Genesis 18. We've looked at this
before. I've read it. You've read it
perhaps many times. But I've learned so much from
this and I hope you will too. New things. This passage is so
powerful. Sobering. And so relevant. So relevant. to our day right
now. Verse 16. Genesis 18. The men, speaking of the Lord
Jesus Christ and His two angels, two servants, whoever they were,
that accompanied Him to speak to Abraham and to deal with Sodom. It says, The men rose up from
the fence and looked toward Sodom. They looked with a very serious
look, a look of great grief, and, may
I say, a look of horror at what they saw, as should we, because we live
in the midst of it. They looked toward Sodom. The
Lord said the cry of Sodom and Gomorrah is great. There's an outcry, a public outcry
of Sodom and Gomorrah. It's great. I hear it, He said.
Their sins, as another scripture says, their cries have come up
to heaven in the Lord's ears. He hears it. They're not cries
for mercy that He hears. It's not cries for forgiveness
that he hears, but public cries, loud outcries, taunting and mocking
and defying God. Like, do you remember when Moses
and Joshua were up on the mountain and Joshua said, I hear noise,
I hear multitude, and the Lord said, I hear it too. And it was
not cries for mercy and forgiveness, but rebels against God. Cries against the truth. That's
what we're hearing today. Public outcries against the truth. Wanting to eradicate the truth
of what God says. Calling the truth a message of
hate. Calling the message of holiness. call it an error, call it good-evil.
Cries, public cries for homosexual rights, the exact same thing
was taking place here. The Lord heard it. Their cries
are very grievous to me, He said. Public outcries for same-sex
marriage rights, women's rights to kill their unborn children,
legalize drugs, you name it, whatever is evil, whatever God
calls evil, an abomination to Him, is highly esteemed among
men. And there's a public cry for
these things and against God. God heard it. Look over at Isaiah
1 with me. Isaiah 1. You know these passages. As you see the day approaching,
these things come alive, the Word of God so relevant. Isaiah chapter 1. God hasn't
changed. The God of the Bible, the true,
living, true God has not changed. He's righteous, He's holy. He
loves righteousness and He hates iniquity. That's what makes him
the holy God. Man hasn't changed. Man hates
holiness. Man loves sin. He hasn't changed. Man is not better. And here in
Isaiah 1, the Lord describes all people, verse 4, a sinful
nation of people laden with iniquity, a seed of evildoers, children
that are corruptors. They've forsaken the Lord. They
provoke, not just forsaken, but provoke him. They've gone way
backward. You remember Isaiah 59, it says
judgment has turned way backward. Truth has fallen in the streets
and cannot enter. They won't allow it to turn away
their ears. Romans 1 says, The wrath of God is revealed from
heaven against all ungodliness and unrighteousness of men who
hold the truth. That is, hold it down. Suppress
it. They see it, they have a Bible,
but they hold it down in unrighteousness. And so God gives them over, Romans
1, gives them over to these things. See, when the truth is not preached,
when the true and living God is not known and feared and declared
from pulpits, then society becomes rotten to the core and openly
wicked and profane. And the Lord said in verse 5
there of Isaiah 1, why should you be stricken any more? You'll
revolt more and more. These judgments from heaven don't
change people. The whole head is sick. See that?
Verse 5. The whole head is sick. Your
mind, your thoughts, your ways, everything. Your whole heart
is faint. From the sole of the foot, your walk, your work, your
ways to the head, to your thoughts, God is not in those thoughts,
but every imagination of every man's thought is only evil continually. That's what Genesis 6 said. The
Lord said right before He destroyed it. And He said, as in the days
of Noah. And in another Gospel, He said,
as in the days of Lot, so shall the coming of the Son of Man
be. Look over at chapter 3. Well,
chapter 2 of Isaiah, verses 6 through 8, this describes our day, doesn't
it? Verse 6, Therefore thou hast
forsaken thy people, the house of Jacob, because they be replenished
from the east as soothsayers like the Philistines. Verse 7,
their land is full of silver and gold and full of horses and
chariots. Verse 8, their land is full of
idols. They worship the work of their own hands. And then
you know these wonderful yet solemn verses. Verse 10, Enter
into the rock, hide thee in the dust, for the fear of the Lord.
That's to us, the believers, for the glory of His majesty.
The lofty looks of man shall be humbled. The haughtiness of
men shall be bowed down. The Lord alone shall be exalted
in that day. The day of the Lord of hosts
is upon everyone who is proud. Let's look at chapter 3. Here
it is. Chapter 3, verse 9, "...to show of their countenance, their
faces, the pride of witness against them." As Paul wrote in 2 Timothy
3, to be proud and boasters and haughty and heady and high-minded,
he said, their countenance. Don't you see the pride? Isn't
that what characterizes the people of this day from the oldest person
to the youngest person? It's pride. And he says, verse
9, they declare their sin as Sodom. They insist upon it. They
cry out. They hide it not. And he went
on to say, Woe unto their soul, they have rewarded evil unto
themselves. And the thing we should keep
in mind, though, is who maketh us to differ? And such were some
of you. Alright, go back to Genesis 18.
So the Lord looks toward Sodom. And He is looking now. That's the title of this message.
The Lord is looking toward Sodom. He's looking. He's looking. The Lord is. He sees what goes
on. He knows. He hears it. Oh boy. Verse 16. It says, Abraham went with them.
The Lord looked toward Sodom and Abraham went with them to
bring them on their way. The way. Abraham was with them. You remember in Exodus 32 where
the Lord said to the people who had turned against the truth
and against the Lord, Who is on the Lord's side? Lion drawn in the sand, let him
come unto me. Right before the Lord destroyed
thousands. And it says all the sons of Levi,
all the sons of Levi were gathered to Moses. Who is on the Lord's
side? Abraham went with them. Abraham
was with them. Abraham walked with God like
Enoch, like Noah, like all of God's people. And Amos 3.3 says,
Can two walk together except they be agreed? It's not God
walking with us, but we walk with Him, and we agree with Him.
What the Lord says, what the Lord does, and how the Lord judges
men, all He says about us, we agree with Him. We're in a complete
agreement with the Lord. Abraham was with them. He was
with them. He was walking with them. Verse
16, to bring them on their way. When the Lord came, and this
is how you knew that Abraham knew Him, he went running to
see Him. He was so happy to see the Lord.
And the two men with Him. Those that love Him that begat
love them that are begotten of Him. And he ran to meet them
and bowed. He reverenced the Lord and even
those men and those angels. He was anxious to see them, and
he didn't want them to leave. It says he brought them on the
way. That means he saw them to the
door and he walked down the road with them. He didn't want them
to leave. Does that sound familiar? You remember the disciples on
the road to Emmaus were talking and sad, and the Lord came and
disguised Himself. They didn't know it was the Lord.
They thought it was just a preacher. But loving the truth and loving
the Lord and His men, They loved what he was saying to them, and
their hearts were burning as he was preaching to them, and
he made it as though he would go on, and they said, don't,
don't, don't. Stay with us a while. And he
did. Well, that's what Abraham's doing. He doesn't want them to leave.
He just supped with the Lord Jesus Christ and two of his angels,
and he did not want them to leave. Now look at this, verse 17 through
19. The Lord said, Shall I hide from
Abraham that thing which I do, seeing that Abraham shall surely
become a great and mighty nation, and all the nations of the earth
shall be blessed in him? For I know him, that he will
command his children and his household after him. And they
shall keep the way of the Lord, to do justice and judgment. that
the Lord may bring upon Abraham that which he hath spoken of
him." Shall I hide this thing from Abraham? You know, the Lord
has hid these things from the wise and the prudent. Romans 1, I just quoted, the
wrath of God, the judgment of God, the creation of God that
is so clearly seen, the heavens declare his glory, the firmament
showeth his handiwork, day unto day utter speech, no language,
these things are not heard. God's eternal power and Godhead
are clearly seen, or should be, and yet Scripture says they profess
themselves to be wise, but no, they become fools. And these
things that are clearly seen are hidden from them. God hides
them. God sends them strong delusions.
Those that don't fear Him, those that don't worship Him, those
that don't acknowledge Him, He hides. plainest things from them. And it gives them over to a reprobate
mind. A reprobate mind means a mind
void of judgment. It means you don't have good
sense. You don't have any understanding.
A reprobate mind means you don't have good sense. You can't think
right. And God gives men over to that.
Now, God is not in all of your thoughts. If you're not thinking
about God in His hands, your breath is and all your way. You
don't have good sense there. If you're shaking your fist in
the face of your Maker who controls your breath, your life, if you're
weighed in the balances and found wanting and not repenting unto
that God and calling upon Him for mercy, but rather shaking
your fist in His face and defying Him and taunting Him and daring
Him to do something about you, you don't have that sense, do
you? Your mind is gone. You're crazy. You're insane. And such were
some of you. So that's where all of us are. But God has given us an understanding
that we might know him that is true and we're in him that is
true. And the only reason he doesn't destroy us with Sodom
is because he had mercy upon us in Christ and him crucified. Well, he says, shall I hide these
things from Abraham? No, he's not going to hide them
from his people. He hides them from the wise and
the prudent. But He reveals them unto babies. He reveals them
unto us and our children. Now, we don't know everything,
but we know all we need to know of God's revealed will, because
He has written it for us, written it down. And God, thank the Lord,
bless His holy name, He has not hid these things from us, but
revealed them unto us. You and I, like Abraham, are
sons and daughters of promise. The Lord said he'll be a great
nation. All nations of the earth shall be blessed in him. God's
people are a great nation. The Lord is the firstborn among
many brethren, sons of God. And what he says of Abraham is
true of all of God's people. He said, Abraham, I know him. He will command his children
and his household after him. They shall keep the way of the
Lord. The way of the Lord. God's people
do keep the way of the Lord. What is the way of the Lord?
It's the truth, isn't it? Christ is the way. We hold to
Christ the way and nothing else. Isn't that right? Sure we do.
All of God's people do. His true people do. They're determined
like the apostle to know nothing among this world that's wise
in its own conceits. It saved Jesus Christ and Him
crucified. God's people worship God in spirit. They really do worship God. They're
not playing games. They rejoice in the Lord Jesus
Christ because they know He's all in all. And they have no
confidence in the flesh, not their own or anyone else's. Those
are the true people of God, the true Israel of God, the true
circumcision. They keep the way of the Lord.
They so do. They hold to the Word, the truth of God. And to
do justice and judgment, see that? Justice and judgment. They have good judgment. And it says that the Lord is
going to bring upon them, as Abraham, that which he has spoken
of him. You say, oh, but we come far
short of true judgment and justice. We come far short of doing what
we should. That's true. That is true. But it is God that worketh in
us both the will and do of his good pleasure. And he that hath
begun a good work will finish it. You have that promise. Abraham
was a sinner. Remember, he had already denied
his wife once. He's going to do it again. He's
a sinner. He's prone to wander, prone to
fail, but because the Lord was in him, the Lord was leading
God in His Spirit, directing Him, He is going to do what the
Lord commanded Him to do because the Lord gives the grace to do
it. He gives the grace to do it. I know Him, the Lord said. Not just know about Him, I know
Him. For whom He did foreknow, He
did predestinate. Alright? Verse 20 and 21, the
Lord said, Because the cry of Sodom and Gomorrah is great and
grievous, their cry is great because their sin is very grievous,
I will go down now and see whether they have done altogether according
to the cry of it which is coming to me. And if not, I will know. Now, the Lord often speaks in
human terms. He often speaks in a way that
only in a way we can understand. Known unto God are all his works
from the beginning of the world. The Lord already knew what he
was going to do. This was not a fact-finding trip for the Lord.
Oh, no. The Lord sees. Before the world,
or so it happened, he knew. But the Lord is speaking in a
way we can understand, in a way to make us accountable to him
and to show his mercy and his justice He's saying, I'm going
to go right down in the middle of this evil place and look and
listen, and I will be a just and faithful witness. This is
a just and faithful witness. One who judges not what they
think, but actually what's taking place. Actually what they see
and hear. The Lord says, I'm a faithful
witness. All that I see and hear, I will judge. I will not justify
the wicked. I will not condemn the just like
men do. That's an abomination to me,
but I will just judge righteous judgment. What I see, I will
deal with. What I hear, I will deal with.
I'm going to go see and hear for myself. And did not the Lord
Jesus Christ do just that? Did he not come down to this
earth made in the likeness of sinful flesh, God manifest in
the flesh? And oh, how his righteous soul
was vexed with all this. Oh, the Lord who knows the thoughts
of men. We can't imagine what it was
like for him to live in this place for thirty-three years. Underline these words. He said,
I will know. Underline those words. I will
know. That's the key right there. All
that is said and done on this earth by men and women and young
people, God knows, God sees, God hears. What should that produce
in us? Fear. Fear of the Lord is the
beginning of wisdom. The whole I know, I see, I hear. He's a just judge and he's righteous. Verse 22. Men turned their face
toward Sodom and went toward Sodom. But Abraham stood yet
before the Lord. Now here's something I really
learned. Here's something I'm learning,
I hope. I haven't learned this perfectly. I hope to learn it. I want to be an Abraham in faith.
I want to be an Abraham, like he said, who will keep the way
of the Lord. I want to be an Abraham who will
do justice and judgment. and command my house and so forth
and walk with the Lord and agree with him, walk with the Lord.
I want to be an Abraham, but, oh, I want to be an Abraham,
one that intercedes the sinners, even sodomites. I'll just be frank with you,
just be honest with you. What I see and hear in most people,
I have no compassion on them. And the reason has to be because
I have forgotten the pit from which I was digged. We're all guilty of that. The
thing that ought to characterize believers more than anything
else, those who have been shown great mercy, is mercy. compassion,
the Lord who has had great compassion on us, who has plucked us as
a brand from the burning, that ought to be our greatest characteristic. It was with Abraham. The Lord
made me and Abraham to intercede for Sodomites even. Jude said
this. I was going to have you turn,
but I ran out of time. Lord's brother, Jude, summed
this up when he said, And he goes on down to say, but
of some have compassion, making a difference, that is, having
good judgment, understanding, knowing their frame, like the
Lord knows ours. Some save with fear, he says,
save with fear, that is, speak to them, pulling them out of
the fire, hating the garment spotted by the flesh, but loving
the sinner. You know, modern religion says
God hates sin but loves the sinner. Well, that's what we're to do. Right? And God does love some sinners,
but not all of them. Right? He does. And He does hate the sin. That's
for sure. But you can't separate the sin
from the man. You can't separate, can you?
What we do is what we are, and the Lord can't hate what you
do and not hate you. But the Lord does love some sinners,
and those sinners whom He loves, He sees in Christ. He views in
Christ. He sees what they will be. That's the only way God could
love us while we were yet sinners, because God is holy. God is righteous.
a sinner, a rebel against him, except as he views them in the
Lord Jesus Christ. Now, that's a fact. Well, read
on now. Abraham stood before the Lord.
The Lord Abraham drew near. Draw nigh unto God, James said. He'll draw nigh unto you. Abraham
was a friend of God. I want to preach on that someday
soon. A friend of God. God spoke face
to face with him like a friend. And Abraham spoke with the Lord,
and he was free to say, free to ask what he would. But he
didn't do it infinitely. He didn't do it without fear
and reverence. You'll notice it. He said, and
now he's not charging the Lord with foolishness. This is written
for our sake. for our learning. He says, wilt
thou also destroy the righteous with the wicked? Perventure there
be fifty righteous within the city. How many people were inside? There were estimates anywhere
from a quarter million to several million people. It's a big city.
At least as big as, you know, a major city in Ireland. Fifty. Lord, if you could just find
fifty. righteous out of two million. Abraham did. He lived. He knew. He'd been there. He'd been there.
Remember, he came out of Sodom. He rescued Lot and the king of
Sodom and all those people. He knew. He saw what was going
on. His eyes were wide open, too. He saw it. It grieved him,
too. And he said, well, if you find
fifty, wilt thou destroy and not spare the place for fifty
righteous that are therein? Be far from thee to do that to
this man. Oh, it's true. God will not destroy the righteous
with the wicked. Read on. Be far from thee, in
verse 25, the last line, shall not the judge of all the earth
do right? shall not the judge of all the
earth do right." Now, this is our faith. God is the judge of
all the earth. And he is righteous, and he does
right. That's our faith. That's what we believe. God is
a judge. And I'm so thankful that we're not without a king.
I'm so thankful that this world is not without a judge, aren't
you? I'm so thankful it's not just running helter-skelter and
chaos out of control. I'm so thankful that the Lord
reigns, aren't you? Even the wrath of man shall praise
him. That God hath made all things for himself, even the wicked.
They're doing His will some. Aren't you thankful? He's doing
all this, and He's the judge. That's our faith and our fear. That's our fear, too. God is the judge. This is what
we believe, and therefore, should by the fear of the Lord, men
depart from evil. And this is our hope. He's going
to do right. He's going to do right. This
is our hope for us and our hope for everyone else. He will never
do wrong. He will never do unjustly. He
will never do something evil. It's all good. All things work
together for good. So then the love of God will
be called according to His purpose. This is our hope. This is our
plea. Lord, if he's righteous, if she's
righteous before you, will you not spare them? Okay, so the question needs to
be asked, doesn't it? What does it mean to be righteous? I'm out of time, but I'm at the
heart of this. Look at Romans 3 with me. I can't quit now.
Here's the question. Who is righteous and how are
they righteous? Can you answer? If someone asks
you that, you know only the righteous will be spared the wrath of God?
Say ye to the righteous, Isaiah said, it shall be well with your
soul. Say to the wicked, it shall not be well. Who's righteous? Who's wicked? Can you answer? Do you know, for your own peace,
in order to answer others? Do you know, for your own peace,
do you know who is righteous? Romans 3. You know these verses. Verse 10, as it is written, there
is none righteous. Not one. The Lord looked down
from heaven to see if there were any. He said, there's none, He
said. Their throat goes on to describe
us by nature. And down in verse 19, it says,
those that are under the law, every mouth that should be stopped
because they're guilty. Who? Us. Verse 20, by the deeds
of the law, no flesh is justified. We all break it. We've broken
every point. Every point. But now, you know,
when the gospel is about to be preached, it begins with a but.
But now, the righteousness of God, how we may be righteous
with God, how God can consider us righteous without the law,
that is, without you and I keeping the law, is clear, is manifest.
It's witnessed by the law. The law even tells us this. And the prophets, all of them.
What did our Lord say of the prophets? They are they which
testify of me. Who? The Lord, our righteousness. Read it, verse 22, "...the righteousness
of God, which is by faith of Jesus Christ." You see that?
That is not a misprint, because it's written four or five times,
the faith of Jesus Christ. We're made righteous not by faith
in Jesus Christ necessarily, but by the faith of Jesus Christ. It is the faithfulness of Jesus
Christ as our substitute, as our righteous representative,
as our Lord, our righteousness, doing what he did, fulfilling
the law for us, and imputing that to us. We are made righteous
by his righteousness. And faith is a result of that. Faith is not the cause. Faith
is the result of that. Faith is not the means. It's
the end. Faithfulness of Jesus Christ
is unto all and upon all men and women, no, them that believe.
And there's no difference. All have sinned and come short
of the glory of God. That's us. Every one of us. We're
no better than they. Paul wrote in this same chapter,
we ain't any better than the Sodomites. No, sir. And we're justified to freely
have. Not by works, but by His grace
through the redemption that is in Jesus Christ. Who's righteous? Whoever believes Jesus Christ.
Whoever trusts Him. God sees you like Abraham, who
was a 75-year-old idolater, but God. Like Noah, who was no different
than the people of his day, but Noah found grace in the eyes
of the Lord. The Lord said, Thee have I seen
righteous in this generation. Because of what he did. That
goes completely against all the scriptures. Not what he did,
but what the Lord did. That's our next message in the
next hour. Genesis 18, and I just have to
read the remainder of this. I can't make any comment. Read
verse 26. The Lord said, If I find in Sodom
fifty righteous within the city, then I will spare all the place
for their sakes. And Abraham answered and said,
Behold, now I have taken upon me to speak unto the Lord, which
him but does tonight. See what a humble man this is. What does it say about The sacrifice of food, all the
talk that men say before God. God is in heaven and we're on
the earth. Let their words be few. Abraham knew that. Verse
28, Peradventure there shall lack five of the fifty righteous.
Will thou destroy all the city for lack of five? And the Lord
said, If I find forty and five, I will not destroy them. Abraham
spake unto him yet again and said, Peradventure there shall
be forty found there The Lord said, I will not do it for 40
seconds. And he said unto him, Oh, let
not the Lord be angry, and I will speak. Peradventure, there shall
30 be found there. And the Lord said, I will not
do it if I find 30 there. Let me just make this comment
here. You see how it's going from 50 down, it got all the
way down to 10. They couldn't find 10 there.
Surely this is prophetic. Surely this is prophetic. That
when the harvest was great in the beginning, there were thousands
of righteous people. Thousands and thousands and thousands
in the very beginning, in the early harvest. But in the latter
harvest, there'll be just here a little, there a little. Down
from fifty down to ten. No, it was only three. Read on. Behold now, verse 31,
I have taken upon me to speak unto the Lord. Peradventure shall
be found a twenty found there. And the Lord said, I will not
destroy it for twenty sayings. And he said, oh, let not the
Lord be angry. And I will speak yet but this once. Peradventure
ten shall be found there. And he said, I will not destroy
it for ten sayings. Surely Abraham must have been
thinking, I know he's thinking about Lot. He has Lot in mind.
Lot's wife. He loved Lot. That's his nephew. He loved his wife. He loved Lot's
daughters. He probably knew them. Lot's
daughters had husbands. He's thinking of at least ten
people or more, isn't he? There are people in this town
I don't believe both the Lord, but, you know, we have a burden, not
the burden I want to have, but we do have a concern for Him,
don't we? Well, so, verse 33, the Lord
went His way as soon as He had left communion with Abraham,
and Abraham returned unto His place. But that first verse,
verse 16, the men rose up, and the Lord looked toward Sodom.
The Lord said, when once the master of the house is risen
up, you know, the clouds are the dust at his feet. And you
can discern the times, and we should clearly see that the Lord
is stirring. The signs of the time clearly
point to the day of Noah. As in the days of Noah, as in
the days of Lot, we live right in the midst of Sodom. It's so
plain. They declare their sin like Sodom.
Surely the Lord is rising up. Can't you see it? The clouds
are the dust of his feet. The thunder, when the thunder
rolls, he says, I have glorified my name. I'm going to glorify
it again. God will be glorified, not only in the salvation of
his people, but in the condemnation of the world. But let us be like
Abraham, lovers, like our Lord, rather, who was like, Abraham
was like our Lord, interceding for even Simon. Lord, may it
please you to find another one of these sinners and save them. Would you be pleased to save
our nephews? nieces and sons and daughters
and their wives and husbands and our neighbors. Would you
be pleased? Would you find ten more righteous?
And we'll rejoice in your mercy and your grace. You were righteous,
or you were merciful to us. Okay. Hare Krsna. Hare Krsna.