R1617-45 Bible Study: God’s Judgment On Sodom

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GOD’S JUDGMENT ON SODOM

I. QUAR., LESSON VII., FEB. 18, GEN. 18:22-33

Golden Text—”Shall not the Judge of all the earth do right?”—Gen. 18:25

The subject of this lesson is an important one, though the limits assigned do not cover the event, which includes all of chapter 18, and chapter 19:1-28. Though the narrative is familiar to every Bible reader, its lessons have been very generally overlooked.

Before considering these it is well to note, in corroboration of our observations on lesson iv., concerning the ministration of angels prior to the beginning of the law dispensation, (1) how promptly they were recognized by those to whom they appeared. Although these appeared in human form, Abraham very quickly recognized them as

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more than human, and honored them accordingly. So also Lot recognized them; and, because he honored them as the messengers of the Lord, he sought to protect them from the Sodomite mob, even at the expense of his virgin daughters if need be. But while Abraham and Lot recognized them as the angels of God, the men of Sodom thought them to be only men. Nor were Abraham and Lot excited, or in the least disconcerted by the honor of such a visit. They received their remarkable guests with becoming dignity and grace, and with great composure; not with superstitious fear, nor as if it were a thing hitherto unknown; but as a rare occurrence and a special honor.

(2) Note also the expression of one of these heavenly visitants—one of the three representatives of Jehovah, possibly his beloved Son, afterward our Savior. Speaking for Jehovah, he said, (verse 17), “Shall I conceal from Abraham what I am about to do, seeing that Abraham shall surely become a great and mighty nation,” etc.? “The secret of the Lord is with them that reverence him,” says the Psalmist. (Psa. 25:14.) Thus it was in Abraham’s day, and thus it is still. The Lord does not honor the world, nor the worldly wise, with a knowledge of his secret purposes.—Dan. 12:10; 1 Cor. 1:19,20; 3:18,19.

In verses 22-33 we have the account of Abraham’s pleading with the Lord for the possible righteous souls that might yet remain in Sodom, and an illustration of the promise that the fervent prayer of a righteous man availeth much. (Jas. 5:16.) But when not even ten righteous persons were found in Sodom, the four that were found were first gathered out before the visitation of wrath descended on the condemned city; for “the eyes of the Lord are upon the righteous, and his ears are open to their cry.”

Coming now to consider the severe judgment upon Sodom, let us note its prominent lessons carefully—(1) We see that the city was wholly given up to wickedness and the basest immoralities. Not even a strange man was safe in coming among them. Sin had there reached that dreadful enormity to which the Apostle Paul seems to have reference in Rom. 1:18-32. See also Jude 7 and Ezek. 16:49,50. They were sinning, too, against sufficient knowledge from the light of nature, as Paul indicates, so that they were, as he affirms, “without excuse.”

(3) We observe next that the penalty inflicted upon them was not eternal torment, but a cutting short of the present life with its privileges and advantages: “I took them away as I saw good, saith the Lord.” (Ezek. 16:50.) And by the same prophet he declares

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his intention to bring them back, together with wayward Israel, the children of the covenant, saying, “When I shall bring again the captivity of Sodom and her daughters, and the captivity of Samaria and her daughters, then will I bring again the captivity of thy captives in the midst of them. … I will remember my covenant with thee in the days of thy youth, and I will establish unto thee an everlasting covenant. Then thou shalt remember thy ways and be ashamed when thou shalt receive thy sisters, thine elder and thy younger [Samaria and Sodom—Verse 46]. And I will give them unto thee for daughters, but not by thy covenant. And I will establish my covenant with thee; and thou shalt know that I am the Lord: That thou mayest remember, and be confounded, and never open thy mouth any more, because of thy shame, when I am pacified toward thee for all that thou hast done [which he declares to be worse than Sodom had done—Verses 47,48], saith the Lord Jehovah.”

When the Lord thus declares his purposes, and that in full view and statement of all the circumstances, and signs his name to the document, there is no room left for cavil or doubt. Wicked Sodom and Samaria and Israel and all the families of the earth shall be brought back from the captivity of death—the only captivity which could possibly be referred to here; for this was spoken long after Sodom was laid in ashes. Nor was there a single Sodomite left to perpetuate the name; for it is written that, “the same day that Lot went out of Sodom it rained fire and brimstone from heaven and destroyed them all.” (Luke 17:29; Gen. 19:24,25.) Our Lord also adds his testimony saying, “Marvel not at this, for the hour is coming in which all that are in the graves shall hear the voice of the Son of man and shall come forth; they that have done good unto the resurrection of life, and they that have done evil unto the resurrection of judgment”*—trial. (John 5:27-29.)

*The Greek word krisis, rendered damnation in the common version, does not mean damnation, but a trial or judgment, and is so translated thirty-nine times in the New Testament.

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And the Apostle Paul states, “There shall be a resurrection of the dead, both of the just and unjust.”—Acts 24:15.

The statement of Jude 7 that “Sodom and Gomorrah are set forth for an example, suffering the vengeance of eternal fire,” may be thought by some to be at variance with the above quoted scriptures. But not so. The word of the Lord spoken by prophets and apostles and by the Lord Jesus himself must of necessity be harmonious; and any interpretation which does not manifest that harmony must be erroneous. The word “fire” is here used as a symbol of destruction, and the word eternal is from the Greek word aionios, which signifies age-lasting. Thus Sodom and Gomorrah are represented as suffering the vengeance of age-lasting destruction. They were destroyed, says Luke (17:29), and they have remained so ever since, and will so remain until the appointed time for bringing them again from the captivity of death, as declared by the Prophet Ezekiel.

Mark also the statement that these were set forth for an example of God’s treatment of the evil doers (See also 2 Pet. 2:6)—an example both of his vengeance and of his mercy. His vengeance was manifested in their destruction; and his mercy is specially manifest in their promised deliverance. God will punish the evil doers, but he will have mercy also. Those who have sinned against a measure of light shall be punished accordingly (Luke 12:48); and those who, during this Gospel age, have been fully enlightened, and who have tasted of the heavenly gift of justification, and been made partakers of the holy spirit, and who have tasted of the good word of God (not its perversion), and the powers (advantages) of the coming age, and have spurned these, and counted the blood of the covenant wherewith they were sanctified a common thing (Heb. 6:4-6; 10:26-31), will be cut off from life in the second death.

However, the Sodomites and others, though great and shameful sinners, and worthy of many and severe stripes, some of which, at least, were received in their past life, as, for instance, in their fearful overthrow and destruction, were not thus fully enlightened, and consequently were not condemned to the second death, from which there will be no resurrection. And, therefore, even the wicked Sodomites will hear the voice of the Son of man and come forth in due time; for “God our Savior will have all men to be saved and to come unto the knowledge of the truth. For there is one [just and merciful] God, and one mediator between [that just and holy] God [who cannot tolerate sin] and [fallen, sinful] men, the man Christ Jesus [the only begotten and well beloved Son of God, whom God gave to redeem us, because he so loved the world even while they were yet sinners, and] who gave himself [in accordance with the Father’s plan] a ransom for all [the Sodomites and all other sinners included],—to be testified in due time.” (1 Tim. 2:3-6.) And while this testimony was not given to the Sodomites in their day, it is just as sure that they shall have it in the coming age under the Millennial reign of Christ, when they shall come forth to judgment—to a shameful realization of their guilt, and to an opportunity for repentance and reformation.

Our Lord’s statement with reference to their future judgment (Matt. 10:14,15) is also worthy of special note. In sending out his disciples to preach the gospel of the Kingdom of heaven (verse 7), he said it would be more tolerable for Sodom and Gomorrah in the day of judgment than for the city or house that would not receive their message—”And whosoever shall not receive you, nor hear your words, when ye depart out of that house or city, shake off the dust of your feet. Verily, I say unto you, It shall be more tolerable for the land of Sodom and Gomorrah in the day of judgment than for that city.” The implication is that it will be tolerable for both classes, but less tolerable for those who wilfully reject the light of divinely revealed truth, and thus prefer the darkness to the light, because their deeds are evil (John 3:19,20), than for those who even sinned egregiously against the dimmer and waning light of nature.

Hear again the Lord’s warning to the caviling Jews who had seen his mighty works, but who wilfully refused to admit their testimony of his Messiahship—”Then began he to upbraid the cities wherein most of his mighty works were done, because they repented not: Woe unto thee, Chorazin! woe unto thee, Bethsaida! for if the mighty works which were done in you had been done in Tyre and Sidon, they would have repented long ago in sackcloth and ashes. But I say unto you, it shall be more

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tolerable for Tyre and Sidon at the day of judgment than for you. And thou, Capernaum, which art exalted unto heaven, shalt be brought down to hades [the grave]; for if the mighty works which have been done in thee had been done in Sodom, it would have remained until this day. But I say unto you, that it shall be more tolerable for the land of Sodom in the day of judgment than for thee.” (Matt. 11:21-24.)

Tyre and Sidon had suffered a terrible overthrow in the midst of carnage, pestilence and blood, and Sodom had perished under a deluge of fire and brimstone*; but the more guilty (because more enlightened) Judean cities remained. Why? Because the great day of judgment had not yet come, and except in a very few instances—of which those cited are in point, which were summarily judged and punished before the appointed time for the world’s judgment, for examples, as stated—the punishment of evil doers tarries until the appointed time, the Millennial age. Thus it is written, “The sins of some men are previously manifested, leading on to judgment, but in some [instances] indeed they follow after.” (1 Tim. 5:24. See also Luke 13:1-5.) The Lord points forward to the day of judgment when all the guilty shall receive their just desserts, and when chastened and penitent sinners may return to God.

*The whole region about Sodom abounds with slime or bitumen pits (Gen. 14:10), sulphur and salt; and the fire was probably from lightning. Thus God used the natural elements with which they were surrounded in accomplishing their destruction.

The judgments of that day will be tolerable for all; and the special revelations of divine truth and the helpful discipline and instruction which were not due in the days of Tyre and Sidon and Sodom, but which our Lord says would have led them to repentance, will be given in the coming day of judgment, both to those wicked cities and also to the cities of Judea.

How plainly all these scriptures point to the coming “times of restitution of all things” of which Peter speaks in Acts 3:19-21, saying, “Times of refreshing shall come from the presence of the Lord; and he shall send Jesus Christ, which before was preached unto you, whom the heaven must retain until the times of restitution of all things, which God hath spoken by the mouth of all his holy prophets since the world began.”

Then these times of restitution are the times of Christ’s second presence; and this work of restitution is the grand object of his predicted thousand years reign on earth; and that must be the day of judgment to which the Lord referred as the time for the “tolerable” discipline and final settlements with Tyre and Sidon and Sodom and Chorazin and Bethsaida and all the rest of mankind—the day spoken of by the Apostle Paul (Acts 17:31), saying, “God hath appointed a day in which he will judge the world in righteousness by that man whom he hath ordained [Jesus Christ], whereof he hath given assurance unto all men in that he hath raised him from the dead.”

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We rejoice in the blessed testimony thus assured to all men that God, who so loved the world, even while they were yet sinners, that he gave his only begotten Son that whosoever believeth on him should not perish but have everlasting life, hath also appointed a day—a period of a thousand years—in which he will grant to them all a righteous judgment, trial, by him—by that same Son, now risen from the dead—who also so loved us that he freely laid down his life for us all, that thus by the merit of his vicarious sacrifice he might remove the legal disability to our restoration. And we rejoice, too, in the mercy and love and helpfulness vouchsafed to our sin-sick race by the character of the Judge who has given such ample proof of his love.

He will be a just Judge, laying “justice to the line and righteousness to the plummet;” “a merciful High Priest touched with the feeling of our infirmities;” a wise and good physician able to apply the healing balm of the tree of life which is for the healing of the nations; and indeed the blessed seed of Abraham in whom “ALL the families of the earth (from Adam to the end) shall be blessed.”

With such blessed assurances, who could doubt that the Judge of all the earth will do right?

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— February 1, 1894 —