Interceding for Your Neighbor

Transcript Search
The Blessing  •  Sermon  •  Submitted   •  Presented   •  37:35
0 ratings
· 26 views
Files
Notes
Transcript
Handout
Genesis 18:20–21 NIV
Then the Lord said, “The outcry against Sodom and Gomorrah is so great and their sin so grievous that I will go down and see if what they have done is as bad as the outcry that has reached me. If not, I will know.”
Ezekiel 16:49–50 NIV
“ ‘Now this was the sin of your sister Sodom: She and her daughters were arrogant, overfed and unconcerned; they did not help the poor and needy. They were haughty and did detestable things before me. Therefore I did away with them as you have seen.
God came down to investigate the COMPLAINTS of Sodom’s VICTIMS.
Genesis 18:17–19 NIV
Then the Lord said, “Shall I hide from Abraham what I am about to do? Abraham will surely become a great and powerful nation, and all nations on earth will be blessed through him. For I have chosen him, so that he will direct his children and his household after him to keep the way of the Lord by doing what is right and just, so that the Lord will bring about for Abraham what he has promised him.”
God invited Abraham to WEIGH IN because his people would need to learn justice and FAIRNESS.
Genesis 18:23–26 NIV
Then Abraham approached him and said: “Will you sweep away the righteous with the wicked? What if there are fifty righteous people in the city? Will you really sweep it away and not spare the place for the sake of the fifty righteous people in it? Far be it from you to do such a thing—to kill the righteous with the wicked, treating the righteous and the wicked alike. Far be it from you! Will not the Judge of all the earth do right?” The Lord said, “If I find fifty righteous people in the city of Sodom, I will spare the whole place for their sake.”
Abraham wanted to find a reason to SPARE the people of Sodom—and so did GOD.
Genesis 18:32 NIV
Then he said, “May the Lord not be angry, but let me speak just once more. What if only ten can be found there?” He answered, “For the sake of ten, I will not destroy it.”
Genesis 19:6–7 NIV
Lot went outside to meet them and shut the door behind him and said, “No, my friends. Don’t do this wicked thing.
Genesis 19:14 NIV
So Lot went out and spoke to his sons-in-law, who were pledged to marry his daughters. He said, “Hurry and get out of this place, because the Lord is about to destroy the city!” But his sons-in-law thought he was joking.
They agreed that Sodom should be spared if there was any INFLUENCE for GOOD left in the city.
Genesis 19:24–28 NIV
Then the Lord rained down burning sulfur on Sodom and Gomorrah—from the Lord out of the heavens. Thus he overthrew those cities and the entire plain, destroying all those living in the cities—and also the vegetation in the land. But Lot’s wife looked back, and she became a pillar of salt. Early the next morning Abraham got up and returned to the place where he had stood before the Lord. He looked down toward Sodom and Gomorrah, toward all the land of the plain, and he saw dense smoke rising from the land, like smoke from a furnace.
In the end God found no hope for Sodom to CHANGE, so he destroyed their OPPRESSIVE regime.
Genesis 19:29 NIV
So when God destroyed the cities of the plain, he remembered Abraham, and he brought Lot out of the catastrophe that overthrew the cities where Lot had lived.

Loving Your Neighbor

God wants all people to be SAVED, no matter how UNGODLY—and so should we.
2 Peter 3:9–10 NIV
The Lord is not slow in keeping his promise, as some understand slowness. Instead he is patient with you, not wanting anyone to perish, but everyone to come to repentance. But the day of the Lord will come like a thief. The heavens will disappear with a roar; the elements will be destroyed by fire, and the earth and everything done in it will be laid bare.
Jonah 4:11 NIV
And should I not have concern for the great city of Nineveh, in which there are more than a hundred and twenty thousand people who cannot tell their right hand from their left—and also many animals?”
As long as there is a GODLY influence in a community, there is HOPE.
Jonah 3:4–5 NIV
Jonah began by going a day’s journey into the city, proclaiming, “Forty more days and Nineveh will be overthrown.” The Ninevites believed God. A fast was proclaimed, and all of them, from the greatest to the least, put on sackcloth.
Jesus did not avoid UNGODLY people—he went to them to bring them HOPE.
Colossians 1:21–22 NIV
Once you were alienated from God and were enemies in your minds because of your evil behavior. But now he has reconciled you by Christ’s physical body through death to present you holy in his sight, without blemish and free from accusation—
We should not avoid the WORLD—we should go into it with the power of JESUS.
John 17:14–19 NIV
I have given them your word and the world has hated them, for they are not of the world any more than I am of the world. My prayer is not that you take them out of the world but that you protect them from the evil one. They are not of the world, even as I am not of it. Sanctify them by the truth; your word is truth. As you sent me into the world, I have sent them into the world. For them I sanctify myself, that they too may be truly sanctified.
Related Media
See more
Related Sermons
See more