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Genesis Chapter
Eighteen
Genesis 18
Chapter Contents
The Lord appears to Abraham. (1-8) Sarah's unbelief
reproved. (9-15) God reveals to Abraham the destruction of Sodom. (16-22)
Abraham's intercession for Sodom. (23-33)
Commentary on Genesis 18:1-8
Abraham was waiting to entertain any weary traveller, for
inns were not to be met with as among us. While Abraham was thus sitting, he
saw three men coming. These were three heavenly beings in human bodies. Some
think they were all created angels; others, that one of them was the Son of
God, the Angel of the covenant. Washing the feet is customary in those hot
climates, where only sandals are worn. We should not be forgetful to entertain
strangers, for thereby some have entertained angels unawares, Hebrews 13:2; nay, the Lord of angels himself;
as we always do, when for his sake we entertain the least of his brethren.
Cheerful and obliging manners in showing kindness, are great ornaments to
piety. Though our condescending Lord vouchsafes not personal visits to us, yet
still by his Spirit he stands at the door and knocks; when we are inclined to
open, he deigns to enter; and by his gracious consolations he provides a rich
feast, of which we partake with him, Revelation 3:20.
Commentary on Genesis 18:9-15
Where is Sarah thy wife? was asked. Note the answer, In
the tent. Just at hand, in her proper place, occupied in her household
concerns. There is nothing got by gadding. Those are most likely to receive
comfort from God and his promises, who are in their proper place, and in the
way of their duty, Luke 2:8. We are slow of heart to believe, and
need line upon line to the same purport. The blessings others have from common
providence, believers have from the Divine promise, which makes them very
sweet, and very sure. The spiritual seed of Abraham owe their life, and joy,
and hope, and all, to the promise. Sarah thinks this too good news to be true;
she laughed, and therefore cannot as yet find in her heart to believe it. Sarah
laughed. We might not have thought there was a difference between Sarah's
laughter and Abraham's, 17; but He who searches the heart, saw that the
one sprung from unbelief, and the other from faith. She denied that she had
laughed. One sin commonly brings in another, and it is not likely we shall
strictly keep to truth, when we question the Divine truth. But whom the Lord
loves he will rebuke, convict, silence, and bring to repentance, and if they
sin before him.
Commentary on Genesis 18:16-22
The two who are supposed to have been created angels went
toward Sodom. The one who is called Jehovah throughout the chapter, continued
with Abraham, and would not hide from him the thing he intended to do. Though
God long forbears with sinners, from which they fancy that the Lord does not
see, and does not regard; yet when the day of his wrath comes, he will look
toward them. The Lord will give Abraham an opportunity to intercede with him,
and shows him the reason of his conduct. Consider, as a very bright part of
Abraham's character and example, that he not only prayed with his family, but
he was very careful to teach and rule them well. Those who expect family
blessings must make conscience of family duty. Abraham did not fill their heads
with matters of doubtful dispute; but he taught them to be serious and devout
in the worship of God, and to be honest in their dealings with all men. Of how
few may such a character be given in our days! How little care is taken by
masters of families to ground those under them in the principles of religion!
Do we watch from sabbath to sabbath whether they go forward or backward?
Commentary on Genesis 18:23-33
Here is the first solemn prayer upon record in the Bible;
and it is a prayer for the sparing of Sodom. Abraham prayed earnestly that
Sodom might be spared, if but a few righteous persons should be found in it.
Come and learn from Abraham what compassion we should feel for sinners, and how
earnestly we should pray for them. We see here that the effectual, fervent
prayer of a righteous man avails much. Abraham, indeed, failed in his request
for the whole place, but Lot was miraculously delivered. Be encouraged then to
expect, by earnest prayer, the blessing of God upon your families, your
friends, your neighbourhood. To this end you must not only pray, but you must
live like Abraham. He knew the Judge of all the earth would do right. He does
not plead that the wicked may be spared for their own sake, or because it would
be severe to destroy them, but for the sake of the righteous who might be found
among them. And righteousness only can be made a plea before God. How then did
Christ make intercession for transgressors? Not by blaming the Divine law, nor
by alleging aught in extenuation or excuse of human guilt; but by pleading HIS
OWN obedience unto death.
── Matthew Henry《Concise Commentary on Genesis》
Genesis 18
Verse 1
[1] And
the LORD appeared unto him in the plains of Mamre: and he sat in the tent door
in the heat of the day;
This appearance of God to Abraham seems to
have had in it more of freedom and familiarity, and less of grandeur and
majesty, than those we have hitherto read of, and therefore more resembles that
great visit which in the fulness of time the Son of God was to make to the
world. He sat in the tent-door in the heat of the day - Not so much to repose
himself, as to seek an opportunity of doing good, by giving entertainment to
strangers.
Verse 2
[2] And he lift up his eyes and looked, and, lo, three men stood by him: and
when he saw them, he ran to meet them from the tent door, and bowed himself
toward the ground,
And lo three men —
These three men were three spiritual heavenly beings, now assuming human
shapes, that they might be visible to Abraham, and conversable with him. Some
think they were all three created angels; others, that one of them was the Son
of God.
He bowed himself towards the ground — Religion doth not destroy but improve good manners, and teaches us to
honour all men.
Verse 9
[9] And
they said unto him, Where is Sarah thy wife? And he said, Behold, in the tent.
Where is Sarah thy wife? — By naming her, they gave intimation to Abraham, that tho' they seemed
strangers, yet they well knew him and his family: by enquiring after her, they
shewed a kind concern for the family of one, whom they found respectful to
them. And by speaking of her, she over-hearing it, they drew her to listen to
what was farther to be said.
Verse 10
[10] And
he said, I will certainly return unto thee according to the time of life; and,
lo, Sarah thy wife shall have a son. And Sarah heard it in the tent door, which
was behind him.
I will certainly return unto thee — And visit thee. God will return to those that bid him welcome.
Verse 12
[12] Therefore Sarah laughed within herself, saying, After I am waxed old shall
I have pleasure, my lord being old also?
Sarah laughed within herself — It was not a laughter of faith, like Abraham's, Genesis 17:17, but a laughter of doubting and
distrust. The great objection which Sarah could not get over was her age. I am
waxed old, and past child-bearing in a course of nature, especially having been
hitherto barren, and which magnifies the difficulty, My lord is old also.
Observe here, That Sarah calls Abraham her lord, and the Holy Ghost takes
notice of it to her honour, and recommends it to the imitation of all Christian
wives, 1 Peter 3:6. Sarah obeyed Abraham calling him
lord, in token of respect and subjection.
Verse 17
[17] And
the LORD said, Shall I hide from Abraham that thing which I do;
Shall I hide from Abraham that thing which I
do — Thus doth God in his councils express himself after
the manner of men, with deliberation. The secret of the Lord is with them that
fear him. Those that by faith live a life of communion with God, cannot but
know more of his mind than other people. They have a better insight into what
is present, and a better foresight of what is to come.
Verse 19
[19] 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.
I know Abraham that he will command his
children, and his household after him —
This is a bright part of Abraham's character. He not only prayed with his
family, but he taught them, as a man of knowledge; nay, he commanded them as a
man in authority, and was prophet and king, as well as priest, in his own
house. And he not only took care of his children, but of his household: his
servants were catechized servants. Masters of families should instruct, and
inspect the manners of all under their roof. And this is given as the reason
why God would make known to him his purpose concerning Sodom; because he was
communicative of his knowledge, and improved it for the benefit of those that
were under his charge.
Verse 21
[21] I
will go down now, and see whether they have done altogether according to the
cry of it, which is come unto me; and if not, I will know.
I will go down now and see — Not as if there were any thing concerning which God is in doubt; but he
is pleased thus to express himself after the manner of men.
Verse 23
[23] And
Abraham drew near, and said, Wilt thou also destroy the righteous with the
wicked?
Abraham drew near —
This expression intimates, A holy concern. A holy confidence; he drew near with
an assurance of faith, drew near as a prince, Job 31:37.
Verse 27
[27] And
Abraham answered and said, Behold now, I have taken upon me to speak unto the
Lord, which am but dust and ashes:
Behold now, I have taken upon me to speak
unto the Lord, who am but dust and ashes - He speaks as one amazed at his own
boldness, and the liberty God graciously allowed him, considering God's
greatness, he is the Lord; and his own meanness, but dust and ashes. Whenever
we draw near to God, it becomes us reverently to acknowledge the vast distance
that there is between us and Him. He is the Lord of glory, we are worms of the
earth.
Verse 30
[30] And
he said unto him, Oh 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.
Oh let not the Lord be angry — The importunity which believers use in their addresses to God is such,
that if they were dealing with a man like themselves, they could not but fear
that he would be angry with them. But he with whom we have to do is God and not
man, and he is pleased when he is wrestled with. But why then did Abraham leave
off asking when he had prevailed so far as to get the place spared if there
were but ten righteous in it? Either, 1. Because he owned that it deserved to
perish if there were not so many: as the dresser of the vineyard, who consented
that the barren tree should be cut down if one year's trial more did not make
it fruitful, Luke 13:9. Or, 2. Because God restrained his
spirit from asking any farther. When God hath determined the ruin of a place,
he forbids it to be prayed for, Jeremiah 7:16.
Verse 33
[33] And
the LORD went his way, as soon as he had left communing with Abraham: and
Abraham returned unto his place.
Abraham returned into his place — To wait what the event would be; and it proved that his prayer was
heard, and yet Sodom not spared, because there were not ten righteous in it.
── John Wesley《Explanatory Notes on
Genesis》
A BLESSING TO ALL NATIONS. (GENESIS 18:17-21.)
Seeing
that Christ is of the “ Seed of Abraham” ( Matt.1:1),
the promise to Abraham is specially fulfilled in Him, for He is the channel of
all blessing.
I
purpose giving an acrostic on the word Blessing, as illustrating how we are a
blessing to others, or the class of people that are a blessing to others.
B. Blessed Ones. “ I have known,” or “ chosen him” (
Genesis 18:19). We cannot possibly be
a blessing without first being blessed. We must receive to give, as when the
disciples received the bread and fish from the hands of Christ, and then gave
them to the multitude. We must know, to make known, as when the apostles had
seen Christ, the Risen One, then they were able to witness of Jesus and the
Resurrection; and those who have met with Christ are able to invite others to
meet with Him, as the woman of Samaria, who invited the Samaritans to come and
see Christ, with whom she had conversed.
L. Living Ones. Abraham was one who was in
touch with the Living God, therefore he had life from Him, even as the branch
of the tree owes its being and well-being to the tree. It is those who have
life from Christ (John 5:24),life in Christ (Romans 8:2).,life with Christ (Gal.2:20),
and Christ as their Life, that are able to “ hold forth the Word of Life” to
others (Phil.2:16), to their Quickening
and blessing (James 1:18), even as exemplified in
Peter on the day of Pentecost, when the Holy Spirit ministered through him.
E. Empowered Ones. In Matthew 28:18-20, we are told that Christ has “ all power” and “therefore”
He bade His disciples to go and make disciples of all nations. All authority is
vested in Christ , therefore He has authority to bid His disciples to act
according to His instructions. His servants only have authority as they are
under His authority. The centurion said he was “ a man under authority,” therefore
he said to one, “ Come,” and he come ,and to another “Go,” and he went (
Matthew 8:9). It was because the
centurion was under authority that he had authority. In like manner, as we are
in the line of the Divine power by obedience to Christ, and as Christ the Power
of God thus lives in us, we have power over others, even as the electric wire
communicates the electricity because of its connection with the dynamo.
S. Sent Ones. The word of the Lord Jesus
to His disciples was “ Go.” When the Lord bids us go on any errand, there
should be prompt and persistent obedience ( John 20:21).
S. Sanctified Ones. The disciples were to
baptize in the name of the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. The spiritual meaning
of baptism into the Father, into His grace and love, to make us loving and
gracious; into the Son, that is, into His life may energize us; and into the
Holy Spirit, that His life may energize us; and into the Holy Spirit, that His
holiness and power may touch every part of our life. The immersion in water was
but an illustration of the deeper truth of immersion into the blessings of the
grace of the Gospel. Therefore it presupposes that those who were sent to
baptize, knew the spiritual meaning and practical outcome of the ordinance they
enjoined upon others.
I .Initiated Ones ( Genesis 18:17-18 ). Those who fear the
Lord are sure to be in the secrets of the Lord ( Psalm 25:14).
The Lord delights to make known His ways to us if we are in touch with Himself,
even as He did to Moses ( Psalm 103:7). It was to Daniel that
God revealed the king’s dream and the interpretation. The wise men of
N. Nothings. Abraham confessed he was “ dust and
ashes” in the sight of the Lord ( Genesis 18:27).
It is easy to say we are “ nothing,” but to know it in reality is to be like
Christ, who “ made Himself of no reputation.” Notice Paul’s growth in grace.
“
Least of the apostles” (1.Cor.15:9).
“
Less than the least of all saints” ( Eph.3:8).
“
Chief of sinners” (1.Tim 1:15),
“
Nothing” ( 2 Cor.12:11).
G. Godly Ones. Those who know the God of blessing, by
walking in fellowship with Him, as Enoch did, shall surely be a blessing from
God to others. To be in touch with the God of Holiness, by union with Himself,
must result in the holiness of God being transmitted in the presence of others,
even as the atmospheres transmits the light. Those who know the God of Love by
acting like Him, have the love of God. When a lady put a number of cakes into
the dirty, ragged frock of a poor shoeless, hatless, hungry lassie, she was so
filled with astonishment that she exclaimed, “ Be you God’s wife , ma’am?” She
knew God loved her, and she therefore thought that the God-like action of the
lady indicated a near relative of His. It is not what we say, but how we serve,
that shows our sanctity.
──
F.E. Marsh《Five Hundred Bible Readings》
ABRAHAM
AND SODOM. (GENESIS
18:22-33)
Ⅰ.
Abraham’s Question relating to
1. Noah and the
Antediluvians. When Noah and his family were safely housed in the ark, then the
flood-gates were opened, and the waters swept away all outside the vessel of
safety ( Gen.7:13, ＆c.).
2.
The firstborn of
3.
4.
The believer and unbeliever. Before the Lord comes in judgment to banish the
unbeliever from His presence, He will have gathered His redeemed to Himself;
hence they are seen coming with Him ( Rev.19:14),
and sitting in judgment as well( Rev.20:4; 1.Cor.6:2,3).
Matthew
Henry says upon Abraham’s question, “ First. The righteous are mingled with the
wicked in this world. Amongst the best there are, commonly, some bad; and among
the worst, some good. Even in
Ⅱ. Abraham’s
Plea regarding
1.
That righteous men are preventative of judgment. “ Ye are the salt of the
earth, ” said Christ to His disciples. The saints are the salt of the earth,
that keep the rest from rotting and putrefying. Many an ungodly man has been
prevented from doing evil in the presence of one who was walking with God. I
well remember a man hiding himself, one Sunday morning, in the bulrushes that
were growing by the river
2.
The law of substitution suggested. Ten righteous men would have been the
salvation of
Ⅲ. Abraham’s
Communion with the Lord about
──
F.E. Marsh《Five Hundred Bible Readings》
GOD’S
JUDGMENT ON SODOM.
Genesis 18:22-33
The Holy
Jehovah, the ministry of angels, the pleading of Abraham, the wrong position of
Lot, the lingering wife of Lot, and filthy Sodom, are brought out in the
following:--
Ⅰ. The Lord answers the prayers of His people on behalf of others. One
of the bright points in Abraham’s life is his pleading on behalf of Sodom. His
prayer is a model one. (1) It was the prayer of a man who was right with the
Lord. Abraham “ stood before the Lord” (verse 22). To stand before the Lord is
to act as in His presence (Lev.24:4), and to be conscious of being right with
Himself (1. Kings 17:1). (2) It was the prayer of a man who was in intimate
communion with the Lord. “ Abraham drew near” (verse 23). We must draw near to
God in the full assurance of faith if we would have His ear (Heb.10:22). (3) It
was a bold prayer. Abraham begins to question the Lord (see verses 23,24,25).
We may come “ boldly” to the throne of grace (Heb.4:16), but we may not come
rudely. (4) It was a humble prayer (verse 27). Cross out the words in
italics—am , but. While he confesses that he is “ dust and ashes,” he is more
than this, for he is an indestructible spirit, therefore to say he is “but dust
and ashes” is not true, though to say he is “ dust and ashes” is to express his
utter abasement of himself. (5) The prayer was persevering. Abraham does not
stop at one answer, but asks again and again. God’s blessings, while they
satisfy, create an appetite, and cause us to ask for more. (6) The prayer was
answered. God gave Abraham all he asked. Abiding in Christ, we have a similar
opportunity, for He says, “ Whatsoever we ask,” ＆c.
(John 14:13; 15:7). (7) The prayer was limited. Young says, “ Ought not six
gracious answers to have strengthened the faith of the suppliant rather than
exhausted it. Who can tell faith of the suppliant rather than exhausted it. Who
can tell whether, if he had asked that the cities should be spared even for
Lot’s sake, the request would not have been answered?” Trapp also remarks upon
this—“Abraham hucked with the Lord so long, till he had brought Him down from
fifty to ten; and mark that he left begging ere God left bating. Let us find
praying hearts, and He will find a pitying heart.
Ⅱ. God takes note of what is going on in the world. Sin has a voice
which cries to God for vengeance, as when the blood of Abel spilt by Cain
called for punishment (Gen.4:10), and as in the case of Sodom (Gen.18:20). The
sin of Sodom was excessive (Gen.13:13); grievous, great (Gen.18:20); bitter
(Deut.32:32); open (Isaiah 3:9; Gen.19:5); hateful (Jer.23:14); it was spoken
of ever afterwards as being most abominable to the Lord, and called for
severest measures upon those who were guilty of like iniquity (Deut.23:17; 1.
Kings 14:24; 15:12; 22:46; Jude 7). There are some who seem to act as if God
took no note of what they were doing, but He surely does. Not a single thing
escapes His notice, for He not only notes the actions of men, but weighs them
as well (1. Sam. 2:3). Two children were playing in a room together. A plate of
sweet cakes was brought in and laid upon the table. “ Oh, I want one of those
cakes!” cried the little boy, jumping up as soon as his mother left the room,
and going no tip-toe towards the table. “ No, no,” said his sister, pulling him
back, “ You must not touch.” “ Mother won’t know it; she did not count them,”
he cried, shaking her off, and stretching forth his hand. “ If she didn’t, God
counted,” answered the sister. Yes, God counts, as Job says, “ Doth not He see
my ways, and count all my steps?” (Job 31:4).
Ⅲ. God punishes sinners for their sins. The Dead Sea to-day is a
silent and solemn witness to this fact, and the overthrow of Sodom is
proverbial of God’s righteous action against sin (Deut.29:23; Is 13:19;
Jer.49:18; 50:40; Amos 4:11; Luke 17:29; 11. Peter 2:6; Jude 7). The French
proverb on punishment is suggestive—“ Punishment is the recoil of crime; and
the strength of the backward stroke is in proportion to the original blow.” “
Whatsoever a man soweth, that shall he also reap” (Gal.6:7). If the farmer sows
tares he does not expect wheat, neither can a sinner expect anything but
punishment if he continues and dies in a course of sin.
── F.E. Marsh《Five Hundred Bible Readings》
18 Chapter 18
Verses 1-8
He took butter, and milk, and the calf which he had dressed, and
set it before them
The duty of hospitality
I.
As
A COMMON DUTY.
II. AS A DUTY OF
PIETY. Thus viewed, all duties are ennobled.
1. In their form.
2. In their motive.
3. The best qualities of the soul are developed.
III. As A DUTY
WHICH IS PROPHETIC OF SOMETHING BEYOND ITSELF, AS genius does not always know
all it utters, so the faithful and loving heart cannot always relate what it
holds. Such was the ease with Abraham in his history. His duty rapidly rises in
the form and meaning of it.
1. He entertains men on the principles of common hospitality (Genesis 18:2).
2. He entertains angels.
3. He entertains God. (T. H. Leale.)
A prelude to the Incarnation
I. GOD APPEARS AS
MAN,
II. GOD PASSES
THROUGH THE SAME EXPERIENCE AS MAN. The angel Jehovah performs human actions,
and passes through human conditions.
1. He both speaks and listens to human words. This Divine visitor
converses freely with Abraham, and listens to his offer of hospitality. So God
manifest in our nature spoke with human lips, and heard through ears of flesh
the voices of men.
2. He shares the common necessities of man. This Divine visitor has
no real need for food and refreshment, and yet He partakes of them. Jesus,
though
He had no need of us in the greatness and independence of His
majesty, yet took our infirmities and necessities upon Him. He lived amongst
men, eating and drinking with them, and partaking of the shelter they offered.
3. As man He receives service from man. Jehovah, under the appearance
of a man, partook of the food and of the hospitable services which Abraham
offered. So Christ, in the days of His flesh, received the attentions of human
kindness, shelter, food, comfort. He had special friends, such as those of the
household of Bethany, which He loved so well. He was grateful for every act of
kindness done to Him.
III. GOD MANIFEST
IS RECOGNIZED ONLY BY THE SPIRITUAL MIND. (T. H.Leale,)
The Divine guest
There is no doubt as to the august character of one of the three
who, on that memorable afternoon, when every living thing was seeking shelter
during the heat of the day, visited the tent of the patriarch (see Genesis 18:1-10). It was thus that the
Son of God anticipated His Incarnation; and was found in fashion as a man
before He became flesh. He loved to come incognito into the homes of those He
cherished as His friends, even before He came across the slopes of Olivet to
make His home in the favoured cottage, where His spirit rested from the din of
the great city, and girded itself for the cross and the tomb.
I. ABRAHAM
TREATED HIS VISITORS WITH TRUE EASTERN HOSPITALITY.
II. MAY IT NOT BE
THAT CHRIST COMES TO US OFTEN IN THE GUISE OF A STRANGER? Does He not test us
thus? Of course if He were to come in His manifested splendour as the Son of
the Highest, every one would receive Him, and provide Him with sumptuous
hospitality. But this would not reveal our true character. And so He comes to
us as a wayfaring man, hungry and athirst; or as a stranger, naked and sick.
Those that are akin to Him will show Him mercy, in whatsoever disguise He
comes, though they recognize Him not, and will be surprised to learn that they
ever ministered to Him. Those, on the other hand, who are not really His, will
fail to discern Him; will let Him go unhelped away; and will wake up to find
that “inasmuch as they did it not to one of the least of these, they did it not
to Him.”
III. GOD NEVER
LEAVES IN OUR DEBT. He takes care to pay for His entertainment, royally and
divinely. (F. B. Meyer, B. A.)
The advent in the theophany
I. GOD VISITS HIS
CHILDREN.
II. GOD VISITS HIS
CHILDREN IN HUMAN FORM.
III. GOD VISITS HIS
CHILDREN UNRECOGNIZED.
IV. GOD VISITS HIS
CHILDREN IN BLESSING. V GOD VISITS HIS CHILDREN AT CRITICAL PERIODS.
VI. WHEN GOD
VISITS HIS. CHILDREN, HE WILL BE BEST RECEIVED IN THE DISCHARGE OF THE SIMPLEST
DUTIES. (W. F. Adeney, M. A.)
Abraham’s celestial visitors
Lessons to be learned.
I. KINDLINESS TO
STRANGERS.
II. FAITH IN THE
PROMISES OF GOD.
III. THAT THERE IS
A CONCATENATION BETWEEN OUR SINS. Want of trust, such as Sarah showed,
necessarily leads to want of courage, and want of courage is the ready cause of
want of truth. Let us avoid the first steps to evil.
IV. THE SIN OR
INNOCENCE OF ANY ACTION DEPENDS UPON MOTIVES. Abraham laughed with joy, Sarah
from incredulity. An action commendable in the one, was sinful in the other.
V. THE
LONGSUFFERING AND CONDESCENSION OF GOD.
VI. THE WONDERFUL
EFFICACY OF PRAYER. VII. THAT FOR THE ELECT’S SAKE THE DAYS OF EVIL ARE OFTEN
SHORTENED OR POSTPONED. Great leaders produce great causes, as much as great
causes produce great leaders. VIII. NOW SPIRITUALLY, AS FORMERLY ACTUALLY, GOD
VISITS HIS PEOPLE. (Homilist.)
Mysterious visitors
I. THE UNEXPECTED
GUESTS.
II. THE POSITIVE
PROMISE. To believe God’s word is the path to blessing.
III. THE REVEALED
SECRET. (W. S. Smith, B. D.)
The coming of God, and the welcome of man
As the ruin of man consisted in his estrangement from God, so his
restoration to eternal life consists in his return into the light of God’s
presence. The Divine enlightenment of man is the glory or manifestation of God.
The history of the spiritual revivals in the patriarchal and Jewish churches
was the history of the renewed manifestations of God’s countenance. The
theophanies witnessed by the patriarchs, Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, gave to
them the inspiration of life. But in the fulness of time, in the Incarnation,
God who appeared in passing visions to the patriarchs, and shone between the
cherubims in the mystery of the holy of holies, manifested Himself in the flesh
and blood of the second Adam: “The Word was made flesh and dwelt among us.”
Thus, “God manifest in the flesh” in Christ Jesus, is the life of humanity. To
behold Him with the eye of the soul is to have the life of the soul. The
conditions upon which God permits men to realize the blessed influences of His
presence, are to-day exactly the same as they were three thousand years ago,
when the “Father of the Faithful” recognized His nearness on the plains of
Mamre. The form of this narrative, which records that manifestation of God,
embodies everlasting principles which can never pass away. For our instruction
it tells us how the “Father of the Faithful” welcomed the approach of God to
his soul. Let us dwell, for our learning--
I. Upon THE MODE
IN WHICH THE DIVINE LIFE APPROACHED THE MAN. “The Lord appeared unto him”. . .
“Lo, three men stood by him.”
1. The mode in which the Divine Life manifested His presence to the
patriarch, as recorded in this passage, is regarded by the Church as an
adumbration of the fundamental doctrine of the Christian verity, that we
worship the Unity in Trinity, and the Trinity in Unity. This passage is
accordingly appointed to be read on the festival of the Trinity. The words,
“The Lord appeared unto him,” give expression to the Unity of the Divine life.
The words that describe the forms of the vision in which God manifested Himself
to the soul of the man, “Lo, three men stood by him,” express the other aspect
of this great mystery, and teach us to think of Three Persons existing within
the One Essence of God. St. John the Divine, in his book of Revelation, has
been inspired by God to use words which may enable us by analogy to form some
faint conception of the relations eternally existing between the three Persons
in the Godhead. He illustrates those relations by teaching us to think of the
Three Persons in the One Godhead, as we think of the three divisions of one
time. Now, the past in time presents itself to our minds as the fountain and
origin out of which the present is for ever being born, and out of which the
future is for ever destined to proceed. The present, in which we have our
being, is for ever departing from us, in order to return into the bosom of that
past out of which it came, and in which it dwells. The future comes to us for
ever, sent by the departed present, and coming, when it comes, in the name of
the present. Our only existence is for ever dependent upon our standing-place
in the present. It is our communion, or participation of the present, that
enables us to look back, and to remember the past out of which we have come. It
is by virtue of our standing on the rock of the present, that we can look
forward to the future which it is about to send to us. In the same manner we
think of God the Father as the fountain of being, who hath created us, and to
whom we look back, seeking the knowledge of our destiny in His creative
purpose. So St. John represents the Father as “Holy”. . . “Lord God Almighty
that was.” We think of the Son as the Ever Present Life, who gives to us our
standing in existence. “He that hath the Son hath life; and he that hath not
the Son of God hath not life.” As we go back into the past, by standing in the
present, so we can only come to the Father through the Son. He for ever says,
“No man cometh unto the Father but by Me.” Likewise, as the present leads on to
the future, so the Son sends to us--proceeding from the Father and Himself--the
Holy Ghost. The “Holy Lord God Almighty that is,” departs and intercedes to
send to us the “Holy Lord God Almighty that is to come.” Furthermore, although
we necessarily think of time as presenting itself to our consciousness in these
three forms, we nevertheless think of it as one in itself. The past, the
present, and the future, are not three, but one time.
II. THE MANNER IN
WHICH THE FATHER OF THE FAITHFUL RECEIVED THE APPROACH OF GOD. Let us proceed
to dwell upon the characteristics that marked the spiritual attitude of Abraham
in welcoming the Divine vision.
1. We may, perhaps, infer from these opening words, “He lift up his
eyes and looked,” the very simple, but very necessary, lesson that the presence
of God cannot be realized, unless the soul of man directs its gaze above the
objects of the sensual, earthly life. There are men who never rise in thought
or feeling above the low level of earthly, transitory interests: that plain
upon which are built the habitations that are doomed to crumble into dust The
prayerless, thoughtless, sensual, earthly-minded man, cannot realize the
presence of the Most High. The splendour of the Triune Majesty never dawns upon
the eye of the soul that is engrossed in earthly things. Let no one expect to
be partakers of Abraham’s lofty experiences, unless he strives to follow
Abraham’s example, and to direct the aspirations of his soul upward.
2. We may also learn from this passage the well-known but frequently
neglected truth, that there must be an effort of the soul to go forth, as it
were, out of the habits of self, to meet the Divine life that comes near. Such
seems to be the significance of the very simple but very deep words, “He ran to
meet them from the tent door.” The neglect of this truth has doomed many souls
to long darkness and exclusion from the presence of God. Man must use the
freedom of his will to go forth to meet the coming of God. There are some who
have been misled by the influence of false teaching to ignore this great truth.
They have reasoned in their hearts, saying, “If I am chosen and predestined to
realize the blessed sight of God’s countenance, He will, in His good time, make
an irresistible approach to my soul, and force His Divine presence into the
innermost chambers of my being. It is not necessary that I should use that
power of will which I have received, in order to go forth to meet Him, who will
come, or not come, to me according to His own good pleasure and eternal
decree.” Man cannot by his own will cause God to be either present or absent from
His sanctuary and throne of grace. “His tabernacle is with men.” But man can
neglect to fulfil those conditions upon which God’s presence can be realized by
his own soul. By sloth, prayerlessness, and apathy, he can remain beneath the
shadow of his earthly tent, and lose the vision of God, because he will neither
lift up his eyes, nor go forth to meet Him.
3. The attitude of the patriarch in welcoming the Divine presence
teaches us another lesson, viz., the spiritual necessity of humility as a
condition of obtaining a clear and near vision of God. The law of reverential
humility is binding upon the human soul, and has its original sanction in the
majesty of God. The self-confident, arrogant, proud man, transgresses one of
the laws that regulate his relation to the majesty of God, and is inevitably
removed in spirit to a distance from the throne of God. He loses the faculty of
realizing the Divine presence. The physical philosopher who proposes to
approach the throne of grace, not as a humble suppliant, but as an irreverent
experimentalist, asking for a sign of his own choosing, ignores the elementary
truths of the relation existing between the King and the subject. He would
acknowledge that for the successful performance of physical experiments, it is
necessary to comply with all the known physical conditions. The laboratory of
spiritual truth has its conditions. One of those conditions is that it must be
pervaded in all its parts by the atmosphere of reverence. God will not reveal
the light of His presence to man, however eagerly he may run forth to seek it,
until he has learnt to recognize the weakness, the littleness, the unworthiness
of his own being before the majesty of the most High. The patriarch’s obedience
to this law of spiritual insight is simply expressed in the words, “He bowed
himself towards the ground.”
4. The next clause in the text gives expression to the deep truth,
that man cannot realize the blessedness of the Divine presence, without an
earnest effort to give depth and permanency to his religious impressions. The
Divine forms that came to Abraham doubtless passed over the plains of Mamre.
They drew nigh to other tents, but those who dwelt beneath their covering
realized not the blessedness of their approach, because they fulfilled not the
conditions upon which it could be known. The high aspiration, the earnest
inquiry, the spirit of reverence, were found only in the Father of the
Faithful. The chosen patriarch fulfilled one other condition, without which
souls cannot attain unto the clear vision of God. He had the grace of spiritual
perseverance. He was not content to permit the truth that had poured its bright
beams into his soul to pass away. He sought to deepen the Divine impressions
received, and to make them permanent. Such is the significance of the prayer:
“My Lord, if now I have found favour in Thy sight, pass not away, I pray Thee,
from Thy servant.” In all the ages, the true children of Abraham are marked by
this spirit of earnest perseverance, which seeks to deepen the experience of
the soul. The dwellers in the tents of the world have not this characteristic.
To them God draws near, but they never invite Him to stay. They seek to
obliterate the impression at once; and in the angry impatience of a soul that
will not give place, even for a moment, to the presence of the Divine life,
that rebukes its own baseness, cry out, “What have we to do with Thee?. . . Art
Thou come hither to torment us before the time?” There are others who welcome
the Divine presence for a brief moment, but soon grow weary of its influence.
In the church, or in some hour when the heart has been softened into
sensibility by some sorrow or joy, they obtain a passing glimpse of the Divine
life. The blessed experience of God’s abiding presence is only known by them
who, in the spirit of the patriarch, seek by prayer to make the vision lasting.
We must learn to pray, as true sons of Abraham, and loving disciples of our
risen Lord, in the journey of life, “Abide with us.” “My Lord, if I have found
favour in Thy sight, pass not away, I pray Thee, from Thy servant.”
5. The next clause in the text, “Let a little water, I pray you, be
fetched, and wash your feet,” doubtless gives expression to a deep and
everlasting spiritual truth. What is the condition, essential to the
entertainment of the Divine life, expressed in these words? They teach us that,
in order to welcome the Divine life in its approach, the soul must apply to the
forms in which it vouchsafes to dwell, the element of purification here
represented by the water. We fetch fresh draughts of the cleansing influences
that stream from the cross of Christ, and strive to welcome the life of God to
abide with us, by washing away the dust that defiles the forms in which it
vouchsafes to dwell. This is an everlasting condition, binding upon every son
of Abraham. God will not dwell with us, and manifest the blessed light of His
countenance to our souls, unless we seek to cleanse our walk in life. The dust
of earth that clings to us unwashed away by the waters of grace; the
unconfessed, unrepented, unforsaken sins, will make us utterly incapable of
realizing the Divine life.
6. Another essential condition which man must fulfil in order to
realize the blessed consciousness of God’s presence, is expressed in these
words addressed to the Divine forms: “Rest yourselves under the tree.” What is
the spiritual truth conveyed in these words? They teach us that there must be
in human life hours of rest and calm meditation, in order to ensure the
enjoyment of the Divine presence. The hours taken from the world and spent in
Divine worship, in the calm peace of the church; the hours in which the soul
enters into the closet, shuts the door, and prays to the Father which is in
secret, are the hours in which man rises into the realization of the eternal
life.
7. The last act in the patriarch’s welcome of the Divine presence is
described in these words: “I will fetch a morsel of bread, and comfort ye your
hearts; after that ye shall pass on; for therefore are ye come to your servant.
And they said, So do, as thou hast said.” The man is here permitted to offer
unto the Creator of His own creatures in order to welcome His presence. Man is
hero represented as offering gifts to sustain the forms of the Divine life, and
his offering is approved and accepted as a part of the welcome which he was
bound to give. Such is the duty that rests upon man for ever. His services in
themselves are of no value. His prayers, worship, alms, oblations--these are
nothing in themselves. But they must be offered as expressions of loving
welcome to the presence of God. If they are withheld, God will not lift up the
light of His countenance upon the soul. The welcome which the human soul offers
to God, finds its full expression in the holy eucharist. This vision of God
brought with it to
Abraham special blessings. He was inspired to look forward to
endless life, typified in the supernatural birth of Isaac; and to realize the
doom of the lost souls, typified in the destruction of the cities of the plain.
Such are for ever the fruits of the knowledge of God. It shows man the ways of
life and death. If we would attain unto the blessedness of God’s realized
presence, we must remember that the conditions to be fulfilled are the same as
they were thousands of years ago on the plain of Mamre. (H. T.Edwards, M. A.)
Abraham, the friend of God
I. THE FRIENDLY
VISIT.
1. Abraham’s hospitality.
2. God’s gracious acceptance. A singular instance of Divine
condescension--the only recorded instance of the kind before the Incarnation.
II. THE FRIENDLY
FELLOWSHIP. In the progress of the interview, as well as in its commencement,
the Lord treats Abraham as a friend.
1. He converses with him familiarly, putting to him a question which
no stranger in the East would reckon himself entitled to put. He inquires into
his household matters, and asks after Sarah, his wife (Genesis 18:9).
2. Then in the pains He takes, by reiterated assurances, to confirm
the faith of Abraham and to overcome the unbelief of Sarah--in the tone of His
simple appeal to Divine omnipotence as an answer to every doubt, “Is anything
too hard for the Lord?”--and in His mild but searching reproof of the
dissimulation to which the fear of detection led Sarah, “Nay, but thou didst
laugh,”--in all this, does it not almost seem as if by anticipation we saw
Jesus in the midst of His disciples, stretching forth His hand to catch the
trembling Peter on the waters, “O thou of little faith, wherefore didst thou doubt?”
or, after the denial, turning to look on Peter, so as to melt his soul to
penitence and love!
3. It is chiefly, however, in the close of this interview that
Abraham is treated by God as His friend; being, as it were, admitted into His
deliberations, and consulted in regard to what He is about to do.
III. THE FRIENDLY
AND CONFIDENTIAL CONSULTATION.
1. The Lord refers to the honour or privilege already granted to
Abraham, as a reason for having no concealment from Him now (Genesis 18:18).
2. The Lord, in communicating His purpose to Abraham His friend,
refers not only to the high honour and privilege which that relation implies,
but also to its great responsibility (Genesis 18:19).
IV. THE LIBERTY OF
FRIENDLY REMONSTRANCE.
1. There is no attempt here to pry into the secret things which
belong to the Lord our God (Deuteronomy 29:29); no idea of meddling
with the purposes or decrees of election, which the Lord reserves exclusively
to Himself.
2. Nor in this pleading does Abraham arrogate anything to himself.
He has boldness and access, with confidence, by the faith of Jesus. He has
liberty to converse with God as a friend, to give utterance to his feelings and
desires before Him, to represent his own case and the case of every one for
whom he cares; and not for himself only, but for others, yea, indeed for all,
to invoke the name of Him whose memorial to all generations is this: “The Lord,
the Lord God merciful and gracious, long-suffering, and abundant in goodness
and truth; keeping mercy for thousands, forgiving iniquity, transgression, and
sin, and that will by no means clear the guilty” Exodus 34:6-7).
3. Abraham’s expostulation, accordingly, proceeds upon this name of
the Lord, or in other words, upon the known and revealed principles of the
Divine administration. Aspiring to no acquaintance with the secret decrees of
God, and standing upon no claim of merit in himself, he has still warrant
enough for all the earnestness of this intercessory pleading, in that broad
general aspect of the character and moral government of God, to which he
expressly refers. For he knows God as the just God and the Saviour; and on this
twofold view of the ways of God he builds his argument in his intercessory
prayer.
4. Such is the principle of Abraham’s intercession for Sodom. And as
it is founded on a right understanding of the nature and design of God’s moral
government of the world, in this dispensation of long-suffering patience,
subordinate to a dispensation of grace, and preparatory to a dispensation of
judgment, so it is combined with a spirit of entire submission to the Divine
sovereignty. (S. R. Candlish, D. D.)
Hospitality
Consider this virtue in--
I. Its source: a
kind and generous heart.
II. Its attendant
qualities.
1. Prompt.
2. Admitting of no refusal.
3. Unsparing.
III. The esteem in
which it is held. It is--
1. Pleasing to man.
2. Approved of by God.
IV. The reward
which it brings.
1. An angel may be entertained unawares.
2. Gratitude in its object is but natural to expect. (J. H.
Jones.)
Abraham’s hospitality
One thinking of these words of Abraham more seriously, “If I have
found favour,” &c., noteth by them, that when one cometh to us to whom we
may do good, we, rather than he, receive a benefit, for the poor man
peradventure receiveth of us a penny, and we of the Lord an hundredfold, and
eternal life also. Whether had Elias the better that received a cake, or the
widow that by him received such comfort? How, then, may the true consideration
hereof quicken us in all charitable and merciful actions towards our brethren
distressed, and needing our pity and comfort? (Bp. Babington.)
The trite hospitality
In that he nameth a morsel of bread, and yet performed better, we
see the antiquity of this modesty, that of a man’s own things he should speak
with least. So use we to invite men to a pittance, or to some particular
morsel, when yet we intend somewhat better. But whatsoever Abraham made ready,
was all but moderate, in comparison of that ungodly excess that some now use,
rather to show their own pride, than to welcome the guest. True welcome never
consisted in meats and drinks, and multitude of dishes, but in that affection
of an inward heart, which truly hath appeared in a cup of water, where better
ability wanted, and which passeth all dishes and meats under the sun. (Bp.
Babington.)
Hospitality
Some years ago a pious widow in America, who was reduced to great
poverty, had just placed the last smoked herring on her table to supply her
hunger and that of her children, when a rap was heard at the door, and a
stranger solicited a lodging and a morsel of food, saying that he had not
tasted food for twenty-four hours. The widow did not hesitate, but offered a
share to the stranger, saying, “We shall not be forsaken, or suffer deeper for
an act of charity.” The traveller drew near the table; but when he saw the
scanty fare, filled with astonishment, he said, “And is this all your store?
And do you offer a share to one you do not know? Then I never saw charity
before! But, madam, do you not wrong your children by giving a part of your
last morsel to a stranger?” “Ah,” said the widow, weeping, “I have a boy, a
darling son, somewhere on the face of the wide world, unless heaven has taken
him away; and I only act towards you as I would that others should act towards
him. God, who sent manna from heaven, can provide for us as He did for Israel;
and how should I this night offend Him, if my son should be a wanderer,
destitute as you, and He should have provided for him a home, even as poor as
this, were I to turn you unrelieved away?” The widow stopped, and the stranger,
springing from his seat, clasped her in his arms. “God indeed has provided just
such a home for your wandering son, and has given him wealth to reward the goodness
of his benefactress. My mother! O my mother!” It was indeed her long-lost son
returned from India. He had chosen this way to surprise his family, and
certainly not very wisely. But never was surprise more complete, or more
joyful. He was able to make the family comfortable, which he immediately did.
The mother lived for some years longer in the enjoyment of plenty.
Verses 9-15
Wherefore did Sarah laugh, saying, Shall I of a surety bear a
child, Which am old?
--
The conflict between fear and faith
I. THE THINGS
PROMISED SO FAITH ARE DIFFICULT OF RELIEF.
1. It is necessary that faith should be thus tried by difficulty.
2. We must be cast entirely upon the word of God.
II. FAITH MAY, FOR
A WHILE, BE QUITE PARALYZED BY FEAR (Genesis 18:15).
1. In sincere souls this condition is only momentary.
2. To accept God at His word would save us from all foolish wonder.
III. GOD GRACIOUSLY
GRANTS POWER TO OVERCOME THE FEAR. If only faith is real at bottom and in any
way lays hold upon God, He will pardon its infirmities and repair its
weaknesses. This He did in Sarah’s case.
1. By mild reproof.
2. By recognizing the good which is mixed up with our infirmity.
3. By repeating His promises.
4. By casting us upon His own omnipotence (Genesis 18:14). (T. H.Leale.)
Lessons
1. Gracious hospitality hath sweet returns from God as acceptance
with Him.
2. Known to God are souls who entertain Him, better than He is known
to them. Where is Sarah?
3. God calleth for the woman to be sharer in the promise with the
man.
4. It is good to be at hand, near to God in our places, when
promises are given out (Genesis 18:9).
5. God labours to put believing souls above all doubts concerning
His promise.
6. God is punctual in His own time to perform His promise.
7. God will keep His saints alive to see the good which He promiseth
them.
8. Weak saints may receive promises with their ears, and yet not
believe nor digest them (Genesis 18:10).
9. Sensible objections may puzzle the weak faith of God’s servants {Genesis 18:11).
10. Weakness of faith and strength of sense may make saints despise
the promise,
11. Nature’s defects are apt to question the power of God to help
them. (G. Hughes, B. D.)
Lessons
1. God takes notice of the unbelief of saints, in word, and deed, to
reprove them. Jehovah said, &c.
2. Good works toward God do not excuse from unbelief of His
promises. Sarah’s feast stops not God’s mouth against sin.
3. Husbands should hear God’s complaints of their wives to amend
them, so Abraham did.
4. God is displeased to have objections from sense set up against
His promise (Genesis 18:13).
5. God is absolutely able to do anything what He please in heaven or
earth.
6. God proposeth His absolute power for faith to rest on against all
sensible objections.
7. God’s promise is joined with His power to take of weak souls from
sinful doubting.
8. God tenders the weak in faith, and doubleth His promise for their
support (Genesis 18:14).
9. Saints weak in faith, may be so overtaken as to seek to hide one
sin by another.
10. Guilt and fear may lead souls to such transgression.
11. God will make His servants own their iniquities, though through
weakness they had denied them.
12. God will be gracious to His saints in making them know their sins
(Genesis 18:15). (G. Hughes, B. D.)
Sarah’s sin
I. HER UNBELIEF.
II. HER UNTRUTH.
God’s promise treated with incredulity
Sarah does not appear to have been by any means a blameless
character. Her conduct towards Hagar showed us that she was a woman capable of
generous impulses, but not of the strain of continued magnanimous conduct. She
was capable of yielding her wifely rights on the impulse of the brilliant
scheme that had struck her, but like many other persons who can begin a
magnanimous or generous course of conduct, she could not follow it up to the
end, but failed disgracefully in her conduct towards her rival. So now again she
betrays characteristic weakness. When the strangers came to Abraham’s tent, and
announced that she was to become a mother, she smiled in superior,
self-assured, woman’s wisdom. When the promise threatened no longer to hover
over her household as a m ere sublime and exalting idea which serves its
purpose if it keep them in mind that God has spoken to them, but to take place
now among the actualities of daily occurrence, she hails this announcement with
a laugh of total incredulity. Whatever she had made of God’s word, she had not
thought it was really and veritably to come to pass; she smiled at the
simplicity which could speak of such an unheard-of thing. This is true to human
nature. It reminds you how you have dealt with God’s promises--nay, with God’s
commandments--when they offered to make room for themselves in the
everyday life of which you are masters, every detail of which you
have arranged, seeming to know absolutely the laws and principles on which your
particular line of life must be carried on. Have you never smiled at the
simplicity which could set about making actual, about carrying out in practical
life, in society, in work, in business, those thoughts, feelings and purposes,
which God’s promises beget? Sarah did not laugh outright, but smiled behind the
Lord; she did not mock Him to His face, but let the compassionate expression
pass over her face with which we listen to the glowing hopes of the young
enthusiast who does not know the world. Have we not often put aside God’s voice
precisely thus; saying within us, We know what kind of things can be done by us
and others and what need not be attempted; we know what kind of frailties in
social intercourse we must put up with, and not seek to amend; what kind of
practices it is vain to think of abolishing; we know what use to make of God’s
promise and what use not to make of it; how far to trust it, and how far to
give greater weight to our knowledge of the world and our natural prudence and
sense? Does not our faith, like Sarah’s, vary in proportion as the promise to
be believed is unpractical? If the promise seems wholly to concern future
things, we cordially and devoutly assent; but if we are asked to believe that
God intends within the year to do so-and-so, if we are asked to believe that
the result of God’s promise will be found taking a substantial place among the
results of our own efforts--then the derisive smile of Sarah forms on our face.
(M. Dods, D. D.)
Verses 16-18
And 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?
--
The secret of the Lord with Abraham
God communicates Himself, and the knowledge of His ways and
designs, to His faithful ones. There was a special propriety for this mode of
dealing with His servant Abraham. Consider this--
I. As ONE OF THE
PRIVILEGES OF GOD’S FRIENDSHIP WITH HIM. Communication of secrets is one of the
special privileges of friendship. Where we trust our secrets the intimacy must
be very close, and the confidence of love very great. God imparted to His
friend Abraham a twofold secret.
1. The secret of loving intercourse.
2. The secret of His purposes.
II. AS DEPENDING
UPON HIS DESTINY AND CHARACTER. Abraham was not only a saint, but also a
representative man, through whom God intended to convey great blessings to
mankind. He was the human foundation upon which God’s most gracious purposes
concerning the race were to he erected. The friendship of God with him,
therefore, is to be considered--
1. With regard to his destiny. God had known him, that is,
determined him for a purpose.
2. With regard to his personal character, God knew that Abraham was
a righteous man, and that he would be just and upright in the government of his
family, bringing them up in the fear and love of Himself. So would they enjoy
the benefits of the covenant of grace, and avoid the doom of the wicked. (T.
H. Leale)
The friend of God
I. WE ARE TO PONDER THIS MOST INTERESTING SCENE. In it we shall
find three leading acts.
1. The condescending visit of God to Abraham.
2. The revelation of the Lord’s purpose to Abraham (Genesis 18:16-22).
3. Abraham interceding for Sodom (Genesis 18:23-33).
II. APPLY TO
OURSELVES. As Abraham’s spiritual seed, we are called to be friends of God.
1. Jesus calls us His friends (see John 15:15).
2. Jesus manifests Himself to us as He does not to the world.
Certainly, this is an inward and spiritual manifestation; but it is not less
real or delightful than that vouchsafed to Abraham.
3. He condescends to be refreshed by us. When we do His will, and
offer Him praise, He sees of the travail of His soul, and is satisfied. He sups
with us.
4. He reveals to us His secret. This relates to His second coming,
to the destruction of the world, and the final overthrow of the ungodly. The
fate of Sodom represents that of all the earth.
5. We are permitted to intercede for others. (The Congregational
Pulpit.)
God’s reasons for revealing His intentions to Abraham
1. The importance of his
character. He was not only the friend of God, but the father of “a great
nation,” in which God would have a special interest, and through which “all
other nations should be blessed.” Let him be in the secret.
2. The good use he would make of it. Being previously disclosed to
him, he would be the more deeply impressed by it: and according to his tried
and approved conduct as the head of a family, would be concerned to impart it
as a warning to his posterity in all future ages. As the wicked extract ill
from good, so the righteous will extract good from ill Sodom’s destruction
shall turn to Abraham’s salvation: the monument of just vengeance against their
crimes shall be of perpetual use to him and his posterity, and contribute even
to the “bringing of that good upon them, which the Lord had spoken concerning
them. (A. Fuller.)
Verse 19
For I know him, that he will command his children and his
household after him
Family religion
I.
THE
LIGHT IN WHICH ABRAHAM APPEARS IN THIS PASSAGE AND HOW HE WAS QUALIFIED FOR THE
DUTY HERE ASCRIBED TO HIM.
1. A man of knowledge.
2. A man of piety.
3. A man of virtue.
4. A man of authority.
5. A man of fidelity.
6. A man of diligence.
II. THE NATURE OF
THIS DUTY OR HIS ENDEAVOURS FOR THE GOOD OF HIS FAMILY.
1. He not only prayed with and before his family, but interceded for
them as a priest.
2. He was a prophet in his family.
3. He was a king in his house, and used authority.
III. HOW PLEASING
IT WAS TO GOD, AND THE BLESSED CONSEQUENCES THEREOF TO ABRAHAM AND HIS FAMILY.
Observe--The reason why God would hide nothing from Abraham. “For I know him,”
&c. Abraham was communicative of his knowledge, and improved it to the good
of those under his care, and therefore God resolved to make communications to
him. The way to the accomplishment of God’s promises: “That the Lord may bring
upon Abraham that which He hath spoken of him.” Family-blessings arise from
family religion;--temperance, frugality, industry, discretion--peace,
quietness, love, harmony--the favour, protection, and care of God; His
direction and aid--all necessaries (Psalms 37:25; Matthew 6:33)--prosperity, as far as will
be good for us, and our families. (J. Benson, D. D.)
The parental empire
The text implies--
I. THAT A PARENT
IS INVESTED WITH REGAL AUTHORITY.
II. THAT A
PARENT’S AUTHORITY IS TO BE WIELDED IN SUBORDINATION TO THE DIVINE.
III. THAT A PARENT
WHO THUS WIELDS HIS AUTHORITY ENSURES THE FULFILMENT OF THE DIVINE PROMISE IN
HIS EXPERIENCE. (Homilist.)
Lessons
1. God’s knowledge of souls giveth them capacity of receiving his
revelations. The knowledge of His election and approbation.
2. God’s knowledge determines souls unto duty and doth commend them
for it, so it did to Abraham.
3. God’s known ones will command for God all within their power.
4. Children and servants are to be commanded by God’s approved
rulers to keep close to His way.
5. Saints known of God will take care for their seed to serve God
after their departure. Succeeding generations are their care.
6. The commands of godly fathers and governors are answered
fruitfully where God knoweth souls.
7. Keeping the way of Jehovah and doing justice are inseparably
enjoined and performed.
8. Such souls are fittest to receive discoveries of God’s purposed
judgments, who make the best use of them.
9. The full accomplishment of all promises in Christ are the
consequents of duty, caused by them.
10. God will bring home all the good promised in Christ unto His
covenant ones.
11. God will not hide any thing that is good from the people of His
promise; He showeth evil to avoid it.
12. What God hath vouchsafed and spoken to Abram hath always been
with respect unto His Church’s good. So in this case to the Church in his
family (Genesis 18:19). (G. Hughes, B. D.)
Parental government of a family
I. We are to
consider, WHO THEY ARE THAT COMPOSE A FAMILY. Some families are smaller, and
some are larger than others. Families are usually composed of parents and their
children, which are sometimes less, and sometimes more numerous. But parents
may have other children and youths committed to their care and instruction, and
those equally belong to their family. Besides their own and other children,
they may have those whom they employ in their service, and who reside in their
house; and these all belong to their family. They may also have some persons
whom they invite to reside with them gratuitously. These likewise belong to the
family. In a word, all whom they permit to enter under their roof for pleasure,
entertainment, protection, or relief, belong to their family for the time
being. Parents are heads of their families, whether larger or smaller, and
whether they are composed of persons of different ages, characters and
conditions, or not. Their parental authority extends to every individual of
their family.
II. WHAT IS
IMPLIED IN PARENTAL AUTHORITY, OR WHAT IT GIVES PARENTS A RIGHT TO DO IN
RESPECT TO THEIR CHILDREN AND HOUSEHOLDS. And here it may be observed--
1. That it gives them the right of dedicating them to God.
2. Parental authority gives parents the right of instructing their
children, as well as the right of devoting them to God.
3. Parental authority gives parents a right to restrain, as well as
to instruct their children and households. Children and youth are naturally
inclined to vanity and vice, from which they need to be guarded and restrained,
not only by instruction, admonition and advice, but by proper authority.
III. THE IMPORTANCE
OF EXERCISING PARENTAL AUTHORITY. This will appear, if we consider the great
and happy consequences which family government tends to promote.
1. Family government directly tends to promote family religion.
2. The proper exercise of parental authority is highly important, as
it tends to propagate religion from generation to generation, throughout the
world.
3. The proper exercise of parental authority directly tends to
promote both temporal and spiritual prosperity.
Improvement--
1. If it be so important, as has been said, that parents should
properly exercise parental authority over their children and households, then
it is highly important that they themselves should be pious.
2. If it be so important that parents should duly exercise their parental
authority over their children and households, as has been said, then they are
entirely inexcusable and guilty, if they neglect to do it.
3. If the proper exercise of parental authority be so important as
has been said, in order to promote and perpetuate religion, then we may
discover the primary cause of the declension of religion in any place where it
has prevailed and flourished. It must be primarily and principally owing to the
neglect of parents in exercising their parental authority over their children
and households.
4. If the proper exercise of parental authority be so important, as
has been said, to promote and perpetuate religion, then we may discover the
primary cause of the prevalence of religious errors at this day in this land.
5. We learn from this subject, to whom it primarily and principally
belongs to bring about a reformation in piety and virtue. It certainly belongs
to parents in particular. And is there a pious or sober parent, who will not
acknowledge that a reformation is necessary? (N. Emmons, D. D.)
Family training
I. WE SEE THE
HIGH VALUE GOD PLACES ON EARLY SPIRITUAL TRAINING. Children and servants are
both to be brought under religious influence.
II. WE SEE THAT
GOD NOTICES HOW SPIRITUAL TRAINING IS CARRIED ON. God could trust Abraham. He
would “command,” not in dictatorial tones of tyrant, but by power of consistent
life. Devout advice. Gentle firmness.
III. WE SEE THAT
GOD MADE THE BESTOWMENT OF INTENDED BLESSINGS DEPENDENT ON THE FAITHFUL
DISCHARGE OF DUTY. (F. Hastings.)
Christian culture
I. The first duty
of the head towards his household, relates to the DAILY WORSHIP of God.
II. RELIGIOUS
INSTRUCTION.
III. FAMILY
GOVERNMENT. (The Homiletic Review.)
Religion in the family
WHAT ARE THE PRACTICAL ELEMENTS OF WHICH THIS RELIGION IS
COMPOSED?
1. Every parent or guardian of a family is in duty hound to maintain
proper domestic government.
2. The religious education of the family properly devolves upon the
parent.
3. God must be worshipped in the family.
4. Religion in the family will be discovered in the exemplification
of the Christian temper.
II. We come to
consider THE BLESSED RESULTS THAT ATTEND RELIGION IN THE FAMILY. The personal
benefits, we apprehend, will be considerable; but we purpose to consider the
relative advantages of religion in the family.
1. The conduct we have described will have an important bearing on
the domestics, as to their future character and final destiny.
2. Your piety as parents will have an important bearing on the peace
and happiness of the family. “Behold how good and how pleasant it is for
brethren to dwell together in unity!”
3. You may further consider that your religion in the family has an
important bearing on society. Society is becoming increasingly corrupt--the
rising race threaten to outdo their parents in crime; iniquity abounds. The
want of religion in the heads of households has contributed in no small degree
to this growing deterioration. (John Williams.)
The true principle of education
I. Now, you
should observe THE PECULIARITY OF THE EXPRESSION, “I KNOW HIM THAT HE WILL
COMMAND HIS CHILDREN AND HIS HOUSEHOLD AFTER HIM.” Such an expression seems to
imply that there is no tendency in children to walk in the right way. They have
to be dealt with in the way of command--as though, if left to themselves, the
almost certainty is that they will walk in the wrong. And this is a great
though melancholy truth never to be lost sight of, in our reasonings upon man
and religion. And the moment it is proved that children are given into our
keeping with a tendency to evil, we are bound to consider that it rests with
ourselves to counteract evil tendencies, just as though it were wholly
dependent on us whether they should grow up into the righteous or the
unrighteous. Let us learn from every instance of stubbornness in children, from
every outbreak of passion, from every spiteful action, from every petty
quarrel, that we are in boyhood the very miniatures of what we should all be in
manhood, if it were not for the grace of God, and that therefore, in dealing
with a child, we have not to deal with unoccupied soil, but with soil already
impregnated with the seeds of moral evil; and, oh! let this knowledge persuade
us of the importance of the duty, and also of the difficulty of thoroughly following
the example of Abraham, of whom God could say--“I know him that he will command
his children and his household after him. But here we come to a most important
question, as to the manner in which the example may most efficiently be copied.
We have a thorough belief that the great secret of training lies in the always
regarding the child as immortal. The moment that this is kept out of sight we
scheme and arrange as though the child had to live only upon earth, and then
our plans not being commensurate with the vastness of their object will
necessarily be inadequate to the securing its good. Educate on the principle
that you educate for eternity, otherwise it is impossible to produce a
beneficial result. If it be a sound maxim, and sound it must be, for Christ
Himself delivered it, that the direct way of obtaining such things as are good
for us upon earth is to “ seek first the kingdom of God and His righteousness,”
what is it but the carrying this maxim into the business of education to count
that the best mode of improving the mind, of forming the manners, and of
fitting for a profession, is never to suffer the present world to keep the next
out of sight, to draw every motive from eternity, and to make every pursuit
terminate in God? Only remember, that in carrying out any theory of religious
education, far more will depend on example than on precept.
II. But we come
now to consider THE PROMISE WHICH IS CONTAINED IN OUR TEXT, AND WHICH MAY SERVE
TO ENCOURAGE US IN OUR ENDEAVOURS TO COPY THE PATRIARCH’S EXAMPLE. “They shall
keep the way of the Lord, to do justice and judgment.” But do children who have
been rightly trained always turn out well? When you come to think on what right
training is, a system of example as well as of precept, you must assuredly see
how likely it is that the best training has been defective--that even parents
who have taken most pains have failed in thoroughly educating their children
for God; and of course it is vain to urge that the Divine promise has not been
accomplished, so long as there could be doubt as to whether the condition on
which it is made has been rigidly complied with. But having delivered this
caution, we may proceed to state our thorough conviction, that when parents
have done their best to bring up their children in the fear of the Lord, the
almost invariable result is, that, sooner or later, these children become what
they have wished them to be. It is not that children will walk from the first
without any deviation in the course which the parent anxiously prescribes;
there is no promise to this effect in Scripture; Solomon only says of the child
trained in the right way, that “when he is old he will not depart from it”; and
the word rendered “old” does not mark youth or manhood, as distinguished from
infancy or child-hood--it belongs strictly to the decline of life, to the
season of decrepitude and grey hairs. It is the word used, for example, of
Isaac, when it is said--“And it came to pass, when Isaac was old, and his eyes
were dim.” Our text, as we have already said, by the using the words “after
him” seems equally to be looking on to some distant day, as if God would throw
parents altogether on their faith, and emphatically warn them against thinking
labour lost, because as yet they can discern none of its fruits. In place of
despairing, ought not the stubbornness of the soil to be but an argument for
increased diligence in all the arts of moral husbandry--seeing that it is on
“patient continuance in well-doing” that a recompense is promised by the word
of our God? We find, then, the greatest material for consolation in such a
passage as our text. We would not ask a stronger encouragement. The emphatic
remonstrance of a parent with a dissolute child is not necessarily thrown away
because the child persists in his dissoluteness; it may come up with all the
touching tones of the remembered voice when the parent has long lain in the
grave, and work remorse and contrition in the prodigal. (H. Melvill, B. D.)
Duties of parents
A well-ordered, godly household is among the noblest triumphs of
our Christianity.
I. Let us first
consider the duties of parents to their children in the years of INFANCY AND
CHILDHOOD. The first anxiety of the parents will be about the infant’s
reception into the Church. And it is a question of no light or ill-considered
moment with the pious parents to determine who shall undertake for the child in
that holy sacrament; who, in the event of their own early removal, would be
most likely to enter into the responsibilities and sanctity of sponsorship, and
so give a practical reality to that orphan’s promise, “When my father and my
mother forsake me, the Lord will take me up.” I shall presume to offer
suggestions to mothers bearing on the treatment of children in their very
earliest years.
1. Thus I exhort you to begin cultivating, even in infancy, the
principle of prompt and unquestioning obedience.
2. Passing, however, from the infant stage to that commonly
designated as childhood, I proceed to offer some suggestions on the best mode
of cultivating the religious affections at this period.
3. But, in connection with the formation of the religious
character in childhood, we must consider how far it is expedient to impress
upon the mind at this tender age anything of stated and compulsory attention to
the practical duties and exercises of the Christian life.
II. But let us
proceed to consider the duties devolving on parents towards their children at
the second stage, or the PERIOD USUALLY ASSIGNED TO THEIR SCHOOL LIFE. But, in
relation to the treatment of children at this period of life, the point which
of all others will be found to task parental judgment and discrimination most
is how to order the discipline of correction or reproof. The discipline itself
must, of course, begin from the very earliest period. Let us see what forms of
correction seem to be here forbidden.
1. Thus the language may be taken to forbid all angry and
intemperate correction,
2. Again, these prohibitions of the apostles extend to that cold,
distant, and forbidding demeanour which some fathers think essential to the
maintenance of parental authority; but which, in effect, turns the reverence of
children into slavish fear.
3. But these are negative directions. What suggestions are to be
offered towards a plan of temperate, judicious, and yet firm and effectual
correction? Of these some are obvious and general; as, for instance, that all
correction be administered upon principles of the most righteous fairness.
Again, it should always be apparent to children that you are driven to the use
of correction by a loving necessity--by the affection you bear to their souls.
4. But a more important direction for the administering of reproof
is to be given, founded on the law for dealing with offenders, laid down by our
Lord Himself. “Moreover, if thy brother shall trespass against thee, go and
tell him his fault between thee and him alone; if he shall hear thee thou hast
gained thy brother.” Here is an excellent model for parental reproofs. First,
let a little time elapse after the wrong is done to give opportunity for
reflection.
III. The third
class of suggestions to be offered on the duties which parents owe to their
children has respect to the interval between the CLOSE OF THE EDUCATION PERIOD
and the time when the parental roof is quitted, and entrance has to be made on
the active duties of life.
1. And here the first subject of anxious thought to the parent will
be a devout and earnest preparation for the rite of Confirmation.
2. A second counsel for this period goes to recommend a careful
avoidance of all needless and irritating restrictions upon children; all
tightly held reins upon their reasonable choice and liberty; all those
offending reminders of an unmitigated and unlightened yoke which might tempt
them to leave the parental roof before the time.
3. We may conclude with one other suggestion having reference to the
choice of a calling for our children, or their ultimate settlement in life. (D.
Moore, M. A.)
Family religion
I. THE DUTY OF
FAMILY RELIGION IS CLEARLY DERIVED FROM SCRIPTURE BY THE CASE OF ABRAHAM. When
it is said that God knew, that is, approved him in his conduct, in that he
commanded his children and household after him, we must consider such
approbation extended to all who tread in the steps of Abraham in this particular.
It is clearly the duty of every Christian to do all the good which he can
during the time of his sojourn here upon earth, whether as relates to the
bodies or the souls of men. The more nearly persons are allied to us, the more
binding is the duty. The master of a family then must improve his talent. His
influence and authority is a sacred trust to be accounted for at the great day.
I infer, therefore, upon these grounds the duty of family prayer. In addition
to this, all the members of a household have many wants and share many
blessings in common, and therefore all should join together in a common service
of prayer and praise.
II. Having thus
pointed out the duty of family prayer, WE MAY CONSIDER THE ADVANTAGES RESULTING
FROM IT. It is an acknowledgment day by day of God’s right over us, of our
dependence on Him for everything which we enjoy, either as relates to time or
eternity. It is a solemn memento to all the members of a household that God is
greatly to be feared. It is a positive channel by which our heavenly Father
conveys multiplied blessings to those who wait upon Him. Moreover it tends to
unite together the members of a family, and to lessen those jars and
dissensions which often interrupt the peace of households.
III. But THERE ARE
DIFFICULTIES IN THE WAY OF FAMILY PRAYER TO BE CONSIDERED. First, as to the
time and manner of conducting it. Only determine to begin the practice, and the
fit time will easily be found. But again, a difficulty may be urged that
persons are not always in a becoming state of mind to pray, and that therefore
it is not desirable or advantageous to appoint a set time for prayer. This
would be a valid argument against all appointed seasons of prayer whatever, and
I believe that we enter upon most dangerous ground in admitting any force in
such an objection. We must stir up the gift of God within us, and this most
especially by calling upon Him to enable us to pray, and by setting ourselves
to pray in dependence on the Holy Spirit who helpeth our infirmities.
IV. We have now to
consider How FAMILY PRAYER OUGHT TO BE CONDUCTED. Let it be done with gravity,
reverence, and seriousness, as becomes the Almighty Being whom we are going to
address, and in whose special presence we are about to appear. Let this be
done, where it is possible, both morning and evening; in the morning before the
members of the family disperse to their several employments, and in the evening
at a convenient hour before they retire to rest. (H. J. Hastings, M. A.)
Family worship: its propriety and utility
I. The OBLIGATION
we are under to maintain the worship of God in our families.
1. And here we will first of all observe that family worship is
reasonable in itself. Shall the father of a human family be respected in his
person, acknowledged in his authority, and loved for his paternal kindness; and
shall the one common Father of all, the Creator, Redeemer, and Sanctifier of
mankind, and the God of all our mercies, remain unrespected, unacknowledged,
unloved?
2. Moreover, family worship comes recommended to us by many
scriptural examples. Joshua’s well-known determination was: “As for me and my
house, we will serve the Lord.” When David had brought the Ark of the Covenant
from the house of Obed-edom, and set it in the midst of the tent which he had
pitched for it, he “returned to bless his house.” Job, fearing lest his sons in
the unchecked gaiety of their hearts should blaspheme the Lord, “rose up early
in the morning and offered sacrifices for them all,” and “thus did Job
continually.” Cornelius was “a devout man--one that feared God with all his
house, and prayed to God alway.” We read of the Saviour praying with His
disciples as well as for them, and often did He privately instruct them.
II. The ADVANTAGES
derivable from family worship.
1. The continuance and prevalence of piety in our families is, in a
good measure, assured by family worship.
2. Family worship, too, when prudently conducted, is attended with
this advantage--it tends to promote unity and peace in households.
3. Another great advantage resulting almost necessarily from the
practice of family worship is the preservation of a sense of Divine anal
spiritual things in the mind.
4. A further advantage derivable from family worship is the
efficiency it gives to ministerial labour.
5. And whatever advantage the worship and service of God in our
families failed to produce, our performance of a plain and acknowledged duty
would bring with it its own rich reward. As in Psalms 19:11, we read, “In keeping God’s
commandments there is a great reward.”
III. The EXCUSES
made for neglecting family worship.
1. An excuse made by many for neglecting family worship is want of
ability to pray in the presence of others, or to lead a family’s devotions.
Now, it so happens that this is almost the only case in which people pretend to
have a very mean opinion of their own abilities. But, admitting you have no
ability to do so, you may seek and ask it.
2. Others, again, will say, We fear being ridiculed; we fear we
shall be thought too strict and precise in our domestic habits. Here, however,
I would observe: The irreligion of the multitude should be a powerful incentive
with us to cherish religious habits and the fear of God in our houses.
3. Another excuse urged by some is, We have no time. Bring this
excuse to the Bible. Abraham had flocks and herds exceeding many, and very much
cattle. Job, too, had the same. Joshua was the leader and commander of all the
armies of Israel. David occupied a throne, and had all the cares of government
on his mind. But have you really no leisure?--none for amusement?
4. A final excuse we shall notice is this, Fear of personal
restraint. This excuse, if we mistake not, lies at the root of almost every
other. Let the heart be examined, and many a one will find there, “I am fearful
of a restraint upon myself; I am afraid if I have daily family worship in my
house I shall not be able to indulge myself and enjoy the world as I am
disposed to do; more will be expected from me then than is expected now; I must
be consistent; if I say, ‘Hallowed be Thy name,’ I must not take the name of
God in vain. (W. Mudge, B. A.)
“My mother never tells lies”
Some females, says The St. Louis Observer, met at the house
of a friend, in this city, for an evening visit, when the following scene and
conversation occurred:--The child of one of the females, about five years old,
was guilty of rude, noisy conduct, very improper on all occasions, and
particularly so at a stranger’s house. The mother kindly reproved her. “Sarah,
you must not do so.” The child soon forgot the reproof, and became as noisy as
ever. The mother firmly said, “Sarah, if you do so again I will punish you.”
But not long after Sarah “ did so again.” When the company were about to
separate, the mother stepped into a neighbour’s house, intending to return for
the child. During her absence the thought of going home recalled to the mind of
Sarah the punishment which her mother told her she might expect. The recollection
turned her rudeness and thoughtlessness to sorrow. A young lady present
observing it, and learning the cause, in order to pacify her, said, “Never
mind, I will ask your mother not to whip you.” “Oh,” said Sarah, “that will do
no good; my mother never tells lies.” Said my informant, who is also a parent,
“I learned a lesson from the reply of that child which I shall never forget. It
is worth everything in the training of a child to make it feel that its mother
never tells lies.” (Moral and Religious Anecdotes.)
Parents, a blessing
I thank God for two things, yes, for a thousand; but for two among
many--first, that I was born and bred in the country, of parents that gave me a
sound constitution and a noble example. I never can pay back what I got from my
parents. If I were to raise a monument of gold higher than heaven, it would be
no expression of the debt of gratitude which I owe to them for that which they
unceasingly gave, by the heritage of their body and the heritage of their
souls, to me. And next to that I am thankful that I was brought up in
circumstances where I never became acquainted with wickedness. (H. W.
Beecher from his last public letter.)
The blessedness of submission to parents
A child who had been trained in the ways of religion by a parent who
was kind, but judiciously firm, as she sunk to rest in peaceful reliance on her
Saviour’s love, affectionately thanked her beloved mother for all her tender
care and kindness, but added, “I thank you most of all for having subdued my
self-will.” And why so much gratitude for the mother’s faithful discipline?
Doubtless because the child regarded it as preparatory to the submission of her
will to God, and thus instrumental of her salvation.
Family religion
Religion in thy house must of necessity be minded, or the whole
family is cursed. The naturalists observe of the eagle that, building her nest
on high, she is much maligned by a venomous serpent called parias, which,
because it cannot reach to the nest, maketh to the windward, and breathes out
its poison, so that the air being infected, the eagle’s young may be destroyed;
but by way of prevention, the eagle, by a natural instinct, keepeth a kind of
agate stone in her nest, which, being placed against the wind, preserveth her
young. Satan, the crooked serpent, is ever busy to poison the air in thine
house, and thereby to destroy thyself, servants, and whole household. The only
stone for prevention is to set up religion. (G. Swinnock.)
Parental example
The ancient Romans were accustomed to place the busts of their
distinguished ancestors in the vestibules of their houses, that they might be
continually reminded of their noble deeds. They supposed that a recollection of
their illustrious virtues would lead to the imitation of the same by all the
living members of their households. There is no doubt that the influence of
this practice was most happy upon the living, awakening in many breasts high
and noble aspirations. At any rate, history records the names of many renowned
Romans who descended from the families in which this custom was observed. The
young grew up to reverence the worthies whose statues they daily saw, and to
emulate the virtues which gave their ancestors such lasting fame. In these days
we have no busts of honoured ancestors in the porches of our dwellings; but we
have something more impressive. The characters of living parents are constantly
presented for the imitation of children. Their example is continually sending
forth a silent power to mould young hearts for good or ill; not for a single
month or year, but through the whole impressible period of childhood and youth,
the influence of parental example is thus felt. If it be constituted of the
highest and purest elements, the results will be unspeakably, precious. Sons
and daughters will become patterns of propriety and goodness, because their
parents are such.
Family prayer
In Greenland, when a stranger knocks at the door, he asks, “Is God
in this house?” and if they answer “Yes,” he enters. Reader, this little
messenger knocks at your door with the Greenland salutation, Is God in this
house? Were you, like Abraham, entertaining an angel unawares, what would be
the report he would take back to heaven? Would he find you commanding your
children and your household, and teaching them the way of the Lord? Would he
find an altar in your dwelling? Do you worship God with your children?. . . If
not, then God is not in your house. A prayerless family is a Godless family . .
. I have sometimes seen family worship in great houses; but I have felt that
God was quite as near when I knelt with a praying family on the earthen floor
of their cottage. I have known of social worship among the reapers in a barn.
It used to be common in the fishing-boats upon the friths and lakes of
Scotland. I have heard of its being observed in the depths of a coal-pit. I
scarcely know the situation in life in which a willing family might not
contrive to pray together. If you live in a scoffing, ungodly neighbourhood, so
much the better. Abraham built his altar whilst the heathen Canaanites looked
on. He lifted up a testimony for God, and God honoured him, so that Abimelech,
his neighbour, was constrained to say, “God is with thee in all that thou
doest.” (J. Hamilton, D. D.)
What the religious man is to his family
The religious man may be considered in his family as the keystone
to the arch of a building, which binds and holds all the parts of the edifice
together. If this keystone be remover!, the fabric will tumble to the ground,
and all the parts be separated from each other. Or he is to his family as the
good shepherd, under whose protection and care the flock may go in and out and
find pasture; but when the shepherd is smitten, the sheep will be scattered. (H.
G.Salter.)
Christian example
The Christian parent ought to be a living exemplification of
Christianity. His house, his habits, his associates, his pursuits, his
recreations, ought all to be so regulated as to evince that religion is,
indeed, the parent of order, the inspirer of good sense, the well-spring of
good humour, the teacher of good manners, and the perennial source of happiness
and peace. (Bp. Jebb.)
Parental instruction
A prison chaplain gives it as his experience that “ the last thing
forgotten in all the recklessness of dissolute profligacy is the prayer or hymn
taught by a mother’s lips, or uttered at a father’s knee; and where there seems
to have been any pains bestowed even by one parent to train up a child aright,
there is in general more than ordinary ground for hope.”
Moulding human character; a noble work
Raphael did well, and Phidias did well; but it is not painter or
sculptor who is making himself most nobly immortal. It is he who is making true
impressions upon the mind of man; frescoes for eternity, that will not shine
out till the light of heaven reveals them; sculptures, not wrought in outward
things, but in the inward nature and character of the soul. (H. W. Beecher.)
Young should be trained to attendance at public worship
The question is often asked how shall we get our working-classes
to attend public worship? The answer may be supplied by an incident of my
boyhood. On the mantelshell of my grandmother’s best parlour, among other
marvels, was an apple in a phial. It quite filled up the body of the bottle,
and my wondering inquiry was, “How could it have been got into its place?” By
stealth I climbed a chair to see if the bottom would unscrew, or if there had
been a join in the glass throughout the length of the phial. I was satisfied by
careful observation that neither of these theories could be supported, and the
apple remained to me an enigma and a mystery. But as it was said of that other
wonder, the source of the Nile, “Nature well known, no mystery remains,” so was
it here. Walking in the garden I saw a phial placed on a tree bearing within it
a tiny apple, which was growing within the crystal; now I saw it all; the apple
was put into the bottle while it was little and grew there. (C. H. Spurgeon.)
Verse 20
Because the cry of Sodom and Gomorrah is great, and because their
sin is very grievous
God’s judgment on Sodom
I.
The
vale of Sodom was a region blooming and smiling in all the riches of nature; ON
EVERY HAND THERE WAS SOMETHING TO RAISE THE THOUGHTS TO THE CREATOR. But amidst
all this, what was man? His wickedness was so aggravated and extreme, that the
region itself was doomed to perish with its inhabitants. Sin still infects the
fair field of nature, and it is this which spoils the beauty of the scene. If
all the sin in the world could become a visible thing, it would blast and
overpower in our view all the beauty of nature. The sin of Sodom was so
aggravated that its cry went up to heaven, and the righteous Governor was
obliged to manifest Himself.
II. It is
impossible not to be struck with THE CALMNESS AND QUIETNESS WITH WHICH THE WORK
OF VENGEANCE PROCEEDED. Three persons came on a friendly visit to Abraham. They
accepted his hospitality; spoke with him on a matter of complacent
interest--the renewed assurance of his posterity. Then “the men rose up from
thence and looked toward Sodom.” We are left in the dark as to one circumstance
here. Only two of the persons went on to Sodom, leaving Abraham to converse
with the Almighty. The third disappears from our view--unless he was a
manifestation of the Divine Being Himself, and the same that Abraham conversed
with in that solemn character.
III. Notice WHAT
VALUE THE LORD MUST SET ON THE RIGHTEOUS, when for the sake of ten such men He
would have spared Sodom. Only one righteous man dwelt in Sodom, and he was
saved.
IV. THE PRECISE
MANNER OF THE FEARFUL CATASTROPHE IS BEYOND OUR CONJECTURE. It would seem that
an earthquake either accompanied or followed it, but the “fire from heaven” is
intimated as the grand chief agent of the destruction. The people of Sodom had
no time for speculations; there was just time for terror and conscience and
despair. Yet our Lord says there is a still greater guilt, a more awful
destruction even than theirs. The man that lives and dies rejecting Him had
better have been exposed to the rain of fire and brimstone and gone down in the
gulf of the vale of Siddim. (Y. Foster.)
Lessons from Sodom
I. Notice FIRST
THE WORDS OF GOD WHICH INTRODUCE THIS HISTORY. “Because the cry of Sodom and
Gomorrah is great,” &c. Behind this human manner of speaking what a lesson
if; here! The judgments of God from time to time overtake guilty nations and
guilty men; but, huge and overwhelming catastrophes as these often are, there
is nothing hasty, blind, precipitate about them. He is evermore the same God
who, when the cry of Sodom and Gomorrah waxed great, is described as going down
to see and inquire whether they had “done altogether according to the cry of
it.”
II. In God’s
assurance to Abraham that if there are fifty, forty, thirty, twenty, or even
ten righteous men found in the city He will not destroy it, we may recognize a
very important law of His government of the world: this, namely,--THAT IT IS
NOT THE PRESENCE OF EVIL BUT THE ABSENCE OF GOOD WHICH BRINGS THE
LONG-SUFFERING OF GOD TO AN END. However corrupt any fellowship of men may he,
however far gone in evil, yet so long as there is a sound, healthy kernel in it
of righteous men, that is, of men who love and fear God and will witness for God,
there is always hope.
III. This promise
of God, “I will not destroy it for ten’s sake,” SHOWS US WHAT RIGHTEOUS MEN,
LOVERS AND DOERS OF THE TRUTH, ARE. They are as the lightning conductors,
drawing aside the fiery bolts of His vengeance, which would else have long
since scorched, shattered, and consumed a guilty world. Oftentimes, it may be,
they are little accounted of among men, being indeed the hidden ones of God
crying in their secret places for the things which are done against the words
of God’s lips. The world may pass them, may know nothing of them, yet it is for
their sakes that the world is endured and continues unto this day,
IV. Does not this
remind us of one duty on behalf of others which we might effectually fulfil if
a larger measure of grace dwelt in our hearts?--I MEAN THE DUTY OF PRAYER AND
INTERCESSION FOR OTHERS. Prayer for others is never lost, is never in vain;
often by it we may draw down blessing upon others, but always and without fail
it will return in blessing on ourselves. (Archbishop Trench.)
Sodom
I. SODOM’S
SINFULNESS. Her sins were committed amidst an unbounded flush of prosperity;
they were committed amidst scenes of much natural loveliness, Nature being
outraged before the eye of her most beautiful forms: and they were committed
not only in opposition to Nature’s silent, but to God’s spoken, warnings.
II. SODOM’S
WARNINGS. One was given by the entrance of Lot within its gates; another was
given by the advent of Chedorlaomer and the invaders from the east. Abraham and
Melchizedek cast their sublime and awful shadows from the King’s Dale southward
upon Gomorrah’s walls; but the sinners within felt not the hallowing sense of
their presence, trembled not at the steps of their majesty.
III. SODOM’S
INTERCESSOR. Abraham’s prayer shows--
1. The confidence that existed between himself and God.
2. It shows God’s personal knowledge of evil.
3. It shows God’s reluctance to punish.
4. It gives proof of the tremendous guilt of Sodom.
IV. This terrible
catastrophe lies in A BYE-PATH OF THE DIVINE PROCEDURE it did not relate
immediately to the general course of the patriarchal dispensation; and yet what
an awful “aside” did the fall of these cities utter. It must have struck
Abraham with a new sense of the evil of sin and of the holiness and justice of
God. (G. Gilfillan.)
I. THEY ARE
PRECEDED BY A LONG HISTORY OF WICKEDNESS.
1. The shedding of innocent blood (Genesis 4:10; Job 16:18).
2. The peculiar sin of Sodom.
3. The oppression of the people of God.
4. Withholding the hire of the labourer (James 5:4).
God’s judgments on nations
II. THEY ARE
MANIFESTLY RIGHTEOUS.
1. They proceed slowly.
2. They are only inflicted when the reasons of them have been made
evident.
3. They are self-vindicating. (T. H. Leale.)
The depravity of Sodom
We have to speak, then, of Sodom’s sinfulness. Delicacy may seem
to repel us from such a subject altogether, but there is a false as well as a
true delicacy, which, by passing by sin in silence, gives it an amnesty, and
suggests the thought of its repetition. Had the sin of Sodom been confined to
that people, and had it been rooted out with the guilty cities, it would almost
have been sacrilege against human nature to dig it up from the slush of the sea
of death, and expose it to the world. But alas I it still exists even in
Christian nations, and requires still to be denounced. Had there been but one
prevalent evil practice in Sodom, there is something so disgusting, and at the
same time comparatively so rare, in the sin which bears the name of the city,
that it might have been as well, perhaps, to have passed it over in silence.
But it is evident that the peculiar iniquity of Sodom was only the climax and
consummation of the general depravity of the place. This is clear, both from
the general principles of human nature, and from certain distinct declarations
in the Word of God. We are told that “pride, fulness of bread, and abundance of
idleness,” were the sins, or rather were sins producing the flagrant and fatal
sin of Sodom; and no doubt along with these every species of excess and licentiousness
abounded, so that the city formed, with the exception of Lot and his family,
one blot on the face of the earth; and we can conceive of a visitor shuddering
with horror, as, passing through it at eventide in haste, he in this street
hears cries, faint and half-sincere, of “Father, force me not I” and in
another, finds men and women staggering in their vomit; and in a third, hears
men cursing Jehovah, and cursing Lot, and cursing Abraham; and in a fourth,
sees obscene dances; and in a fifth, beholds many plunging into the fires of an
idol-sacrifice. All this, and more than this, which dares not even be shadowed
out in expression, might have been seen in this fearful city, running over as a
great caldron of iniquity, and coming to a point in that sin for which its
inhabitants are set forth for an example, “suffering the vengeance of eternal
fire.” It added to the aggravation of these sins, that they were committed
amidst an unbounded flush of prosperity; that they were committed amidst scenes
of much natural loveliness, nature being outraged before the eye of her most
beautiful forms; and that they were committed not only in opposition to
nature’s silent, but to God’s uttered protest. (G. Gilfillan.)
Sodom and its sin
Sodom itself stood not only in the alluvium of a river bed, but on
a main highway for land carriage between Babylon and Egypt. The natural
consequences of such a position followed fast. When Ezekiel in his analysis of
its decline calls “fulness of bread,” comes without toil to a population so
favourably situated. Wealth flowed in. With wealth easily acquired came
“abundance of idleness”; and with leisure and wealth came luxury, their
daughter. Then followed pride, the insolence of the pampered; at last,
self-indulgence and shameless licence. Possibly the time had not yet arrived
for the cultivation of those adornments which lend dignity to wealth, and serve
even to veil the deformity of dissolute manners; of letters, I mean, and of the
arts. Possibly the race was not endowed by nature with such gifts. At any rate,
we detect no signs of such a degree of culture or refinement as has always
accompanied civilization among Aryan peoples. The early civilization of the
Hamitic tribes seems to have been of a vulgar material type, and to have fallen
a speedy prey to vice and corruption. How far that corruption had gone in the
case of Sodom is only too apparent on the face of the narrative. Disgusting and
unnatural lust has been the plague-spot of heathenism in other times, as well
as of at least one Moslem race in our own. But it never carried itself with
such effrontery, or showed its vileness so openly, as in the town which has
given it a name. Wherever it has appeared, it has marked a stage of social
degradation ripe for destruction. Four hundred years after Sodom, other
Canaanite tribes in Palestine had become infected with it, till the land was
ready, in the strong words of Leviticus, to “spue them out.” Its prevalence in
Greece when St. Paul wrote his letter to the Church of Rome showed how near Greece
was to its fall. What it means in the case of the Turk, we are seeing to-day
with our eyes. Unnatural vice fills the cup of iniquity to overflowing. It
sends up a “cry” to heaven that the righteous Judge must answer. (J.
O.Dykes, D. D.)
Abraham stood yet before
the Lord
Abraham’s intercession for
Sodom
The intercession of
Abraham is the first prayer that the Bible records; and in its great characteristics,
human and spiritual, it is one of the most remarkable.
It is the intercession of a good man, a friend of God, for men who, in their
wickedness and their defiance of God, had well-nigh approached the utmost
possibilities of human evil.
I. A MAN’S PRAISE
POWER IS NOT AN ARBITRARY THING IT IS THE RESULT OF LONG ANTECEDENT SPIRITUAL
PROCESSES. It is very significant that it is Abraham and not Lot who is the
intercessor for Sodom.
1. Jehovah does not even impart His confidence to Lot; only at the
last moment, when all is determined, He mercifully sends His messengers to
bring him to a place of safety.
2. Even supposing Lot had been made acquainted with Jehovah’s
purpose, he would not have been capable of interceding for Sodom as Abraham
did. He had not the requisite spiritual qualifications. There was spiritual
life in Lot, but it ever leaned to the worldly side of things. There was
spiritual life in Abraham, but it leaned to the heavenly side of things.
II. THE PRAYING
POWER OF MAN IS CONDITIONED UPON THE CIRCUMSTANCES BY WHICH HE SURROUNDS
HIMSELF. Abraham was at Mamre; Lot in Sodom.
III. EVEN WHEN GOD
VOUCHSAFES TO VISIT A MAN, MUCH OF HIS SPIRITUAL BLESSING DEPENDS ON HIS
CHARACTER AND CIRCUMSTANCES.
IV. IT IS
INSTRUCTIVE TO COMPARE THE INTERCESSION OF ABRAHAM WITH THE PLEADINGS OF LOT
WHEN THE ANGELS SOUGHT TO DELIVER HIM. The prayer of Abraham is perfect in its
humility, when daring in its boldness. The prayer of Lot is troubled, selfish,
and self-willed.
V. There is one
contrast more, which is very suggestive. THE NARROW, SELFISH, SELF-WILLED
PRAYER OF LOT WAS ANSWERED THE HOLY, CHRIST-LIKE INTERCESSION OF ABRAHAM WAS
UNAVAILING. Therefore it is no criterion of a right or wrong prayer, that it
does not receive the kind of answer we solicit. (H. Allen.)
Abraham pleading for Sodom
I. ABRAHAM’S
INTERCESSION WAS THE RESULT OF A DIVINE COMMUNICATION (Genesis 18:17-18). The Spirit of truth inspires men to pray by showing them things
to come. It is asserted by Dr. Finney that there are three ways in which God
still makes communications to men: first, by the express promises and
predictions of the Bible; second, through the movements of His providence; and
third, by His Spirit, instructing us and making intercession for us, because we
know not what to pray for as we ought. When we are thus moved to pray, we pray
according to the will of God.
II. THE
PATRIARCH’S PRAYER WAS GROUNDED ON A CONVICTION OF GOD’S CHANGELESS RECTITUDE (see
Genesis 18:25). “It is,” as one says, “man beseeching that right may prevail;
that it may prevail among men: by destruction, if that must be; by the infusion
of a new life, if it is possible. It is man asking that the gracious order of
God may be victorious, in such a way as He knows best, over the disorder which
His rebellious creatures have striven to establish in His universe. The mercy
which is prayed for is not an exception from righteousness, but the fruit of
it.” Any other prayer must be a mockery and an abomination in the sight of God.
Any other prayer is an insinuation that man is a better being than his Maker.
III. ABRAHAM’S
PRAYER WAS DEFINITE. He had many flocks and herds, men-servants and
women-servants; yet he asked only that the inhabitants of those guilty cities
might be spared. His one request he made known in simple, straightforward
language, speaking with God as a man talks with his friend. This is the
character of most of the prayers recorded in the Bible.
IV. ABRAHAM’S
PRAYER CONSTANTLY ENLARGED ITSELF. He asked for more and more: first, that the
city should be spared for the sake of fifty righteous men, then for the sake of
forty-five, then for forty, for thirty, for twenty, and for ten. There he
paused. A whole city would have been spared for the sake of ten righteous men.
God tempts His children to ask large blessings. We make too small demands on
His mercy and goodness.
V. ABRAHAM’S
PRAYER WAS INSPIRED BY THE HOLY SPIRIT, The impulse came from above. As the
strings of an AEolian harp are breathed upon by the winds of heaven and made to
send forth sounds of an almost unearthly sweetness in swelling and dying
cadences, so the mute faculties of the human soul are made vocal: unspoken
thoughts become articulate in prayers and intercessions, according to the will
of God; in supplications and thanksgivings; nay, even in deep sighings and
groanings that utter themselves forth with supernatural sweetness and power, expressing
the mind of the Spirit and the will of God. (E. B. Mason, D.D.)
Abraham’s intercession
I. THE MARVELLOUS
CONDESCENSIONS OF GOD.
1. He has friends among men.
2. He reveals to His friends His plans, His hidden purposes.
II. GOD TESTS THE
WICKEDNESS OF MEN TO SHOW WHETHER OR NOT IT IS RIPE FOR JUDGMENT.
III. THIS NARRATIVE
DISCLOSES IMPORTANT TRUTHS CONCERNING, INTERCESSORY PRAYER. The first solemn
prayer on record is an intercession, a plea for sparing a wicked city. We see
here:
1. The encouragements to intercessory prayer. God made known to
Abraham what He was about to do, and thus invited his intercession. He has made
known to us the purposes of His government. He has disclosed the issues of sin
and holiness. Does He not thus invite us to intercede with Him in behalf of
sinful men?
2. We see here the qualifications for intercessory prayer. Power in
prayer is in proportion to holiness. The best men are nearest to God, and most
powerful in prayer. Faith strengthened his petition. Humility made his approval
pleasing to God. Charity enforced his plea. Earnestness characterized his
intercession.
3. We see here the grounds for intercessor, y prayer. Abraham did
not approach God thoughtlessly, or without good reasons which he was prepared
to plead. He urged the value of righteousness. He also urged God’s perfect
justice as a reason for his petition. God would not destroy the innocent with
the guilty. The Almighty is pleased to invite us to urge upon Him reasons for
granting our requests, though they are at the beginning perfectly plain to Him.
If to these reasons we add also His mercy displayed in the sacrifice of Christ,
may not our prayers be irresistible?
IV. WE LEARN THAT
THERE ARE LIMITATIONS TO INTERCESSORY PRAYER. Why did not Abraham ask that the
judgment be averted from Sodom for the sake of five righteous men? God draws
out from him the inanity of his intercessory spirit; and as the suppliant
approach up nearer acquaintance with God, he gains a better understanding of
the Divine judgments. He is led to a new insight into the condition of Sodom,
and the forbearance and justice of God. Abraham appears at first to have been
shocked at the destruction with which God threatened Sodom. His justice had not
been outraged. His love had not been abused. But intimate communion with God
reconciled him to the punishment which God inflicted. The point at which he
ceased to plead came sooner than we might have expected. But the failure of his
intercession, if he regarded it as a failure, resulted from his ignorance of
the depths of sin, and an inadequate conception of the mercy of God. Men are
often shocked at God’s threatened punishment of the wicked. But the true way to
comprehend the meaning of His threats is, not to argue against the justice of
God, not to explain away His threatenings, and presume to interpret them in
violation of the ordinary laws of language; but go and plead with Him for the
lost, and as you approach nearer to Him in the increasing earnestness of
petition, you shall gain such clearer insight into His wisdom and mercy as
shall content you with His purposes. (A. E. Dunning.)
Intercessory prayer
I. THE RIGHT TO
UTTER IT PRESUPPOSES A LIFE OF GODLINESS.
II. IT IS
SUPPORTED BY THE THOUGHT OF THE DIVINE JUSTICE.
III. IT IS MARKED
BY THE SPIRIT OF BOLDNESS.
1. This boldness was based upon the conviction that God would stay
judgment upon wicked communities for the sake of the righteous few among them.
2. This boldness was based upon a sense of the Fatherhood of God.
Without a sense of this filial relationship with God no man could presume so
much.
3. This boldness is tempered by humility. Abraham speaks as one who
can hardly realize his right to speak at all (Genesis 18:27). He remembers what he is in the sight of his Creator. Our high
privilege does not destroy the reasons for awe and reverence.
IV. WE MUST
RECOGNIZE THE FACT THAT IT HAS PROPER LIMITS.
1. The moral limits of the Divine clemency. The long-suffering and forbearance
of God may be tempted too far,
2. By a sense of what is due to the Divine honour. The dignity of
God’s character and government must be upheld.
3. By our recognition of the Divine sovereignty. God rules all
things supremely by a righteous will. It is not given to us to adjust the exact
proportions of justice and mercy in God’s dealings with mankind. To attempt
this would be presumption.
4. By the confidence which we ought to have in the Divine character.
Abraham felt that he had no need to go further. He had seen enough already of
God’s favour and willingness to save. Therefore he might hope and trust for the
future. (T. H. Leale.)
Pleading for Sodom
I. THE BURDEN OF
THE DIVINE ANNOUNCEMENT.
II. THE IMPRESSION
WHICH THIS ANNOUNCEMENT MADE ON ABRAHAM’S MIND.
1. There was a natural anxiety about his kinsman, Lot.
2. There was also a fear lest the total destruction of the cities of
the plain might prejudice the character of God in the minds of the neighbouring
peoples.
III. THE ELEMENTS
OF ABRAHAM’S INTERCESSION.
1. It was lonely prayer.
2. It was prolonged prayer.
3. It was very humble prayer.
4. This prayer was based on a belief that God possessed the same
moral intuitions as himself.
5. This prayer was persevering.
IV. OBSERVE ONE OF
THE GREAT PRINCIPLES IN THE DIVINE GOVERNMENT OF THE WORLD. A whole city had
been spared if ten righteous men had been found within its walls. Ungodly men
little realize how much they owe to the presence of the children of God in
their midst. (F. B. Meyer, B. A.)
Intercessory prayer
I. THIS IS THE
ENERGETIC ENERGIZING (LITERAL FOR “EFFECTUAL”) PRAYER OF THE RIGHTEOUS
(CHRISTIAN) MAN. In ingenuity, in a kind of dialectic skill where logic is
spiritualized by devotion, and reasons step by step, it is the mate and type of
the cry of the woman out of the coasts of Canaan, “That be far from Thee to do
after this manner, to slay the righteous with the wicked;” and then, carrying
the moral argument deeper yet, “and that the righteous should be as the wicked,
that be far from Thee.” How well this clear-sighted man knew, how much better
than some of us “advanced” nineteenth-century Christians know, what kind of a
God God is! How vivid the figures! How real the action! How intense the
personality! “Anthropomorphism”? Very well: why not? The yearning, aching heart
of a mother, of a loving friend, of a true patriot, of a shepherd-king whose
descendants, herds and flock lie asleep around him in the pastures every night
while he leans on his staff and talks with the Almighty, is not to be
frightened by ultra-spiritualism with a Greek polysyllable. The first chapter
of St. John ought to exorcise that phantom. What is “the Word made flesh” but
anthropomorphism--God in man’s form? What faith foresaw and prophecy foretold,
the incarnation has made a fact; and thereby prayer becomes what otherwise it
could never be--one part in a dialogue, one voice in an antiphon, a
conversation between earth and heaven.
II. A CHIEF
BLESSEDNESS OF INTERCESSORY PRAYER IS THAT WE CAN USE IT FOR THOSE WHOM WE LOVE
AND CARE FOR WHEN WE CAN SERVE THEM IN NO OTHER WAY. Their distance, their very
nearness, their unbelief, their pride, their dignity, their resentments, their
desperation, may render our other helps--helps of the hand or tongue, of
counsel or cheer or warning--of the most delicate generality or the friendliest
sympathy, impossible or futile. We stand by the sufferer, the blind wanderer,
the ungrateful child, the hardened sinner, in speechless agony and dismay. The
patriarch doubtless felt that to go down into Sodom and preach against sodomy
would be waste, or worse. But there is one gracious benefaction which no
possible hindrance can stay; one gracious office which cannot lose its grace by
opposition, or apathy, or rejection, or scorn; one heavenly charity which we
can bestow at our own free will, everywhere, under all outward conditions, in
spite of any infirmity or rebuff or discouragement, in health or sickness, by
ejaculation or continued entreaty, as long as we live.
III. Notice THE
JOINING OF THE TWO BRANCHES OF THE CHRISTIAN LOVE,
THE LOVE OF THE BROTHER
MAN WITH THE LOVE OF THE FATHER. (Bishop F. D. Hutington.)
Abraham’s intercession for
Sodom
Next to being concerned
about his own safety, a good man will be anxious that others should be saved.
The Bible contains several examples of this benevolent anxiety. Thus Jeremiah Jeremiah 9:1; Jeremiah 13:17; Jeremiah 14:17), Isaiah (Isaiah 23:4), Lot (2 Peter 2:7-8), &c., &c. The reasons are clear.
1. A good man cannot forget his own past life.
2. He has now a clear view of the nature and effects of sin.
3. He desires the extension of the kingdom of God. Hence his
intercession for Sodom was--
I. MARKED BY
GREAT IMPORTUNITY. Importunity an element of successful prayer. Jacob wrestled
till the break of day. The blind man (Mark 10:48) cried “so much the more.” Our Lord enforced importunity in His
teachings (Luke 18:1; see also Luke 11:5; Luke 21:36; Ro Ephesians 6:18; Colossians 4:2; 1 Thessalonians 5:17). Abraham was importunate. Prayed six times,
and obtained six distinct answers.
II. CHARACTERIZED
BY WONDERFUL HUMILITY.
1. Did not presume upon the distinguished relation in which he stood
to God. Always referred his request to the will and character of God. He prayed
because a good man ought to pray; not because being good he deserved to be
answered.
2. Acknowledged he was but “dust and ashes” in the presence of God.
The Pharisee and the Publican.
III. FILLED WITH
LOFTY REGARD FOR THE CHARACTER OF GOD.
1. He assumed that the wicked ought to be punished. Of this he
expresses no doubt. Adopts this as the inevitable determination of infinite
justice. Yet earnestly desires that the righteous may be spared. Would have men
know that the righteous God distinguished between the good and the bad. Would
rather the wicked should be mercifully spared than that the righteous should be
unrighteously destroyed.
IV. SIGNALIZED BY
A WIDE CHARITY. Would fain believe that there were fifty righteous souls even
in Sodom (comp. with those who thought that nothing good could come out of
Nazareth). Still clung to the hope that there might be some, however few, good
men in that vile place. Charity hopeth all things. Would sooner believe too
much that was good of Sodom than too little.
V. DISTINGUISHED
BY PROFOUND ACQUIESCENCE IN THE WILL OF GOD. Was afraid to go beyond that will.
“Suffer me to speak,” &c. Went as far as he felt that he dared. Found, as
he proceeded, that God would be merciful as well as just; even to the worst.
Was willing to save many for the sake of a few (see Matthew 13:28-29). LEARN--
1. TO pity sinners, and hate sin.
2. To prize the righteous. “The salt of the earth.”
3. To intercede for one’s own house especially (Job 1:5). (J. C. Gray.)
Four great facts
In this passage there are
four great facts which should be borne in mind by Christian thinkers and
teachers.
I. That God holds
inquest upon the moral condition of cities.
II. That God is
accessible to earnest human appeal.
III. That the few
can serve the many.
IV. That human
prayer falls below Divine resources. (J. Parker, D. D.)
Intercession
What do most of us know of
the value and meaning of intercession? I speak of intercession in its human
aspect. And I begin by asking you to confess that you know but little of it as
a part of prayer: that most of us, when we have prayed, as we may, more or less
fully and earnestly, for ourselves, have done praying; that, whether we feel
much or little interest in prayer for ourselves, we feel less or none in prayer
for others not ourselves. And in contrast with this admission, it must have
struck all of you how very much of intercession there is in our public
services--how much in proportion to the other kind of prayer. I might almost
say that of prayer directly for ourselves there is but little in the public
worship of our Church, following, in this respect as in others, alike the
direction of the inspired Scriptures and the example of more ancient Christian
Churches. I fear that this is sometimes felt by us to be a drawback to the
spiritual character of our congregational devotions. We should like more about
ourselves. Even our Lord’s own form of prayer has too little about ourselves
for our taste. For “our” and “us” we should read “my” Father, “my” daily bread,
“my” trespasses, lead “me,” deliver “me.” Next in order amongst our
intercessions we place the ministers of God’s Word and sacraments, and the
congregations in which they are appointed to conduct that ministry. Thus far we
have thought rather of the work of life, the work of rulers, and the work of pastors,
and the work of Christians generally; praying that each and all may do that
work effectively, and not forget in doing it that, whatever it be, it is the
work of God. But now in the last place we are taught to think of the other half
of life--its sufferings. I have briefly spoken to you of some of the topics
suitable to intercession. Let me not end without a word or two as to the
motives by which we should be drawn to it. And I can suffer none to compete in
importance with this, the most obvious of all; that all such prayers have a
special assurance of acceptance and success. They are, indeed, even more than
other prayers, conformable to the mind of God. They are unselfish prayers. It
is the recorded experience of one at least who knew what he thus testified,
that he had often proved the value of intercessory prayer in its reaction upon
other prayer and upon the heart. Often when he knelt down cold and indifferent,
unable to brace himself to strong spiritual effort in his own behalf, he
bethought himself of another--a friend or a sister--and prayed earnestly to God
not for his own but for what he knew to be another’s want. And never did he do
so without finding himself in no long time released from darkness and bondage,
and able to pour out his whole heart, for himself also, with a fervour and
happiness which a few moments before had seemed to be impossible. Let us try
this experiment. When we know not how to pray, let us intercede. When the
chamber of prayer is fastened within us, let the key of intercession be used to
unlock it. I need not say to any one what the effect of intercessory prayer
must be in its influence upon our spirit and conduct towards him, or towards
those, who have been the subject of it. What a spirit of kindliness, of
friendly interest, of concern in their best and truest welfare, must it kindle
within us! How shall we watch over them and towards them for good! How anxious
shall we be to see good, how fearful of communicating evil! How it pledges us
to the recollection of their souls, and lays us under a double responsibility
not to counteract our own desires, our own efforts, in their behalf! Finally, I
must add that intercession is a Divine work, and that, in practising it, we are
sharers with Christ and with the Holy Spirit in that which is at once their
chosen office and our one hope. When we pray for another, we are doing that,
through Christ’s merits, which it is our happiness to think that He is doing
for us through His own. (Dean Vaughan.)
The intercourse of God and
His friend
I. THE FRIEND OF
GOD CATCHES A GLEAM OF DIVINE PITY AND TENDERNESS. Communion with the very
Source of all gentle love has softened his heart, and he yearns over the wicked
and fated city. Where else than from his heavenly Friend could he have learned
this sympathy? The friend of God must be the friend of men; and if they be
wicked, and he sees the frightful doom which they do not see, these make his
pity the deeper. Abraham does not contest the justice of the doom. He lives too
near his friend not to know that sin must mean death. The effect of friendship
with God is not to make men wish that there were no judgments for evil-doers,
but to touch their hearts with pity, and to stir them to intercession and to
effort for their deliverance.
II. THE FRIEND OF
GOD HAS ABSOLUTE TRUST IN THE RECTITUDE OF HIS ACTS. Abraham’s remonstrance, if
we may call it so, embodies some thoughts about the government of God in the
world which should be pondered. His first abrupt question, flung out without
any reverential preface, assumes that the character of God requires that the
fate of the righteous should be distinguished from that of the wicked. Another
assumption in his prayer is that the righteous are sources of blessing and
shields for the wicked. Has he there laid hold of a true principle? Certainly;
it is indeed the law that “every man shall bear his own burden,” but that law
is modified by the operation of this other, of which God’s providence is full.
Many a drop of blessing trickles from the wet fleece to the dry ground. Many a
stroke of judgment is carried off harmlessly by the lightning conductor. The
truest “saviours of society” are the servants of God. A third principle is
embodied in the solemn question, “Shall not the Judge of all the earth do
right? He is Judge of all the earth, and therefore bound by His very nature, as
by His relations to men, to do nothing that cannot be pointed to as inflexibly
right. But true as the principle is, it needs to be guarded. Abraham himself is
an instance that men’s conceptions of right do not completely correspond to the
reality. His notion of “right” was, in some particulars, as his life shows,
imperfect, rudimentary, and far beneath New Testament ideas. Conscience needs
education. The best men’s conceptions of what befits Divine justice are
relative, progressive; and a shifting standard is no standard. It becomes us to
be very cautious before we say to God, “This is the way: walk Thou in it”; or
dismiss any doctrine as untrue on the ground of its contradicting our instincts
of justice.
III. THE FRIEND OF
GOD HAS POWER WITH GOD. “Shall I hide from Abraham that thing which I do?” The
Divine Friend recognizes the obligation of confidence. True friendship is
frank, and cannot bear to hide its purposes. On the human side, we are here taught
the great truth that God’s friends are intercessors, whose voice has a
mysterious but most real power with God. If it be true that, in general terms,
the righteous are shields and sources of blessing to the unholy, it is still
more distinctly true that they have access to God’s secret place with petitions
for others as well as for themselves. The desires which go up to God, like the
vapours exhaled to heaven, fall in refreshing rain on spots far away from that
whence they rose. In these days we need to keep fast hold of our belief in the
efficacy of prayer for others and for ourselves. God knows Himself and the laws
of His government a great deal better than anybody else does; and He has
abundantly shown us in His Word, and by many experiences, that breath spent in
intercession is not wasted. In these old times, when worship was mainly
sacrificial, this wonderful instance of pure intercession meets us, an
anticipation of later times. And from thence onwards there has never failed
proof to those who will look for it, that God’s friends are true priests, and
help their brethren by their prayers. Our voices should “rise like a fountain
night and day” for men. But there is a secret distrust of the power and a
flagrantly plain neglect of the duty of intercession nowadays, which needs
sorely the lesson that God “remembered Abraham” and delivered Lot. Luther, in
his rough, strong way, says: “If I have a Christian who prays to God for me, I
will be of good courage, and be afraid of nothing. If I have one who prays
against me, I had rather have the Grand Turk for my enemy.” (A. Maclaren, D.
D.)
Abraham’s intercession for
Sodom
I. THE CLOSE
INTIMACY WHICH A GOOD MAN MAY HAVE WITH HIS MAKER. Three things indicate
Abraham’s closeness of intimacy.
1. He knew his Maker’s purpose.
2. He felt his Maker’s presence.
3. He heard his Maker’s voice.
II. THE WONDERFUL
INFLUENCE WHICH A GOOD MAN MAY HAVE OVER HIS MAKER. Abraham’s prayer was--
1. Definite.
2. Unselfish.
3. Trustful.
4. Humble.
5. Importunate.
Lessons:
1. The spiritual blessedness of a good man.
2. The social value of a good man. (Homilist.)
Abraham’s address to God
I. THE BEING WE
WORSHIP.
1. Infinitely great.
2. Incomprehensibly glorious.
3. Transcendently holy.
4. Unboundedly benevolent.
II. THE TRUE
CHARACTER OF THE BEST WORSHIPPERS. “Dust and ashes.” The terms seem to
indicate--
1. Our origin and mortality. Formed of the dust; residents of the
dust; travellers to the dust.
2. Our depravity. Dust and ashes. Ashes are only the refuse of what
was once more valuable. Now man is fallen, debased, and worthless.
III. IN WORSHIP GOD
ALLOWS US TO SPEAK UNTO HIM. Now, we do this--
1. In adoration and praise.
2. In confession of sin.
3. In supplication and prayer.
Abraham’s intercessory
prayer
I. CONTRASTS.
1. Abraham at Mature. Lot in Sodom.
2. The peaceful entertainment in the tent of Mamre. The disturbed
hospitality of Sodom.
3. The purity of country life--the corruptions of the city.
4. Abraham’s prayer for others--Lot’s prayer for himself.
5. Sodom was destroyed--Zoar was saved.
II. THE VALUE OF
INTERCESSORY PRAYER.
1. TO pray for others a duty.
2. To pray without discouragement.
3. Its value to others.
4. Its value to ourselves. Our religious life will register itself
in prayer.
III. THE RELATION
OF GOOD MEN TO THE WORLD.
1. They are “the salt of the earth” and “the light of the world.”
2. Cities and nations attain to true greatness and permanence when
they have righteous men in them.
3. With their decline, they decline; and with their extinction they
perish. Sodom was safe so long as Lot remained in it.
IV. LESSONS:
1. The unselfishness of a religious life.
2. To live near to God.
3. To make the right use of religious knowledge.
4. To run our prayers along the line of God’s character, and to base
them upon Divine precepts and promises.
5. That prayers may be denied in their letter, but answered in their
spirit. (Lewis O. Thompson.)
Abraham’s intercession
I. THE
SUPERINDUCING CIRCUMSTANCES OF ABRAHAM’S INTERCESSION.
1. Abraham’s characteristic courtesy.
2. The revelation of Divine purposes.
II. THE ARGUMENT
OF ABRAHAM’S INTERCESSION.
1. An appeal to Divine justice.
2. An appeal to Divine compassion.
III. THE REASON OF
THE FAILURE OF ABRAHAM’S INTERCESSION.
1. His intense humility, which would not allow him to go beyond a
certain limit.
2. His inadequate conception of Divine mercy.
3. His knowledge of the unworthiness of the Sodomites, for whom he
pleaded.
4. His spiritual conception of the demerit of sin, and of the
perfection of the Divine attribute of justice.
Lessons:
1. The possible important consequences of things trifling in
themselves: Abraham’s courtesy led to the most sublime scene of human
intercession on record.
2. The high estimate that God places upon family instruction.
3. God’s readiness to answer prayer is greater than the faith of the
greatest believer.
4. So long as Abraham interceded, so long Jehovah tarried to listen.
5. There is nothing more acceptable to God than the intercession of
His saints. (D. C. Hughes, M. A.)
Abraham’s intercession
1. Abraham makes a good use of his previous knowledge. Being made
acquainted with the evil coming upon them he stands in the gap, and labours all
he can to avert it. They knew nothing: and if they had, no cries, except the
shrieks of desperation, would have been heard from them. It is good having such
a neighbour as Abraham; and still better to have an Intercessor before the
throne who is always heard. The conduct of the patriarch furnishes an example
to all who have an interest at the throne of grace, to make use of it in behalf
of their poor ungodly countrymen and neighbours.
2. He does not plead that the wicked may be spared for their own
sake, or because it would be too severe a proceeding to destroy them; but for
the sake of the righteous who might be found amongst them. Had either of the
other pleas been advanced, it had been siding with sinners against God, which
Abraham would never do. Wickedness shuts the mouth of intercession; or if any
should presume to speak, it would be of no account. But how then, it may be
asked, did Christ make intercession for transgressors? Not by arraigning the
Divine throne, nor by alleging ought in extenuation of human guilt; but by
pleading His own obedience unto death!
3. He charitably hopes the best with respect to the number of
righteous characters even in Sodom. At the outset of his intercession, he
certainly considered it as a possible case, at least, that there might be found
in that wicked place fifty righteous: and though in this instance he was sadly
mistaken, yet we may hope from hence that in those times there were many more
righteous people in the world than those which are recorded in Scripture. The
Scriptures do not profess to be a book of life, containing the names of all the
faithful; but intimate, on the contrary, that God reserves to Himself a people,
who are but little known even by His own servants.
4. God was willing to spare the worst of cities for the sake of a
few righteous characters. This truth is as humiliating to the haughty enemies
of religion as it is encouraging to its friends, and furnishes an important
lesson to civil governments, to beware of undervaluing, and still more of
persecuting, and banishing men whose concern it is to live soberly, righteously,
and godly in the world. Except the Lord of Hosts had left us a remnant of such
characters, we might ere now have been as Sodom, and made like unto Gomorrah!
If ten righteous had been found in Sodom, it had been spared for their sakes:
but alas, there was no such number! God called Abraham to Haran, and when he
left that place, mention is made not only of “the substance which he had
gathered,” but of “the souls which he had gotten.” But Lot, who went to Sodom
of his own accord, though he also gathered substance, yet not a soul seems to
have been won over by his residence in the place to the worship of the true
God. (A. Fuller.)
The world’s obligation to
God’s saints
I. THE CERTAIN
DESTRUCTION OF THE WICKED which some people say they cannot believe, because
out of harmony with their notions of the character of God. God is determined on
the destruction of the cities of the plain, and all their inhabitants; and He
gives these reasons (Genesis 18:20)--“The cry of Sodom and Gomorrah is great, and their sin is very
grievous,” or heavy. Observe--
1. The cry was very great. A cry of blood, like that of Abel’s from
the ground, for vengeance against the murderer (Genesis 4:10). Murder, no doubt, was rife in Sodom; and He who had demanded
blood for blood, could not overlook it. A cry of proud defiance against God, as
represented Ezekiel 16:49-50; and that God knows too well what is due to
Himself to disregard. A
cry of oppression, injustice, and wrong. The cry of defrauded labourers, which
the Apostle James says, “enters into the ears of the Lord of Sabaoth” (James 5:4). A cry of cupidity, drunkenness, and revelry, such as went up to
Jehovah from those whom He had called to be His people, and to whom “He looked
for judgment, but beheld oppression; for righteousness, but beheld a cry” (Isaiah 5:7). And shall we not add, a cry from the vexed spirit of righteous
Lot--a cry of filial supplication mingling its music, so agreeable to the ears
of a loving Father, with the hoarse discord of angry passions and
self-inflicted woes? Doubtless that cry from Lot brought down the Omnipotent
avenger; and the accumulated cry from the multitude “which no man could
number,” of His blood-bought people, who have complained to Him of their
treatment from a Satan-ruled world, in every generation since, shall at last
bring Him down again, to teach the persecutors that they have persecuted not
them but Him Acts 9:4).
2. Their sin was very grievous, or heavy. Like a black cloud,
gathering increased density from accumulated vapours of human wickedness until
it becomes so charged with rain, thunder, lightning, and tempest, that it must
at length empty itself upon the devoted earth over which it lowers. Thus sin
cannot be suffered to press upon God’s creation for ever--sooner or later it
shall be removed, and all who have their life in it must perish.
3. The signal destruction of Sodom and her kindred cities was
resolved on. God is a Sovereign Judge and Ruler. To Him vengeance belongs. “He
can create and He destroy.” “To Me,” says God, “belongeth vengeance and
recompense” (Deuteronomy 32:35); and His people are taught to address Him in that character (see
Psalms 94:1); and shall we say that “God is unrighteous who taketh vengeance”?
(Romans 3:5). The sinner, in fighting against God, is labouring for his own
destruction.
II. THE CERTAIN
SALVATION OF THE RIGHTEOUS.
1. If this means those whom God shall find naturally righteous, when
He comes to take account of such as shall be saved, then the whole human race
must be excluded from its benefits, for never since the day of Adam’s fall, was
there a man, woman, or child on the earth whom God would or could admit to be
righteous in themselves
2. No inspired writer, either of the Old or New Testament, has
failed to describe man as a sinner, and far from righteousness.
3. And yet have God’s righteous ones, in every generation, had a
place and a mission in the earth. God speaks of them as actually existing human
beings. The Bible is full of their history, position, character, proceedings,
and prospects.
III. THE
FORBEARANCE OF GOD TOWARDS THE WICKED, FOR THE SAKE OF THE RIGHTEOUS, Under
this head we are called upon to consider--
1. That God has a people whom He calls peculiarly His own, mingled
among the mass of dead, ignorant, and ungodly human beings composing what is
called the world; just as righteous Lot was placed in Sodom, in the city, but
not of it, residing in the midst of its depraved inhabitants, yet not
identified with their wicked ways or deeds of darkness, “but rather reproving
them.” We have a perfect illustration of the external mingling, yet spiritual
separation, that exists between Christ’s redeemed ones and the subjects of
Satan’s rule in this world, in the parable of the tares and wheat, supplied by
our Lord for the instruction and consolation of His people in their present
state. And in referring to the value of intercessory prayer for our beloved country
at such a time as this. Abraham pleaded for Lot. He remembered him when God
announced to him the overthrow of Sodom, where Lot dwelt.
Observe:
1. Lot was dear to the heart of Abraham. He called him his brother Genesis 13:8; Genesis 14:14); and he probably thought there would have been found at least
ten righteous persons in his household, for whose sake Sodom would be spared.
Thus our Divine Mediator loves those whom “He is not ashamed to call His
brethren “ (Hebrews 2:11), and claims for their sake the suspension of Almighty judgment
pronounced against an apostate world.
2. Lot had accompanied Abraham out of the land of idolatry into the
land of promise. He was, therefore, identified with him in his pilgrimage
state, and this formed a link between them, which, notwithstanding their present
local separation, rendered them objects of tenderest interest to each other.
Thus Jesus included in Himself, on the cross, and at the sepulchre, all that
the Father had given to Him. They were crucified with Him, and they are risen
with Him (Romans 6:6; Colossians 2:12). Thus they are one with Him, and He is one with them.
3. But the tie between Abraham and Lot had been drawn still closer
by the devoted affection exhibited by the former in rescuing his kinsman from
the hands of the spoiler. Sodom had been attacked by the confederate kings,
taken, and pillaged. Lot and his family were carried away captives, and his
property fell into the hands of the conquerors. Abraham pursued the captors,
and at great risk to himself succeeded in delivering the objects of his
fraternal interest, and all that belonged to them, out of their hands. Our
Divine Champion has done more than this. He has sacrificed His precious life to
redeem His beloved ones from eternal captivity, and their inheritance from the
confiscation of Almighty justice. The link cannot be more close or inseparable
that binds them to their Deliverer and their Head.
4. Abraham obtained all that he desired--not impunity for the guilty
citizens of Sodom, but safety for righteous Lot. The Lord was merciful to Genesis 19:16). “I pray for them: I pray not for the world, but for them which
Thou hast given me; for they are Thine,” and ascribe their salvation from
present and eternal evil to the principle of unconditioned grace embodied in
that prayer; while feeling satisfied that, as regards God’s dealing with
nations or individual members of the human family, merely as such, “the Judge
of all the earth will do right” (Genesis 18:25). (S. A. Walker, M. A.)
A contrast, and a resemblance
No scene in English
history is more familiar to us from our childhood than that of Queen Philippa
kneeling at the feet of Edward III. to plead for the lives of the six burgesses
of Calais, who had brought the keys of the city to the conqueror, barefooted
and with halters round their necks, ready, by their own deaths, to save the
town from the sword. It is chiefly by contrast that this scene illustrates the
wonderful narrative now before us; but there is one point of resemblance upon
which I wish to lay stress. We may well contrast the cruel ferocity of King
Edward, as he cries, “Call the headsman! Cut off their heads!”--sending to
death venerable citizens whose only fault was that they had too bravely
defended their hearths and homes--with the mingled justice and mercy of God,
devoting to well-merited destruction the foulest city on earth, and yet first
going down to see (Genesis 18:21), and even willing to spare it if ten good men could be found
there. We may contrast Queen Philippa’s petition that six willing martyrs might
be spared, with Abraham’s petition that fifty--nay, ten--righteous lives might
avail to save thousands of the ungodly. But the point of resemblance is this--that
the queen’s intercession was accepted because she was the queen, and was dear
to her fierce husband, and that Abraham’s was accepted because he was in a
peculiar sense the friend of God. The petitioner in each case had access to the
throne, and could draw near to Him that sat on it. (E. Stock.)
The tone of Abraham’s
intercession
The tone of Abraham’s
intercession may teach us how familiar the intercourse with the heavenly Friend
may be. The boldest words from a loving heart, jealous of God’s honour, are not
irreverent in His eyes. This prayer is abrupt, almost rough. It sounds like
remonstrance quite as much as prayer. Abraham appeals to God to take care of
his name and honour, as if he had said, If Thou doest this, what will the world
say of Thee, but that Thou art unmerciful? But the grand confidence in God’s
character, the eager desire that it should be vindicated before the world, the
dread that the least film should veil the silvery whiteness or the golden
lustre of His name, the sensitiveness for His honour,--these are the effects of
communion with Him; and for these God accepts the bold prayer, as truer
reverence than is found in many more guarded and lowly sounding words. Many
conventional proprieties of worship may be broken just because the worship is
real. “The frequent sputter shows that the soul’s depths boil in earnest.” We
may learn, too, that the most loving familiarity never forgets the fathomless
gulf between God and it. Abraham does not forget that he is “dust and ashes”;
he knows that he is venturing much in speaking to God. His pertinacious prayers
have a recurring burden of lowly recognition of his place. Twice he heralds
them with “I have taken upon me to speak unto the Lord”; twice with “Oh let not
the Lord be angry.” Perfect love casts out fear and deepens reverence. We may
come with free hearts, from which every weight of trembling and every cloud of
doubt has been lifted. But the less the dread, the lower we shall bow before
the loftiness which we love. We do not pray aright until we tell God
everything. The boldness which we as Christians ought to have, means literally
a frank speaking out of all that is in our hearts. Such “boldness and access
with confidence” will often make short work of so-called seemly reverence, but
it will never transgress by so much as a hair’s-breadth the limits of lowly,
trustful love. (A. Maclaren, D. D.)
Abraham’s persistency
Abraham’s persistency may
teach us a lesson. If one might so say, he hangs on God’s skirt like a burr.
Each petition granted only encourages him to another. Six times he pleads, and
God waits till he has done before He goes away; He cannot leave His friend till
that friend has said all his say. What a contrast the fiery fervour and
unwearying pertinacity of Abraham’s prayers make to the stiff formalism of the
intercessions one is familiar with! The former are like the successive pulses
of a volcano driving a hot lava stream before it; the latter, like the slow
flow of a glacier, cold and sluggish. Is any part of our public or private worship
more hopelessly formal than our prayers for others? This picture from the old
world may well shame our languid petitions, and stir us up to a holy boldness
and insistence in prayer. (A. Maclaren, D. D.)
A good man the protection
of his country
It was the poet’s vain and
groundless conceit of Hector, that so long as he lived Troy could not be
destroyed, terming him the immovable and inexpugnable pillar of Troy. But well
it may be said of a faithful man that he is a mighty stay and strength, a main
defender and upholder of the place where he liveth; for whose sake, for whose
presence and prayers, out of the Lord’s abundant kindness to all His, even the
wicked are often within the shadow of God’s protection, and spared. (J.
Spencer.)
Verse 25
Shall not the Judge of all
the earth do right?
--
God in human history
I. GOD WORKS IN
HUMAN HISTORY.
1. He originates all the good.
2. He controls all the evil.
II. GOD WORKS RIGHTEOUSLY
IN HUMAN HISTORY. Abraham meant either that God ought to do right, or that He
will do right. Both are true. (Homilist.)
The Judge of all the earth
doth right
I. THE LORD IS
JUDGE OF ALL THE EARTH.
1. The Lord is a judge.
2. He is the Judge of all the earth.
3. He will finally judge the world in the last great day (Acts 17:31). That judgment will be solemn, grand, awful, equitable, and
final.
II. IT IS CERTAIN
THAT THE JUDGE OF ALL THE EARTH DOTH RIGHT,
1. There is nothing wrong in any voluntary action, but what may be
traced up to the following principles: it proceeds, in all instances, either
from ignorance or from wickedness.
2. He cannot do wrong for want of knowing better. Speaking after the
manner of men, all things, whether past, present, or future, are fully known to
Him.
3. He is perfectly holy, and cannot do wrong from any evil
principle. “Thou art not a God that hath pleasure in wickedness, neither shall
evil dwell with Psalms 5:4). Viewing His infinite wisdom, and His transcendent purity, we
are constrained to say, He cannot do wrong.
4. He doth what is right to men, in all their temporal affairs.
5. He doth right to men in all their spiritual concerns. All men
fell in Adam, and all have been redeemed by Christ.
6. He will do right in the eternal rewards and punishments of men.
III. GENERAL
OBSERVATIONS ON THIS IMPORTANT SUBJECT.
1. Pious men, of widely different sentiments on the purposes and
decrees of God, meet on this ground, and, while they sincerely acknowledge that
the Judge of all the earth doth right, may cordially embrace each other in the
arms of Christian love.
2. While we are piously impressed with the great truth, that the
Judge of all the earth doth right, we shall submit ourselves to Him, in all the
varying circumstances of life.
3. We should walk before the Judge of all the earth with
circumspection, carefully avoiding everything that is offensive in His sight,
and steadily pursuing those things which He approves.
4. While we conduct ourselves on this plan, and at the same time
rely on the merits of Christ for salvation, we may safely leave all our affairs
in the hands of our Judge.
5. This is matter of great joy to holy men. They may be accused and
slandered, hut God will vindicate their character; and they may suffer with
Christ, but they shall also reign with Him.
6. But this subject is truly awful and alarming to the wicked. They
may be suffered to prosper in this world. There are weighty reasons for this in
the
Divine mind; but they
stand in slippery places, and ere long will be cast down into destruction. (Sketches
of Sermons.)
The moral rectitude of God
I. GOD IS A BEING
OF MORAL RECTITUDE.
1. God ought to be a Being of moral rectitude. He knows what is
right and wrong respecting His own conduct, and respecting the conduct of all
other moral beings in- the universe. He ought therefore to feel and act
according to His moral discernment of what is right in the nature of things.
And as He feels much more sensibly His obligation to moral rectitude than any
other being, so we have far more reason to believe that He possesses moral
rectitude, than that any other being in the universe does.
2. God claims to be a Being of moral rectitude. “When Moses
requested Him to show him His glory, The Lord passed by before him, and
proclaimed the Lord, the Lord God, merciful and gracious, long suffering, and
abundant in goodness and truth, keeping mercy for thousands, forgiving
iniquity, and transgression, and sin, and that will by no means clear the
guilty.”
3. God has made His rational creatures capable of discerning His
moral as well as natural attributes. He has implanted in their minds a moral
sense, by which they can distinguish moral beauty from moral deformity in moral
characters. But can we suppose that He would have done this, if He knew that
His own moral character would not bear examination?
4. God has not only made us capable of judging of His moral
rectitude, but commanded us to do it. “Judge, I pray thee, between Me and My
vineyard.” “Are not My ways equal? are not your ways unequal? saith the Lord.”
His knowledge of His own moral perfections is the only ground upon which He
can, with propriety, or even safety, appeal to us in respect to His moral
rectitude.
5. God has not only commanded His intelligent creatures to judge of
His moral rectitude, but has placed them under the best advantages to judge. He
has placed them all in a state of trial, and in different parts of the
universe, where they have had great opportunities and strong inclinations to
examine His conduct with the strictest scrutiny. Now, if the greatest and best
of God’s intelligent creatures, after their strictest scrutiny of His conduct
in the various parts of the universe, have not been able to discover the least
moral defect or imperfection in His character and conduct, we may confidently
believe that He possesses the perfection of moral rectitude. And to close this
connected train of reasoning, I would observe--
6. That God has appointed a day for the very purpose of giving all
His intelligent creatures the best possible opportunity of judging of His moral
rectitude. The day of judgment is called the day of “the revelation of the
righteous judgment of God.”
II. How ABRAHAM
COULD KNOW THAT GOD IS A BEING OF MORAL RECTITUDE.
1. Abraham could not know the moral rectitude of God by knowing what
God would do to promote the highest happiness of the universe.
2. Abraham could not know the moral rectitude of God by knowing that
the punishing of the innocent would not promote the highest good of the
universe.
3. Though Abraham could not know what would be right or wrong for
God to do, either by knowing what had a direct tendency to promote the highest
good of the universe, or what had an indirect tendency to promote that great
and important object, yet he could know what was right or wrong for God to do
to answer any purpose whatever, by knowing that right or wrong or moral good
and evil are founded in the nature of things. Moral good, which consists in
true benevolence, is morally right in its own nature. And moral evil, which
consists in selfishness, is morally wrong in its own nature.
IMPROVEMENT.
1. If God be a Being of moral rectitude, then He can never do evil
that good may come.
2. If God be a Being of moral rectitude, then He can never approve
of His creatures’ doing evil that good may come.
3. If God be a Being of moral rectitude, then He will not punish the
finally impenitent the less, on account of the good they have done in the
world.
4. If God be a Being of moral rectitude, then it is morally
impossible that He should ever injure any of His creatures.
5. If God be a Being of moral rectitude, then all the objections
which have been made or can be made against His conduct are altogether
groundless. For He has always acted agreeably to the moral rectitude of His
nature.
6. Since God is a Being of perfect moral rectitude, all His works
will eventually praise Him. They will deserve and receive the approbation and
praise of all His holy creatures.
7. If God be a Being of moral rectitude, then the weight of His
wrath will be insupportable to the finally miserable. They will know that He
does not punish them from malice, revenge, or malevolence, but from true, pure,
disinterested benevolence and justice. (N. Emmons, D. D.)
Justice
I. Notice the
grand fundamental truth that the ways of God are ways of righteousness.
II. That the
impartiality of God’s dispensations is evident from the fact that the entire
field of judgment is subject to His control, “all the earth.”
III. That God’s
dealings with men are not partial in this life; i.e., they do not
involve injustice here to be counterbalanced and rectified by the judgment
which is to be hereafter.
IV. That while
justice must be tempered with mercy, every appeal for mercy should be grounded
on an underlying principle of justice. (The Lay Preacher.)
The moral government of
God
I. By the moral
government of God is meant His GOVERNMENT OF INTELLIGENT AND ACCOUNTABLE
CREATURES ACCORDING TO PRINCIPLES OF MORAL RECTITUDE. It implies a government
similar to that which a civil magistrate exercises over his subjects. All
government supposes a law, together with an obligation on the part of the
governed to obey it, and power lodged with the magistrate to enforce the
obligation. In moral governments it is essential that the law should be
righteous, and its administration just. An arbitrary and lawless government may
inflict punishment where it is undeserved, and confer rewards where they are
unmerited; but a righteous governor will regulate his conduct towards his
subjects by the moral quality of their characters. He will reward the good; he
will punish the wicked. The law of his empire will have its foundation in
righteousness, and his subjects will know that instead of being liable to the
effects of misrule and caprice, they will be treated with a uniform regard to
truth and justice. Such is the notion we form of the moral government of God.
II. And now,
having thus explained what is meant by His moral government, I may proceed to
point out to you SOME OF THOSE PROOFS AND ILLUSTRATIONS OF ITS EXISTENCE AND
ADMINISTRATION WHICH MAY SERVE THE PURPOSES OF GENERAL IMPROVEMENT.
1. Man is a moral agent. A moral agent is a being capable of those
actions which are properly the subjects of commendation or of censure, which
are either laudable or worthy of blame. He is endowed with intellectual and
moral powers. He can distinguish between good and evil. He has a capacity of
choice, guided by understanding and reason; a will governed by moral motives
and inducements; and a power of acting according to his determination and
pleasure. These are some of the most essential and distinguishing attributes of
moral agency. Such a being is man. Since, then, the natural constitution of man
is so framed--since there is obviously everything in his mental character to
render him a fit subject for moral government, it is reasonable to conclude that
such a government is actually established over him.
2. The same thing is to be inferred from the supremacy of
conscience. It is the office of conscience to preside over and control all the
other faculties of our moral nature. To direct the will, to curb the passions,
and to regulate the conduct, belongs to conscience. To conscience also it
belongs to judge what propensities may be indulged, and in what degree, and
which ought to be restrained. Conscience is set up within us as the arbiter of
our actions, the superintendent of our senses, affections, and appetites; and
the judge who shall bestow commendation or censure on all our principles and
motives.
3. The tendency of mankind to institute moral governments among
themselves is an argument in favour of the moral government of God. Such a
tendency, from its almost universal development, may be considered as among the
original properties of our nature. It seems to fall in with man’s natural
perceptions of the fitness of things, not only that he should live in society
with his fellow-men, but that society should be so framed as to involve moral
subordination and supremacy--that, in other words, there should be governors
and the governed.
4. The course of events in the present dispensation of Providence,
is upon the whole so ordered as to indicate on the part of the Supreme Disposer
a preference for virtue in distinction from vice. In this constitution of
things, therefore, we have a declaration from Him who orders all the
arrangements of providence, and presides over the course of natural events,
which side He is of, and what part He takes in the great conflict between moral
good and evil. In the struggle which is carrying on between these opposite and
contending principles, He determines to give no countenance to vice. The worker
of iniquity shall have no sanction from Him; but if a man will be true to
virtue, to veracity and judgment, to equity and charity, and to the right of
the case in whatever he is concerned, he shall have the righteous God to be the
Protector of his integrity, and the whole weight of His moral administration to
countenance and uphold it. For the voice of nature, and the events of
providence, concur to proclaim aloud that “the Lord loveth the way of
the righteous, but the way of the wicked He turneth upside down.”
5. The moral government of God is the only proper basis upon which
religion can be made to rest with security. If men can once discard from their
minds the fact of their responsibility to their Creator, nothing will remain
upon which to build any sense of piety, or by which to enforce the claims of
religious faith and duty.
6. The moral government of God has received its grand proof and
establishment in the scheme of human redemption. True it is, that the
prevailing character in the mediatorial economy is mercy. It is a dispensation
of grace. Its design is to pardon the guilty, to save the lost. But, in making
its wonderful provision for the spiritual exigencies of man, it does no
violence to the righteous claims of God. If it had, such a circumstance would
have been conclusive against it. It would then have been a method of salvation
upon which no satisfactory or enlightened dependence could be placed. But it is
now “ worthy of all acceptation,” being alike honourable to justice and mercy.
“If grace reigns,” “it reigns through righteousness.” (E. Steane.)
The principles of God’s
government
I. In the first
place, THE GOVERNMENT OF GOD PROCEEDS ON PRINCIPLES OF PURE COMPASSION AND
LOVE.
II. THE GOVERNMENT
OF GOD IS NOT LESS MARKED BY PRINCIPLES OF PURITY AND JUSTICE THAN BY THOSE OF
COMPASSION.
III. THE DIVINE
GOVERNMENT GOES ON THE PRINCIPLE OF PREVENTION.
IV. Observe THE
SPIRIT OF REFORMATION AND AMENDMENT WHICH PREVAILS THROUGHOUT THE GOVERNMENT OF
GOD. (J. W.Cunningham, M. A.)
Abraham’s intercession,
or, doubt and confidence
Observe the great honour
which the Lord conferred upon His faithful servant. Surely this signal
recognition of personal worth and faithful service speaks volumes of the esteem
in which the Lord holds His servants. Observe, again, the unselfish use which
Abraham made of the wonderful interview with which he was honoured. Men of the
world, when ushered into the presence of royalty, only think of their own
interest; they consider well how such an opportunity may be improved for their
own personal advantage. How very different the conduct of Abraham! Observe,
again, the nature of the plea which Abraham sets up for the preservation of the
city. He points out the claims of righteousness, which the Lord, as a righteous
judge, could not less than respect. “Wilt Thou also destroy the righteous with
the wicked?” And the Lord readily admitted the validity of his plea, for He
said, “If I find in Sodom fifty righteous within the city, then will I spare
all the place for their sakes.” Thus the only thing which God values in man is
righteousness, purity of character; compared with this, the accidents of birth,
possessions, attainments, are utterly insignificant in His eyes. In the
conversation which followed, Abraham not only showed his intimate knowledge of
God’s merciful disposition, but showed also that this intimate knowledge was
far from being perfect. Let us contemplate the words--
I. As AN
EXPRESSION OF DOUBT. “Shall not the Judge of all the earth do right?” With regard
to what the Judge of all the earth ought to do, there can be but one opinion.
The position of any judge is one of dignity, authority, and responsibility; he
cannot, therefore, maintain his position for a single day unless he do right,
and execute justice, and act impartially. Nevertheless, a superficial view of
the condition of this world--a world so full of confusion, disorder, and
lawlessness--have led some to doubt the righteousness of its great Judge and
Governor. Let us now glance, for a moment, at some of the circumstances which
give rise to these distressing thoughts.
1. When right is defeated, and wrong is triumphant. In this world,
it is might that triumphs, and not right. Read the records of the past, and see
how empires grew, waxed strong, and acquired wealth. In very many instances it
was the work of the sword, the result of military skill, valour, and power.
What was Alexander the Great? What was Julius Caesar? What was Napoleon
Buonaparte? What was the nature of the work which they severally accomplished?
They were neither more nor less than conquerors; men who established the
dominion of might. They may have sometimes been the champions of right, and
used their splendid victories for the best purposes. Look at individuals. The
mighty, the powerful, the strong, have it all their own way; while the weak are
ruthlessly trampled under foot. And many a down-trodden weak one, knowing the
righteousness of his cause, whispers in the bitterness of his soul, “Shall not
the Judge of all the earth do right?”
2. When wickedness prospers and virtue fails. There can be no
dispute whatever as to which ought to prosper, and which ought to fail. It is
only reasonable to suppose that the order of things established by a Creator
who is infinitely wise and good, should discountenance vice and favour virtue.
3. When what we conceive to be strict order is displaced by what
seems to be utter confusion. Can you look back upon the experience of a single
day, and say that all things have been conformable to your own notions of
propriety? Does not the most superficial review suggest many improvements? It
was strange to see King Edward the Sixth, under whose beneficent reign England
began to enjoy the blessings of freedom, enlightenment, and true religion, cut
off a tender youth, to make room for the tyrannical and bloodthirsty Mary, who
brought upon the land darkness, oppression, and despair. The only child of rich
parents, who have more possessions than they can possibly use, is carried away
by death, while their poor neighbour, who finds it a difficult matter to earn
the bare means of existence, is allowed to rear a numerous family. Is this the
way we should have arranged matters?
II. As AN
EXPRESSION OF CONFIDENCE. “Shall not the Judge of all the earth do right?”
There can be no doubt whatever that Abraham used them in this sense--to express
his unlimited confidence in the wisdom and righteousness of God. Having trusted
God, he trusted Him altogether; and never allowed even the shadow of a doubt to
darken the brightness of his faith. Many considerations might be suggested here
which are adapted in the highest degree to hush our doubts, and to inspire our
confidence. Consider--
1. That in this world we know God’s ways only in part. What may be
the entire bearing, or the ultimate issue of any event, we have no means of
ascertaining.
2. That whenever we have understood the whole bearing of mysterious
events, we have been compelled to admit their wisdom.
3. That things which are apparently evil and unnecessary, may be
really good and necessary. (D. Rowlands, B. A.)
God makes no mistakes
There is here a young man
of about thirty, of fine talents and capabilities for active life, but for
years a cripple, paralytic and helpless. He would starve if left alone, A
friend was commiserating his condition, when, with deep earnestness, he
exclaimed, as he slowly raised his withered hand, “God makes no mistakes?” How
noble the sentiment! “Shall not the Judge of all the earth do right?” This is
piety. Only a heart divinely taught could thus speak. (Dr. Talmage.)
Verse 27
But dust and ashes
Abraham interceding
I.
THE TRUE POSTURE FOR A
SINNER, AT THE THRONE OF GRACE. He must lie low, and aim high. You see this in
the behaviour of Abraham on the present occasion. Though honoured by a fresh
token of the Lord’s confidential friendship, he has--
1. Low thoughts of himself. He cannot forget who and what he is: “I
am but dust and ashes!” The expression is singular. It alludes, I think, first
to the meanness of his origin. What was Abraham--what are all men--but “dust”?
But this expression of Abraham may allude, secondly, to the corruption of his
nature. “Dust” is what God made it: but “ashes” have had a value, which is now
departed from them. Thus man, however mean, was yet not offensive, till he
“corrupted his way” before God.
2. High thoughts of God: high thoughts, first, of His equity; “The
Judge of all the earth,” he is persuaded, must and “will do right.” Any other
supposition, indeed, were an affront to the Lord. But, secondly, let Abraham
teach you also to entertain equally high thoughts of His mercy. Be not backward
to ask of God, what you are unable to claim.
II. THE GENEROUS
CHARACTER OF TRUE GODLINESS. For whose welfare does Abraham make this urgent
intercession? Two parties were included in it, neither of whom had very greatly
deserved such kindness at his hands.
1. Lot his nephew, though not named, had (we may suppose) the
foremost place in his good wishes. He was a pious person; and “wilt Thou also
destroy the righteous with the wicked?”
2. The people of Sodom, on the other hand, are expressly named.
Abraham knew that they “were wicked, and sinners before the Lord exceedingly.”
Yet even for them he prays.
III. THE EFFICACY
OF INTERCESSORY PRAYER is another lesson taught us by this narrative.
IV. A FAINT TYPE
OF OUR GREAT INTERCESSOR, JESUS THE SON OF GOD.
1. Was Abraham’s a generous interposition? That of Jesus is far more
unmerited. He intercedes for enemies!
2. Did Abraham appear to have some weight, as “the friend of God”?
Far more authoritative is the mediation of Jesus. He stands in His own name,
and on His own merits; not as a servant, high in favour indeed at court--but as
the King’s Son.
3. Did Abraham persevere, with an earnestness which, in his own
eyes, seemed almost to border upon presumption? The event showed,
notwithstanding, that he left off too soon. This will never be said of our
Divine Intercessor. “He will not fail nor be discouraged, till He have set
judgment in the earth”--till He have fully accomplished all His purposes of
grace.
4. Once more: let Abraham intercede as he might, whether on this or
on subsequent occasions, yet his good offices were sure to be terminated, sooner
or later “not being suffered to continue, by reason of death.” After death--as
the rich man in torments found--he neither can nor will interpose. But Jesus
“ever liveth to make intercession for us.” (J. Jowett, M. A.)
How may we have suitable
conceptions of God in duty?
That which we have more
especially to take notice of is, with what apprehensions or conceptions of God
Abraham did speak to God, did deport himself towards God, did manage this great
undertaking with God: concerning which, four things present themselves for our
observation:--
1. That those apprehensions or conceptions [which] Abraham had of
God, did highly exalt and magnify the greatness and excellency of God in his
heart: “Behold, now I have taken upon me to speak unto the Lord”; One who hath
excellency, and sovereignty, and majesty, and dominion, and power, and glory.
2. That they were such conceptions of God as did humble, vilify, and
abase Abraham in himself in comparison of God: “I have taken upon me to speak
unto the Lord, which am but dust and ashes”; a sinful, weak, worthless, frail
piece of vanity and mortality.
3. That they were such conceptions of God as did represent Him
gracious, propitious, benevolent to the creature, notwithstanding the greatness
and excellency of God, and the meanness and unworthiness of the creature: thus
much seems to be comprehended in the note of admiration, “behold!” O what
admirable condescension is this in the great God! O what wonderful mercy and
grace is this, that such a poor vile creature should have liberty to speak to
Him, to parley with Him!
4. That they were such apprehensions of God as did beget in Abraham
a faith of acceptation with God in the performance of that duty, without which
it had been dangerous presumption in him, “who was but dust and ashes, to take
upon him to speak unto the Lord.”
DOCTRINE: THAT SUCH AS
SPEAK TO GOD OR SPEAK OF GOD, SUCH AS DRAW NEAR TO GOD OR HAVE TO DO WITH GOD
IN ANY PART OF DIVINE WORSHIP, MUST MANAGE ALL THEIR PERFORMANCES WITH RIGHT
APPREHENSIONS AND DUE CONCEPTIONS OF GOD.
1. The first proposition is this: That we cannot have any true,
right apprehensions or conceptions of God, except we have a true knowledge of
Him. Such as have not known God, have slighted Him: “Who is the Lord,” saith
Pharaoh, “that I should obey His voice? I know not the Lord” Exodus 5:2). Such as know not God, nor desire to know Him, are so far from
drawing near to God, that they drive Him as far from them as they can; they say
unto the Almighty, “Depart from us; for we desire not the knowledge of Thy
ways” (Job 21:14).
2. The second proposition is: That we cannot know anything savingly
of God, further than He is pleased to manifest and make known Himself to us. No
man can make known God but God Himself. Moses, who had seen as much of God’s
glory as any man, when he desired a further manifestation of God’s glory, in a
higher measure or degree than formerly he had seen, he goes to God Himself for
it: “I beseech Thee, show me Thy glory” Exodus 33:18).
3. The third proposition is: That the clearest manifestations of God
to us, and such as can beget in us right apprehensions and due conceptions of
Him, are made out to us in and by Jesus Christ. “No man hath seen God at any
time; the only-begotten Son, which is in the bosom of the Father, He hath
declared Him” (John 1:18). Therefore no man ever did or canapprehend anything of God
truly, that is, upon a saving account, but in and by Jesus Christ. The Divine
Essence or Godhead “no man hath seen, nor can see” in itself (1 Timothy 6:16). In the works of creation, God is a God above us; in His works
of providence, a God without us; in the law, a God against us; in Himself, a
God invisible to us. Only in Christ He is Emmanuel, “God manifested in our
flesh,” God in us, “God with us,” God for us.
4. Hence follows the fourth proposition: That the manifestations of
God to us in Christ are those which alone can beget those due apprehensions and
right conceptions of God, with which we must draw near to Him, and perform all
our worship to Him. As Abraham is held forth to us a pattern of faith; so he
may be to us a pattern of worship, inasmuch as all true worship to God is
performed by faith, by faith in Christ.
6:16.
1. Without due apprehensions and conceptions of God, we cannot
perform any part of that natural worship we owe to God. We cannot love Him,
fear Him, trust in Him, pray unto Him, praise Him, &c.
2. Without the right apprehensions and due conceptions of God in
Jesus Christ, we cannot perform aright any part of His instituted worship.
This is expressed: “Having boldness to enter into the holiest,”
where the Divine glory appeared between the cherubims on the mercy-seat, “by
the blood of Jesus, by a new and living way, which He hath consecrated for us,
through the veil, that is to say, His flesh” (Hebrews 10:19-20). (T. Mallery, D. D.)
Dust and ashes
1. The first thing that occurs, is the lamentable folly of those who
cry up the dignity of human nature: for neither revelation nor reason discovers
any nature to us, but such as is mortal and sinful; and there is no dignity
either in sin or mortality.
2. Secondly, the fearful effects of sin are displayed to us by this
subject in a very particular manner. Why does the body, so wonderfully formed
by the Divine wisdom, return again to its original dust, but because that which
has taken root in it cannot otherwise be extracted? Why are we under
condemnation, and liable to be reduced to ashes, but because sin has kindled
the flames of the Divine wrath? How odious then must sin be in itself, and how
contrary to the nature of God, if it compels His justice to destroy the work of
His hands! Lastly, they who have ears to hear, will learn from this subject,
not to set their affections upon a world, which is under sentence of
condemnation, and whose end is to be burned. (W. Jones, M. A.)
Necessity of humility
The grandest edifices, the
tallest towers, the loftiest spires, rest upon deep foundations. The very
safety of eminent gifts and pre-eminent graces lies in their association with
deep humility they were dangerous without it. Great men do need to be good men.
Look at this mighty ship, a leviathan on the deep. With her towering masts, and
carrying a cloud of canvas, how she steadies herself on the waves, and walks
erect upon the rolling waters, like a thing of inherent, self-regulating life!
When the corn is waving, and trees are bending, and foaming billows roll before
the blast and break in thunders on the beach, why is she not flung on her beam
ends, sent down foundering into the deep? Why, because unseen, beneath the
surface, a vast well-ballasted hull gives her balance, and taking hold of the
water, keeps her steady under a press of sail, and on the bosom of a swelling
sea. Even so, to preserve the saint upright, erect, and safe from falling, God
gives him balance and ballast, bestowing on the man to whom He has given lofty
endowments, the grace of a proportionate humility.
Humility in prayer
Artabanus, one of the
military officers of the Athenians, was applied to by a certain great man, who
told him that he desired an audience of the king. He was answered that before
it was granted, he must prostrate himself before him, for it was a custom of
the country for the king to admit no one to his presence who would not worship
him. That which was an arrogant assumption in an earthly king, is a proper
condition of an approach to the King of kings. Humility is the foundation of an
intercourse with Him. We must bow before His throne. No sinner who is too proud
to yield obedience to this law need expect any favours from His hands.
Verse 32
I will not destroy it for ten’s sake
The incalculable worth of good men
This narrative teaches--
1.
The
highest development of genuine philanthropy. Importunate intercession with
Heaven on behalf of humanity.
2. The mysterious power of intercessory prayer.
3. The incalculable worth of good men, however few in number.
I. That good men
in a community, however few, are HIGHLY ESTEEMED OF GOD.
1. Because of the tender relationship they sustain to Him. His
children.
2. Because of the critical position in which they are placed in this
life.
3. Because of the beneficent influences they are capable of
exercising upon the race.
II. That good men
in a community, however few, are of INEXPRESSIBLE SOCIAL WORTH.
1. Prize good men more than all others.
2. Seek to multiply good men.
God’s willingness to save
Those who censure this narrative, asserting that it represents God
as wavering and undetermined, should observe that His resolution was not yet
taken (Genesis 18:21); and even if this had been
the case, that it is indeed always open to the repentance and prayer of those
whom it concerns; God has no delight in punishing and destroying; He tried the
hard-heartedness of Pharaoh by ten successive plagues; He accepted the
repentance of the wicked Ninevites; and He ordered a systematic ritual of
sacrifices, solely intended to furnish to man the means of restoring his peace
with Himself. If we banish this “vacillation” from the attributes of God, man
may tremble before His will; but he can never love Him. But the truth, that the
principles on which His government is based are eternal and unalterable, is
expressed many times with singular emphasis: “God is no man that He should lie,
nor a son of man that He should repent.” God is, indeed, said to have repented
that He had created man, and that He had appointed Saul king over Israel; but
these are strong expressions denoting how unworthy the former had proved to
bear the
Divine image; and the latter, to be the representative of Divine
sovereignty. (M. M.Kalisch, Ph. D.)
──《The Biblical Illustrator》