Text: Genesis 13:10-13
Theme: Fall of a Community
Introduction: Greetings in the name of our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ. The Lord is good; His love endures forever. Our monthly theme is, Take heed, lest you fall. The Topic for this Sunday is, Fall of a Community.
Bible has several examples of fallen Nations, communities. They have earned the displeasure of God and the judgment of God upon their heads. These things had happened due to their corporate sin, it spreads from an individual or King.
Three lessons we can learn from the text based on Genesis 13:10-13:
1. Sodom and Gomorrah were wealthy cities
2. Sodom and Gomorrah were wicked cities
3. Sodom and Gomorra were wrecked cities
13:10 a -12 Sodom and Gomorrah were Wealthy Cities
We read in Genesis 13:10: “Lot looked around, and he noticed the grassy plains in the Jordan Valley looked well-watered and fertile, just as he imagined the Eternal One’s gardens might be or as he knew the land of Egypt in the direction of Zoar to be. This all happened before the Eternal destroyed Sodom and Gomorrah (The Voice Translation). Three keywords are notable: Well-watered, Garden of Eden, and Land of Egypt.
Sodom looked like the Garden of God or the Garden of Eden. The word paradise is neither Hebrew nor Greek. The root word comes from Aramaic to refer to the meaning for fruitful and well-watered. The Hebrew word associated with Paradise, it refers to pleasure. The Arabic and Persian words signify a garden, a vineyard, and the place of the blessed. Peters Pett Commentary: The word ‘gan’ signifies a protected place of fruitfulness, which means garden with a ground. The Hebrew word gan, renders garden, and paradise signifies a fenced or enclosed garden. The Garden of Eden was not a cultivated, enwalled garden, but a fruitful, tree-covered area of land set apart by God for man’s use. It pleased God to provide for man, when he formed him, a proper place of reception, a garden.
As we learned the concept Eden signifies delight and pleasure. It was adorned with every tree pleasant to the sight and enriched with every tree that yielded fruit grateful to the taste and good for food (Genesis 4:16; Amos 1:5). So the cities of Zoar and such other places, probably received their name from their fertility, pleasant situation, etc. Egypt refers to wealth, popularity, safety, property, horses and establishments, wrong decisions. But Moses preferred to suffer rather than enjoy the pleasures of Egypt.
Here, we read that Lot separated from Abraham as a bachelor and chose a partner from Sodom and quickly regretted but could not come out of it, because of his wedding band. He saw only the greeneries, luxuries, and various attractions (Barnes). Lot chose an excellent future from a worldly point of view but ruined his spiritual interest with worldly advantage (Jameison – Fausset). We have many signboards on roads to know the curves and warnings signs to be cautious about our speed on the road, likewise, we have signboards in our life journey. Lot did not see the future destiny only God knows. Decisions based on monetary benefits lead to destruction.
Proverbs 14:12-14 says that there is a way appears to be right, but in the end, it leads to death, even in laughter the heart may be in pain and the end of joy may be grief (Proverbs 16:25). The "prima facie"--on its face--at first appearance-at first view appears right and pleasant. Without looking at the other side, it is to be assumed as true. It does call for further honest and thorough investigation notwithstanding all this appearance of being right. The mind is very willing to satisfy itself with mere seeming.
Matthew Henry: Those who are guided and governed by the lust of the flesh, the lust of the eye, and the pride of life cannot expect God's presence and blessing in their choice of relations in marriage and friends, callings or vocations, dwellings, housings, and settlements. These self-deceived men have no heart in their worship of God. Their souls are not all liquid, flowing out in praise, and full of love and heaven. There is none of the spirit of heaven in their hearts. Yet they think they mean to do right and to do their duty. It seems so to them. How often we rush in our choices. We do not have time to wait for the Lord and his counsel (Psalm 32:8).
The realities are no delights can be satisfying to the soul except those which God himself has provided and appointed. If not wherever it is, it has all desirable conveniences, without any inconvenience though no other house or garden on earth ever was so. Our pleasure comes from God through the Word of God and the anointing of God. Psalms are full of sweetness and pleasures of God for our souls and minds. Garden of Eden for us, is God’s fenced, planned, provided blessing in our lives. We need to till it, dress it to enjoy the pleasure through what God has blessed with.
Psalm 1, explicitly convey this great message. Those who delight in the Lord and His word are like a garden planted by streams of water and yields its fruit in season and whose leaf does not wither, and he does prosper (Psalm 1:2-3).
Dear brothers and sisters, are you caught in any Sodom and Gomorrah? The pleasures of this world are passing clouds. Nothing is permanent except your Salvation and eternal life in Christ. Every green grass will wither and dry one day. Every peak will show you the valley beyond. Christ is our Solid Rock. We hope in God and his providence and protection. Wealth belongs to none but God, wealth in our hands leads to snare and leads to wickedness if God is absent.
13:13 Sodom and Gomorrah were Wicked Cities
What a great contrast, we read in the following verses after introducing the beauties of the cities of Zoar, of Pentapolis. “Now the men of Sodom were wicked and were sinning greatly against the Lord” (Genesis 13:13). Isaiah 3:9 says, the sin of Sodom was nakedness and their faces showed it. The gross sin is always referred to as Sodom and Gomorrah. Their vines were vines of sins and filled with poisons (Deuteronomy 32:32). The beautiful cities became filthy, shameful cities, and wicked cities.
Sin means missing the mark or aim. Exceedingly wicked means persons who broke the established order of things, destroyed and confounded the distinctions between right and wrong, and who afflicted and tormented both themselves and others. Every affection and passion depraved and out of order, a person seeks for happiness where it never can be found. He seeks worldly honors and possessions, and sensual gratifications. The end of which are a disappointment, affliction, vexation, and ruin (Adam Clark).
Benson: Sodomites were impudent and daring sinners, who despised and openly defied God. How true it is to remember the prayers of Agur. He had two petitions, neither to become rich nor poor but to have a steady life(Proverbs 30:8-9). Gill quotes from the Targum of Jonathan reckons up many of their sins, as defrauding of one another in their substance, sinning in their bodies, incest, unclean copulation, shedding of innocent blood, worshipping of idols, and rebelling against the name of the Lord (Isaiah 3:9).
Haggadic traditions in the Oral Torah open wide the possibilities in inhospitality, greed, theft, deception, disregard of the poor and the orphan, and inhumanity, the pinnacle of Sodom’s depravity is mercilessness (Samuel D. Giere, Professor of Homiletics).
Lot knew the sins of Sodom, Gomorrah, and neighboring cities. However, his desire prevail in the purpose and plan of God. Lot, so consciously made this evil choice, to take up his abode among high wicked men. He made this choice for the pleasing prospect of convenience for his cattle, and of enriching himself. Alas! such a step soon turned into a great deal of grief, trouble, and vexation to him. Lot looked for grass for cattle, Abram looked for grace for Children. Life is the sum of all your decisions. Your vantage points may turn into disadvantage your views are limited views, maybe deceived (Proverbs 3:5-6). Jude says in verse 11: Woe to them! They have taken the way of Cain; they have rushed for profit into Balaam’s error; they have been destroyed in Korah’s rebellion. Whoever pursues righteousness and kindness will find life and honor (Proverbs 21:21).
Lot saw Paradise afar off, but in reality, he ended up in Hell. How often we see many Green things afar off and going closer understand the dryness and emptiness. The hypocrites' lives of wicked are as contagious as the most dreadful plague that infects the air. It is more contagious than Coronavirus. People of our generation use a word known as Viral, media viral.
Dear friends, check where you stand. Take heed lest you fall. Please read Genesis 6:5—8: The whole world was indulging in great wickedness. Every inclination of the thoughts of men’s hearts was only evil all the time. The Lord grieved for creating humankind. What about you and me? But Noah found favor in the eyes of the Lord. Lord grieved for making Saul as King but David became a man after God’s own heart (1 Samuel 15:11, 26; 13:14). We cannot justify the unjust acts because the world says so. Jesus taught us to say YES as YES and NO as NO means plain truth. King of Sodom, Gomorrah, Admah, Zeboim, and Bela had acquaintance with Abraham but never learned the habits of him. They continued in wickedness.
13:10. b Sodom and Gomorrah had Wrecked Cities.
The outcry against Sodom and Gomorrah is so great and their sin so grievous (Genesis 18:20). The issues at hand are more than just broken sexuality and violence. God heard particularly the cry of the poor among them, whom they suffered to starve. Other sins have enlisted in Ezekiel 16:49: Now this was the sin of your sister Sodom: She and her daughters were arrogant, overfed and unconcerned; they did not help the poor and needy though there was the fullness of bread in the midst of them (Read: Ezekiel 16:49-50).
Jewish Rabbis say, they appointed false judges, who oppressed all strangers that came to Sodom, and made a law that whoever relieved a poor person should be burnt alive with fire: their sins were many and great and openly and impudently committed. The cry of which came into the ears of the Lord of hosts and called for vengeance. Those two cities, which perhaps were the greatest and the most remarkable for their sins, are put for all the five cities of the plain, called Pentapolis.
Lot made a Worldly choice and took the wrong decision because he fought with righteous man Abraham and departed from the blessed man of God. Lot lost fellowship, spiritual advice, and needed strength to overcome the evil. He associated with evil men of Sodom and Gomorrah (Genesis 19:1). Lot sat at the city gate. City gate refers to the Court of Justice. He became the city council member, board member. He became a compromised leader. He lived with a double standard life. He offered prayers for wickedness and identified with them.
Lot was a righteous and godly man. He was distressed by the filthy lives of lawless men. He was tormented day after day in his righteous soul for the lawless deeds he saw and heard (2 Peter 2:7-8). He tormented but never came out of it. He prayed, the Lord heard him and came to verify the reality (Genesis 18:20). A lot went with countless blessings, with numerous cattle.
His wrong choice looked very beautiful in the beginning, but soon he lost everything. He lost his Cattle, beautiful wife and children lost their future. Everything collapsed (Genesis 19:24-38). Genesis Chapter 13 depicts Lot as having plenty of wealth equivalent to Abraham, but in Genesis Chapter 19 he became an alienated vagabond with extreme poverty. A wrong step and wrong decision will ruin lives and drag into an end. Lot built his tent on Sand, but he thought he was erecting his tent on Solid ground (Matthew 7:24-27).
Adam Smith writes: The glare of Sodom and Gomorra has flung down in the whole length of Scriptural history. This judgment occurred in Genesis, applied in Deuteronomy, then referred by Amos, Isaiah, Jeremiah, Ezekiel, Zephaniah, and Lamentations. Even our Lord employed more than once to point out judgment. Paul, Peter, Jude make mention of its doom. In revelation, it has referred to as the City of Sin. Jesus mentioned about Sodom and Lot in Luke 17:28-29 as the world will do all things as the days of Lot. People were eating and drinking, buying and selling, planting, and building. But the day Lot left Sodom fire and sulfur rained down from heaven and destroyed them all (Genesis 19:24). How you will be remembered by people as good examples or bad.
It is not the presence of evil, but the absence of a good which brings the long-suffering of God to an end, the Judgment of God on a particular nation. The conversation between God and Abraham refers to this great truth. Abraham bargains as fifty, forty, thirty, twenty, and ten righteous. Unfortunately, the pentapolis haven’t had even one or two righteous.
Historically the destroyed cities of Zoar, Sodom, and Gomorrah had submerged under the circled, shallow waters of the Dead Sea. Later the Mosaic map places the Zoar as the southeast corner of the sea. Archaeological shreds of evidence confirm that the Sodom, Gomorrah, and Zoar had been submerged by the continual rising of the Dead Sea. The Jewish historian Josephus records that the Dead Sea extended as far as Zoar (B.J. IV. Viii. 4). The Christian historian Eusebius confirms the statement and adds that a Roman garrison had stationed there. Jebel Usdum (Mount Sodom), a mountain of Crystalline Salt, 5 miles long, and 300 ft high is so named to identify Sodom. Compromise with the community will wash away everything. Became a monumental city.
Shechemites – The Story of sexual Abuse of Dinah led to the fall of the Ruler Shechem and his community (Genesis 34:1-4, 25). Regarding Amalekites, Lord vowed that he would eradicate them from the face of the earth because of their hindrance to the advancement of the Children of God (Exodus 17:8-16). They were the descendants of Esau (Genesis 36:12, Deuteronomy 25:17-19). 1 Chronicles 4:43 reports that the Lord destroyed Amalekites during the days of King Hezekiah. The armies of Pharaoh had wheeled out in the red sea.
Isaiah 1:9 Sodom and Gomorrah stand for merciless judgment of God. We all survive because of the grace of God and mercy. The glorious cities became gloomy. They were the owners of despondencies and anguishes. Their agonies are inexpressible. The Lord has overthrown those cities, within a moment (Lamentations 4:6). The punishment of the cities which are rejecting the Gospel would be grave and unbearable than Sodom (Mathew 10:15). The nation, community, and city which rejects Gospel and Christ is Sodom. A person who rejects Christ is Sodom (Revelation 11:8).
Conclusion: The fear of God and let others live, and allow them to use freely available and unused resources at their critical moments will bring more blessings to us. Opposing the Will of God out of jealousy and arrogance leads to falling.
So friends, take heed, lest you fall. We have learned throughout history on the rise and fall of many unfaithful communities. Unfaithful leaders create unfaithful communities. Corrupted leaders leave corrupted footsteps. The lack of financial integrity and practice of corruption certainly are the outward signs of an imminent fall of the organizations and denominations. The place for nepotism, casteism, and regionalism are the traps Christians usually caught and dwindled. Dear friends and leaders, take heed, lest you fall.
