Don’t Do What Lot Did: A Father’s Day Sermon From Sodom (Genesis 19)
I was considering leaving Sodom and Gomorrah to preach for Father’s Day until I was reminded of what great Father’s Day Sermon fodder Lot would be for this special occasion. And as I thought about it, this is indeed the case. And in reality, there are a lot of lessons to be learned from the negative example of Lot. So, here we are on Father’s Day, considering Lot as a father.
I want to preface everything about this sermon by saying that I believe what Scripture tells me, therefore I believe that Lot was a righteous man. And I believe this because that is what is said about Him in God’s Word.
“For if God did not spare angels when they sinned, but cast them into hell and committed them to chains of gloomy darkness to be kept until the judgment; if he did not spare the ancient world, but preserved Noah, a herald of righteousness, with seven others, when he brought a flood upon the world of the ungodly; if by turning the cities of Sodom and Gomorrah to ashes he condemned them to extinction, making them an example of what is going to happen to the ungodly; and if he rescued righteous Lot, greatly distressed by the sensual conduct of the wicked (for as that righteous man lived among them day after day, he was tormenting his righteous soul over their lawless deeds that he saw and heard); then the Lord knows how to rescue the godly from trials, and to keep the unrighteous under punishment until the day of judgment, and especially those who indulge in the lust of defiling passion and despise authority. Bold and willful, they do not tremble as they blaspheme the glorious ones, whereas angels, though greater in might and power, do not pronounce a blasphemous judgment against them before the Lord.” (2 Peter 2:4-11 ESV)
When I use Lot as a negative example, as will be done in this sermon, it is not because I believe the Bible to be false about Lot’s righteousness. It is because Lot really is portrayed as having fallen significantly short in many ways. And many of those shortcomings involve his leadership in his home.
As I read through this story and the many interactions in it, something about Lot becomes incredibly obvious. He was a passive man. He seems to be moving toward what is easy and not what is right.
A father is to lead his household toward righteousness, and from the beginning that is not what we find with Lot. As a father we are to lead our family toward righteousness.
Lead Your Family Toward Righteousness (Genesis 13:12-13)
If you’ll remember a few months back, Lot behaved rather poorly toward Abraham (Genesis 13). Abraham and Lot’s servants were fighting with each other due to the overcrowding of this massive family, so the two parted ways. When given the choice of the well-watered land of the Jordan Valley and the more desolate looking land to the east, Lot chose the better location (Genesis 13:11). As was pointed out at the time, Lot did not choose what custom and deference to Abraham demanded. Lot chose what was easier, more plentiful, and what should have been given to Abraham.
And even at this time we saw Lot moving his household closer and closer to the wickedness of Sodom.
“Abram settled in the land of Canaan, while Lot settled among the cities of the valley and moved his tent as far as Sodom. Now the men of Sodom were wicked, great sinners against the LORD.” (Genesis 13:12-13 ESV)
Lot could have chosen to live on the outskirts of town. He could have chosen to stay far away from Sodom. But Lot chose to take his household into Sodom.
It is quite likely that there were better business prospects for him in Sodom. He might have also seen better property in Sodom. Or, he might have been drawn into Sodom by his wicked heart. We don’t know the answer to why he would do so. But we do know that he ended up there.
The decisions Lot made here didn’t just affect him, but also the rest of his family in a devastating manner.
Fathers, the decisions you make in this life matter. The direction that you lead your family matters. You must lead them toward righteousness, not toward sinfulness.
This happens first with you. You can’t lead your family to a place that you are not headed.
I used to wonder why John Bunyan wrote Pilgrim’s Progress the way that he did. Christian makes his journey through the Christian life and then the next book is about his wife and children’s progress. Even though I could wish that the two were combined in the story, it does make sense in a way. He could never have led his family to a place he was not. You, as a father, need to be repenting of sin and walking in holiness if you are going to lead your family in that direction.
You can’t do this while you are, as a husband and father, addicted to pornography. You can’t do this while you are yourself neglecting to walk in holiness. You’re not going to be able to take your family to a place that you are not. This doesn’t mean that you need to give up on walking according to God’s ways. It means that you need to repent.
There is forgiveness for those who have started out poorly. There is forgiveness for those who have lived in rebellion against God. That is the central message that we seek to proclaim.
God the Son came to Earth to accomplish forgiveness of sins on behalf of sinners. We rebelled against God, and He made a way for us to be brought to Him through the work of Jesus Christ in His perfect life, death, and resurrection. He paid the debt that stood against me as He bled and died on that Old Rugged Cross. He never sinned, even while being beaten and placed upon the cross. And He rose from the grave three days later. We are united to Christ by faith, or trust in Him, so that His death paid the price for our sins, His perfect righteousness is credited to our account, and His resurrection power is given to us as well. All those who lay down their arms and trust in the Savior are found in Him to be completely forgiven of sin, completely righteous before Almighty God, and given resurrection power to walk in newness of life.
There will never be a time in your life when you are past that message. You will never be beyond the need for forgiveness. Until the day the Lord calls us home, we will be repenting of different sins, killing sins in our lives, and reforming in the power of the Holy Spirit. There will always be places where we’ve failed. So, repent, kill that sin in your life, ask for the Lord’s forgiveness, and trust in Him as you move forward in holiness.
And you also need to be moving your children toward holiness. This will be done in part through discipline and correction.
“Folly is bound up in the heart of a child, but the rod of discipline drives it far from him.” (Proverbs 22:15 ESV)
What is bound up in the heart of a child? Folly or foolishness.
How is that driven from your child? The rod of discipline.
You teach your children God’s ways, which we will discuss in the next point of our message. And you teach them to follow God’s ways. This does not mean that you are going to spank your children into the Kingdom of God. But it does mean that you are going to teach them to walk in righteousness. It does mean that you are going to lead your children to the Law of God through teaching and the rod of discipline. And it does mean that, as your children learn to better walk before the Lord in this life, that they are prepared to walk faithfully in the Lord at their conversion.
I have a word of advice here that I gathered from reading a few intelligent parents. Keep the family rule book simple and easy to remember. Don’t change the rules. Don’t keep adding to the rules like Dolores Umbridge.
It could be as simple as,
- Do not be disobedient.
- Do not lie.
- Treat others with respect.
That’s not hard to remember. And it’s easy to understand when you’ve crossed that line. God had one rule in the Garden. And Jesus boiled the Ten Commandments down to two commandments. Having less rules and requiring obedience to them is more important than frustrating children with a plethora of rules.
Also, if your punishment for the children is spanking, which I endorse, do not do so out of anger. Your purpose for spanking is not to get all your anger out. The purpose is godliness.
Teach And Prioritize God’s Word (14, 20, 26)
Lot was prominent in Sodom (Genesis 19:1). Last week we discussed his being at the city gate and what that meant. It meant that he was an influential man in Sodom.
Consider for a moment, what it took for him to get there.
It is likely that Lot had done several things to become prominent in that bustling city. That was the place where the major conversations of city business took place. That was the place where personal disputes were settled. That was a place for the prominent men of town to make big decisions for the city. No doubt he was doing well financially and did well with commerce. He likely did a lot of business in Sodom and so was thought of well by the citizens of Sodom. His conversation was also likely laden with enough wisdom for people to think that he should be one who makes decisions at the city gate, enough at least to be thought fit to judge others.
Lot was not just lying around and letting everything fall to pieces. Lot seems to have worked hard to do some things. But it quickly becomes obvious that one of those things was not teaching and prioritizing God’s Word.
At this point some of you might look at me and say, but Dwain, Lot didn’t have a Bible. And you would be correct. But Lot did have the word of the Lord. God knew of the promises God gave to Abram. That is why they left the land of Ur. That is, at least in part, how he ended up in Sodom.
The evidence for this lack of prominence of God’s Word in the household of Lot is the response of Lot’s family to the words of warning brought before them. Lot knew that God would soon destroy the city. He knew what was going on. And he delivered that message to his family.
“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.” (Genesis 19:14 ESV)
When Lot delivered this message to his family, the sons-in-law did not take it seriously at all.
After the family didn’t take matters seriously, it seems that Lot didn’t either. Lot “lingered” (16), and he and his household were drug out of the city. Here, Lot and his family was again told to flee.
I believe that verse 20 reveals a lot about Lot and the reason his family didn’t take the Word of the Lord seriously. God had told Lot where to flee, but he pleaded with the angels to go to a different city: Zoar. Lot should have led his family to do exactly what the Lord had commanded him to do. He should have just led them to follow the Lord’s command. But instead he desired to go to a place that was at least a little similar to Sodom, the place he is now to be fleeing far away from because it will be turned into a heap of ash.
And then we read of Lot’s wife being turned into a pillar of salt. Even she hesitated as she looked back, longing for that sinful place they had called home.
Lot was prominent in Sodom, but God’s Word was not prominent in his family. And this story points to a man who did not lead his family to reverence and obey God’s Word. God’s Word was not a priority in his family.
You need to be leading your family to read God’s Word and to learn God’s Word. If you are going to lead your family toward righteousness, then it will be necessary for you to lead them to the Word.
“It is better to be without bread in your houses than without Bibles. For the words of God’s mouth are and should be to you more than your necessary food.”[1]-Matthew Henry
Do you believe that? Because if you really believe that, then you will be teaching God’s Word to your children.
Your children need to learn God’s Word from you and you are commanded to give it to them.
“”Hear, O Israel: The LORD our God, the LORD is one. You shall love the LORD your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your might. And these words that I command you today shall be on your heart. You shall teach them diligently to your children, and shall talk of them when you sit in your house, and when you walk by the way, and when you lie down, and when you rise. 8 You shall bind them as a sign on your hand, and they shall be as frontlets between your eyes. 9 You shall write them on the doorposts of your house and on your gates.” (Deuteronomy 6:4-9 ESV)
When should you be teaching your children? You should be teaching them at all times. You are to work at this diligently. And I believe that you will be most effective when you do this both formally and informally.
We teach from a catechism, in homeschooling, and in life. We use a question-and-answer format called a catechism that is put into song. These help to give a theological foundation to our children’s faith. And then throughout our day, we attempt to answer the questions and trials that come up in everyday life with God’s Word. This gives us both a formal and nonformal way of teaching God’s Word to our children. When we are running on all cylinders, this allows us to teach God’s Word to our children in some manner throughout the entire day.
And we also read in Ephesians 6:4,
“Fathers, do not provoke your children to anger, but bring them up in the discipline and instruction of the Lord.” (Ephesians 6:4 ESV)
What does it mean to “provoke your children to anger”? Well, it is the opposite of raising “them up in the discipline and instruction of the Lord”.
The word translated as “discipline” is “παιδεία” and that word sounds like “paideia”. This word is loaded with meaning for Paul’s readers in Ephesus. That is why Strong’s gives it such a broad definition.
“education or training; by implication, disciplinary correction:–chastening, chastisement, instruction, nurture.”[2]
It has an all of life meaning. A roman child was raised up in the “paideia” of Rome. And it would make them a good Roman citizen. Paul is using that same phrase to discuss the instruction of our own children. We are to raise them up in the Paideia of God. They are to receive an all-encompassing instruction in the Lord that prepares them to be good citizens in God’s Kingdom. That means that Ephesians 6:4 is essentially a restatement of Deuteronomy 6:4-9 using terminology that those in Ephesus would understand quite easily.
Do not neglect teaching God’s Word to your children. It could have devastating consequences.
The Devastating Consequences Of Neglect (Genesis 19:23-38)
Lot made it to Zoar and then the Lord rained sulfur and fire from Heaven (Genesis 19:23-24). This included the cities of the valley. All the people were destroyed, every man, woman, and child. The whole land was devastated, even the plants were destroyed. The place was turned into an ash heap.
Now we see the devastating consequences of Lot’s mistakes.
Lot’s wife died, as was mentioned above, as she looked back toward Sodom. She longed for that place that she’d called home. She apparently wanted to have what she was leaving behind (Luke 17:26-33). She had such affection for that sinful place that she looked back and was turned into a pillar of salt.
And not only was Lot’s wife lost, but the rest of his family lived in fear. Lot and his daughters made it to Zoar, but out of fear went to a cave (Genesis 19:30). Had he simply heeded the word of the Lord, it is likely that he would have escaped this torment (Genesis 19:20). But that is not the path that he chose.
It should be noted that this fear was likely for two reasons. Part of this was a fear of God. Lot’s wife had just been turned into a pillar of salt and I am certain that Lot’s failings weighed heavily upon his mind. And they were now in a city that was at least a little similar to Sodom, because of Lot’s requestion. But part of this fear was of the people around them in Zoar. This comes out in the daughter’s perverted plan to have children. They said there was no one on Earth for them to be with, but there obviously were people. But there weren’t any men near the caves, and the people outside of the caves knew that these were people that were part of the Judgment that had just fallen upon Sodom. Outside of the cave lie only rejection and loneliness. The consequences were immense.
And Lot’s family was marred by the immorality of Sodom. Lot was repeatedly blackout drunk following their flight to the cave (Genesis 19:33, 35). This man is old enough to know better, for he is not a young man. But he is repeatedly getting so drunk he has no idea what he is doing. And the daughter’s hatched a perverse plan to sleep with their father (Genesis 19:30-38). They got him drunk and had children with him.
The sinful immorality of the place from which they came had stuck with them all the way to the cave. Lot had moved the family to a place where perversion had been normalized and it was normalized to his daughters. They don’t seem to have had any misgivings about what they wre about to do. They were affected by the immorality of Sodom. And they were affected by a father that didn’t protect them from the sexual perversion of Sodom (Genesis 19:8). Remember, he almost handed his daughters over to be ravaged by the men who surrounded his home earlier in this chapter.
For me, the names of the children tell the story of how bad Sodom had influenced Lot’s daughters. They named the children after their sin. They seem to have fully embraced what they had done. Moab means “from the Father”. And Ben-ammi means “son of my people”.
Fathers, we can’t make the mistakes of Lot in his household. Lot serves as a warning to us concerning the importance of our role as leader of the home. And the devastation that his lack of leadership cost his home stands as a reminder to us that we need to do this thing well.
We have an important task. Fathers, God has given you children to raise and nurture in Him. In Matthew Henry’s sermon, “A Church in the House, A Sermon Concerning Family-Religion”, which was preached in 1704, he stated,
“Every child you have has a precious and immortal soul, that must be forever either in heaven or hell. Will it not be very sad, if through your carelessness and neglect your children should learn the ways of sin, and perish eternally in those ways? Give them warning, that, if possible, you may deliver their souls, at least that you may deliver your own, and may not bring their curse and God’s too, their blood and your own too, upon your heads.”[3] (Matthew Henry)
That child sitting next to you in the pew is a precious and immortal soul. That child that asks you a million questions and you have to decide whether to spend the time to raise them right, is an immortal soul. Are you going to treat this task with the care that it requires?
Conclusion
We live in a society that has completely rejected God’s Word and God’s ways. I have spent a large amount of time comparing our current plight with Sodom and the parallels can be quite terrifying. But this also means that if you neglect God’s Word and discipline in your home, it very well could mean that you end up devastating consequences in your own household, much like Lot did.
Do not neglect godliness! Do not neglect your household! Learn from Lot and do not feed your family to the wolves of this world!
R. Dwain Minor
[1] Matthew Henry, Edited by Scott Brown, Building A God Centered Family: A Father’s Manual, Merchant Adventures LLC, 2010, p. 36.
[2] G3809 – paideia – Strong’s Greek Lexicon (esv) (blueletterbible.org) accessed 06/16/2022
[3] Matthew Henry, Edited by Scott Brown, Building A God Centered Family: A Father’s Manual, Merchant Adventures LLC, 2010, p. 42.