Genesis 19.27-29-The Power of Abraham's Intercessory Prayer
Sunday February 12, 2006
Genesis: Genesis 19:27-29-The Power of Abraham’s Intercessory Prayer
Lesson # 98
Please turn in your Bibles to Genesis 19:1.
This morning we will study this morning Genesis 19:27-29, which records that Abraham received his request from the Lord, in his intercessory prayer recorded in Genesis 18:23-32.
As a result the Lord delivered his nephew Lot from the destruction of Sodom, thus, revealing the power of the believer’s intercessory prayers.
Let’s pick it up in Genesis 18:22 and read the account of Abraham’s intercessory prayer.
The intercessory prayer of Abraham that appears in Genesis 18:23-32 was unlike the prayers that we in the church age are to make.
Abraham spoke directly face to face with the visible manifestation of the Son of God whereas in the church age we are commanded by the Son of God to pray directly to the Father who is invisible (Jn. 16:26-27; Eph. 3:14).
Genesis 18:22, “Then the men (elect angels; see Gen. 19:1) turned away from there (oaks of Mamre in Hebron, 19 miles southwest of Jerusalem, see Gen. 18:1) and went toward Sodom, while Abraham was still standing before the LORD.”
Genesis 18:23, “Abraham came near and said, ‘Will You indeed sweep away the righteous with the wicked?’”
Genesis 18:24, “Suppose there are fifty righteous within the city; will You indeed sweep it away and not spare the place for the sake of the fifty righteous who are in it?”
Genesis 18:25, “Far be it from You to do such a thing, to slay the righteous with the wicked, so that the righteous and the wicked are treated alike. Far be it from You! Shall not the Judge of all the earth deal justly?”
Genesis 18:26, “So the LORD said, ‘If I find in Sodom fifty righteous within the city, then I will spare the whole place on their account.’”
Genesis 18:27, “And Abraham replied, ‘Now behold, I have ventured to speak to the Lord, although I am but dust and ashes.’”
Genesis 18:28, “Suppose the fifty righteous are lacking five, will You destroy the whole city because of five? And He said, ‘I will not destroy it if I find forty-five there.’”
Genesis 18:29, “He spoke to Him yet again and said, ‘Suppose forty are found there?’ And He said, ‘I will not do it on account of the forty.’”
Genesis 18:30, “Then he said, ‘Oh may the Lord not be angry, and I shall speak; suppose thirty are found there?’ And He said, ‘I will not do it if I find thirty there.’”
Genesis 18:31, “And he said, ‘Now behold, I have ventured to speak to the Lord; suppose twenty are found there?’ And He said, ‘I will not destroy it on account of the twenty.’”
Genesis 18:32, “Then he said, ‘Oh may the Lord not be angry, and I shall speak only this once; suppose ten are found there?’ And He said, ‘I will not destroy it on account of the ten.’”
Genesis 18:33, “As soon as He had finished speaking to Abraham the LORD departed, and Abraham returned to his place.”
Genesis 19:1, “Now the two angels came to Sodom in the evening as Lot was sitting in the gate of Sodom. When Lot saw them, he rose to meet them and bowed down with his face to the ground.”
Genesis 19:2, “And he said, ‘Now behold, my lords, please turn aside into your servant's house, and spend the night, and wash your feet; then you may rise early and go on your way.’ They said however, ‘No, but we shall spend the night in the square.’”
Genesis 19:3, “Yet he urged them strongly, so they turned aside to him and entered his house; and he prepared a feast for them, and baked unleavened bread, and they ate.”
Genesis 19:4, “Before they lay down, the men of the city, the men of Sodom, surrounded the house, both young and old, all the people from every quarter.”
Genesis 19:5, “and they called to Lot and said to him, ‘Where are the men who came to you tonight? Bring them out to us that we may have relations with them.’”
Genesis 19:6-7, “But Lot went out to them at the doorway, and shut the door behind him and said, ‘Please, my brothers, do not act wickedly.’”
Genesis 19:8, “Now behold, I have two daughters who have not had relations with man; please let me bring them out to you, and do to them whatever you like; only do nothing to these men, inasmuch as they have come under the shelter of my roof.”
Genesis 19:9, “But they said, ‘Stand aside.’ Furthermore, they said, ‘This one came in as an alien, and already he is acting like a judge; now we will treat you worse than them.’ So they pressed hard against Lot and came near to break the door.”
Genesis 19:10, “But the men reached out their hands and brought Lot into the house with them, and shut the door.”
Genesis 19:11, “They struck the men who were at the doorway of the house with blindness, both small and great, so that they wearied themselves trying to find the doorway.”
Genesis 19:12, “Then the two men said to Lot, ‘Whom else have you here? A son-in-law, and your sons, and your daughters, and whomever you have in the city, bring them out of the place.’”
Genesis 19:13, “for we are about to destroy this place, because their outcry has become so great before the LORD that the LORD has sent us to destroy it.”
Genesis 19:14, “Lot went out and spoke to his sons-in-law, who were to marry his daughters, and said, ‘Up, get out of this place, for the LORD will destroy the city.’ But he appeared to his sons-in-law to be jesting.”
Genesis 19:15, “When morning dawned, the angels urged Lot, saying, ‘Up, take your wife and your two daughters who are here, or you will be swept away in the punishment of the city.’”
Genesis 19:16, “But he hesitated. So the men seized his hand and the hand of his wife and the hands of his two daughters, for the compassion of the LORD was upon him; and they brought him out, and put him outside the city.”
Genesis 19:17, “When they had brought them outside, one said, ‘Escape for your life! Do not look behind you, and do not stay anywhere in the valley; escape to the mountains, or you will be swept away.’”
Genesis 19:18, “But Lot said to them, ‘Oh no, my lords!’”
Genesis 19:19, ‘Now behold, your servant has found favor in your sight, and you have magnified your lovingkindness, which you have shown me by saving my life; but I cannot escape to the mountains, for the disaster will overtake me and I will die.”
Genesis 19:20, “now behold, this town is near enough to flee to, and it is small. Please, let me escape there (is it not small?) that my life may be saved.”
Genesis 19:21, “He said to him, ‘Behold, I grant you this request also, not to overthrow the town of which you have spoken.’”
Genesis 19:22, “Hurry, escape there, for I cannot do anything until you arrive there. Therefore the name of the town was called Zoar.”
Genesis 19:23, “The sun had risen over the earth when Lot came to Zoar.”
Genesis 19:24, “Then the LORD rained on Sodom and Gomorrah brimstone and fire from the LORD out of heaven.”
Genesis 19:25, “and He overthrew those cities, and all the valley, and all the inhabitants of the cities, and what grew on the ground.”
Genesis 19:26, “But his wife, from behind him, looked back, and she became a pillar of salt.”
Genesis 19:27, “Now Abraham arose early in the morning and went to the place where he had stood before the LORD (not far from the oaks of Mamre in Hebron).”
Genesis 19:28, “and he looked down toward Sodom and Gomorrah, and toward all the land of the valley, and he saw, and behold, the smoke of the land ascended like the smoke of a furnace.”
“Looked down” is the verb shaqaph ([q^v*) (shaw-kaf), which means, “to look down over a valley from a steep angle” and Genesis 18:1 records this high elevation as being the “oaks of Mamre,” located in Hebron, nineteen miles southwest of Jerusalem, and was 3,040 feet above sea level.
“Sodom” and “Gomorrah” are on the east at the south end of the Dead Sea and helped to form a confederation of cities, which included Admah, Zeboiim and Zoar according to Genesis 14:2, 8 and are called by theologians “the cities of the plain.”
The entire Dead Sea region in the Jordan valley was filled with smoke as a result of the Lord raining down upon it burning sulfur.
Genesis 19:29, “Thus it came about, when God destroyed the cities of the valley, that God remembered Abraham, and sent Lot out of the midst of the overthrow, when He overthrew the cities in which Lot lived.”
When the Bible says, “God remembered Abraham” it does “not” mean that He had forgotten Abraham but rather it signifies that God acted upon Abraham’s intercessory prayer request and delivered Lot from the destruction of Sodom.
Lot was a disobedient and unfaithful, cosmic believer who was under divine discipline as a result whereas, Abraham was an obedient and faithful believer.
Therefore, Genesis 19:29 teaches that the intercessory prayer of a faithful and obedient believer can deliver a disobedient and unfaithful cosmic believer from death.
The confession of sin to the Father is essential for our prayers to be heard since the Father will not hear our prayers if we are harboring any known sin in our stream of consciousness.
Psalm 66:18, “If I regard wickedness in my heart, the Lord will not hear.”
1 John 1:9, “If any of us does at any time confess our sins, then, He (God the Father) is faithful and just with the result that He forgives us our sins and purifies us from each and every wrongdoing.”
All prayer in the church age must be addressed to the Father (John 14:13-14; 16:23-27; Rom. 8:15; Eph. 3:14; 5:20; Col. 1:3, 12; 3:17; 1 Pet. 1:17; Rev. 1:6).
Matthew 6:9, “Pray, then, in this way: 'Our Father who is in heaven, Hallowed be Your name.”
Prayer must be made in the name of Jesus Christ because it is through His merits and our eternal union with Him that gives us the privilege to boldly approach the throne of God in prayer (John 14:13-14; 16:23-24; Eph. 5:20; Col. 3:17).
John 16:23, “In that day you will not question Me about anything. Truly, truly, I say to you, if you ask the Father for anything in My name, He will give it to you.”
Prayer must be made in the power of the Spirit meaning guided by the Word of God, which is inspired by the Spirit (Eph. 2:18; 6:18; Jude 20).
Jude 20, “But you, beloved, building yourselves up on your most holy faith, praying by means of the power of the Holy Spirit.”
Prayer is asking for what God wants and must be according to His will in order to be effective and productive for God.
1 John 5:14, “This is the confidence which we have before Him, that, if we ask anything according to His will, He hears us.”
Believers are commanded to offer up intercessory prayers for all men since God desires all men to be saved and sent His Son to die for all men without exception and without distinction (1 Jn. 2:2; 1 Tm. 2:4; 2 Pet. 3:9; Jn. 3:16-17).
1 Timothy 2:1, “First of all, then, I urge that entreaties and prayers, petitions and thanksgivings, be made on behalf of all men.”
When praying for unbelievers, we should pray that God would bring in people and circumstances that would cause the unbeliever to have the humility to give the Gospel a hearing and that they would be “exposed” to the Gospel so that they can make a decision to either accept or reject Jesus Christ as Savior.
Nowhere do the Scriptures sanction or command believers to pray that God would save the unbeliever since God, because He is just and righteous, cannot coerce or make the unbeliever do anything against his will, thus God cannot save the unbeliever unless the unbeliever makes a decision to accept Christ as Savior.
Although God’s will is that all men be saved, God cannot force any human being to believe in His Son Jesus Christ against their will, thus people go to the Lake of Fire forever and ever and not because God desires it.
Intercessory prayer can be: (1) Specific (2) General.
A “specific” intercessory prayer is when we pray and know the specific needs (illnesses, personal problems, adverse situations, etc.) of those people we are personally involved with and know face to face.
Examples of Specific Prayers: (1) Elisha prayed to God for his servant to see the angelic armies protecting him and Elisha (2 Kings 6:17) (2) Apostolic church praying for Peter’s deliverance from prison (Acts 12).
A “general” intercessory prayer is when we pray not knowing the specific needs of those people that we are interceding for and do not know personally or face to face.
Philemon 4, “I thank my God always, making mention of you in my prayers.”
When praying for all believers, and ourselves we should pray for our growth in God’s love and enlightenment regarding our eternal union with Christ and the Father’s will.
Philippians 1:9, “Now, this I make it a habit to pray that your divine-love might continue to flourish yet more and more by means of a total discerning experiential knowledge.”
Ephesians 1:16, “I never cease making it a habit giving thanks on account of all of you. I make it habit to make mention of all of you during my prayers.”
Ephesians 1:17, “In order that the God of our Lord Jesus Christ, the glorious Father may give to all of you a spiritual wisdom, yes, and revelation too (from God the Holy Spirit) by means of an experiential knowledge of Him (the Father).”
Ephesians 1:18, “I make it a habit to pray that the eyes of our heart would receive enlightenment for the purpose of knowing for certain what is the confidence of His calling and what are the glorious riches, which is His inheritance distributed among the saints.”
Ephesians 1:19, “And what is the surpassing greatness of His divine omnipotence directed towards all of us who are believers. This is in accordance with the operative power, namely, the possession of power to overcome (the sin nature, the devil and his cosmic system) originating from His manifested power (through the resurrection and session of Christ).”
Colossians 1:9, “For this reason also, since the day we heard of it, we have not ceased to pray for you and to ask that you may be filled with the knowledge of His will in all spiritual wisdom and understanding.”
Colossians 1:10, “so that you will walk in a manner worthy of the Lord, to please Him in all respects, bearing fruit in every good work and increasing in the knowledge of God.”
In conclusion, the intercessory prayer of Abraham delivered his nephew Lot from the destruction of the cities of the plain and demonstrates the power of intercessory prayer and challenges us to practice it every day because it makes a difference in the lives of believers.