Psalms chapter 91 and Genesis
chapter 19. Psalms chapter 91 beginning in
verse 5. Thou shalt not be afraid for
the terror by night, nor for the arrow that flyeth by day.
nor for the pestilence that walketh in darkness, nor for the destruction
that wasteth at noonday. A thousand shall fall at thy
side, and ten thousand at thy right hand, but it shall not
come nigh thee. Only with thine eyes shalt thou
behold and see the reward of the wicked, because thou hast
made the Lord, which is my refuge, even the Most High, thy habitation,
thy dwelling place, thy house. In Genesis chapter 19 and verse 27. Genesis chapter 19
and verse 27. And Abraham got up early in the
morning to the place where he stood before the Lord, and he
looked towards Sodom and Gomorrah and towards all the land of the
plain, and beheld, and lo, the smoke of the country went up
as the smoke of a great furnace. 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 the which Lot dwelt." You remember the context, the
destruction of Sodom and Gomorrah. In chapter 18, The Lord had come
with these two angels and had visited Abraham's house. The
Lord and these two angels had taken unto themselves the form
of humanity, put on flesh, robed themselves in our likeness for
a few hours. And the Lord in chapter 18, when
He visited Abraham, He revealed two things to Abraham. He told
him two things. One was that Abraham and Sarah
would have a son. They'd have a son Isaac. The
Lord would visit them and they'd have a son. And of course this
was fulfilled in the 21st chapter of this book of Genesis. But
then the Lord revealed something else to Abraham concerning the
cities of Sodom and Gomorrah. that the cry of their sins had
come up before the Lord, and that cry was very grievous. And
the Lord told Abraham, He said, I'm going down to examine, and
if it's according to as I've heard, then I'll deal with him
accordingly. And He said it like this, He
was thinking in His heart what He was going to do, He said there
in the 18th chapter in verse 17, he said, Shall I hide this
thing from Abraham, which I do? In other words, he was saying,
Shall I hide my wrath against sin? Can I hide the anger from
Abraham that I feel towards the wickedness of Sodom and Gomorrah? So he makes known to Abraham
And when I say he makes known to Abraham, he makes known to
Abraham's heart. He impresses upon Abraham's heart
the destruction that is pending upon these cities of Sodom and
Gomorrah. And we know it went home to Abraham's
heart when the Lord revealed this to him. When he said, Abraham,
I'm going down to examine. I'm going down to investigate
to see if this sin is as grievous as it's reported to me. And if
it is. And if it is. And Abraham, we
know this went home to his heart because immediately the Scripture
says upon hearing this news that Abraham drew near unto the Lord
and began to plead with Him. And he said, will thou destroy
the righteous with the wicked? And the remainder of chapter
18 is made up of that prayer of Abraham pleading with the
Lord for the cities, for the inhabitants of Sodom and Gomorrah
and the cities of these plains. And the judgment that was coming
was described by Abraham in this way. Will thou destroy? Will thou destroy? He felt this
in his soul, and this is the words he used to describe the
judgment that was coming. Abraham had just witnessed the
exceeding grace of God. The Lord had just spoken to him
and said, Abraham, you and Sarah will have this child. Isaac shall
be his name. And out of him all the nations
of the earth will be blessed. The Messiah is coming out of
your son." Oh, what grace was revealed to Abraham. Abraham
knew that Christ must come, and he knew he must come through
his loins. And here the Lord graciously
revealed, I promise you, you'll have a son. But now Abraham was
made to know And he was reminded of something else, and that was
the Lord's severity upon the children of disobedience. The
goodness of the Lord and the severity of the Lord. And it's
because Abraham knew this that it prompted him to approach unto
the Lord and begin to plead for these cities. And then we're
told, In chapter 18 and chapter 19, that same day when the Lord
had revealed this to Abraham, these two angels went down to
Sodom. Lot was sitting there in the
gate and he greeted these two angels and he took them into
his house and prepared them a meal. And these wicked men can pass
the house about to do violence to these two angels. And these
angels smote him with blindness. And then in the 19th chapter,
in verse 12 and verse 13, the angels revealed to Lot the same
thing that the Lord had revealed to Abraham. Look at it here in
chapter 19 and verse 12. And the man, that is the angels,
said unto Lot, Hast thou heard any besides? Son-in-law, and
thy sons, and thy daughters, and whatsoever thou hast in the
city, bring them out of this place, for we will destroy this
place, because the cry of them is waxing great before the face
of the Lord, and the Lord hath sent us to destroy this place."
And this revelation from these angels went home to Lot's heart
just as it did to Abraham's heart when the Lord made it known unto
him. We know that's so because look
in verse 14, And Lot went out and spake unto his sons-in-law,
which married his daughters, and said, Up, get you out of
this place, for the Lord will destroy this city. But he seemed
to them as one that had malked. So everybody is using the same
word to describe the severity of this judgment. Total ruin. The Lord says, I'm going to destroy
it. Abraham pleaded with Him not
to destroy it. And now the angels said, the
Lord will destroy this city. Lot goes and pleads with his
sons-in-law that the Lord will destroy this city, to flee from
it. And in these two men, in Abraham
and Lot, You and I see the attitude of every child of God. Every child of God has felt something
of the terror of the Lord in his own conscience. And it's
been that terror that has caused him to flee to the Lord Jesus
Christ with the promise of salvation and the promise of peace. But
it's not long that he finds himself burdened for his friends, burdened
for his family, burdened for his neighbors, and he begins
to request of the Lord mercy for them also. And one of the
things that prompts him to pray is just this, it's the terror
that he feels in his own soul for them. He's felt it himself,
and now he feels it for them. So every child of God, no sooner
is it that the Lord gives him rest from his own burden of sin,
than he begins to plead with the Lord for others. O Lord,
spare them. O Lord, don't destroy them. But often the poor child of God
feels that he cannot express in word what he feels in his
soul. Paul says, I have continual sorrow
and heaviness in my heart, but this sorrow is so heavy, it's
so continual, that the only way sometimes a poor child of God
can express it is with groans and with tears. Don't you feel
this to be so sometimes? Oh, if the children of disobedience
could feel in their souls one half what the child of God feels
for them. If they felt in their own conscience
one half of the terror of the Lord that the children of God
fear for them, they would not sleep as easily as they do in
their sins. They would flee for mercy from
their awful doom, and mercy's door would be opened to multitudes
that are now sleeping while heaven decides their fate. Oh, how heavy
Abraham's soul was as he pleaded to the Lord for these people. Will thou destroy? Will thou
not spare? And in Lot we see the child of
God as he seeks to warn others to do what he himself had been
instructed to do. What do these angels warn Lot
to do? Flee from the wrath to come.
Flee from the wrath lest you yourself be consumed in the iniquity
of the city. And what does Lot do? He goes
out to warn others of what he himself feels in his own soul. Oh, but poor Lot, he's not able
to express what he feels for these people. He has this heaviness,
he has this sorrow, he has a sense of the Lord's terror and the
judgment of God upon this place, but when he opens his mouth to
speak, he finds his words are few and insufficient. Did you
ever feel that way? Did you ever feel the terror
of the Lord against your neighbors, against your friends, against
your family? And you go to them and you have
this desire to warn them, but when you open your mouth to speak,
it seems like the words that you speak are just so insignificant
to what you feel. Oh, Lord, thanks to Himself,
if I could speak to these people as those angels spoke to me,
If I could alarm their conscience as my own conscience was alarmed,
oh, that I had a heart, that I had words, that I had ability
to speak and persuade men to flee from the wrath to come. Oh, but he can only utter a few
words. He says, get you out of this
place, for the Lord will destroy this city. And that's all he
could say. That's all he could say. And when these men mocked him,
paid no mind to him, we see in him no doubt what we see in our
own selves. When we've spoken to others and
sought to warn them of the judgment of God that's upon them and that's
coming, And yet if they pay no mind to us, sometime we're apt
to blame ourselves. Oh, it's my fault. I don't have
sufficient words. I don't have the ability. I don't
have the mind, the knowledge, and the desire to speak to persuade
these people as I should have. Brothers and sisters, can you
relate to this? when you fail to persuade others
to flee to the Lord Jesus from the wrath to come, and yet they
pay no mind to you? And sometimes the poor child
of God is so discouraged with his perceived inability that
he's ready to stand back and be silent and mourn no more. I tell you, it's not easy to
bear this burden for the lost, is it? It is not easy to live
in this world and carry this continuous sorrow and heaviness
in your heart towards this lost world. It is difficult for us
to face our fellow man every day with this terror that we
feel for them and their present state. There are times when we become
weary. And our weariness is usually caused by these things that we're
talking about this morning. We grow weary of carrying this
continuous sorrow. We grow weary of thinking every
day that I am facing that man and he's walking on thin ice.
I am talking with this friend and with this neighbor while
the judgment of God rests upon him. And it's difficult to continually
bear the thoughts of such a thing. We're apt to grow weary with
it. We're apt to grow weary because of our felt inability. We cannot
effectively speak as we should. Oh, we pray for utterance. Lord,
give me some words to speak to warn these people of the wrath
to come. And yet how little we are able
to say. So few words. So few words. Lot spake so few words. Get you
out of this city. Oh, and I wonder sometimes if
he hadn't thought in himself after destruction had come. Oh,
why didn't I say more? Why didn't I think of more words
to say? And then we grow weary sometimes
because of the unwillingness of the lost to take our warnings
to heart. How many we warn, but how few
take heed, and we're apt to grow weary. I think that you and I, for our
own encouragement, for our own renewed effort and determination,
we need to come right here to my text this morning and stand
where Abraham stood and look just a minute through Abraham's
eyes. He got up early in the morning
to the place where he stood before the Lord. The day before he had
stood here and pleaded for these cities. And now he comes back
to this high hill, and he overlooks Sodom and Gomorrah, and towards
all the land of the plains, and beheld, and lo, the smoke of
that country went up as the smoke of a great furnace." Did Abraham's
pleading for these cities deliver them? No, it didn't. It didn't. Did Lot go in and seek to warn
these people? Were they taking heed and fleeing
from the wrath to come? No, they did not. But Abraham's
pleading and Lot's warnings were justified. They were justified. When you and I feel we don't
have the heart to plead to this lost world, and we don't have
the ability to plead with them, And we've become dumb with silence.
Then go stand here where Abraham stood. The next time, brothers and sisters,
we're tempted, as we often are, I'll remain silent. I'll warn
people no more. I'll testify to people no more.
My testimony has been rejected. I'll keep silent. The next time
we're tempted to do that, then let us come here and stand where
Abraham stood. and smell this sufferest fumes,
and see the sky blackened with this smoke, and see these cities
reduced to heaps of ashes. These cities that before, just
the day before, you could hear children playing in the streets.
Just the day before this, the economy was strong, food was
plenteous, idle time was abundant, and sinful pleasures reigned.
And you could hear the laughter and the music, feel the night
air, and countless thousands of faultless sinners occupied
these cities. But now, stand where Abraham
stands. See what Abraham sees. There's
not a person that can be seen. There's not a building that's
not been reduced to ashes. There's not an animal spared. There was sheer and certain and
total destruction. These cities were reduced to
ashes. Not even to this very day has
a trace of any of these cities ever been found. That's what
Abraham seen. You and I will remain willing
to carry the burden and to speak the truth to our poor, perishing
fellow man, then we mustn't consider their present happiness and security,
for these things are only perceived by them. Oh, just before, just
the day before, These cities seem to be so happy. Their inhabitants
seem to be so secure. But they were neither happy nor
secure. And brothers and sisters, when
you and I look upon our neighbors, when we look upon our family
and our friends and our co-workers who are lost, they may think
themselves to be happy and they may think themselves to be secure,
but they're neither happy nor secure. A man will never be happy
until he's reconciled to his Creator. And a man will never
be secure until he finds himself in the person of the Lord and
Savior, Jesus Christ. Paul says it like this in 2 Corinthians
chapter 5. He said, We labor. We labor. We who know the Lord, we labor
that where the present with the Lord are absent from Him. We may be accepted of Him. We want to be accepted. I don't
want to be rejected. You don't want to be rejected.
We don't want our worship to be rejected. We want our prayers
to be accepted. Our service to be accepted. of
the Lord. Paul said we labor. We labor
in faith and we labor in love. And he says this, for we must
all appear before the judgment seat of Christ. without any exception,
without any distinction, we must all one day soon stand before
the Lord of glory that we may give account of the things that
we've done in this body according to that which we've done, whether
it be good or whether it be evil. Therefore, he said, since all
of this is true, Knowing the terror of the Lord, we persuade
men. We don't look at man's present
circumstances, what he perceives himself to be in his carnal security,
but we go to the end of it all. We stand before the Lord in the
judgment, and we know that our friends must soon stand there
and give account of the Lord who knows the hearts of all men.
And we know in that day will be manifest the terror of the
Lord, as well as the goodness of the Lord. Therefore, we seek
to persuade men. John says it like this. He said,
I saw a great white throne. and him that sat on it from whose
face the heavens and the earth fled away." And he said, the
dead, small and great, stood before God. And the sea delivered
up the dead that was in them, and they all stood before the
Lord. And the books were open. The
books of the law were open. And the books of men's works
and their deeds were opened. And the books of conscience was
opened. And all those people gave account
of what they had done to the Lord. And when death and hell
delivered up the dead, everyone who was not found written in
the book of life was cast into the lake of fire and brimstone. There is where you and I should
go stand. Abraham was there when the judgment fell. That's what
he saw. And you and I could go to the
Word of God and by faith stand there where the unrighteous shall
soon stand. And if you and I would not grow
discouraged and slothful in our prayers for the lost, and are
witnessing to the lost here in this world, in this life, then
let us remember that this world and this life as we know it is
soon coming to an end. And it's at this end the severity
of God will be manifested towards the children of disobedience. When you and I feel a tendency
to forget the severity of God, And when we have to listen to
this sentimental world speaking about a love of God and a goodness
of God, as though the love of God and the goodness of God had
eliminated the holiness of God and the justice of God, and when
you and I are tempted to forget and compromise and to diminish
the severity of God, then there's another place we can go to. There's
another place we can go to when we're tempted not to confront
this world with the severity of God, knowing how this world
feels about it, when we're tempted to be silent and to say nothing
about the coming wrath of God. And here's another place we can
go to. Go outside the walls of the city
of Jerusalem. Go to Mount Calvary. We don't
have to go and see the sky blackened with a smoke as Abraham did.
We don't have to go smell those sulfurous fumes, and we don't
have to go there to the last day of the great judgment and
see heaven and earth flee away from the face of Him that sits
on the throne. But go yonder to Calvary, brothers
and sisters. and see the darkness as it comes
over this earth, and listen to the Son of God Himself as He
hangs groaning in agony upon that tree. And here hangs a man
who had no sin of his own, but he hanged there pouring out his
soul for the sins of others. Here is the beloved Son of God
who now hangs forsaken of God. Here is the one who did always
those things that pleased heaven, and yet here he hangs, enduring
the wrath of heaven. And as you and I stand there
and gaze upon him, we should ask ourselves this one question. What must the severity of God
be that it takes the blood of this holy man to deliver us from
it? How severe is the judgment of
God? How severe is the wrath of God? How severe is the anger of God
upon sin? Here hang a man, enduring that
judgment, enduring that wrath, being delivered up to save men
from it. That's what it takes. When men
are tempted to deny the wrath of God and the holiness of God,
then go yonder to the cross of the Lord Jesus Christ. That's
how holy God is. He spurred not His own Son, but
punished Him even unto death. And if God spurred not His own
Son, He will most certainly, most certainly, doomed the wicked
to hell without any remedy except repentance for the end. What was it that Abraham hoped
to see when he got up early this morning and stood out there on
this high hill overlooking the cities of the plains? Had he hoped to see the beautiful
valleys and the buildings intact? and the cities full of inhabitants
safe and sound? Had that what he hoped to see?
Had Abraham secretly hoped that the threatened doomed had been
averted? And at the last moment the Lord
had relinquished and relented and spared the city? If that's
what he hoped, one glance across those plains, dash those hope
to pieces. For all he saw was ashes. What could Abraham have thought
as he stood here upon this hill and gazed out upon these plains? What had he thought? What would
you have thought? If you could go stand and put
yourself in Abraham's stead, what would you have thought?
standing there beholding the ashes and the smoke bellowing. I think, first of all, this is
what Abraham must have experienced. There may have arisen this conflict
between flesh and spirit. The spirit of Abraham knowing
that this was a just judgment This judgment was right and he
justified God in it. God must deal with the unbeliever. He must punish sin. And he knew
this in his heart of hearts. But then there was that flesh
of Abraham. And I can almost feel that his
flesh begin to question. Why wasn't it your will to save
these people? You could have saved these people.
Our Lord Himself said that He could have saved these people.
He said, O Capernaum, if I had done the mighty works in Sodom
and Gomorrah that I've done in you that remain to this day,
why didn't He do it? Why didn't the Lord save Sodom
and Gomorrah? It wasn't His will. It wasn't
His will. And I can almost feel what Abraham
felt. Lord, you could have if you had
only willed. Those who have never felt the
conflict between flesh and spirit have never had the judgment of
God come close to them. If you're here this morning and
you say, I have no idea what you're talking about, then you've
never witnessed the Spirit of God upon a friend or upon a family
member, upon a child or a mom and dad. Why, Lord? Why? You've spared others. Why would you not spare my friend? You saved others just as bad
as they are. Why wasn't it your will to save
them? I think Abraham thought this
secondly as he stood there upon this high hill. Could I have
done more? Could I have prayed more earnestly
for these people? Could I have pleaded longer?
Could I have witnessed better? Have I been faithful and honest
to the souls of these who have now perished? Did you ever feel
that? I remember not long after the
Lord saved me, I was working with an old gentleman, the hardest
man I ever worked around in my life. And seemingly the more
I tried to witness to him, the harder he got until he died. And I was so afflicted in my
soul that I warned him as often as I should have. Did I instruct
him as I should have. Is his blood in any way upon
my hands? I tell you, there's a lot of
people that never think of this. You know who thinks of such things?
A gracious soul thinks of these things. That person who loves
the Lord and loves his fellow man, he's the man and she's the
woman that examines themselves to think, did I do enough? Did I speak to them in earnest? You think the Pope feels this
way? When a whole line of poor souls lines up to kiss his ring
or to bow before him? Do you think he thinks in his
conscience, will their blood be upon my head? He thinks no
such thing. These TV preachers who preach
their health and wealth gospel and get enriched from it, do
you think they lay awake of the night and worry their souls thinking,
will the blood of these people be upon my hands? They don't
think that. It's you who think this. It's
the gracious souls who are concerned about this. And I imagine as Abraham stood
there and looked out over the plains and felt the awful severity
of God. Can you imagine how he felt?
He experienced the severity of God. City after city. Countless thousands of thoughtless
sinners now gone, burned to ashes, and he's here witnessing the
result of it. Can you imagine how he felt?
And I know that he must have felt this, because we often feel
it in ourselves. I'm no better than they are in
and of myself. The severity that's come upon
them, I deserve to suffer it myself. He looks down upon these
dust and ashes, and he had already acknowledged to himself, to the
Lord, that's all I have, dust and ashes. Oh, Abraham thought to himself,
as you and I often think, if the Lord had not called me, if
the Lord had not saved me from my sin and my rebellion, I'd
have been among them. No thanks to me that I wasn't
destroyed. A truly gracious soul sees in
himself such unworthiness in the light of God's judgment upon
others that he sometimes falls into unbelief himself and sometimes
is tempted to believe that he himself may be subject to the
severity of God. How did Lot feel as he looked
back upon the cities himself? Oh, he thought within himself,
I escaped by the skin of my teeth. Abraham dwelt so close to these
people. He could go look and see with
his physical eyes their destruction. That's how close he was to it. And Lot was so close to it that
he was in the mist when the fire began to fall. And both Lot and Abraham may
have thought to themselves, Oh, I was scarcely saved. I was barely saved. If the righteous
scarcely be saved, and sometimes they are in their own apprehension,
where shall the ungodly and the unrighteous appear? But though
they were so close to the destruction that came upon others, it never
touched them. It never touched them. That's why I read this passage
over here in Psalms chapter 91. A thousand shall fall at thy
side, and ten thousand at thy right hand, but it shall not
come nigh unto thee. Only with thine eyes shalt thou
see it. Thou shalt behold and see the
reward of the wicked, but it shall not come nigh thee. Why? Because thou hast made the Lord,
which is my refuge, even the most high on thy habitation. Brothers and sisters, you who
are in the Lord Jesus Christ this morning, wrath has already
fallen upon Him, and it will never fall upon Him
again. You may apprehend in your own conscience the terror of
the Lord. You may feel it. You may feel it. But I tell you
this morning, if you're in Jesus Christ, He's felt it for you. And though you may feel it in
your own apprehension, you'll never experience it. It'll never
come near to you because you've made Him your habitation. Let's pray.