Message for THE LORD'S DAY EVENING, July 12, 2015 Christian Hope Church of Christ, Plymouth, North Carolina by Reggie A. Braziel, Minister Message 1 in Hot Summer Nights sermon series God's Fiery Judgment Genesis 19:12-29 NKJV Series Introduction Russell Baker once said, Ah, summer, what power you have to make us suffer and like it. Summertime means family vacations...lying on the beach... fishing for hours on a slow, lazy river...fireworks and the Fourth of July. Summertime is flip-flops...homemade ice cream...ice cold watermelon...and burgers on the grill. Summertime is the sweet chorus of crickets chirping, bull frogs croaking, and whipper-wills singing in unison. But summertime is also flies, mosquitoes and gnats... fire ants, bees and wasps...lightning, thunder, and torrential downpours of rain. And summertime is HEAT...SCORCHING, OPPRESSIVE HEAT... long, hot days and hot, sultry nights. One hot day back in early June I was mowing my yard. The sun was bearing down on me and there was a hot breeze blowing. I began to think about some of the number of times where fire and heat and sticky situations are mentioned in the Bible.
And I thought, what better time to preach a series of messages on some of these passages than during the hot, dog days of summer. So tonight I want to begin a series of messages I have appropriately called the HOT SUMMER NIGHTS SERIES. As we begin this series I would like to take you back to a very familiar passage of scripture in GENESIS chapter nineteen as we look at God's Fiery Judgment upon the wicked cities of Sodom and Gomorrah. ************************************************** B A C K G R O U N D Let me set the stage for tonight's message. In Genesis chapter 18 we find Abraham sitting at the door of his tent one hot, sultry day, when he looked up and saw three men standing by him. Now Abraham could tell there was something very special about these three men because the scriptures tell us he bowed down to the ground before them.? (Genesis 18:2) But what Abraham didn't realize at that time was that one of those men was none other than the pre-incarnate Christ and the other two men were actually angels. Realizing they must be tired and thirsty from traveling in the heat, Abraham offered them water to drink and invited them to get under a shade tree to escape the heat. After enjoying a big meal with Abraham and Sarah, the LORD told Abraham that Sarah was going to bear a son. Well Sarah was eaves dropping behind the tent door and when she heard that she was going to have a baby she laughed; number one because she was barren and unable to bear children; and two because she was an old woman well past her child-bearing years. None-the-less, GOD was going to bless Abraham and Sarah with a miracle baby.
After revealing this incredible news to Abraham, the LORD, the two angels, and Abraham, stepped outside the tent and looked towards the city of Sodom off in the distance. The LORD tells Abraham, There has been a terrible outcry against Sodom and Gomorrah because their sin is very grave. He said, I am going to go down to see if their wickedness is as bad as I have heard, and if it is not, I want to know. After the LORD said this, His two angels departed toward Sodom, but the LORD remained with Abraham. Now naturally the very first thing Abraham thought of was that Sodom was the city where his nephew Lot, and his wife and two daughters lived. Because he had family living in Sodom, he had a vested interest in the LORD'S plan to destroy Sodom. Knowing that the LORD would find confirm that Sodom was just as wicked as he had heard it was, Abraham asks the LORD a very honest and heartfelt question: Will you destroy the righteous people along with the wicked? What if there are fifty righteous people in Sodom? Will you not spare the city for the sake of fifty righteous people? In a display of His mercy and grace, the LORD assured Abraham He would spare Sodom from destruction for the sake of fifty righteous people. But Abraham didn't stop with fifty. He continues to push the issue. Abraham knew there weren't fifty righteous people to be found in Sodom. And so he asks the LORD, What if there are 45 who are righteous? Then 40? Then 30? Then 20? Then 10? And each time, the LORD assures Him He would spare Sodom if that many righteous people could be found in the city.
Throughout this whole bargaining process, Abraham remains humble and reverent towards the LORD. He knows in his heart that the LORD must do what he has to do with regards to Sodom. (MOVING INTO GENESIS 19...) As we move into GENESIS chapter nineteen, the two angels arrive in Sodom late that evening. As they enter the city, who do they find sitting at the city gate? None other than LOT, Abraham's nephew. Why was LOT sitting at the city gate? Well he wasn't just passing time watching people come and go. LOT was actually a judge or a magistrate in Sodom. He settled petty disputes that the higher courts didn't want to deal with. And the place where LOT settled these disputes as at the city gate. LOT immediately recognized these were more than two ordinary men, because verse 1 of chapter nineteen tells us, When Lot saw them, he rose to meet them, and bowed himself with his face to the ground. Remember that is the same thing his Uncle Abraham had done when they showed up at his tent. The two angels offered to stay in the city square that night, but LOT insisted that they come stay at his house. LOT knew just how wicked the people of Sodom were, and he knew it wasn't safe for the angels to stay in the city square. What happens next literally turns our stomachs. The angels went home with LOT and enjoyed a delicious meal with LOT and his family. But by bed time that night all of the men from every part of the city showed up at LOT'S house wanting to engage in lewd, homosexual acts with the two angels. This one incident was all the proof the angels needed to convince them that everything they had heard about the wickedness of Sodom was true and that Sodom was worthy of destruction.
It is a mistake to conclude the sole reason Sodom was judged because of their rampant homosexuality. That was just one of the perverse sins that plagued this wicked city. EZEKIEL 16:49,50 (NLT) says, Sodom s sins were pride, gluttony, and laziness, while the poor and needy suffered outside her door. She was proud and committed detestable sins, so I wiped her out, as you have seen. Arrogance...indulgence...indifference...and detestable immorality. Does that not sound eerily characteristic of present day America? In Isaiah 3:9 Isaiah compares Jerusalem to Sodom. He said They parade their sin like Sodom; they do not hide it. The people of Sodom openly practiced homosexuality and other despicable sins with absolutely no shame or remorse. So imagine this scene if you will: LOT has two angels staying in his house. Young men and old men from all over town have surrounded the LOT'S house like a pack of wild dogs, desiring to engage in homosexual acts with the angels. Now you and I can't even imagine what LOT does next. He offers his two daughters up to these wicked men to do with as they pleased. As if that isn't horrible enough, we learn in verse 12 that both his daughters are married. LOT was the one righteous man in Sodom. How could he even possibly make such a horrible offer?
What we see here is the effect living in a godless, immoral society can have even on the righteous. Apparently LOT had lived in the wicked environment of Sodom so long, he had become more like them in his thinking than he realized. He had lowered his standard of righteousness so much that he could actually rationalize it was OK to offer his two married daughters up as play things to the wicked men of Sodom. When the men refused LOT'S offer they tried to plow LOT over and storm through the door. The two angels reached out and pulled LOT inside the house and bolted the door shut. And when the men persisted in trying to break the door down the angels afflicted all of them with blindness, and eventually they gave up and left. After being convinced that SODOM was every bit as wicked and perverse as they had heard, the angels now prepare LOT and his family for God's Fiery Judgment upon the wicked cities of Sodom and Gomorrah. Let's pick up the record now in Genesis chapter nineteen, beginning with verse 12 and following...
GENESIS 19:12-29 (NKJV) 12 Then the men said to Lot, Have you anyone else here? Son-in-law, your sons, your daughters, and whomever you have in the city take them out of this place! 13 For we will destroy this place, because the outcry against them has grown great before the face of the LORD, and the LORD has sent us to destroy it. 14 So Lot went out and spoke to his sons-in-law, who had married his daughters, and said, Get up, get out of this place; for the LORD will destroy this city! But to his sonsin-law he seemed to be joking. 15 When the morning dawned, the angels urged Lot to hurry, saying, Arise, take your wife and your two daughters who are here, lest you be consumed in the punishment of the city. 16 And while he lingered, the men took hold of his hand, his wife s hand, and the hands of his two daughters, the LORD being merciful to him, and they brought him out and set him outside the city. 17 So it came to pass, when they had brought them outside, that he[a] said, Escape for your life! Do not look behind you nor stay anywhere in the plain. Escape to the mountains, lest you be destroyed. 18 Then Lot said to them, Please, no, my lords! 19 Indeed now, your servant has found favor in your sight, and you have increased your mercy which you have shown me by saving my life; but I cannot escape to the mountains, lest some evil overtake me and I die. 20 See now, this city is near enough to flee to, and it is a little one; please let me escape there (is it not a little one?) and my soul shall live. 21 And he said to him, See, I have favored you concerning this thing also, in that I will not overthrow this city for which you have spoken. 22 Hurry, escape there. For I cannot do anything until you arrive there. Therefore the name of the city was called Zoar. 23 The sun had risen upon the earth when Lot entered Zoar. 24 Then the LORD rained brimstone and fire on Sodom and Gomorrah, from the LORD out of the heavens. 25 So He overthrew those cities, all the plain, all the inhabitants of the cities, and what grew on the ground. 26 But his wife looked back behind him, and she became a pillar of salt. 27 And Abraham went early in the morning to the place where he had stood before the LORD. 28 Then he looked toward Sodom and Gomorrah, and toward all the land of the plain; and he saw, and behold, the smoke of the land which went up like the smoke of a furnace. 29 And it came to pass, when God destroyed the cities of the plain, that God remembered Abraham, and sent Lot out of the midst of the overthrow, when He overthrew the cities in which Lot had dwelt.
A P P L I C A T I O N How can we read this account of what GOD did to Sodom and Gomorrah and not think about what is going on right here in our own country? How can we not think about our own wicked cities such as New York...and San Francisco...and Hollywood...and Las Vegas and New Orleans? How can we read this account and not think about our Supreme Court's recent decision to sanction samesex marriages. How can we not think about the immoral filth that is being piped into our homes through cable and satellite TV? If God would not tolerate the wicked, perverted behavior of these two ancient cities, what makes us think that GOD would judge this nation any less harshly? If God burned these two wicked cities to the ground which never heard the gospel, how much more harsh will His judgment be upon a nation that has been blessed to hear the gospel more than any other nation? And on a more personal level, is there really all that much difference between LOT and many who profess to be Christians today? LOT believed in GOD but he didn't have a close relationship with GOD. Couldn't the same can be said of many Christians today? LOT blended right in with the evil society around him. Couldn't the same be said of a lot of Christians today? LOT made lots of compromises and lowered his standards of righteousness. Couldn't the same be said of lots of professing Christians today?
As we leave the smoldering ruins of Sodom and Gomorrah on this HOT SUMMER'S NIGHT I want to leave you with a very sobering question: If the LORD said to me tonight, I am going to destroy this world tomorrow would I go kicking and screaming all the way like LOT'S WIFE or would I willingly go with the LORD?