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[0:00] Just so good. And he knows that I want to be here doing this. Many thanks to the men of this church who carried the baton,! most especially to Pastor Greg and do the wand of power if you would.

[0:33] Let's see if it'll let me... Good? Yep, there I am. Consequences of spiritual compromise. Alright, now one of the first things I want to say to you about this passage of Scripture is this is a much misunderstood and maligned and misapplied passage of the Bible.

[0:51] Even among Christians. Especially among believers who want to do all kinds of gymnastics with it to make it say what it doesn't clearly say. But even beyond that, there are so-called churches and there are people who claim to know Jesus who have adopted and accommodated themselves to the culture in terms of what we read in this passage so that they are anti-Genesis 19 and they try in every way to explain away what we're going to read and see this morning.

[1:22] And I'll tell you, friends, it wasn't wasted on me as I studied this week that as I come to preach from this particular chapter about God's judgment on Sodom and Gomorrah on this first Sunday of June, I guess, our nation is mired in a sickening celebration of homosexual sin that they refer to as Pride Month.

[1:46] Taking pride in what God calls a sickening abomination that leads to death and hell. The influence of the gay agenda on our society is profound and it's profoundly bad.

[2:01] Nevertheless, Christianity is here to affect the culture, not the other way around. Now, unfortunately, history teaches us, as well as the situation in our own time, that too often the ways of the world have more of an impact on the church and Christian living than the church and Christians have on the world.

[2:24] And yet, we don't despair any more than Paul said, I don't despair over that reality. We take spiritual stock of the reality, we pray, and then we get busy in godly living.

[2:37] And this is what the church is called to. We are called to make disciples. And in order to do that, we've got to be in the world, don't we? We've got to go get them. We've got to get into the mission field and bring these people to an encounter with the God who made their souls.

[2:54] And we have to help them see the grave consequences of rejecting that God in the only provision that He's made to be right with Him in Jesus Christ. We'll never tire of saying that because that's the gospel.

[3:08] We don't despair. I want to share with you something that pastor, author Kent Hughes, many of you will know who Kent Hughes is. He's long retired now, but he wrote a number of commentaries.

[3:22] He is a wonderful, wonderful theologian, and he was a very faithful pastor. And he weighed in on this after decades of ministry as he talked about Christians and culture.

[3:36] So let me read from just the preface alone of this particular book that he wrote. This is called Set Apart, Calling a Worldly Church to a Godly Life.

[3:48] This was written back in 2003. Now listen to this. Our own time and place require that we take stock of what is actually happening in our culture and in our churches.

[4:07] The evidence is pretty clear that we do not understand either of these as well as we should. Our culture and what it means to be the church. We're not doing church right now.

[4:20] We are the church. We are being the people of God right now, involving ourselves in what God calls us to do as His people. What comes first?

[4:32] The transforming of your nature and then from that nature you begin to live a different life because Jesus now lives in you. Among evangelicals there is great disconnect between on the one hand what Christians believe and assimilate from sermons and Christian sources and how on the other hand they actually live.

[4:54] Well now Pastor Greg and I are very concerned about that dilemma. We don't want that to continue among the people that we serve as shepherds. As your pastors we don't want you to have a disconnect between what you are taught and what you hear on Sunday and what you come to in the men's ministry and the women's ministry and the way of the teaching of the Word of God and how you actually function in life out in the everyday workaday world.

[5:19] We don't want to disconnect with that. We want you to live your faith as James tells us we should. It is this very disconnect that is the subject of this book.

[5:32] The model for cultural critique as part of the religious life exists within the Bible itself. Right. The Old Testament prophets were thorough going cultural critics.

[5:45] They didn't simply preach a remedy for cultural ills. They took the time to portray the cultural situation to which they offered solutions. You will see that today. The resulting prophetic discourse as we find in the Old Testament combines sometimes shockingly exposés with exhortations about what God requires of His people.

[6:07] You'll be shocked today I think. In the New Testament Jesus and the apostolic writers of the epistles do exactly the same thing. Jesus repeatedly mingles analysis of what was awry in His own social world with His teaching about a godly life.

[6:24] Now as for the New Testament epistles there is so much reference to problems in the early church in its cultural setting that a main difficulty we have as modern readers is to work through the mass of cultural references en route to discovering the moral and spiritual application for our own times and lives.

[6:43] It's true, isn't it? The contemporary evangelical church is not lacking for moral and spiritual instruction it is lacking in its ability to remain uncontaminated by the unchristian thinking and morality of contemporary culture.

[7:00] It is doubtless true that there's been too much cultural criticism and not enough gospel content in theological liberalism, yes. But in contemporary evangelicalism there has been a deficiency of cultural awareness and a resulting lack of discernment regarding how the world has overwhelmed the thinking and behavior of Christians.

[7:23] Well, we're going to do something about that here at Grace. We don't want you to be overwhelmed with the thinking and behavior of the world.

[7:34] We want you to have an answer for the world in the way that you live and speak. And that answer has to be Jesus.

[7:45] We need to live for Christ. Now, let's turn then to Genesis 19 and what I'll do is I'll just leave it to reading the text for today and I'll explain to you what we're going to do with it.

[7:58] Beginning in verse 1, Now the two angels came to Sodom in the evening as Lot was sitting in the gate of Sodom. Now when Lot saw these two angels he rose to meet them and bowed down with his face to the ground.

[8:11] Here's what he said in verse 2, Now behold my lords, notice that is a small L, unlike when Abraham addressed the Lord, capital L, back in chapter 18, 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.

[8:30] And they said, No, we'll spend the night in the square. And yet Lot 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.

[8:44] Now 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. And they called to Lot and said to him, Where are the men who came to you tonight?

[8:56] Bring them out to us that we may have relations with them. But Lot went out to them at the doorway and quickly shut the door behind him and said, Please, please, my brothers, do not act wickedly.

[9:09] Now behold, I have two daughters who have not yet had relations with a 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.

[9:29] 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.

[9:40] And so they pressed hard against Lot and came near to break the door. But the men reached out, that is the angels, reached out their hands and brought Lot into the house with them and shut the door.

[9:53] They then 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 and on and on it goes.

[10:06] It gets worse. Now I want to ask you to stop reading there with me. Don't read ahead of me. You can do that later. And let's talk about what's going on here. I'll ask this particular question.

[10:19] If this was all that you knew and if I would have read the rest of the chapter all the way to the end you'd be and you probably have read some of it you'd be astounded. If this was all you knew of Lot and all you knew about his life what would you think of him?

[10:35] How would you measure his character? What kinds of words would you use to describe a man like this? Another question that we might ask is this.

[10:47] Why is Lot so central to this story? There's all kinds of ways that God could have put the destruction of Sodom and Gomorrah in the Bible and yet Lot seems to be a central character in every single part of it from beginning to end.

[11:04] Why is that? What are we to learn from Lot and about Lot in this instance? I want to share this with you. This is from 2 Peter chapter 2 verses 7 and 8.

[11:14] Listen to this. And if he rescued God rescued righteous Lot He doesn't sound so righteous right now does he? Oppressed by the sensual conduct of unprincipled men for by what he saw and heard that righteous man while living among them felt his righteous soul tormented day after day by their lawless deeds.

[11:37] Righteous man. How do we understand the difference in these accounts? Because what we read up here from 2 Peter doesn't sound like the guy we're reading about in Genesis 19 at least not right now.

[11:52] The answer is this. The answer is that Lot was righteous in the same way that Abraham was righteous. He was justified or declared righteous by faith in God.

[12:04] But unlike Abraham Lot made his home among the pagans of Canaan and I'm going to explain that phrase. Made his home. There is a difference between living in the world and being like the world.

[12:21] Being of the world. We have to live in our mission field so that we can reach them. But we don't need to be like them. We don't need to adopt their priorities and their ways and their fads.

[12:35] That's not what we're called to be or do. And yet this is exactly what we see Lot doing in Sodom. Now over time here's what happened.

[12:46] Even righteous Lot was brought down in his spiritual life until much of the way he lived was full of compromise and that is what we're seeing now. This is the text now.

[12:58] Now hear this carefully. This has enormous importance for Israel as a nation set apart by God to carry his blessing and his name into a corrupt culture.

[13:10] A corrupt world. Time and again God will tell them throughout the Old Testament don't be like your neighbors. Don't be like the people around you. Time and again God will give them that message.

[13:23] Let me ask you a question. Did they listen? On the whole did they listen? No. Time and again they did not. Israel is to be a holy people who are not to pollute themselves with the ways of the unbelieving nations around them.

[13:39] Now compromise with the culture will corrupt their walk with God and bring his chastening upon them. So the consequences for embracing the ways of the societies around them would be devastating to the nation of Israel.

[13:58] So the Lord lovingly tells them to look to him and steer clear of the ways of ungodliness. Don't let them have that kind of accommodating effect on you.

[14:09] Let it go the other way. You keep the high road and don't descend into the depravity that you will see practiced around you day in and day out.

[14:21] Lot's life among the Sodomites is further warning to the children of Israel. Remember they are the original audience of this text right? Moses has written this so that the children of Israel standing on the edge of conquering the promised land will better understand this is you are my instrument of judgment.

[14:45] Now God's counsel and commands on this were meant to cleanse they were meant to safeguard! the Israelites from idolatry and spiritual corruption.

[14:57] This is what he said friends don't marry them don't worship like them don't eat like them hence the eventual dietary laws don't parent like them don't raise your kids like they do don't conduct business like them don't take on the priorities of life that they have instead and this is hard wipe them out now that's judgment that's God's judgment and I'm going to show you text down the road here in this message about what why what that is now look lots life in Sodom teaches us the dangers of compromising with culture in this chapter teaches us the wisdom goodness and grace of God and his judgment of wickedness in our societies there there are several several consequences or I would call them dangers of cultural compromise which individual

[16:00] Christians church families your family and even nations on the whole should heed in this chapter and I'm just going to help you search out two of them today just two of them I think I have like six in total we'll see if we can do the other four next Sunday today I wanted to slow down a little bit and lay more of the ground work for what we're going to do God willing next time and so the first thing that I want to point out to you in the way of a consequence of spiritual compromise in your life is this spiritual compromise corrupts our relationship with God's servants God's servants now for you that would be your pastors and it would also include the people sitting around you as you try to make yourself a servant of your brothers and sisters in Christ so that God uses you as an instrument to help them grow more like Jesus in character in word and speech and deeds we're all ministering to each other to help each other become more like

[17:05] Jesus or what's the point if we're not becoming more like Jesus this is just religiosity we're just marking time as religious people no we want to become more like the God who saved us we want to mirror more and more of his character his love his goodness his spiritual compromise corrupts our relationship with God's servants that would first of all include your pastors pastor Greg and myself and then servants who would try to minister the truth to you in love now keep in mind Israel's dealings with God's prophets apostles and even with Jesus himself as I say this what did they do to Jesus how did spiritual compromise in sin cause them to look on Jesus Christ they eventually saw him as a threat and an enemy and they killed him

[18:05] I wonder how many church people have left good churches and good pastors because they just quite got rubbed the wrong way over something the pastor said or the way that they said it or something that the pastor did that could have been worked through!

[18:27] we're trying and so pray for us and sit knee to knee with us and talk it through now we also have this in mind we have heavenly minded Abraham as we consider this because we do have in chapter 18 an example of a man who is trying to be honest he's trying to be humble he's trying to be hospitable and helpful toward God's servants so I don't want to just brush please listen to some of the messages that I had from chapter 18 about Abraham and how Abraham treated what we know to be the Lord Jesus and these two angels and the hospitality that he offered them I'm not going to take time to read back through 18 we've already covered that ground but I wanted to mention it to you Abraham's life in contrast to lots was an open book as it were now his life wasn't a perfect life we'll see again Abraham's going to mess up here in just a little while but he was a man who was trying to walk with the

[19:31] Lord and cared about the Lord and wanted to serve the Lord and we don't see this kind of compromise in Abraham's lifestyle we see the man struggling but we don't see it as a lifestyle!

[19:42] With Lot Genesis 19 shows us a lifestyle and that's the issue the issue isn't that I sin or you sin the issue is what we do with it the issue is also how we bring it before the Lord and what we ask God to help us do in light of it Father help me to walk in integrity and uprightness in my heart before you and when I sin let it break my heart as my pastor friend sin we deal with it as we come to know what it is and bring it before the Lord that's not what you see in Lot and he becomes an example for us of what spiritual compromise will do in your life beginning with how you'll treat God's servants people that God send to you to minister the truth to you in love and you don't want to be doing this rejecting those servants of the Lord you don't want to be in such a sour disposition in your own heart through spiritual compromise that when people come to speak the truth in love to you you reject it because who are you rejecting whose word is it well you hope it's the

[20:58] Lord's right if they're speaking the truth in love then they're speaking the words of the Lord to you and you don't want to reject that then we have double minded lot his life was heavily influenced compromised conflicted by his culture you know I'm saying all this because we may be tempted to see lots actions as a mirror of Abraham's we might conclude that they acted in similar ways with similar motives toward the angels that's not true I believe the context of this chapter chapter 19 cannot and does not support that view lot seems to be acting more in his own interests overall and I ask myself why is the Lord showing us this now zero in on verse one with me if you would beloved now the two angels those are the two angels that were alongside the Lord Jesus in chapter 18 these two angels now come to

[22:01] Sodom and so the Lord Jesus was left standing up a ways away with Abraham and the two angels make their way down to Sodom in the evening and they find Lot nephew Lot Abraham's nephew sitting in the gate of Sodom and when Lot saw them he rose to meet them and he bowed down with his face to the ground now this is not worship as Abraham provided because Abraham knew immediately who he was addressing and dealing with God this is something different verse 1 brings out right away as we find Lot sitting at the gate that he's serving his own interests so I'll show you why is this significant in showing that Lot is a man compromised by his own culture how does verse 1 help us that listen the gate of any city in this region is a place of business it's a place of commerce it's a place of political posturing and of dealing with legal matters judged by officials and so

[23:10] Lot is a quasi official or judge in Sodom Lot is a foreigner to these people as they will point out in just a little while and yet he's managed to secure a degree of rank and political standing among its citizens why is that important listen that social standing is more likely larger in his own mind than it is real to those around him and they're going to tell him that in just a little!

[23:36] while! Who do you think you are man setting yourself up as a judge among us and saying these things to us and talking to us in this way I'll tell you what we're going to do worse to you than we were going to do to the men inside your house how about that we're going to drag you and your wife and all your family out here and we're going to do worse to them than we were going to do to those two men I'll get to that in a minute ask yourself what does worse mean when we see what they had in mind for the angels it's like what's worse the Bible doesn't leave this out now think about this with me lot has some influence he does when you are living in a society of tremendous!

[24:23] evil! Corruption and gross wickedness and you find yourself meeting with the approval of the leaders and movers and shakers of that society ask yourself this what kind of compromises have you had to make to secure that approval and standing you with me now this is why the Bible has this in here this is why this is important what does this tell us about lot that over the years he has compromised and compromised and compromised until to some degree he's gained some influence and won the approval of these wicked wicked wicked people whom God says I'm going to wipe them out so whatever Abraham thought whatever lot thinks God says I'm done and I'm going to wipe them out that's scary we don't want to see anybody like that even people who want to make themselves our enemies we don't want to see people come under that kind of judgment

[25:26] I don't well it keeps on going in verse 2 lot bows himself down to these men and he says now behold my lords please turn aside into your servants house and spend the night wash your feet this is common Asian hospitality eastern hospitality here you know!

[25:46] I'll fix you a meal and they reply you know what we think we're going to do we appreciate that we think we're just going to sleep in the square tonight you know under the stars it's nice night oh you think the angels didn't know what was going on do you think the servants of God were clueless about what Sodom was why did they come there in the first place what's their mission from God destroy it utterly leave no trace I believe it's best to see lots actions here toward these angels is mostly selfish what do I mean well he didn't yet know they were from God did he nope he didn't know that he didn't know that they had come to destroy the city not yet so what was going on well I think he saw them as important men he recognized that they were important men and by having them stay in his house they brought lot honor and certain bragging rights among the other well-to-do officials in the city and so lot kind of beat these guys to the punch and garnered all the distinction of hosting them for himself you might say

[27:03] Jeff that's not fair well I think the context makes it clear that that is a very fair assessment of where lot is right now and how pervasively this culture has affected his heart in what's right and what's wrong now I will ask the question and put it out here for all of us look did lot want to protect these guys is it fair did he want to protect them perhaps I think so because lot knows how vile his city is he knows what's coming so he's likely trying to spare these men the horrors of what he knows will happen to them if they stay in the square he doesn't know they're angels he doesn't know that these men could easily say and call down just one other angel and wipe the city off the face of the planet he doesn't know that or they themselves could do it lot like look guys it's a bad idea you don't want to be doing that believe me it won't end well this is where he's coming from okay I'll give you that but chapter 19 seems to tell us something more going on behind lot's intentions we don't have to read between the lines we just need to read carefully and so we have verse 3 yet lot urged them strongly that's a double emphasis there so they turned aside to him they gave in they relented and they entered lot's house and lot prepared a feast for them and baked unleavened bread unleavened bread remember is the bread of haste and so there's a sense of urgency and haste in lot's preparations again

[28:43] I think the text is trying to tell us and the Hebrews would have picked up on this it's trying to tell us everything about what Lot's doing right now so everything is being done quickly alright let's get this thing out of the way and everybody go to bed pull the covers up over your head and pray hard what am I saying hide hide yeah well I think Lot is hiding the reality of what his city is from these men and of what it intends for his visitors he knows full well what he's dealing with he has lived with these people for years and years and he knows what's going on spiritual compromise corrupts our relationship with God's servants in so many ways and folks when you when you start doubting and disparaging in your heart at any level the people who are trying to tell you the truth bear with you in forgiveness and patience and kindness to come alongside of you and walk with you even though there might be staggering and stumbling along because we're just people those are the kinds of people you want to embrace work with labor diligently with amen well when you're compromising yourself spiritually in your own walk with

[30:20] God your perspective on these kinds of people is going to be terribly! terribly skewed that's exactly what we're seeing here with these men it gets worse when Lot does come to realize here now in just a moment who these men are and what their mission is things don't get better they get worse a lot argues with them my goodness friends when they finally tell him that look we're going to destroy this place completely this entire valley for as far as you can see and left it's going to be desolation Lot argues with him so what did the angels have to do I'm getting ahead of myself they have to grab his family by their hands and drag them out of the city that's spiritual compromise and accommodation friends when God's telling you to go one way and you stand there and argue with him now how much pride do you have to have to do on sin if you look at verse 4 before they lay down the men of the city now look they barely had time to eat their supper and before they were able to lay down the men of the city the men of

[31:41] Sodom surrounded the house both young and old all the people from every quarter surrounded the house well it didn't take long for word of these new faces to spread did it and now the Bible actually forces us to see what is meant by the outcry of Sodom and Gomorrah is indeed great and their sin is exceedingly grave chapter 18 verse 20 remember this is what the angels and the Lord told Abraham as a reason for going down to Sodom verse 4 then depicts a terrifying scene for these angels and for Lot and his family now folks just real quickly put yourself in their position we've got daddies in here we've got daughters we've got sons right now guys think of yourself in the situation where you live and a gang of rapists a mob of rapists have surrounded your house and cut off all the exits and they are making clear what their intentions are toward you and your family and anybody that you have in your house is that scary now for some of us we have an answer for that it's kind of dramatic nevertheless it's a scary proposition none of us want to hurt other people but don't bring that kind of nonsense and we're fine unfortunately these men have set their hearts to bring that kind of nonsense

[33:19] Lot's house is surrounded by rapists they've cut off any avenue of escape their numbers dispel any notion that they could be kept from their sickening intentions Lot and his family are trapped they're trapped and this is what the Bible is showing us so verse 4 stresses this look up on the screen if you would verse 4 stresses the pervasive nature of all sin but especially of sexual sin sexual sin and particularly homosexuality is pervasive in that it is all consuming it is infectious it is pervasive in that it is prevalent widespread and extensive it's very aggressive so friends verse 4 is telling us that no person in the city was saved from the corrupting influence of this sin you can imagine an entire city of people and there wasn't a man in the city who wasn't a part of this problem not a man that's mind blowing to me this is the point that the

[34:39] Bible is making when it says old and young you have to see this on a spectrum old is on one polar side young on the other and everything in between you see how it's pervasive this is pervasiveness in sin there were rich and there were poor see we got two polar extremes again we got the rich and the poor and everybody in between we got important people and common people we have men from every walk of life who were involved in homosexual sin to one degree or another and it dominated the climate the attitude and the life of the cities of the valley hear this as I say it because I think you will hear our culture in it homosexuality then and sexual sin had become normalized and accepted as the way of life in these cities friends Sodom is a city looking to itself now let's look at how the Lord develops this and warns us away from the road that leads to this terrible way of life because in history we can see society and culture society and culture one after another collapsing from within because of this kind of pervasive sinfulness in their lives look at verse 5 with me if you would and so these men now this mob of rapists who gathered around the house they called to Lot and said to him where are the men who came to you tonight oh that's right Lot we've heard all about them bring them out to us see they want

[36:12] Lot to participate bring them out to us that we may have relations with them alright what you're seeing here in verse 5 is Sodom's debauchery it's a clear case of gross human depravity now folks this verse leaves us in no doubt about the sinister motives of this mob of lustful men and the Bible doesn't draw any quarter here it's telling us in plain language what's going on and I'm going to preach it that way the literal translation of the end of verse 5 means these men want to engage in intercourse with these angels they do not know they are angels they just know they're attractive men they're fresh different men and so we're going to have our way with them one of the many lame and erroneous reasons unbelievers people who mock the Bible have given for God's judgment on these cities is their lack of hospitality that's why God did this it didn't have anything to do with sexual sin or homosexuality it was the fact that the people were not hospitable they take this view from

[37:20] Ezekiel 16 49 and 50 for those of you who are taking notes Ezekiel 16 49 and 50 where Ezekiel speaks of the issue of the judgment coming on the cities as being something you didn't take care of the poor you didn't feed people you didn't take care of the common needs but then it also mentions this and you did abominations and it's like the people who want to make this about hospitality they avoid that word abomination in those verses now let's use the context and be fair and let's define abominations the way God does what does God mean by abominations going on well I'll show you in just a few minutes just hang on to that all I'm saying here is they ignore this word abomination and they shouldn't because that changes the context and it's going to lead them to a different meaning and so that's why they say oh Sodom and Gomorrah was destroyed for lack of hospitality not homosexuality do you know

[38:22] I've actually had that argument presented to me now let me go ahead and let you know this my heart breaks for people who are dominated by this kind of sin from the very beginning of my public ministry as I began to get involved in ministry as a young college student as I surrendered to full-time ministry when I went to seminary for the first time I immediately was introduced to this population of people and in the work that I started to do in my clinical work as a counselor I had to work with this population we would do group sessions and the groups were organized in different categories of struggle and sinfulness and that kind of thing and for whatever reason it was good to the people that were in charge that I was put in the group with sexual offenders and so I spent 18 months working with this population of people dozens and dozens of men who were embroiled in this I went to college and I met a young man

[39:25] I'll tell you the story another time I met a young man who was trying to come out of homosexual sexuality and he and I became friends from the very beginning of my ministry God has put me in a position to face with these folks to offer hope to these folks and to wrestle within myself about how I would think about and feel about being close to people like this getting over my own pride my own prejudice about these kinds of things I was raised in the deep south I grew up beating up these kind of people I won't even tell you the kinds of things that we said it wouldn't be appropriate in the pulpit remember I haven't always been a believer I want you to know that about me because I don't want you to hear me preaching this in a way that says go out and kill all these people or let God destroy them all no we want to see them saved we want to see these people who are in our families and among!

[40:29] from what we know will be the judgment of almighty God on their lives now let me share this with you since I've used these words debauchery and depravity look debauchery is this debauchery is excessive indulgence in lust so this is a habitual lewdness so this is a soul defining life defining pursuit of sexual pleasure immorality licentiousness lasciviousness are all words the Bible uses synonymously to describe this kind of debauchery depravity refers to the total corruption and pollution of our lives by sin now this is very important theologically that you understand this no part of who we are is left unaffected by the ruining effects of sin every human being then is depraved I'm depraved you're depraved we're all depraved but not every human being acts out their depravity on equal levels what do I mean in other words it's possible for a person to sink into deeper stages of the expression of his or her corruption by sin so depravity total depravity simply means this there's no part of your humanity that is unaffected by sin every part of you is polluted and corrupted by sin there's not a little speck of you somewhere that's still okay and God taps into your okayness to save you no

[41:54] God saves you to the uttermost because you are totally corrupted by the blackness of your own heart in sin if that weren't the case we wouldn't need a cross we would just need God to tap into the goodness that's already there in minuscule form and save us but we needed a cross because it had to be punished to the uttermost so that we could be saved to the uttermost let's do amen okay right you're agreeing with God not simply with me every human being is depraved but not every human being acts out their depravity at equal levels let me give you a quick example stealing bubble gum isn't the same expression of sin as molesting a child agreed murder is not the same expression of depravity as gossip cheating on your spouse is not the same expression of sin as cheating on a test sin is sin in

[42:58] God's eyes in that each sin deserves death and each sin must be forgiven by God or atoned for by Jesus Christ himself every single sin whether it's stealing bubble gum or murder but we don't all express sin at the same levels so verse 5 clearly exposes the wickedness bringing about God's judgment what is it homosexuality and the question I ask is this it's up on the screen now why is this particular sin highlighted when so many sins prevailed in Sodom I mean there's selfishness there's pride there's unkindness there's all kinds of sin going on and here's the answer because homosexuality is what you find at the bottom of the depravity barrel now our world hates to hear stuff like that I have made people so angry at me so that they've cut me out of their lives because I've had to say things like that to them pleading with them to come to Christ warning them about what this sin would do to their heart and their life this sin and its similar sins of sexual perversion are particularly devastating to societies and so God says stay away he was so adamant about this that he destroyed these cities rather than let Israel have anything to do with them now one of the things that we can say about this is this sin is perverted it's perverted it is certainly not something that we need to be proud of or flaunt or use to mock what

[44:36] God says is good and what is full of his purposes for sexual relationships no it's an aberration and abomination of human relationships it's a corruption of God's design for marriage for procreation for family life societal life individual life and so I say again Israel as they read this in Genesis 19 and every society reading this to include our society today they have to be sobered and warned about what is taking place here and just a plain clear reading of the text you don't even have to dig down deeply and take apart the Hebrew you see exactly what he's talking about bring these men out so that we can have intercourse with them men with men I just don't know how much plainer the Bible can get than that in verses 6 and 7 but Lot went out to them when they said that and he shut the door quickly behind them now he's standing right in the doorway he barely gets out because the men are right there he barely gets out and he closes the door behind him real quickly and then he starts to appeal to these guys please brothers isn't that interesting brothers what are you talking about

[45:52] Lot these men are not your brothers I don't want to call people like this my brother I want to tell them repent and you can be a brother but there's something very significant that separates us right now I love the Lord and the Lord has worked in my life in forgiveness of sin you don't love the Lord and he has not forgiven you and you're under his wrath please become like me and trust in the Lord Jesus Christ and be saved that's what we want please brothers do not act wickedly in these two verses when we read that Lot went out to confront them and asked them not to act wickedly there was another way to translate this that would be even more literal and here it is I'm putting it up how do we understand this kind of cowardice on Lot's behalf how do we understand what he's doing it's a crazy crazy crazy reality that we're dealing with it's a wonder that any of this came off in the way that it did with

[46:55] Lot and his family Lot exposes himself let me include verse 8 behold I have two daughters they've not yet had relations with a man let me bring them out to you and you can do to them whatever you want but don't do anything to these men because why well they're under my protection that is so lame he exposes himself for the hypocrite and spiritually weak man he's become through his constant spiritual compromising over the years he tells them this lame lame argument no don't act in homosexual wickedness but then right away tells them no instead act this way toward my virgin daughters who've never known men and do to them whatever you like don't do homosexual sin but do this great rape of immorality to my own flesh and blood does that sound like a godly man to you I know every man in this place as my brothers they would give their lives before they would let anything like this even closely come about you'd have to tear us apart chop off one arm and

[48:08] I'd be flailing you with the other one right we're all committed to that kind of care for our families here's Lot wanting to throw his daughter to the wolves do with them whatever you want and he knows full well what they want to do this is nuts so Lot's reasoning ought to be grounded in the truth but he's abandoned what the Lord would have him do as a godly man in this situation his rationale at the end of verse 8 is shocking these men are under my protection well what about his daughters are they not under his roof and in need of his protection so how do we understand this kind of cowardice and sin on Lot's behalf they said stand aside furthermore they said this one came in as an alien and already he's acting like a judge now we'll treat you worse than them so they pressed hard against Lot and came near to break the door they're just going to mow

[49:11] Lot down to get into his house folks sexual sin is pervasive it's perverted and now we see that it's pernicious pernicious pernicious means causing insidious harm or ruin it's ruinous injurious it's hurtful the sin itself is pernicious!

[49:34] homosexuality is ruinous by nature like cancer is ruinous by nature it is a life-consuming sin it hurts everyone it touches so that it causes insidious harm even to those who don't practice it but have to live with it and around it I've been there also I think there's a sense in which the sodomites themselves are pernicious they're acting on what they are from within they're acting from their hearts that's very important they are full of violence because they're consumed with homosexual lust it's what's driving them it's what's defining them so their actions are the fruit of who they are nobody's making them do this they do according to what is in their heart and now now we see where this wickedness of heart continues to take these people what what what do the sodomites mean up here on the screen by they will do worse to lot than they had in mind for the two men i mean it's difficult for me to imagine as i studied this out something worse than what these evil men want to force on the angels and lot family we're going to do worse to you and yours than we were going to do to them well whatever it is here's the point here it is they knew what was worse and they fully intended to do it to lot and his family these men were inflamed with lust completely consumed with acting on their own carnal appetites and you add to this that they had become enraged this is mob anger we see it all over the

[51:17] TV today on the news this is mob anger and it feeds itself and the Bible speaks to this people don't realize this that the Bible already shows us this in plain form well what are they they so mad about what are they well in verses 6 and 7 we read that Lot went out to confront them and he asked them don't act like this and I was telling you that this can be translated this way it can actually be translated literally do not be wicked oh he shouldn't have said that not not only do not act wickedly do not be wicked now we've taken a different turn it's one thing for me to say okay you're doing some things that you know you need to stop and clean up and you know do something different it's another thing for me to look at you and say you are wicked I am wicked now some judgments being made about who you are not just what you do and they they recognize that was coming from lot that went right into their heart that's a more literal understanding so in the eyes of the wicked sodom might!

[52:33] Lot's done the unpardonable thing now folks hear this today think about this today their vitriolic words and threats of verse 9 come because of the homosexual men being confronted by lot with the idea that what they are and what they are doing is sinful wicked wrong and evil don't you call me evil anything and anyone that gets in the way of their desire is an enemy an obstacle and has to be silenced and overcome so sin lusts sin lives and sin labors for one thing more more more of what God forbids sin and more is never enough for sin never so pervasive perverted pernicious and persistent now we have verses 9 through 11 stand aside you're an alien you're a foreigner get out of the way so they pressed hard against lot and came to break down the door but the men reached out their hands and brought lot into the house with them and shut the door and they struck the men who were at the doorway of the house with blindness small and great so that they wearied themselves trying to find the doorway so now now they become violent to get what they want most and the only thing that saved lot the only thing that saved his family was

[54:07] God's supernatural intervention through these two angels! helpless and groping in the dark and did that stop them?

[54:21] Did you read ahead? Did it stop them from trying to break the door down and get in to satisfy their carnality? Not one bit it didn't even slow them down so great is their evil desire and powerful their sexual appetite that they persist in trying to find their way into the house so fueled by a toxic combination of anger and lust and pride and greed the mob of men grope towards sin even in blindness sin is blindness and it promotes blindness now folks this is a shocking warning for all God fearing people to heed making homosexuality and all sexual perversion a part of accepted everyday societal life is going to bring God's judgment and it's going to corrode the culture from within God's word is clear about the Lord's heart regarding the acceptance practice and spread of homosexuality in society now folks as I work toward a close here

[55:29] I want to share a few passages with you that set us up for next time so just bear with me here if you'll turn to Leviticus 18 just give me a little bit more time Leviticus chapter 18 and this is in response to those people who would tell us that the sin of homosexuality is not in view here in this chapter and if it is at best it's minimal so let's let God define this Leviticus 18 beginning in verse 19 where prescriptions from God on Israel are being given also you shall verse 19 you shall not approach a woman to uncover her nakedness during her menstrual impurity now I want you to notice the context here that's being dealt with so this is sexual purity along a number of lines or avenues of societal life you shall not have intercourse with your neighbor's wife to be defiled with her you shall not give any of your offspring to offer them to

[56:34] Molech the false god of the Canaanites nor shall you profane the name of your god I am the Lord verse 22 you shall not lie with a male as one lies with a female it is an abomination also you should not have intercourse with any animal to be defiled with it nor shall any woman stand before an animal to mate with it it is a perversion do not defile yourselves by any of these things for by all these the nations which I am casting out before you have become defiled the nations around them have done all these things for the land has become defiled therefore I have brought its punishment upon it so the land has spewed out its inhabitants but as for you you are to keep my statutes and judgments and shall not do any of these abominations neither the native nor the alien who sojourns among you for the men of the land who have been before you have done all these abominations and the land has become polluted or defiled so that the land will not spew you out should you defile it as it has spewed out the nation which has been before you that's judgment whoever does any of these abominations those persons who do so shall be cut off from among their people thus you

[57:53] Israel are to keep my charge that you do not practice any of the abominable customs which have been practiced before you so as not to defile yourselves with them I am the Lord your God you see something similar in the New Testament in Romans chapter 1 I'll take you there very I won't make comments on all this I just want you to see it there were other places in Leviticus 20 I've put it up there you can see that but I want to go to Romans and show you this before I move on for this reason the apostle Paul says God gave these people over these people who had rejected God he gave them over to degrading passions Notice for that which is unnatural and in the same way also the men abandoned the natural function of the woman burned in their desire toward one another men with men committing indecent acts and receiving in their own persons the due penalty of their error and on and on it goes 1st

[59:03] Corinthians chapter 6 verse 9 or do you not know that the unrighteous will not inherit the kingdom of God so do not be deceived into thinking that unrighteous people will inherit they won't neither fornicators nor idolaters nor adulterers nor effeminate nor homosexuals and then he goes on nor thieves or covetous nor drunkards nor revilers nor swindlers will inherit the kingdom of God notice these lists that homosexual sin and sexual sin in general are included in these lists with murderers and other kinds of sins that go on friends homosexuality is not a disease did you hear me not according to scripture it's not a disease because I say it's not it's because the Bible says it's not homosexuality is not a disease it's not a genetic defect that people are born with that predisposes them to this lifestyle of sin no it's not the expression of a mistake that nature made or God himself made that predisposes these people to this idea that a woman is trapped in a man's body and vice versa the Bible has none of that none of that homosexuality is a sin against the heart wisdom and order of God and making us male and female so homosexuality is a desperate bid to rebel against the

[60:38] Lord and his design for order authority and accountability in mankind homosexuality is sin and sin leads to death unless it's forgiven and overcome by God's righteousness the world doesn't have any answer for this it's just getting worse no hope no help for those consumed and caught up in this sin or any other sin for that matter so I ask the question friends is there any hope is there any hope for forgiveness for people who live like the sodomites in our culture today can unbelievers caught up in homosexual sin and lesbianism in all the forms of sexual sin and perversion be saved from themselves and from spiritual corruption you know the letters just keep getting longer to describe perversion don't they lbgtq xyz plus plus plus they just keep getting bigger and bigger you know why because sin is pervasive and persistent and putrid and it won't stop man if God gives me 20 more years of life the entire alphabet will represent perversion and sexual sin in our society thank God yes in God there is hope and there's an answer in Jesus

[62:02] I'll just share it with you real quickly here the apostle proclaimed this what did he say there's the hope folks if you're listening to this and you're caught up in sexual sin you're caught up in homosexuality or lesbianism or some other form of degrading perverted sin in the eyes of the Lord there's hope for you there's a way out don't listen to the world that tells you that it's okay and it's normal it's not in the sight of God Paul says I am not ashamed of the gospel it's the power of God for salvation to everyone everyone who believes including homosexuals lesbians and others mired in sexual sin amen the apostle John declared whoever whoever believes that Jesus is the Christ is born of God and whoever loves the father loves the child born of him including those rescued from sexual sin and finally

[63:03] Jesus himself boldly pronounced he who hears my word and believes him who sent me has eternal life and does not come into judgment but has passed out of death and into life including every sinner seeking God's forgiveness through faith in the Lord Jesus Christ folks Lot was a believer who made himself miserable he robbed himself and his family of the joy of godly living by him having one foot in Sodom and the other in God's camp now do I believe he was a Christian or a believer yes because the Bible says he was he was made righteous in the Lord but what we're seeing in this man's life is the compromise that comes even among Christians when we begin to allow the culture to assimilate and accommodate our hearts instead of standing in the truth so this created for Lot a daily battle with competing loyalties competing impulses little compromises here and there and Peter said his soul was tortured by what he saw and lived with but folks that kind of torture that's what you get up on the screen when you try to mix light with dark and right with wrong

[64:13] Lot was tortured not just because he knew it was wrong but because he knew he accommodated himself to the wrong he remained in Sodom he didn't leave he didn't get his family out of that mess he took a wife from the city he pledged two of his daughters to two vile men in the city he transacted business in matters of legal enterprise with these wicked men and this was a daily torturous conflict within himself which he created by his accommodation with the culture read that we are called not to be conformed but transformed by the renewing of our mind in the truth and that is what we need to serve each other in love the truth will you pray with me father I thank you for your truth and your word and I thank you for these precious souls my brothers and sisters who patiently listen each

[65:19] Sunday as I do my best to expose and exposit the Bible verse by verse as we've come to Sodom and! Gomorrah Lord is a shocking and arresting and very hard difficult thing for us to talk about and to read about it arrests our souls because we want to be righteous and speak righteously we know that each one of us in our own way struggles with sin in our lives some of us struggle with sexual sin and so I pray for us I pray for my brothers and sisters to have their minds renewed in the truth of the Lord and that we will fight against being conformed to the world's way of thinking and prioritizing about these issues of sexual sin for my to help them keep their eyes not on worthless things but on the things that honor Jesus most and that you will grow my brothers in this room in a heart that is devoted to

[66:20]  Jesus devoted to their wives and devoted to their families and so that we will keep ourselves in that devotion to Christ so that we can turn then and minister the gospel truth to those in need of it in Christ who help keep the line of godliness I pray that any struggle that they might be having in their own hearts with sexual sin in any form you will help them to come to you and have hope you will help them to see in you the certainty of your pledge that we will be helped by Jesus in these ways as we look to his truth and embrace it in our hearts thank you for your goodness and your grace almighty god even as we come now to sing our final song of our service and then pastor Greg comes to pray god may you be honored in Jesus name amen please