Sermon Tone Analysis

Introduction

Get Attention:

In telling Lot to escape to the mountain, the Lord wanted to turn a city-boy into a mountain man.

Throughout Scripture, the Lord continually calls His people to the mountains…

• With Abraham, who was ready to sacrifice his son in obedience to the Lord’s command, He calls us to Mt. Moriah, the Mount of Devotion.

• With the Israelites, who gathered to receive His commandments, the Lord calls us to Mt. Sinai, the Mount of Instruction.

• With Moses, who viewed the Promised Land, He calls us to Mt. Pisgah, the Mount of Vision.

• With Elijah, whose prayer brought down fire from heaven, He calls us to Mt. Carmel, the Mount of Passion.

• With Peter, James, and John, who beheld the glory of the Lord, He calls us to Mt. Hermon, the Mount of Transfiguration.

[Jon Courson, Jon Courson’s Application Commentary: Volume One: Genesis–Job (Nashville, TN: Thomas Nelson, 2005), 82.]

Raise Need:

In gaining great worldly influence, Lot had lost all influence and spiritual power, even over his own family, v. 14.

Choose between the Word and the world.

No heart can mature two crops.

[Keith Brooks, Summarized Bible: Complete Summary of the Old Testament (Bellingham, WA: Logos Bible Software, 2009), 8.]

Orient Theme:

Lot shows us the true cost of worldliness.

State Purpose:

1.

He chose his own way in life (Genesis 13:1–13).

2.

He persisted in his own choice (Genesis 14:1–16, 2 Peter 2:6–8).

3.

He suffered the consequences of his wrong choice (Genesis 19:1–38).

Main Thought:

No Christian can find his pleasure and profit in the world and at the same time bear effectual testimony against the world.

[Brooks, 8.]

Sub-Introduction:

Connecting Context:

Lot, as seen in Genesis 13:2–13; 14:1–16; 19:1–38; and 2 Peter 2:6–8.

By combining these passages, we see a tragic example of a man who walked “in the counsel of the wicked,” who stood “in the way of sinners,” and who sat “in the seat of mockers.”

Background/Intro Material:

This chapter in Scripture is not for those with weak hearts and stomachs.

B. H. Carroll said of this chapter to his students, “I want you to barely look at what is too foul for public speech.

Read it alone … this last sin of Sodom which gives a name to a sin, ‘Sodomy.’

” Leupold said, “There is hardly a more horrible account anywhere on the pages of Holy Writ.

Both the degeneracy here described as well as the catastrophic overthrow of the cities involved are calculated to startle by their lurid and gruesome details.” Then Leupold adds a note about Luther’s view of the chapter, “Luther confessed that he could not read the chapter without a feeling of deep revulsion.”

Griffith Thomas also spoke of the awfulness of the sin recorded in Genesis 19.

He said, “This is one of the most terrible chapters in the Bible and is a reminder of the hideous possibilities of sin.”

As unpleasant as Genesis 19 may be, it, however, needs to be earnestly studied and pondered.

Especially today does it need to be earnestly studied and pondered, for it is exceedingly applicable to our day—particularly in two ways.

First, it is a chapter which shows the hellish, foul character of homosexuality and God’s great condemnation and wrath upon it.

In our day of increasing acceptance of this filthy conduct, which acceptance is evidenced by frequent marches exhibiting it and exalting it, by legislation protecting it, and schools teaching it, our land needs to heed the warnings of this chapter better than we are or else grab for fire and brimstone proof umbrellas because we will need them.

Second, this chapter reveals, in the conduct of Lot, the pathetic performance of a worldly Christian.

This nineteenth chapter of Genesis, which will give us the rest of the history of Lot as it is recorded in the Scripture, is a history of how sordid a believer’s behavior can become when it is given to worldliness.

We need to study this chapter in order to help us avoid Lot’s worldly ways which, unfortunately, are very popular and accepted today in Christendom.

[John G. Butler, Lot: The Worldly Christian, vol.

Number Ten, Bible Biography Series (Clinton, IA: LBC Publications, 1994), 68–69.]

I.

We Can Choose Our Own Way in Life

A. By Making Our Plans Independently of God, As Lot Did (Gen.

13:12-13; 2 Pet.

2:6-8):

State Point -

The course of his life is one long slide downhill.

The first step in his fall is found in Genesis 13:10, where we are told that he “looked” toward Sodom.

This was no casual glance.

It means that he looked with longing.

He was not content with the life God had given him on the mountain with Abraham, the life of one living in tents.

He wanted the more exciting life of the city.

And besides, the city was situated near the best land, and he wanted the best land for himself.

Second, we are told that he “pitched his tent toward Sodom” (Gen.

13:12).

If we had asked him at this time why he was living near Sodom and not in it, he would have explained that Sodom was a very wicked city and that he did not want to get too involved in its life.

He did not want to become wicked.

Lot is next seen “dwelling in Sodom” (Gen.

14:12).

There is no explanation of this change, but the fact is ominous.

Like a moth attracted to the flame, Lot had been unable to hold his distance and was now within the very place God would destroy.

Finally, we find Lot even attaining some kind of prominence in the city, for that is what “sitting in the gate” implies (Gen.

19:1).

This is where the elders or principal men sat.

It was where justice was administered.

If many of our modern churchmen had been there, they would have congratulated Lot that he had successfully thrown off his fundamentalist past and come of age as God’s man for Sodom.

But Lot was nothing of the sort.

He had abandoned a high calling and was now the precise opposite of the upright man of Psalm 1.

He had walked in the counsel of the wicked, stood in the way of sinners, and sat down in the seat of mockers.

His delight was not in the law of the Lord, and he was certainly not meditating on it day and night.

He was not a tree planted by rivers of water; his leaf was withering; his work was not prospering.

He was dangerously close to being like the chaff that the wind drives away.

[James Montgomery Boice, Genesis: An Expositional Commentary (Grand Rapids, MI: Baker Books, 1998), 620.]

Validate Point -

The utter worthlessness of all this success is manifest.

The man who attempted to compromise with principle was hated of Sodom, had lost his personal peace; his testimony was paralyzed, and he was utterly unable to influence the city toward righteousness.

He was delivered from the threatening of the city by the angels whom he was attempting to defend.

[G.

Campbell Morgan, The Analyzed Bible: The Book of Genesis, vol. 9 (New York; Chicago; Toronto; London; Edinburgh: Fleming H. Revell Company, 1911), 126.]

[Apply Point] -