Comparing Attitudes (Gen. 19:15-26)

SPIRITUAL DIARY FOR 09/12/2006

My Worship Time                                                                   Focus:  Comparing Attitudes

Bible Reading & Meditation                                    Reference:  Genesis 19:15-26

            Message of the verse:  “15  When morning dawned, the angels urged Lot, saying, ‘Up, take your wife and your two daughters who are here, or you will be swept away in the punishment of the city.’  16  But he hesitated. So the men seized his hand and the hand of his wife and the hands of his two daughters, for the compassion of the LORD was upon him; and they brought him out, and put him outside the city.  17 When they had brought them outside, one said, ‘Escape for your life! Do not look behind you, and do not stay anywhere in the valley; escape to the mountains, or you will be swept away.’

18 But Lot said to them, ‘Oh no, my lords!  19  ‘Now behold, your servant has found favor in your sight, and you have magnified your lovingkindness, which you have shown me by saving my life; but I cannot escape to the mountains, for the disaster will overtake me and I will die; 20  now behold, this town is near enough to flee to, and it is small. Please, let me escape there (is it not small?) that my life may be saved.’  21 He said to him, ‘Behold, I grant you this request also, not to overthrow the town of which you have spoken.  22 ‘Hurry, escape there, for I cannot do anything until you arrive there.’ Therefore the name of the town was called Zoar.  23 The sun had risen over the earth when Lot came to Zoar.  24 Then the LORD rained on Sodom and Gomorrah brimstone and fire from the LORD out of heaven,  25 and He overthrew those cities, and all the valley, and all the inhabitants of the cities, and what grew on the ground.  26 But his wife, from behind him, looked back, and she became a pillar of salt.”

In this section the difference between the attitude of Lot and the attitude of Abraham are going to be discussed.  It is good to remember that Abraham was a man who loved the Lord and wanted to serve Him, but Lot was a man who can be classified as a worldly believer and so his attitude will be different, and those differences can be seen in this section of Scripture. 

It is only by the grace and mercy of God, and probably the pleading of uncle Abraham that Lot and his wife and daughters are being rescued from Sodom, but Lot sees fit to argue with those who are doing the rescuing and really does not want to leave, nor does he want to go where these angels are telling them to go.  There is no gratitude at all in Lot for having his life and the life of his family saved.  On the other hand Abraham will obey God in the future by even offering up his only son to be sacrificed because the Lord had asked him to do it.  There is a lot of difference here in these two men’s attitudes.

            Spiritual meaning for my life today:  Lot was a man who was called a worldly believer and because of that he was a selfish person and wanted his own way all of the time.  This is not good, and it is my desire to seek the Lord in this area of my life.

The Word of God has been convicting to my heart as I read and studied it this morning.

My Steps of Faith Today:  To pray and as the Lord to have His love flow through me towards Dave and Callie even though there has not been much love returned to me, nor any feelings of love in our relationship for some time. 

            I would seek also to have the Lord to continue to teach me contentment and to direct my path and to show me what it is He wants me to teach on Sunday evening, and give me the grace to do so.

Influence (Gen. 19:14)

SPIRITUAL DIARY FOR 09-11-2006

My Worship Time                                                                                     Focus:  Influence

Bible Reading & Meditation                                         Reference:  Genesis 19:14

            Message of the verse:  “14 Lot went out and spoke to his sons-in-law, who were to marry his daughters, and said, "Up, get out of this place, for the LORD will destroy the city." But he appeared to his sons-in-law to be jesting.”

           

            Comparing the influence that Abraham had with that of Lot would not be much of a comparison, for as seen in this verse Lot did not even have enough influence on his married daughters and their husbands to convince them that the Lord really was going to destroy the city and so they thought he was just jesting.  Again it can be seen that Lot’s problem can be described as being worldly, for Lot loved the things of the world more that the things of the Lord and therefore was not a good influence on the people who were living around him, even on his family for the only two people who would eventually escape with Lot were his two unmarried daughters and they would commit incest with him in order to have children, and those two nations that would come out of their wombs would be a thorn in the side of Israel for a long time, yet by God’s grace Ruth would come out of one of those nations and be in the bloodline of the Lord Jesus Christ.

            Spiritual meaning for my life today:  Not getting to close to the world and being content with the place where the Lord has me, and not getting to attached to the things of this world, so if the Lord decides it is best to take them from me that it will not destroy my life.  It seems that Lot’s life was ruined because of all of the things he lost when God destroyed Sodom and Gomorrah.

The Word of God has been challenging to my life as I read and studied it this morning. 

My Steps of Faith Today:  Again I would hope and pray that the Lord would help me to keep away from worldliness and to continue to teach me contentment.

  

Comparison of God's Messages with His Angels (Matt. 19:12-13)

SPIRITUAL DIARY FOR 09-08-2006

My Worship Time                                                       Focus:  Comparing God’s Messages

Bible Reading & Meditation                                    Reference:  Genesis 19:12-13

            Message of the verses:  “12 Then the two men said to Lot, ‘Whom else have you here? A son-in-law, and your sons, and your daughters, and whomever you have in the city, bring them out of the place; 13 for we are about to destroy this place, because their outcry has become so great before the LORD that the LORD has sent us to destroy it.’”

           

            It has been established in the last chapter that if ten righteous people were found in the cities of Sodom and Gomorrah that God would not destroy it, but there were not found ten righteous people so know God will destroy the cities, but He will remove the righteous out of the city before He judges these cities by destroying them.  This was the message that the angels gave to Lot and his family and it was not a good one, and if compared to the message given to Abraham and Sarah it is quite different, for God told Abraham and Sarah that in one year would have a child of their own.

           

            It has been written before that the judgment of Sodom and Gomorrah is compared to the judgment that God will bring about latter on in human history, and so it can also be compared that God will remove His own before those judgments.  (1Thes. 4:13-18)

            Spiritual meaning for my life today:  Dr. Wiersbe suggested some verses to look up to make the point that God would remove His own before He brought judgment upon the earth and one set of verses was 2 Peter 2:4-10 and while reading them I was touched by something in them that will be my spiritual meaning for my life today.  “7 And if He rescued righteous Lot, oppressed by the sensual conduct of unprincipled men 8 (for by what he saw and heard that righteous man, while living among them, felt his righteous soul tormented day after day by their lawless deeds), 9 then the Lord knows how to rescue the godly from temptation, and to keep the unrighteous under punishment for the day of judgment.”  The part that spoke to me is that the Lord knows how to rescue the godly from temptation, and the example that he gave was from “righteous Lot.”  God knows how to keep me from temptation and He will.

The Word of God has been Challenging to my heart and convicting to my soul as I read and studied it the morning.

My Steps of Faith Today:  To trust the Lord to deliver me from temptation, for He know how, and to trust the Lord to teach me contentment and to direct my path each day.

           

What really happened to Lot? (Gen. 19:2-11)

SPIRITUAL DIARY 09-07-2006

My Worship Time                                                               Focus:  What happened to Lot?

Bible Reading & Meditation                                     Reference:  Genesis 19:2-11

            Message of the verse:  “2 And he said, ‘Now behold, my lords, please turn aside into your servant’s house, and spend the night, and wash your feet; then you may rise early and go on your way.’ They said however, ‘No, but we shall spend the night in the square.’  3 Yet he urged them strongly, so they turned aside to him and entered his house; and he prepared a feast for them, and baked unleavened bread, and they ate.

4  Before they lay down, the men of the city, the men of Sodom, surrounded the house, both young and old, all the people from every quarter; 5  and they called to Lot and said to him, ‘Where are the men who came to you tonight? Bring them out to us that we may have relations with them.’ 6 But Lot went out to them at the doorway, and shut the door behind him, 7 and said, ‘Please, my brothers, do not act wickedly.  8  ‘Now behold, I have two daughters who have not had relations with man; please let me bring them out to you, and do to them whatever you like; only do nothing to these men, inasmuch as they have come under the shelter of my roof.’  9 But they said, ‘Stand aside.’ Furthermore, they said, ‘This one came in as an alien, and already he is acting like a judge; now we will treat you worse than them.’ So they pressed hard against Lot and came near to break the door. 10 But the men reached out their hands and brought Lot into the house with them, and shut the door.  11 They struck the men who were at the doorway of the house with blindness, both small and great, so that they wearied themselves trying to find the doorway.”

            Peter writes that Lot was righteous and if he had not written that in his letter it would have been difficult to see that from the passages that tell about Lot in Genesis, and this passage here gives little evidence to support Lot being righteous, yet it is the Lord who saves people and sometimes when a person is saved he does not act like there has been any changes in his life, and in the case of Lot it was because he was a friend of the world.

Lot does offer a place for these men to stay, and it is doubtful that at that time he knew that they were God’s angels.  The hospitality that he shows to them is not the same that Abraham had shown to these men when they were in his tent.

Lot realized that the acts that the men of Sodom were doing was wrong, yet he had no influence on them to cause them to want to stop their homosexuality, which is a horrible sin before the Lord.  In order to protect these men when the men of the city came to as for them in order to have sex with them Lot would stoop so low as to offer his two virgin daughters to them instead of these men, but the men would not allow this to happen by striking the men of the city with blindness.  Now these men of Sodom were not only spiritual blind, but also physically blind too.

How are believers to act when it comes to the sin of homosexuality?  Believers are never to treat any sin as something that is right, however it has been said many times that as believers in Jesus Christ we are to love the sinner, because that is what Jesus Christ has done for all sinners, but we are to hate the sin.  There is a difference and the example is set by our Lord who came to earth in order to pay for the sins of the world, and His example while on earth was that He truly loved sinners, but because He died for sin we know that He hated sin.

            Spiritual meaning for my life today:  As I look at what worldliness had done to Lot it surely makes me not want to be affected by the world, but more important it makes me want to realize that this world is not my home for I am just passing through, and because of that I don’t want the world to put its snare on me so that it becomes more important to me than serving the Lord.

The Word of God has been both convicting and also it has presented a challenge to my heart as I read and studied it this morning.

My Steps of Faith Today:  I have been asking the Lord to teach me to be content this year and this goes along with this portion of Scripture in that if Lot would have been more content with his lot in life, then he would not have been so tied to this world. (No put intended).  I would also ask the Lord to direct my path.

Comparing Abraham and Lot (Gen. 19:1)

SPIRITUAL DIARY FOR 09/06/2006

My Worship Time                                             Focus:  Comparisons of Abraham & Lot

Bible Reading & Meditation                                     Reference:  Genesis 19:1

            Message of the verse:  “1 Now the two angels came to Sodom in the evening as Lot was sitting in the gate of Sodom. When Lot saw them, he rose to meet them and bowed down with his face to the ground.

           

            There are many comparisons that occur between Abraham and Lot and some of them will be brought out in the study of this chapter, which is one of the saddest in all the Scriptures.     

           

            Abraham was in the world but not of the world, while Lot was of this world while being in this world.  It is probably true that when Abraham went down to Egypt that Lot began his passion for the world as he saw the thing in Egypt that were worldly. 

           

            The Lord did not go down to Sodom, but sent His two angels there and they went at night as opposed to when they met Abraham in the daylight.  This could be seen as Abraham being in the light while Lot was in the dark.  The Lord and His angels meet Abraham in a tent and this tent was where he worshiped the Lord, while Lot was met in the gate of the city where the business was of the city was conducted. 

           

            There is a difference between different people in the Scriptures who had been sent to places of evil by the Lord for reasons of the Lord than Lot going to this evil city in order to fulfill his lusts.  Joseph went to Egypt in order to save a people, and God sent Jonah, even though he did not want to go, to Assyria to preach the good news to them, and there were other cases too, which we will not mention at this time.

            Spiritual meaning for my life today:  I must say that there have been far too many times in my life when I have been too attracted to the world system and have gotten to close to it, but this has rarely if ever made me want to stay there.  The three enemies of the believer are very real enemies that have a pull on me at times and can only be overcome by the power of the Spirit of the Lord who lives in me and also through the power of the Word which I can read and study.  The world is only one of them, while the flesh and the Devil are the other two and there are times when I yield to one or more of these.

The Word of God had been a very big challenge to me and it has also been very conviction to my heart as I read and studied it this morning.

My Steps of Faith Today:  To trust the Lord for the outcome of the medication that I have taken this morning, that His will may be done.  To trust the Lord to continue to teach me contentment and to direct my path.  

Abraham Minister to the World (Gen. 18:23-33)

SPIRITUAL DIARY FOR 09-04-2006

My Worship Time                                                Focus:  Abraham Ministers to the World

Bible Reading & Meditation                                    Reference:  Genesis 18:23-33

            Message of the verse:  “23 Abraham came near and said, ‘Will You indeed sweep away the righteous with the wicked?  24 ‘Suppose there are fifty righteous within the city; will You indeed sweep it away and not spare the place for the sake of the fifty righteous who are in it?  25 ‘Far be it from You to do such a thing, to slay the righteous with the wicked, so that the righteous and the wicked are treated alike. Far be it from You! Shall not the Judge of all the earth deal justly?’  26 So the LORD said, ‘If I find in Sodom fifty righteous within the city, then I will spare the whole place on their account.’

27 And Abraham replied, ‘Now behold, I have ventured to speak to the Lord, although I am but dust and ashes.  28  ‘Suppose the fifty righteous are lacking five, will You destroy the whole city because of five?’ And He said, ‘I will not destroy it if I find forty-five there.’  29  He spoke to Him yet again and said, ‘Suppose forty are found there?’ And He said, ‘I will not do it on account of the forty.’  30  Then he said, ‘Oh may the Lord not be angry, and I shall speak; suppose thirty are found there?’ And He said, ‘I will not do it if I find thirty there.’  31  And he said, ‘Now behold, I have ventured to speak to the Lord; suppose twenty are found there?’ And He said, ‘I will not destroy it on account of the twenty.’  32  Then he said, ‘Oh may the Lord not be angry, and I shall speak only this once; suppose ten are found there?’ And He said, ‘I will not destroy it on account of the ten.’  33 As soon as He had finished speaking to Abraham the LORD departed, and Abraham returned to his place.”

           

            The concern of Abraham for Lot and his family can be seen in these verses as Abraham intercedes for the people in Sodom and Gomorrah.  Abraham was not arguing with the Lord in these verses, but was trying to protect his nephew Lot, because Abraham knew that Lot was a true believer even though he was not living like one.

           

            These verses show the importance of what a small group of believers can do for if Lot would have been able to even win his family to the Lord then the entire cities would have been saved, however as it will be evident to see in the next chapter that Sodom was in Lot in the way that it should not have been and his missionary work there was not at all successful.

            Spiritual meaning for my life today:  The thing that I can take away from this section is that of Abraham’s concern for the lost, for the picture of the destruction of Sodom and Gomorrah is a picture of the judgment of the lost at the end of this age, and the intercession of Abraham for that lost world to the Lord is a picture of what I should be doing for lost people in this time in which I am living.  I should not get so caught up in the things of this world that I am living so that the world has more of an affect on me than me on the world, which was the case of Lot.

The Word of God has brought conviction and challenge to my heart as I read and studied it this morning.

My Steps of Faith for Today:  Not to be conformed to the world, but to be ready to be a wittiness to the world, and not to be ashamed of the Gospel.  To allow the Lord to continue to teach me contentment and also to have my steps directed by the Lord.

God's Coming Judgment is Revealed to Abraham (Gen. 18-16-21)

SPIRITUAL DIARY FOR 09-01-2006

My Worship Time                           Focus:  God’s coming judgment revealed to Abraham

Bible Reading & Meditation                                    Reference:  Genesis 18:16-21

            Message of the verse:  “16 Then the men rose up from there, and looked down toward Sodom; and Abraham was walking with them to send them off.  17 The LORD said, ‘Shall I hide from Abraham what I am about to do, 18 since Abraham will surely become a great and mighty nation, and in him all the nations of the earth will be blessed?

19  ‘For I have chosen him, so that he may command his children and his household after him to keep the way of the LORD by doing righteousness and justice, so that the LORD may bring upon Abraham what He has spoken about him.’  20 And the LORD said, ‘The outcry of Sodom and Gomorrah is indeed great, and their sin is exceedingly grave.

21  ‘I will go down now, and see if they have done entirely according to its outcry, which has come to Me; and if not, I will know.’  22 Then the men turned away from there and went toward Sodom, while Abraham was still standing before the LORD.”

           

            The men or angels leave the Lord and Abraham and proceed down to Sodom in order to destroy it.  In verses 17 & 18 the Lord seems to be speaking to the angels although He may just be speaking to Abraham.  The question is whether or not He should reveal to Abraham what He is about to do to Sodom and Gomorrah, since He was about to destroy it.  What I see in these two verses is wicked cities which God is about to destroy because the cup of God’s wrath for them is full and because He is a just God He must act in judgment.  I want to compare this judgment to what the Lord says to Abraham, for Abraham was called by God out of his sinful past to become a man that would begin a people who would be set apart for the Lord in order that God may send His Son into the world to pay the debt of sin for all.

           

            The Lord goes on in verses 20-21 to speak of the outcry that had come to the Lord about the sin that has been going on in Sodom and Gomorrah, and He says that He wants to see if they have done according to that outcry.  First it is a mystery to me as to where this outcry has come from, and second why would God have to go down and check this out since He knows all things?  I will seek some answers to these questions. (Today is June 1, 2020.)  John MacArthur in his study Bible writes “The iniquity of the two cities, by then complete (cf. 15:16), had reached the point of no return before the Lord, who demonstrated before Abraham ho justly He assessed the time for judgment (v. 21), ‘I will go down, and see…’).”  In his commentary Barns writes the following for verses 20-22:  “The Lord now proceeds to unfold his design. There is justice in every step of the divine procedure. He comes down to inquire and act according to the merits of the case. The men now depart on their errand; but Abraham still stands before the Lord.”   

            Spiritual meaning for my life today:  Abraham is known as “a friend of God,” and Jesus speaks of His disciples as being His friends and in both cases because of this friendship the Lord will reveal secrets to His friends, which is what the Lord was doing in the case of Sodom and Gomorrah, revealing its outcome to Abraham.  In light of these statements I can see that God reveals things to me, as one of His sons, through His Word, and I must keep myself clean by confessing any sins and walk with the Lord so He will speak to me through His Word.

The Word of God has been a challenge and also it has be convicting to me as I read and studied it this morning.

My Steps of Faith Today:  To continue to learn contentment from the Lord as He directs my path, and to continue to seek the Lord as I read and study His Word each day so that I can be more like my Lord and Savior Jesus Christ.