day no. 14,199: remember Lot's wife

Genesis 19:26

But Lot's wife, behind him, looked back, and she became a pillar of salt.\

 

One of the shortest verses in the Bible is Luke 17:32 where Jesus says, "Remember Lot's wife." Three simple words, one tremendous principle: do not outrage the Spirit of grace by turning back to that from which He has rescued you. Do not show mercy to your sin. Do not scrapbook your former life before Christ. Face forward, striving with every fiber of your being to take hold of Him Who has taken hold of you.

day no. 14,198: creative commons

Genesis 19:23-25, 27-28

The sun had risen on the earth when Lot came to Zoar. 24 Then the Lord rained on Sodom and Gomorrah sulfur and fire from the Lord out of heaven. 25 And he overthrew those cities, and all the valley, and all the inhabitants of the cities, and what grew on the ground. 27 And Abraham went early in the morning to the place where he had stood before the Lord. 28 And he looked down toward Sodom and Gomorrah and toward all the land of the valley, and he looked and, behold, the smoke of the land went up like the smoke of a furnace.

 

Sulfur and fire fell from heaven as divine judgment on Sodom and Gomorrah. God overthrew those who overthrew the order of things as God designed. Their utter disregard for His creative authority cost them their progressive lives.

day no. 14,197: the right to be rescued

Genesis 19:15

As morning dawned, the angels urged Lot, saying, “Up! Take your wife and your two daughters who are here, lest you be swept away in the punishment of the city.” 16 But he lingered. So the men seized him and his wife and his two daughters by the hand, the Lord being merciful to him, and they brought him out and set him outside the city.

 

Why Lot lingered we do not know. We know from 2 Peter 2 that he had come to both cry out against the city's immorality and to continue to pitch his tent among them. Whatever compelled him to stay before likely motivated his procrastination at the present. But God, in His mercy, did not give Lot what his delay deserved. He brought him out of harm's way by His grace, because He wanted to, not because Lot had earned the right to be rescued.

day no. 14,196: not moved or motivated

Genesis 19:14

So Lot went out and said to his sons-in-law, “Up! Get out of this place, for the Lord is about to destroy the city.” But he seemed to his sons-in-law to be jesting.

 

Lot came with urgent news that was met with resistance in the genre of dismissive. His sons-in-law could not believe the urgency. They couldn't take this seriously. Perhaps it was because Lot had a habit of expressing his discontent for Sodom in superlatives (2 Peter 2:7-8) or maybe it was due to their own moral luke warmness, but either way, these boys were not moved or motivated by Lot's plea.

day no. 14,195: groping for greater darkness

Genesis 19:9-11
Then they pressed hard against the man Lot, and drew near to break the door down. 10 But the men reached out their hands and brought Lot into the house with them and shut the door. 11 And they struck with blindness the men who were at the entrance of the house, both small and great, so that they wore themselves out groping for the door.

Sodom pressed hard against Lot, but the men God sent to destroy the city rescued him by blinding the sexual predators. Notice that their blindness was not, however, a deterrent to their desires. Sodom feverishly continued trying to get to these two men - so consuming was their desire that they wore themselves out groping for the door. Just as a frightened person in a dark room desperately tries over and over to find the door handle to get out, these men greedily groped to find the entrance into Lot's home and into these men. Sodom was outside in the dark, darkened in their understanding, and seeking greater degrees of darkness inside.

day no. 14,194: to the last man

Genesis 19:4-5

But before they lay down, the men of the city, the men of Sodom, both young and old, all the people to the last man, surrounded the house. 5 And they called to Lot, “Where are the men who came to you tonight? Bring them out to us, that we may know them.”

 

Every single man in the city showed up to have their way with the two strange men rumored to be staying at Lot's place. There were no men left in the city other than Lot who were not conspiring to molest these two men. The whole town was the bad part of town. Sodom was not interested in "getting to know" these men as friends or enemies, but to "know" them the way Adam knew Eve resulting in the conception of children. Abraham's proposal to find 10 righteous men would fail and Sodom would be destroyed.

day no. 14,193: any and every

A Christian should be willing to do anything, anytime, anywhere for Jesus by faith that God has done, is doing and will continue to do everything, everywhere, every time.