A Remnant Didn’t Look Back (Advent 11, 2022)

Noah and the Flood are widely known and remade for the children’s nursery instead of a horror story, but Sodom and Gomorrah don’t get the sanitized or woke treatment.  They remain widely known for their obliteration.  In both cases, the Bible stories involve destruction because sin had gotten beyond the point of God’s willingness to withhold His wrath.  His patience ran out.  Wrath followed.

Sodom and Gomorrah are well known for another reason,
but we don’t need to talk about that right now. 
There is a point about a remnant.

Genesis 18:22 The men turned away and went toward Sodom, but Abraham remained standing before the LORD. 23 Then Abraham approached him and said: “Will you sweep away the righteous with the wicked? 24 What if there are fifty righteous people in the city? Will you really sweep it away and not spare the place for the sake of the fifty righteous people in it? 25 Far be it from you to do such a thing– to kill the righteous with the wicked, treating the righteous and the wicked alike. Far be it from you! Will not the Judge of all the earth do right?” 26 The LORD said, “If I find fifty righteous people in the city of Sodom, I will spare the whole place for their sake.” 

You know it’s bad when out of a whole city, apart from Lot’s family (Lot, his wife whose righteousness one can reasonably question, and two daughters questionable also—see Genesis 19:31-38), are so steeped in sin that God obliterates the whole thing. Even Lot’s two sons-in-law thought it was a joke—a big laughing matter until they were toast.

And then there’s Lot’s wife.  Some women just don’t listen.  She looked back—why? Even God told them not to—and she became a pillar of salt.  She’s the stuff of legend as salt formations near the end of the Dead Sea testify to her foolishness and she adds to the bad rap women have gotten since Eve.

Questions for further thought:

How do people treat sin as a laughing matter?

I remember a day when comedians were funny.  What do many laugh about today?

How do people dismiss God’s impending wrath and hell as laughing matters?

How does God feel about disobedience in Lot’s wife and in us?

Were any righteous swept away along with the wicked? 

Lot is not in the lineage of Christ for good reason.  The sons of Lot’s daughters (fathered by him in a drunken stupor) went on to be the Moabites and the Ammonites, two nations that would persist as archenemies of Abraham’s descendants. 

Do you see the formation of an array of enemies of God’s chosen people?

Prayer: 

Forgive us, Lord, for not taking sin seriously; for treating it as a laughing matter; and for treating Your holiness as something to be trampled. We thank You, Father, that You are a merciful God and for the forgiveness that is available through Jesus Christ and His shed blood on the Cross. Please, Lord, turn our eyes towards You and away from the ways of this world so that we might bring glory to You through our actions and our faith. Amen.

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Advent began Sunday, November 27, 2022 and continues to Saturday, December 24th as we explore the remnant spoken of in Scripture and awaken as the end draws near.

 By signing up on the sidebar of my Home Page you can receive these daily “Awaken, Remnant” devotionals. Or they will be reposted on SeminaryGal’s Facebook page as well.

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Acknowledging inquiries about an entire season’s devotionals for your study group’s planning purposes, Seminary Gal’s prior seasons’ Advent devotionals can be accessed via the archives to the right and are as follows:  

• The multi-faceted Interlude between the promise of a Deliverer and the birth of our Messiah and King was the theme of 2021’s devotional series. It is archived beginning November 28, 2021.
• 2020’s Devotional Series Divine Intervention began on November 29, 2020 and explored God’s activity on behalf of a hurting world and nations in tumult– Intervention for you and for me when our status as sinners required nothing short of a miracle.
• God’s Christmas list explored what might be on God’s Christmas list, learning what He wants from us. It began December 1, 2019.
• Storyteller began December 2, 2018 and entered into the Christmas story through its telling.
• The 2017 series Still Christmas, began December 3, 2017 and was the Advent complement to the Lenten series, Be Still and Know that I AM God.
• The 2016 season devotionals were called “Timeless: The Message of Christmas for All Ages” and explored how the message of Christmas is timeless truth, for all ages of people, and for all ages at all times.  Timeless hope, encouragement, grace, peace, and love as we looked into the Word, saw the face of our Lord Jesus, and experienced restoration in His presence.  His goodness and His Gospel are truly Timeless. The 2016 devotionals began November 27, 2016.
• The 2015 season devotionals were titled Incarnation and involved digging deep–and yes, I mean deep– in this important mystery of Christian theology.  They began November 29, 2015.
• Carol Me, Christmas! remains one of my most popular offerings and tells the Christmas story through our most beloved Christmas hymns and carols.  You can access all of the numbered devotionals from 2014 via the archives.  They began November 30, 2014.
• The 2013 series was Emmanuel: When LOVE Showed Up in Person and examined the Prologue to the Gospel of John.  It began December 1, 2013.
• The 2012 series focused on Expecting the Unexpected…the unexpected, unlikely, and uniquely divine qualities of God’s perfect plan outlined in Luke’s account of the Christmas story.  It began December 1, 2012.