18:1-15 God comes to Abraham, promises Sarah will have a baby in the year to come. She laughs, God says “why did you laugh” She says she didn’t laugh . . . God says, yep. You did. When the baby was born the next year they called him Laughter=Isaac.
18:16-33 God Tells Abraham he will destroy Sodom & Gomorrah. Abraham asks if God will spare the cities for 50, 40, 30, 20, even 10 righteous. God says He’ll not destroy the city, even if there are only 10 righteous souls there.
19 1-11 God seems to have returned to wherever it is He came from. The two angels go down to Sodom and find Lot at the gate. Lot pressures them to stay with him, though the seem reluctant. When they get home the men of the city, young and old, surround the house and demand to have the two men/angels out so they can abuse them sexually. It doesn’t look like Lot & his family will survive until the angles pull Lot back into the house and strike the men with blindness. The depth of their depravity is clear.
12-16 The angels tell Lot to get any loved ones out of the city. They all hesitate to the point that the angles have to take them by the hand and lead them out.
17-22 Lot doesn’t want to go up to the mountains, so the angles give him permission to move to Zoar.
23 By the time Lot reached Zoar, the sun had risen over the land. 24 Then the LORD rained down burning sulfur on Sodom and Gomorrah—from the LORD out of the heavens. 25 Thus he overthrew those cities and the entire plain, destroying all those living in the cities—and also the vegetation in the land. 26 But Lot’s wife looked back, and she became a pillar of salt.
Why did God destroy Sodom & Gomorrah?
It is pretty clear that it’s because they had given themselves over to homosexuality.
The Bible is clear and unequivocal on the subject.
Paul said
18 The wrath of God is being revealed from heaven against all the godlessness and wickedness of people, who suppress the truth by their wickedness . . . 21 For although they knew God, they neither glorified him as God nor gave thanks to him, but their thinking became futile and their foolish hearts were darkened. . . 24 Therefore God gave them over in the sinful desires of their hearts to sexual impurity for the degrading of their bodies with one another. 25 They exchanged the truth about God for a lie, and worshiped and served created things rather than the Creator—who is forever praised. Amen.
26 Because of this, God gave them over to shameful lusts. Even their women exchanged natural sexual relations for unnatural ones. 27 In the same way the men also abandoned natural relations with women and were inflamed with lust for one another. Men committed shameful acts with other men, and received in themselves the due penalty for their error.
28 Furthermore, just as they did not think it worthwhile to retain the knowledge of God, so God gave them over to a depraved mind, so that they do what ought not to be done. 29 They have become filled with every kind of wickedness, evil, greed and depravity. They are full of envy, murder, strife, deceit and malice. They are gossips, 30 slanderers, God-haters, insolent, arrogant and boastful; they invent ways of doing evil; they disobey their parents; 31 they have no understanding, no fidelity, no love, no mercy. 32 Although they know God’s righteous decree that those who do such things deserve death, they not only continue to do these very things but also approve of those who practice them.
Jesus said
18 But the things that come out of the mouth come from the heart, and these make a man ‘unclean.’ 19 For out of the heart come evil thoughts, murder, adultery, sexual immorality, theft, false testimony, slander.
Homosexuality in the Culture of Biblical Times
Was VERY common
For the Greeks, a man of means was expected to have a wife to have legitimate children with, and a concubine to have sex with. But a male sexual “friendship” was thought of by the Greeks as a more noble kind of intimacy than normal, male-female relations.
Ravi Zacharias [SLIDE 16] (BEGIN AT 1 MINUTE, STOP AT 4:51
--Ravi Zacharias answers a question “Can an sincere, honest Christian live as a practicing homosexual”. His answer is that there are standards for any group, and higher standards for leaders within that group. For Christians, part of what is expected is that we not indulge our fleshly proclivities. He says any healthy married man endures temptation on a daily basis to betray his marriage vows. He is expected to rise above those temptations and live a godly, faithful life.
I may have a proclivity towards murder (I don’t, just in case you’re wondering. This is just an illustrative example). But if I kill a member of the congregation every Sunday, very soon no one will be coming to my church. In fact, someone may want to incarcerate me. Any enlightened society would quickly put an end to such behavior.
But we would not want to live in a society that encouraged people to live according to such proclivities. As Laura Hollis expressed:
“. . . a society with libertarian leanings is one where some unpopular behaviors are lawful. But there is a world of difference between something being "legal" and its being moral or admirable or even just sensible. A libertarian society has room for criticism of otherwise legal decisions or choices. Pastors, priests and ministers in particular are religious leaders, not lawyers. They do not call their flocks to avoid illegality; their mission is advising followers to do what is moral. They call people to a higher standard.
And there's the rub. Few of us want to be told that we ought not do that which we wish to do.
Nor is this exclusively about homosexuality or transsexuality. In fact, there are far more heterosexual behaviors that run counter to the tenets of the Christian faith, notwithstanding their legality. Divorce is legal. So are cohabitation, contraception, premarital sex and having children outside of marriage. Even adultery has been decriminalized in many states. Christian (and other religious) leaders routinely preach against these -- as well as gambling and drinking, and the use of drugs.
“We all have friends and loved ones who have divorced. There are times when divorce is the best of bad options. That doesn't make it great. Many of us also know and love people who have cheated on their spouses or left them for lovers. Does this mean adultery is something to be aspired to? Ditto for having children out of wedlock. One can love and care for the moms and children without proclaiming that unwed mothers and fatherless children is the best that we can do.
And then there is abortion. It's been legal for 41 years. Yet Elle magazine published an article in which Planned Parenthood president Cecile Richard discussed her abortion, as part of the "1 in 3" campaign intended to "end the silence that fuels abortion stigma." It isn't women's silence about abortion that creates the stigma; it is the knowledge that there is something deeply violating about a mother taking her child's life. Let the PR campaigns abound; there will always be a stigma to the decision to end your child's life. I don't think we want to contemplate life in a society where there is no such thing.”
By Laura Hollis Published Oct. 23, 2014 http://www.jewishworldreview.com
According to Laura Hollis there will always be a stigma to the decision to end your child’s life.
There should also always be a stigma to the decision to live an openly homosexual lifestyle.
There are many reasons this should be the case:
1. Society simply cannot survive if a large portion of society abandons normal sex and, therefore, stops making babies. This should not require much explanation.
2. The homosexual lifestyle is by its nature unhealthy, with the vast majority having more than one form of venereal disease and a much greater risk of AIDS and other deadly diseases. The life expectancy for a male homosexual is less than 50 years. My life expectancy is more than 90 years.
3. Many adult homosexuals tend to prey on younger, developing recruits. This must be discouraged.
4. The nature of a life lived to indulge the natural, undirected drives for pleasure is a life not worth living
(This is not close to an exhaustive list, it is only a sample of the kind of thinking any sensible person should have the capacity to exercise and express in a free society.)
And, above all else, this is a sin which is an abomination to God. That should be enough motivation to avoid it. God hates sin BECAUSE He loves us. He knows the destructive nature of the sins He restricts.
God hates the devastation of divorce. He hates the dissipation of promiscuity. He hates the destruction of drunkenness. He hates the dissolution of homosexuality.
Does this mean if you have experienced homosexual desires or encounters that you are cut off from God? May it never be.
Yet such tendencies, like all other weaknesses of the flesh, can either drive us away from God in shame, or drive us towards God, so that we can abide in His strength.
As God said to Paul “my grace is sufficient for you, for my power is made perfect through weakness”.
When Jesus responded to the woman caught in adultery we see the difference between the Old Testament response to this kind of sin and Jesus' response. Jesus saved the woman and then told her He didn't condemn her. He also told her not to sin any more.
In the twenty first century we have the same responsibility to save and not condemn, and, also, to say "sin no more". We must be willing to do this in a society that seems to either be on the side of virulent hatred or perverse celebration. Neither response is a reflection of Jesus' nature. He is loving. He is also holy. We, therefore, must be loving, and we must be holy.
Whatever secret (or openly expressed) weakness torments your soul this morning, Jesus wants to meet you where you are, and bring healing, restoration, strength, wisdom, truth, and power.
