By Rev. Dr. Charles J. Tomlin, DMin
Flat Rock-Zion Baptist Partnership
March, 4th 2018
Unique to human life is our ability to
raise questions. While Science has been
able to determine how certain animals feel, love, think, and have similar human-like
behaviors, only humans ask questions. The
ability to ask: Why should I live? Why
should I live rightly? Why should I love? These are the most necessary questions to
keep us human. Even though we don’t always
agree on the specifics, our ability to ask is part of what makes us human.
We see human questioning arise almost
immediately in the Genesis story. When
the Serpent came to Eve in the Garden, it used the human capability to pose questions
to lure humanity into to doubt and disobedience: “Did
God really say, when you eat of this fruit, you will die? Continuing with his twisted logic he suggested
the wrong answer: “You won’t surely die,
but your eyes will be open, and you will be like God.”
The lesson Adam and Eve learned the hard
way, which is a lesson we all learn, was that the human capability to question anything could lead us to question everything. This
could be a step too far; such as when a teenager while developing their own
identity, questions the sincerity of their parent’s love. Perhaps the most important safeguard we have
to keep us from losing our head is our heart.
When we love, questions can remain constructive, healthy, and part of
human maturity, rather than turn unhealthy and destructive.
SHALL I HIDE FROM ABRAHAM….?
The personal and loving relationship
Abraham and God had with each other should help us understand the strange story
before us today. Here, it seems that Abraham
is raising some serious questions about God’s own personal judgment.
How can we understand a mere mortal
questioning the ways of an eternal God?
Well, for one thing, we need to understand just how close God and
Abraham were to each other. A couple of
times in the Bible, once in the OT book of Isaiah, and another time in the NT
book of James, Abraham is referred to as
‘a friend of God’. The whole idea of ‘friendship’ implies intimacy, transparency and relationship. As
you study Abraham’s life, you will find some of the most personal and revealing
stories in the entire Bible. So, rather than jump conclusions, we need to
consider that in the first place, God was allowing Abraham to enter the most
intimate thoughts of God. God is
allowing Abraham deep into God’s own heart.
But why?
Jewish scholar James Kugel observed that
the way Abraham, and other patriarchs related to God is very different from how
God is viewed later in the Bible. This “God of Old”, as Kugel described him, is
a much more human like. Abraham’s God is
relatable, relational; maybe even touchable.
This God of Abraham thinks out loud, reasons and talks to himself,
appears on earth like any other human being, he wrestles with people, becomes disappointed,
angry, shows up unannounced, then walks away like any other person. This God shows up just when you need him,
and sometimes even when you don’t. But
before you people can get too close to him to make him a ‘special buddy’, this
God is gone, as mysteriously as he came.
The conversation going on here is perhaps
one of the most fascinating of all. It
just doesn’t fit our normal understanding of God. The text tells us that after Abraham’s three male
visitors revealed Sarah’s pregnancy test, Abraham walks with them along the way. They were looking in the direction ‘toward Sodom’, the home of Abraham’s
nephew lot. As you recall, Abraham had
fought a war against 5 kings who had once threatened Sodom. Abraham won the war and rescued Lot and his
family. In doing so, Abraham became the
king of Sodom’s protector. But now, something
has drastically changed. God reasons
within himself: “Shall I hide from
Abraham what I am about to do” (17)?
We are told that God has heard the ‘outcry against Sodom and Gomorrah (20).’ This ‘outcry’ pointed to the seriousness of ‘their sin.’ God figures
he must let Abraham in on his divine intentions. It’s a good idea to inform Abraham since
someday ‘Abraham will become a great
nation’, ‘all the nations will be blessed in him’ (18) and Abraham has been
chosen to ‘keep the way of the LORD’
by ‘doing righteousness and justice
(19).’ In other words, God wants Abraham to know that righteousness and
justice are not happening in Sodom and Gomorrah.
God’s openness with Abraham is something
we just don’t see that often, even in the Bible. God is treating Abraham like a prophet,
though even the great prophet Isaiah described Israel’s God as one whose ‘ways are higher…, and whose thoughts are not our thoughts’ (Isa. 55:9) and also, he declares that He is ‘the
God who hides himself’ (Isa. 45:15).
But contrary to Isaiah’s vision, Abraham is having face to face conversations
with ‘the LORD’. Not much later in the Bible, Moses was told
that he can’t see God’s face and live (Exodus 33:20). Even during the time of King David, God has
become even more distant, and unapproachable, so that when someone accidently
touched God’s holy furniture, they are struck dead (2 Sam. 6:7). Even in New Testament times, it is still said
that “It can be a fearful and terrible
thing, to fall into the hands of a living God” (Heb 10:31).
So, what changes all this? Why do we move from a God who appears as a
human visitor, having face to face, intimate conversations, to having a more
distant vision of an eternal God who seems distant, aloof, far away, and we
can’t see or directly talk to, unless we are dead. You might think it should be the other way
around---with God getting easier to relate to than harder. Christians also, only
approach Israel’s God through the ‘name’ of Jesus? Why?
When I was growing up, we had an interim
pastor who told us how he used to walk in the woods and having real, verbal,
audible, conversations with God, like Abraham did. He said that God was so real to him, that he
could actually hear his voice. Now, I
was a teenager at the time, and this bothered me quite a bit. I was learning how to pray and talk to God
myself, and was trying to take prayer more seriously, but I never had heard
God’s voice. Was there something wrong
with me? Was my faith not strong enough? Had I not really learned all the right ways
to pray? It seemed that all my
conversations with God were one sided. The
preacher went on to say when we got the sin out of our lives, we too could hear
God’s voice.
Perhaps the Preacher had good intentions,
and was partially right. But I think his
very literal explanation of what it means to relate to God took me down a ‘primrose path’. Most people who say they actually hear God’s
voice today are in mental institutions I
don’t think that that preacher meant that kind of ‘voice’, but perhaps we sell both
the Bible and the human mind short, and this story too, if we only look at this
as a normal human-like conversation.
The conversation and relationship between God and Abraham just may not
be that different from our own capability to relate to God today.
We don’t have to take this conversation of
Abraham in a strictly literal sense, to appreciate it, or take it seriously. The story is told in a very simple way, with ideas,
we all can understand: even children too.
When adults read ‘Bible stories’ to children, they seldom look at them
the same way our children do. Children listen
to the story just for the story, but adults listen for the truth in the
story. We don’t get stuck with whether
Jonah was swallowed by a whale or big fish---because the story is about
prejudice, not fish. We don’t get stuck
on God making a deal with Satan to tempt Job, because the story is about the
suffering of the righteous, not God making a deal bet with the devil. We also don’t get stuck on Adam and Eve
talking to a snake or about Balaam’s talking donkey either. Mature adults don’t get stuck on arguing
about where the ark is parked, or where empty tomb was, or whether this or that
cave in Bethlehem actually is where Jesus was born. It’s the truth of the story we are after.
Whether or not we prove everything in
life will never be as important as living the truth we already know. I once knew a mentally handicapped lady in my
home church. She was a sweet adult lady
who had the emotional intelligence, but the rational intelligence of a
scientist. She could figure out anything
and everything. But people often felt
uncomfortable around her. By always
analyzing, figuring, and thinking through everything literally, you couldn’t
have a normal conversation with her.
You didn’t want to hurt her or her parent’s feelings, but when she came
up to you, arguing some point, you wanted to run. That’s how it is when people always read the
Bible with strict literalism, always trying to prove this or that happen,
betting their life on proving all the details, rather than trying to live what
we know is true. Reading the Bible should be like fish; we eat
the meat and leave the bones for scholars to chew on and pray they don’t
choke.
Still, even if we take this conversation
between Abraham and God seriously rather than literally, it raises questions raised
all through the Bible, which are never fully answered. These are the kinds of questions all people
of faith still live with, if they take God seriously. In this story, the truth is that Abraham takes
some of his deepest questions about God, to God. This question is not, does God exist. No, the even greater question is rather, is
God fair? How is it that this God who
has been revealed as compassionate, merciful, redemptive, and righteous, is
also a God who judges, condemns, and punishes sin with death? In the biblical revelation, you can’t have a
true God worth anything that really matters, unless God has both angles of divine
and human truth. Biblical revelation declares that God is kind
and loving, but it also declares that God is holy and just. “…I
will be gracious to whom I will be gracious, and will show mercy on whom I will
show mercy…” The problem with a
merciful God, is that because God is God, he reserves the right to choose ‘to whom’ he will be gracious and merciful. That’s the question.
WILL
YOU ALSO SWEEP AWAY THE RIGHTEOUS ….?
The heart of Abraham’s questioning is
where most of our great questions arise.
Our problem is seldom ‘what will happen to the unrighteous, the evil
or undeserving people’ like Hitler, Stalin, Osama Bin Laden, or Saddam Hussein. Remember the play about the Baptist
president, Harry Truman: “Give’em Hell, Harry!”
We think some deserve it. But other
times we wonder what will happen to the ‘good’, ‘righteous’ and innocent people
when God finally brings his justice, judgement and conclusion to life in the
world. What about the good people
who’ve never heard the gospel? What
about the good Hindu, the good Buddhist, the good Muslin, or the good Agnostic
or Atheists? When people really don’t
understand, grew up differently, or failed to understand what we understand,
does this mean they are condemned forever?
This line of questioning was already there in Abraham’s mind way back
then.
What I find most interesting about
Abraham’s questioning, is that Abraham does not question God because he doesn’t
trust God, but Abraham’s appears to be questioning God because he does trust
and have faith in God, but still he is worried about people. Abraham questions, because he is God’s
friend. He questions because he has
faith, not because of any lack of faith.
God has called Abraham to ‘be a blessing’ to others, so why would God
destroy a city if there are still ‘righteous’
people living there? Again, Abraham’s
question arises out of God’s blessings in the world, not because he is finding
fault with God, or not finding fault in Sodom.
The ‘grave’ or serious ‘sin’
of Sodom and Gomorrah is not explained to Abraham, but later in the story (Gen.
19: 1-38), the things that went on at ‘night
in the square’ (19:2) is presented in a very sordid event. The angels wanted to sleep there and see for
themselves, but Lot invites them to his house to distract them. Before going to bed, we are told that the ‘men of Sodom, both young and old, all the
people to the last man’ (19: 4), surround the house, demanding that Lot ‘bring his visitors out’ so that they can ‘know
them’ (rape them). Lot stands
outside the door and ‘begs’ them ‘not to act so wickedly,’ even offering
his own two virgin ‘daughters’ to
them. When the wicked men try to force
themselves in, the angels grab Lot and strike the intruders with ‘blindness’. Now the angels reveal to Lot that they are about
‘to destroy this place’ so Lot and
his family had better ‘get out’ (14).
Most of us know that popular preaching
has tended to focus primarily on the sexual sin that appears in the text, as
the ‘men of Sodom’ attempted to ‘gang rape’ the angels while ‘all the people’ watched (19:4). Interestingly,
however, the ‘sexual sin’ was listed last on the list of serious sins the
prophet Ezekiel made. Ezekiel wrote that
the ‘guilt’ of Sodom was more about ‘pride’, ‘excess food’, ‘prosperous
ease’, and that they did not ‘aid
the poor and needy’. It appears to
be the overflow of this kind of ‘materialistic’ lifestyle that Ezekiel says
that ‘they were haughty, and did
abominable things...’ (Ezek. 16:49-50).
While God didn’t approve of the
sexual sins of Sodom, I don’t think any of these sins by themselves, brought
judgement and destruction. It was the combined
sins of pride, excess, ease, lack of concern and arrogance that resulted in the
abominable ‘crowd’ behaviors which was displayed as an act of sexual violence
against the two angels, which was most offensive to God. Thus, the men of Sodom are on the exact
opposite side of God’s dealing with Abraham; displaying violence, aggression,
and complete disregard for the ‘strangers’ in their midst, rather than
displaying kindness and respect with the intent to bless.
It was because of the ‘outcry against Sodom and Gomorrah’ that
God informed Abraham that he was going to take a look. But what does Abraham have to do with
this? Is it just because of Abraham’s
nephew, or because Abraham had become ‘Sodom’s protector? We are not sure whether or not Abraham knew anything
about what was going on in Sodom, but we do know that Abraham knows God as just
and righteous. So, Abraham asks over
and over, starting with a large number, to an ever smaller number, addressing
the same concern to God: ‘Will you sweep away the righteous with the wicked?’ Suppose some ‘righteous’ people are found there, won’t ‘the God of the earth do right’ and spare them, or the city? Besides Abraham’s own ties to Sodom, was
Abraham only trying to ‘pray’ God out of it, so that Abraham look more
‘righteous’ than the God he worships?
But before you get all ‘stressed out’
over Abraham’s questions, we need to see the ‘truth’ in this story. You can only understand a story like this through
the whole story of Israel, through story of the gospel. This is already hinted at in how God already
answered his own decision to inform Abraham about all this in the first place. Notice how God answers, “Shall I hide this from Abraham….” with “No, for I have chosen him….” (18:19). God is letting Abraham question him exactly
because God ‘chose’ Abraham for the sake of blessing, even eventually blessing
‘all the nations’ which ultimately will be bring salvation to whole human race. Abraham’s desire for God to find a few
‘righteous’ points us right back to Abraham’s people, which includes Jesus’
people too. By finding only a few
righteous who are ‘the salt of the earth’, the whole outcome can shift.
Thus, the story here is not really about
whether God is righteous, but how God’s faithful, righteous, and caring God’s
people can invite God’s redemption, reconciliation, and salvation to come into
the world. The drama going on here is
indeed bigger than Abraham and Sodom, because what was happening within both of
them, points us to the great saving purposes of God. It is Abraham’s concern that helps us see,
early on, God’s hidden desire to save.
This whole ‘strange’ story can only be
rightly interpreted with an eye on and a heart full of God’s compassion. This is what the ‘promise’ to Abraham has always been about. God did not choose Abraham for the sake of only
choosing Abraham; but it was about choosing Abraham so that the ‘all the nations’ could be blessed. In the same way, God did not just choose
Israel because Israel was better than anyone, but God choose Israel because God’s
wants his grace, mercy and love to spread to everyone. In the same way, God did not send Jesus in the world only to
save the church, or to save an elite few, but God sent Jesus because “God so love the world… so that whosever believes him will not
perish, but have everlasting life’ (John 3:16). Even that great text which says that ‘there is salvation in no other name’ or
the one which says ‘no comes to the
Father except through me’, does not mean that God excludes everybody else,
but it means that God sent his son ‘to
save’ ‘whosoever calls upon the name of the Lord.’
To use the Christian faith as a ‘bully stick’ is like thinking that
Abraham is questioning a God who doesn’t know what he is doing. This story is not about questioning God,
but it’s about God allowing Abraham to learn about God’s love through his questions. As strange and unobvious as it might seem, this
story, even the one about Sodom’s destruction, is also preparing us to
understand God’s love. As the New
Testament letter understood, even in judgement God ‘is not wanting any to perish, but all to come to repentance’ (2
Pet. 2:9). Just like the cross of Jesus
was not merely about human sin (which is true), but was mainly to point to
God’s compassion and forgiveness, this story about Abraham questions and Sodom’s
sin is about to show us God’s desire to save.
“And
the LORD went his way….Abraham returned to his place….”
Now that we understand what Abraham’s
relationship with God was about, maybe we can learn what our own relationship
with is about. It’s not really just about you. It’s about God calling us to be His partners
to make a difference as ‘salt and light’.
And the surprise of this text is
that we begin this ‘difference’ not by changing the world, which we can’t do,
but by being in honest prayer and conversation with God.
There used to preaching professor at
Fruitland Bible Institute, who was much beloved among preachers in western North
Carolina. Dr. Kenneth Riddings, taught a
couple of my childhood friends, and a couple of Teresa’s uncles. He didn’t teach me, but I did get to meet
with him in several meetings. To many ‘Brother
Kenneth was the ‘prince of preachers’ who taught them not just how to be a good
preacher, but also how to take care of themselves. Once Dr. Riddings told how he used to work so
hard trying to save the world, until he finally noticed that as he tried to save it, it was getting
worse, rather than better. Finally, he
told his young preachers that they’d better preach the word, and let God take
care of saving the world.
Perhaps that’s what happens at the end
of this story, when we read that ‘the
Lord went his way’ and ‘Abraham
returned to his place’ without all the answers. What Abraham is being called to do is to trust
God keep ‘doing righteousness and justice’, no matter what is happening around
him. Perhaps this is still the sign of
true faith; when we can come to God with our questions and remain faithful, when
they are, and even when they are not answered, as we wish. Years ago, a lady came once came to a Baptist
professor who was her pastor at the time.
She had questions about God along with some anger, and she felt guilty
about it. “What should I do with all
these feelings?” She asked her professor pastor. He responded “Go ahead and tell God about it, he can take it!”
Can you understand a God big enough
to ‘take it?’ When I used to talk to my
Dad about the War, he would tell me how he fought in a special battalion
attached to General Patton. Then he told
me that while the troops respected General Patton, but they loved and trusted most
in General Bradley. He was the soldier’s
general.
In his autobiography, General Bradley
tells about boarding a commercial plane one day, wearing a business suit. He began working on some important papers. It
so happened that his seat-mate was a private in the U.S. Army, who was rather expressive.
This private, who didn’t recognize the General, said, “Sir, we are going to be
traveling together for quite a while, so it would be nice if we got to know one
another. I’m guessing that you are a banker.” Bradley, not wanting to be rude,
but wanting to get some work done, replied, “No, I am not a banker. I am
General Bradley, head of the Joint Chiefs of Staff at the Pentagon.” After a
slight pause, the young soldier said, “Wow, sir, that is a very important job.
I sure hope you don’t blow it.” It is an understatement to say that we
Christians have a vital role to play in America’s future and we dare not blow
it. (From James Moore, When All Else Fails…Read the Instructions,
(Dimensions for Living: Nashville, 1993, p. 142, as quoted by Bill Bouknight at www.esermons.com).
Perhaps the greatest thing we can do for
the hope of the world is ‘let God be God’ and not try to worry about God ‘blowing
it’. Like Abraham, we need to be praying,
caring for each other, and even praying for and caring for strangers too, then
we need to leave the rest to God. Fred Craddock used to end some of his sermons
with a line that reflects what Abraham did, after he left all this questions
with God: “Live simply, love generously, speak
truthfully, serve faithfully, and leave everything else to God.” Amen.
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