Genesis chapter 18 and verse
17. And the Lord said, Shall I hide
from Abraham the 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. And the Lord said, because the
cry of Sodom and Gomorrah is great and 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 has come
unto me. And if not, I will know. And
the men turned their faces from thence and went towards Sodom. But Abraham stood yet before
the Lord. And Abraham drew near and said,
"'Wilt thou also destroy the righteous with the wicked? "'Peradventure
there be fifty righteous within the city. "'Wilt thou also destroy
and not spare the place "'for the fifty righteous that are
therein? "'That be far from thee to do after this manner, "'to
slay the righteous with the wicked, "'and that the righteous should
be as the wicked? that be far from thee. Shall
not the judge of all the earth do right?' And 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 am but dust and ashes. Peradventure there shall lack
five of the fifty righteous. Wilt thou destroy all the city
for lack of five? And he said, If I find there
forty and five, I will not destroy it. And he spake yet unto him,
and he spake unto him yet again, and said, Peradventure there
shall be forty found there. And he said, I will not do it
for forty's sake. And he said unto him, O let not
the Lord be angry, and I will speak. Peradventure there shall
thirty be found there. And he said, I will not do it
if I find thirty there. And he said, behold, now I have
taken upon me to speak unto the Lord. Peradventure there shall
be twenty found there. And he said, I will not destroy
it for twenty's sake. And he said, O let not the Lord
be angry, and I will speak yet but this once. Peradventure 10
shall be found there. And he said, I will not destroy
it for 10's sake. And the Lord went his way as
soon as he had left communing with Abraham, and Abraham returned
unto his place. This passage opens, the passage
that we have read together, with the Lord honouring the fact and
the privilege of the covenant promise that he had established
with Abraham. And it is something that we should
remember that outside of God's covenant, Men and women and boys
and girls will be judged by God according to what they deserve. But inside that covenant, we
obtain what the Lord is pleased to give in love and mercy. And God remembers His covenant
promises. It is a blessed and beneficial
thing for parents to command their children in the way of
the Lord, to do justice and judgment. And the Lord knew that Abraham
would so command his children. Not ordering them about in some
dominating way, but leading by example and guiding and educating
young people in gospel principles and in spiritual truth. We cannot
make our children believers. but we can bring them under the
truth of God's word and help them to become familiar with
the work of the Lord Jesus Christ. And if you are a young person
listening to this today, if you're a boy or a girl, you might think
sometimes, why do my mum and dad keep talking about the Bible? Why is it that church is so important
in our family? Why is it that I have got to
do things that my friends don't have to do? Well listen, it is
because your mum and your dad because your grandparents care
for you and care for your souls and care for your lives and care
for your spiritual well-being. That is why they command their
children in the way of the Lord. And we should be very grateful
that we have those who love us and pray for us in such ways
as that. This is a very interesting conversation
that we have before us here. The people of Sodom and Gomorrah,
we might assume the five cities of the plain, they knew nothing
here about this man Abraham. praying with God for them, asking
God to be merciful to them for the sake of any righteous people
who might be found in those cities and amongst the wicked inhabitants
of Sodom and the cities of the plain. I wonder if you noticed
with me that wickedness cries out to God for judgment. Did you notice that? People think
that they can do wickedly, they can do evil things and nobody
knows about it. We try to hide the evil things
that we do. Do it in darkness, do it in quietness,
do it in secret, do it in private. But wickedness cries to God and
even if God didn't have an all-seeing eye, his all-hearing ear would
hear that wickedness shouting out to him that I deserve judgment. You know there are terrible things
done in this world, terrible things happen in this world.
Atrocities, shameful things, wicked things. But there is nothing
that happens in this world that God doesn't know about and that
God will not judge. And he will either judge it upon
the souls of its perpetrators or he will judge it upon the
soul of the Lord Jesus Christ. The Lord Jesus Christ is that
judge of all the earth who does right and nothing escapes his
notice. Abraham intercedes for Sodom
and the cities of the plain and he speaks about the numbers that
might be found there and he speaks about 50 and 45 and 40 and 30
and 20 and 10 and it goes down and down and down and Abraham
is seeking for the deliverance of these people. It's a lovely
thing that Abraham does, asking for the preserving of the wicked
for the sake of the just, that yet there might be time given
before the judgment of God falls upon the wicked. We have the
privilege of praying for our friends and for our neighbours,
for our towns and for our communities, that they might be benefited
and blessed because there is the presence of the Lord's people
amongst them, because the gospel is yet being preached in this
day to our towns and our cities and our communities and to our
neighbours and our families. Abraham was likely thinking about
Lot and his family. He asks for mercy. that perhaps
even for the sake of 10 people, 10 righteous souls, mercy will
be bestowed upon these cities. And what Abraham was doing was
interceding. And that's what we call this
kind of prayer, a prayer of intercession, to come before the Lord on behalf
of someone else and ask for help and ask for mercy. Another word
that might be used for that is to advocate, to speak for someone
else. And of course, that is a picture.
Abraham was a type here of the Lord Jesus Christ, who is our
great advocate and our great intercessor. That the Lord Jesus
Christ goes before his father on behalf of his people and he
prays for us. There's a lovely little verse
in Isaiah chapter 53 which says that he bear the sin of many. That's the substitutionary role
of the Lord Jesus Christ. He bear the sin of many and he
made intercession for the transgressors. That speaks of the Lord Jesus
Christ as our mediator between God and man. that we might have
access into the presence of God because of Christ's blood and
his intercession on our behalf. Abraham, we learn, was unsuccessful
in his intercession because not even 10 were found in those cities. Such was the wickedness that
existed there. We'll learn a little bit more
about that in the days to come perhaps. But here's something
lovely that I want to mention in conclusion. In the Gospel,
the Lord Jesus Christ is a successful intercessor because he himself
was found to be righteous for his people. He took our sin,
the righteous one took our sin and he carried it away, thereby
securing our deliverance and deliverance for all for whom
he stood as substitute, bearing their sins and as intercessor
on our behalf. That speaks a little bit of the
priestly office of the Lord Jesus Christ. Remember we speak of
him as prophet, priest and king. This is his priestly office and
the Lord Jesus Christ encourages poor sinners like us to come
to him in repentance and in faith. because he ever liveth to make
intercession for them. them that come to him, and is
able to save to the uttermost all who come to God by him. What a wonderful saviour we have. Let us take him at his word. Let us come to God by him, for
he is able to save us, whomsoever we are. and he ever liveth to
maketh intercession for us. May the Lord bless these thoughts
to us and encourage