in the Bible.
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The first major judgment came when man ate of the fruit of the tree of the garden.
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He was cast from the garden.
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He was separated from God.
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That was the first, and might I add, I think in a sense the worst, because the fellowship that Adam had with God was divided and separated.
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We see the first judgment come in Genesis chapter 3.
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Three chapters later, the wickedness of man was wild on the earth and widespread, and so God sends a flood.
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That's the second major judgment that we find in the Bible.
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Then we get to chapter 11.
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We come to the third major judgment.
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Man was commanded to go into all the world to fill the earth and subdue it, but rather he stayed in one place, and he tried to build a tower to heaven, and tried to build a tower for his name, and to make his name great.
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Rather than exalting the God of heaven, he tried to exalt himself, and so he built the tower of Babel.
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And when he built the tower of Babel, God came down, and He confused their languages, and He divided men.
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He created nations.
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Remember, we go through the table of nations in chapter 10, which is all the division of all the nations.
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We look around the world today, a war all over.
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This is part of the separation that happened at Babel.
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So we see three major judgments, right? We see the fall, we see the flood, we see Babel.
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Then we come to chapter 19, and we experience the fourth, and might I say, quite possibly the most stunning of the judgments.
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Because as epic as Noah's flood was, and it was epic, it was on a global scale, but it wasn't fire falling from heaven.
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We've all seen water fall from heaven.
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We have all seen rain flood the earth in one sense or another.
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We've all seen as hurricanes come, and break levees, and destroy cities.
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We have seen a snippet of what Noah experienced.
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But outside of, perhaps, a volcanic eruption, none of us have seen fire fall from the sky, and consume a people in brimstone and ash.
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The spectacle of it must have been absolutely mind-boggling.
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And that's what we see in Genesis 19.
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Now before we read the text, and I tend to have longer introductions, and the reason for that, in case you haven't picked up on my methodology yet, I'm preparing you so that when we actually read the text, you have some context to understand more of what we're reading.
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And the last thing I want to say before we get to reading the chapter is this.
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There is a particular sin which Sodom is associated with.
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And it wasn't too long ago that the term Sodomite was used to describe a homosexual.
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And there's a reason for that.
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And we're going to see that in the text today.
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However, I don't know how familiar you are with biblical academic literature, and men who write to make arguments about the Bible, but in the last 10 to 15 years, there's been a huge push in the academic circles to try to say that the sin of Sodom was not homosexuality.
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And rather, they will point to passages like Ezekiel, which does mention some other sins, and say it really wasn't homosexuality, but it was the sin of not being hospitable.
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It was the sin of being gluttonous.
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It was the sin of being lazy.
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These are things that Ezekiel mentions.
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And all of those are true.
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I want you to understand.
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All of those sins are true.
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But if we try to eliminate the sin of homosexuality from this, we have missed a very important part of the story.
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And in fact, what we are doing is we're trying to whitewash one sin.
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Oh, yeah, sure.
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Inhospitality is a sin, and sure, gluttony is a sin, and these are all sins.
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But this one's not a sin.
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You see, that's what's trying to happen.
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But understand this.
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When we read through the Bible, and Sodom is mentioned, the abomination of their sin, the abomination of their sexual sin, is often the key point that's brought out.
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In fact, if you go into the New Testament, and you read 2 Peter, and you read when the passage is mentioned in Jude as well about these, about Sodom, it mentions their sexual perversion.
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So we can't eliminate that as part of the issue.
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And I want to just point something out to you.
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In Romans 1, it tells us what happens to a people when they abandon God and they are given over to a debased mind.
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You remember what it says? It says that they give up worshiping God, and instead they worship the created things.
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They worship birds, and animals, and totems, and creeping things, and all these different things.
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They worship all these things.
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And what happens to them? They're given over to a debased mind.
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In fact, that's one of the things that God does, is He gives people over to the basest part of their sin.
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And what does it say in Romans 1? I'll read it to you.
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Romans 1, 26.
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For this reason, God gave them up to dishonorable passions.
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For their women exchanged the natural relations for those that are contrary to nature.
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And the men likewise gave up natural relations with women and were consumed with passion with one another, men committing shameless acts with men and receiving in themselves the penalty for their error.
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You say, well, Romans 1 isn't talking about Sodom.
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Not specifically.
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What Romans 1 is talking about, it's talking about a people that have continually rejected the God of Scripture, and God has given them over to the sinful lusts of their flesh.
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And one of the ways that they express the sinful lusts of the flesh is through abhorrent and perverted sexual expression.
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When a society is given over to overt expressions of sexual depravity, especially the unnatural perversion of homosexual lust, you can be confident that that society has been given over to a debased mind.
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Now I say that, and you stop for a minute, and let's leave Sodom and let's go to America for just a hot minute.
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And what have we done? We have given over to overt expressions of perverted sexuality, calling them normal.
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We are a Romans 1 society.
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That should scare us, because we are right where Sodom was.
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I mean, sure, people aren't surrounding the house, calling for the angels to come out, but who knows what's going to happen tomorrow.
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So this is where Sodom is.
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Sodom is right in the heart of Romans 1.
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So that gives us the context to begin reading.
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Now let's read Genesis 19 beginning in verse 1.
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The two angels came to Sodom in the evening, and Lot was sitting in the gate of Sodom.
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When Lot saw them, he rose to meet them and bowed himself with his face to the earth and said, My lords, please turn aside to your servant's house and spend the night and wash your feet.
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Then you may rise up early and go on your way.
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They said, No, we will spend the night in the town square.
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But he pressed them strongly, so they turned aside to him and entered his house, and he made them a feast and baked unleavened bread, and they ate.
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All right, just for a moment.
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I don't want to read the whole chapter.
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I want to stop and make some comments as we go.
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The angels have been sent by the Lord to investigate the city of Sodom.
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As the angels come into town, they come upon a man who is sitting at the city gate.
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The city gate was a place of authority.
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So in some way, Lot has risen to a position of authority within the city.
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He's risen to a position of being probably a judge, one who made legal decisions among the city.
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You'll remember, what was it, Psalm 31? I'm sorry, Proverbs 31, about the Proverbs 31 woman.
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And her husband is known in the city gates, you know, references that.
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So this is common in the ancient world that a man of prominence would have a position in the gate of the city, and this is where Lot was.
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And I want to say something about Lot before we go too far into the story.
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It is important to remember that the Bible identifies Lot as a righteous man.
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I say that because he's going to do some stuff that's going to make us wonder about that designation.
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But if you go to 2 Peter 2, in fact, let's do it.
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Let's look at 2 Peter 2.
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Just quickly turn in our Bibles.
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I want you to notice what it says about Lot.
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It first talks about Noah in verses 4 through 6.
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I'm sorry, 4 and 5.
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And then it says in verse 6, If by turning the cities of Sodom and Gomorrah to ashes, he condemned them to extinction, making them an example of what is going to happen to the ungodly, and if he rescued righteous Lot, notice righteous Lot, that term, greatly distressed by the sensual conduct of the wicked, for as that righteous man, second time, uses the word righteous, still talking about Lot, as that righteous man lived among them day after day, he was tormenting his righteous soul over their lawless deeds that he saw and heard.
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Notice it calls his soul righteous.
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Three times the word righteous is used of Lot.
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And this is what it says.
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It says he lived among a wicked people, but it vexed his soul.
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Living among a wicked people vexed his soul.
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Now, do you feel that like I do? I really, I feel that because there have been times where I turn on the television and I see the wickedness of the world that I live in and it vexes my soul.
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So, for a moment, before we get into Lot's failures, let's at least identify who he was in Sodom.
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He was a voice of reason and righteousness in the midst of a people of wickedness and debauchery.
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He was one of the judges.
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And some people think, well, the reason why he had a position of a judge is because he was related to Abraham.
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Abraham had saved them all from the evil kings.
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Maybe that's how he rose to power.
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Could be.
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We don't know.
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But it could also be that they recognized in this man a reasonableness and a justice that was necessary even in the midst of a wicked people.
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He had a position in the town where he was sitting at the gate.
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And in come the two angels.
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We can go back to Genesis now.
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In come the two angels.
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And what does he try to do? He tries to protect them.
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They said, we're going to go sleep in the city.
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Oh, imagine how that would have went.
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We're going to go sleep in the city square.
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And Lot said, no, you're not.
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If you go to the city square, I can't imagine what's going to happen to you.
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See, he knows the potential danger.
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By the way, and I don't think he knows they're angels yet, just to be clear.
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He thinks these are two men.
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In fact, you know why I believe Lot sat at that gate? I believe Lot sat at that gate to turn people away.
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Now, I can't prove that.
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And again, you want to argue with me later? You can.
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But I think Lot had a protective heart.
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And when he saw people coming, he knew the danger they would be in.
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And he would try.
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What does he say to them? They said, we're going to go stay in the...
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No, you come to my house.
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And you're going to leave early in the morning.
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You're going to leave before anybody sees you.
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We're going to get you in.
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We're going to get you fed.
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We're going to get you out.
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Again, Lot is no superhero.
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Trust me.
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He's going to make a mistake.
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A bunch.
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But I'm trying to help you understand what I think his heart's at in this.
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As they're coming in, no, don't come into the city square.
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Come into my house.
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And we're going to put you up for the night.
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You're going to leave early in the morning.
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Okay.
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So that's where we get to.
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And he feeds them.
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By the way, he feeds them well.
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We see the example of hospitality.
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We talked about Abraham was so hospitable last chapter.
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We see Lot taking the example of his uncle and being also hospitable here.
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And then we get to verse 4.
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But before they lay down, the men of the city, the men of Sodom, both young and old, all the people to the last man surrounded the house.
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And they called to Lot, Where are the men who came to you tonight? Bring them out to us that we may know them.
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Just very quickly.
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The term no there does not simply mean they wanted to check their green card.
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It does not mean that they wanted to check their citizenship papers.
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And some people argue that's all they meant.
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They just want to get to know these guys.
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They just want to know who they are.
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You got strangers, Lot.
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And we don't take kindly to strangers.
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We want to get to know them.
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In the Bible, the word no is often associated with intimate or some might use the term carnal knowledge.
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Adam knew Eve and they conceived a child.
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It's a good example.
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So the idea of no does not simply mean, hey, we want to get to know these guys.
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And I can prove it.
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If you have an issue with my interpretation, I will prove it by simply continuing to read.
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Because notice what Lot does.
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Verse 6.
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Lot went out to the men at the entrance, shut the door after him and said, I beg you, my brothers, do not act so wickedly.
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Notice he doesn't say, I beg you to leave these men alone.
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You don't have to get their green card.
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You don't have to get their citizenship papers.
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No, no.
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Don't act wickedly.
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Why does he say that? Because he knows what they want.
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They don't want these men simply to check their ID.
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They want these men to engage in a brutal act of community molestation.
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That's the nicest way I can say it.
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Verse 8.
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This is the part we have trouble with.
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And I get it.
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Verse 8 makes your stomach turn.
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Notice what he says.
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Behold, I have two daughters who have not known a man.
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Let me bring them out to you, and do to them as you please.
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Only do nothing to these men, for they have come under the shelter of my roof.
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By the way, there's proof right there what they want.
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What they want is a carnal interaction.
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Lot knows it.
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They know it.
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Lot comes out.
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Do not molest these men.
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And then he says something that I don't get at all.
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And please don't come to me and ask me to defend him.
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Because I will not.
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Lot says, I have two daughters who are virgins.
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Take them.
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I don't get it.
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The only thing I can say, and this is the only thing I can really, and again, I've thought all week.
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I pray about this.
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What am I going to say? How am I going to understand this? How am I going to preach this? The only thing I can understand is Lot has had his mind so jaded living among the people of Sodom that his thoughts are messed up.
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The way he thinks is messed up.
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That's kind of the way I've kind of, you know, you live among a sinful people long enough.
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In effect, you know, the Bible says your bad company corrupts good morals, right? And so he's among these people long enough that he begins to think a little messed up.
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That's one way of considering it.
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But also this, and this one's a little tougher.
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Lot is, Lot knows these men enough, he knows it's not going to work.
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That's another thought.
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He knows they don't want that.
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They have wives.
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They're not looking for female intercourse.
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They're looking for this debauchery.
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And by the way, think about the position that Lot is in.
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This is like House of the Living Dead, right? I've never seen it, but I've seen clips.
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Where like the zombies are coming and they're surrounding the house.
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Send out the men.
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And so this is his response.
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He's trying to bargain with them.
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He's trying to find something that will get them to give up this wickedness and go home.
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Go sleep it off.
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Get away from here.
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So in sheer terror, and with a mind that has been probably corrupted in many ways, he offers his daughters.
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Verse 9, But they said, Stand back.
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And they said, This fellow came to sojourn and he has become the judge.
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Now we will deal worse with you than with them.
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Then they pressed hard against the man Lot and drew near to break the door down, but the men reached out their hands and brought Lot into the house with them and shut the door.
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And they struck with blindness the men who were at the entrance of the house, both small and great, so that they wore themselves out, groping for the door.
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By the way, verse 11, crazy.
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Absolutely crazy.
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Because here's what happens.
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Lot goes out.
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He tries to bargain with the guys.
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The guys aren't having it.
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They begin to say, Who are you to judge us? Don't you love that? Doesn't that sound like America 2021? Who are you to judge? This man is a sojourner among us.
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He is a visitor with us.
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He's not one of us.
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He's not a sodomite.
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Who is he to be our judge? And they're shouting, Who are you to be our judge? And we're going to treat you worse than them.
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What does that mean? Lot's about to become the victim of their lust.
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So the angels grab Lot.
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They bring him back inside.
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And then they blind the men.
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Now, it's interesting.
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If you look at the Hebrew word for blind here, it's not the typical word for blindness.
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It's actually a word that would mean more something to the idea of dazzle them or confuse them.
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And Brian Borgman, one of my favorite pastors, he said it was kind of like the angels threw out a flashbang grenade.
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It was like, it wasn't that they were totally blinded, like sight removed, but they were confused.
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Absolutely confused.
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But notice verse 11.
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They don't stop.
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Their lust and their passion for this desire to be fulfilled.
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It says they were groping for the door.
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I can't get past that.
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I can't get past the fact that even though they were blinded, they were still groping for the door.
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Sinful men.
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It's kind of like a person who, you know, a person who's addicted to something.
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They know it's killing them, but they still got to have it.
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Even though they're dying, they still want it.
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And these men are addicted to this lust, and they're not going to let anything stop them from getting it, even blindness.
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Verse 12.
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Then the men said to Lot, Have you anyone else here, sons-in-law, sons, daughters, or anyone you have in the city? Bring them out of the place, for we are about to destroy this place, because the outcry against this people has become great before the Lord, and the Lord has sent us to destroy it.
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So Lot went out and said to his sons-in-law, who were to marry his daughters.
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By the way, that sounds confusing.
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He calls them sons-in-laws who were to marry.
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In the ancient world, remember, betrothal was a year process that happened before the marriage.
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They were still considered married, but they had not yet consummated the marriage.
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This is why he said his daughters had not yet known a man.
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Right? His daughters had not yet been officially in the relationship of marriage, but they're still sons-in-law, because they've already signed the contract.
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Okay? So that's where they are.
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And he goes to them.
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So Lot went out, said to his sons-in-law, who were to marry his daughters, Up, get out of this place, for the Lord is about to destroy the city.
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But he seemed to his sons-in-law to be joking, to be jesting.
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Understand this.
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To the unbelieving world, God's judgment is a joke.
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To the unbelieving world, the justice and judgment of God is laughable.
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You turn on your television.
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What is Satan? He's a fictional character in a TV show.
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He's a goat-legged, horned beast with a pitchfork.
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He's not anything to be feared.
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He's a joke! Hell's a joke! Everything's a joke! Jesus is a joke! They thought he was joking.
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Many people, when you proclaim the Lord to them, they will think you're joking too.
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They will laugh at you.
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But the judgment of God is no joke.
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Verse 15, As morning dawned, the angels urged Lot, saying, Up, take your wife and your two daughters who are here, lest you be swept away in the punishment of the city.
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But he lingered.
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Oh, I'm sorry, I keep having to stop.
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Lot lingered.
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He just told his sons-in-law, God's about to destroy this city.
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Come with us.
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When it's finally time to go, though, Lot doesn't want to go.
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Why? Because he's still in Sodom in his heart.
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His heart's still in Sodom.
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He's not ready to go.
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It says, But he lingered.
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So the men, that being the angels, seized him and his wife and his two daughters by the hand, the Lord being merciful to him, and they brought him out and set him outside the city.
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Now I want to say this now, so I don't forget to say it later.
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This is a picture of how God saved us.
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We, who are in the world, loving the world, dead in trespasses and sins, and the Bible says God came and He changed our heart.
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He brought us out.
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We didn't go looking for Him.
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He came to us.
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Talk about irresistible grace.
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These angels.
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Come with us.
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And they grabbed Lot by the arm.
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Verse 17.
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And as they brought them out, one said, Escape for your life.
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Do not look back.
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That's important.
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Do not look back.
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Or stop everywhere, anywhere in the valley.
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Escape to the hills, lest you be swept away.
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And then verse 18.
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Again, this guy confuses me so much.
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I want to give him the benefit of the doubt in every area, but Lot just...
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I don't get it.
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Verse 18.
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Again, I've been studying this all week.
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I just don't get it.
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Listen to what he says.
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Verse 18.
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And Lot said to them, O my lords, behold, your servant has found favor in your sight, and you have shown me great kindness in saving my life.
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We call that the understatement of the year.
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But I cannot escape to the hills, lest the disaster overtake me and I die.
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Behold, the city, this city, is near enough to flee to.
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And it's a little one.
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Let me escape there.
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Is it not a little one? And my life will be saved.
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Behold.
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Excuse me.
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He said to him, Behold, I grant you this favor also, that I may not overthrow the city of which you have spoken.
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Escape there quickly, for I can do nothing till you arrive there.
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Therefore, the name of the city was called Zoar.
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Zoar means...
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It's not in the text, but Zoar means insignificant or small or little.
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The idea of a...
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It's a little city.
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But here's the thing.
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You got angels, right? And they're like, Come on.
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We gotta go.
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And they're grabbing him by the arm.
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They're pulling him along.
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And Lot, first of all, he doesn't want to leave.
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He's lingering.
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Don't understand that.
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And he's dragging him along.
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And they go, You're gonna go to the hills and you're gonna find your place in the hills.
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And no, no, no, no, no.
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I need city living.
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I'm not made for country life.
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I need a city.
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But notice his excuse.
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If I go there, I'll die.
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You mean to tell me that God sent two angels to save you from this city that's about to burn with fire from heaven and you think you're not gonna make it in the mountains? You think God's gonna let you go up there and perish? But they gave him his desire.
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Go to the city.
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We'll find out in a minute, though.
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He didn't stay there long.
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He ends up in the mountains.
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Could be the fact that in a few moments, we're gonna see something happen to his wife that's really could have maybe changed his mind.
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But that's where he's at, right? He wants to go to the city.
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They say, OK, go to the city.
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We won't destroy that city.
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We'll leave that city for you.
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Then we get to verse 23.
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This is the moment of impact, if you will.
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The sun had risen on the earth when Lot came to Zoar.
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Then the Lord rained on Sodom and Gomorrah sulfur and fire from the Lord out of heaven.
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And he overthrew those cities and all the valley and all the inhabitants of the city and what grew on the ground.
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But Lot's wife behind him looked back and she became a pillar of salt.
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This moment has created much consternation in the minds and hearts of people for two reasons.
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One, there are those who would say this is purely mythological.
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The idea that God would throw fire out of heaven and destroy a people, that's mythology.
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And the idea that God would turn a woman into salt, sort of like Medusa.
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If you looked at her in the face, she would become stone, right? And so many people who have a derisive heart against the Scriptures, who have a very antagonistic heart against what the Word says, they look at this and they say, see here, this never happened.
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This is absolute mythology.
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Let me respond to that.
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The Bible does tell us that God does amazing things.
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They're called miracles.
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And these miracles are when God steps into the order that He has created, what we might call the natural order.
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And God interrupts the natural order to interject His will in a spectacular way.
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Remember the story of the Red Sea that parted? It says the water stood as a heap on both sides as the people of Israel walked through on dry land.
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You know what water doesn't do? Water doesn't stand up.
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If you pour water out, it's just going to fall.
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It's going to run.
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It's going to drip.
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It'll never stand up.
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You can never pour water out and make a heap.
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You can only pour water out and make a puddle.
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But God, who can intervene in history, takes water and He makes walls of water that stand as a heap so that the people of Israel can walk through on dry ground.
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So is it any doubt that the God of heaven can rain down fire from the heaven that He created on a people that He wants to destroy? Absolutely not.
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There's no doubt that He can.
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And the Bible said that He did.
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Now, moreover, the question of Lot's wife becoming salt.
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Some people say she didn't really become salt.
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And this is a possible interpretation.
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I'm going to give you a possible interpretation.
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The interpretation was that she fell behind and as the sulfur and fire rained down from heaven that her body was covered and encased in salt.
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Some people interpret it that way.
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But the Bible doesn't seem to make that the way that we're supposed to understand it.
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It seems as if the way we're supposed to understand it is she literally became salt.
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In fact, for a long time there was a woman-shaped figure down near the Dead Sea and even during the time of Josephus when he wrote, he said they believed that was her.
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That they were seeing Lot's wife still a pillar of salt so many hundreds of years later.
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I don't know that.
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Again, that's extra-biblical history.
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But the point of it being her story ends here because her heart was still in Sodom.
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Why did she look back? Because her heart was still in that wicked place.
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She was a Sodomite.
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I'm certain Lot got her from Sodom.
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Now again, I can't prove that from the text.
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But her heart was there.
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And as God rained down fire from heaven.
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And by the way, there's a Trinitarian reference here.
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Because it says the Lord rained down heaven from the Lord in heaven.
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It talks about the Lord raining down fire from the Lord.
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It's an interesting Trinitarian reference there.
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Remember Lot's wife.
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It's Jesus when He talked about putting your hand to the plow and not looking back.
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And setting and being prepared for His coming and His return.
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Look forward, not backward.
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Remember Lot's wife.
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Because her heart was still in Sodom.
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Verse 27 And Abraham went early in the morning to the place where his head stood before the Lord.
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And he looked down toward Sodom and Gomorrah and toward all the land of the valley.
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And he looked and behold the smoke of the land went up like smoke from a furnace.
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I want to mention just this.
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Can't you imagine Abraham's broken heart shouting, There wasn't even ten! Sometimes I hear people say, I can't believe the gospel because so many people don't believe it.
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And if it's true, I don't know how many so many people could be lost.
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There wasn't even ten in Sodom.
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You come to church this morning.
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You pass by car after car after car that were going anywhere else but to the Lord's house.
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You pass so many driveways where the cars had no interest in leaving.
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The people had no interest in leaving.
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The cars are going to sit right where they are.
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Jesus said, The way of destruction is wide and the way to life is a narrow path.
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I'm going to read and say just a few comments but I want to finish this chapter.
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I know we're a little late.
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And if you're hungry, it'll still be there when you get there.
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Let me just finish.
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I promise.
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Because I don't want to talk a lot about this last bit but I want to at least make a comment.
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Here's what it says.
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It says, So it was when God destroyed the cities of the valley God remembered Abraham and sent Lot.
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By the way, Lot was benefited because of his relationship with Abraham.
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It says, God remembered Abraham.
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It says, God remembered Abraham and sent Lot out of the midst of the overthrow where he overthrew the cities in which Lot lived.
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Now Lot went up out of Zoar and lived in the hills with his two daughters where he didn't want to go in the first place.
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Now he went.
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For he was afraid to live in Zoar so he lived in a cave with his two daughters.
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And the firstborn said to the younger, Our father is old and there is not a man on earth to come into us after the manner of all the earth.
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Come, let us make our father drink wine and we will lay with him that we may preserve offspring for our father.
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So they made their father drink wine that night and the firstborn went in and lay with her father.
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He did not know when she lay down or when she rose.
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The next day the firstborn said to the younger, Behold, I lay last night with my father.
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Let us make him drink wine again tonight then you go lie with him that we may preserve his offspring for our father.
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So they made him, they made their father drink wine that night also and the younger arose and lay with him and he did not know when she lay down or when she rose.
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Thus both the daughters of Lot became pregnant by their father.
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The firstborn bore a son called his name Moab.
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He was the father of the Moabites to this day.
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The younger also bore a son called his name Ben-Ami and he was the father of the Ammonites to this day.
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I call this the disgusting epilogue.
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Lot's daughters raised in Sodom, thought like Sodomites, reasoned like Sodomites.
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Some people say maybe they did this because they were angry with their father for offering them to the men.
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But notice they don't seem to be angry.
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They are wanting to retain a remnant for him.
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They don't seem to be angry with him.
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They just seem to be very perverted in mind and by the way Lot didn't take a lot with him but he did take a bottle of wine.
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He went to the mountains.
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He brought the necessities.
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He brought him a bottle of wine.
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At least enough to get drunk two nights in a row.
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This is the last we will hear of Lot.
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His story ends here.
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But his descendants will go on.
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And I want to show you one passage of Scripture.
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If you would turn with me to Zephaniah.
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Chapter 2 Because the descendants of Lot would become the enemies of the Israelites.
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The Moabites and the Ammonites would go on to become the enemies of God's people.
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Notice what this says.
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I just found this incredibly fascinating.
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Zephaniah writes this in verse 8 of chapter 2.
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He says, I have heard the taunts of Moab and the revilings of the Ammonites how they have taunted my people and made boasts against their territory.
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Therefore, as I live, declares the Lord of hosts, the God of Israel, Moab shall become like Sodom and the Ammonites like Gomorrah.
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A land possessed by nettles and salt pits and a waste forever.
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The remnant of my people shall plunder them and the survivors of my nation shall possess them.
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Interesting that the descendants of the Sodomites, the daughters, the two Sodomite daughters, the daughters of Lot who sought to give their father children would actually give birth to the enemies of God who would later meet the same fate as their ancestors in Sodom.
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It is easy for us to hear this story and to have our stomach turned by the wretched sin.
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But we need not and must not ever forget that the wretched sin of Sodom continues even in our own day.
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And we find ourselves, I think, much like Lot, we find ourselves as people of God in the midst of a godless people.
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I don't know if God's going to bring judgment upon our land.
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I know that in a way we're already under it.
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Because we're already seeing wicked rulers.
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Wicked rulers are a judgment to a people.
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We're already seeing people turned over to a debased mind.
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That's a judgment to a people.
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But we must remain faithful in the midst of wickedness.
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And we must understand that God will not allow His elect to be destroyed with the wicked.
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The blessing of Lot's story is that as many errors as Lot made, as many failures as Lot committed, God still took him by the hand through those angels and led him to safety.
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One day this world, our tenure in this world will end.
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And if we are in Christ, the Bible says in Luke 16, when those who die in Christ die, it says angels escort them.
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Remember the story of Lazarus? Angels took him to Abraham's bosom.
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I believe we go to be with the Lord.
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So just remember this.
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If you are in Christ, though the world around us be wicked and though it be evil, Christ has overcome the world.
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And one day He's going to make it right.
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But it will be through fire.
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I hope that this...
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I know it was a lot to say today.
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I know this was a lot to go through and I know we're much later than normal.
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But I pray that this has been an encouragement to you to hear this story and to hear it from the idea that God will save His people even in the midst of wickedness.
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Let's pray.
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Father, I thank You for Your Son, the One who saves us, the One who You sent to die for us, the One who came and took us by the hand and led us into Your kingdom.
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And Lord, this morning as we consider those here today who have come, some of which, Lord, may not know You.
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Lord, we have a room full of people and some of them, Lord, have bowed the knee to Jesus and some have not.
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For those who have bowed the knee to Christ, Lord, I pray that they would be satisfied in You, that they would be comforted by You, that they would be, as we sang earlier, hidden in You.
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But Lord, for those who are outside of Christ today, that they would understand that unless they repent, they will perish as sure as Sodom perished.
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Your Word reminds us, unless we repent, we will all likewise perish.
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In Jesus' name, amen.