It really vexes his soul, the Bible says. It troubles him. Then, when you follow the story, you find that he loses everything. He literally loses everything! His character was eroded; he lost his wife; he lost all his resources; he lost his other children, their wives, their grandchildren… Everything was taken away. Everything was lost, destroyed; and the two daughters that he had, they got him drunk, and he ended up sleeping with them - had incest with them. The two tribes that descended from them, the Moabites and Ammonites, were incredibly sexually perverse idolaters, who resisted God's work all through history.
It was a little thing at the beginning, but it become a big thing at the end. When you make your decisions, they may seem little at the beginning, but they can have major consequences at the end. You've got to watch then, and see, that the decisions you're making are aligned with the word of God.
Now, when we think of the City of Sodom and Gomorrah, you're going to think straight away of homosexuality; but the Bible identifies what the real sin is. It's very frequently, among Christians, that we judge and condemn people. We show a very deep blind spot to our own issues, but we love to pick on something that we can hammer.
Ezekiel 16:49 – “This was the sin of your sister Sodom: She and her daughters were arrogant, overfed and unconcerned; they did not help the poor and needy.”
He's talking to the church, saying that City of Sodom - it's your sister! You're in the same family. He's trying to rebuke the church for its condition. Then he says: this was the iniquity of your sister Sodom. Her and her daughters had pride - fullness of food; abundance of idleness; and neither did they strengthen the hand of the poor and needy. They were haughty; and committed abomination before me. Therefore, I took them away, as I saw fit.
The word ‘abomination’ refers to homosexuality, but notice it's not even named. It's just called ‘abomination’. It's all the other things that God identifies, that lead to that. The condition of it, was haughtiness and pride. The core thing that God identifies is the heart condition, because always, the fruit in our life springs from the heart. So, if you look at the fruit, and get all strong on the fruit, then you're missing the whole thing. You can't change it, by attacking the fruit. You've got to deal with the heart, and the issue with the heart was pride, and haughtiness.
Pride is to elevate yourself. Haughtiness is to look down upon others, and to despise others. He says that firstly, it's the heart condition of pride (rather than humility and gratitude). Secondly, there was “fullness of bread”. They were prospering. They were doing well. They had no need of anything. It sounds like the Church of Laodicea. Thirdly, and here's the real bite… There was a neglect of justice. There was a neglect of the poor and the needy.
I just want to catch what the problem that God has with the church, in His day. He said: there's pride, arrogance, and a looking down and judging people. There's a satisfaction because you're doing well, and a focus on your prosperity; and there's a lack of heart for the people that are suffering injustice, suffering because of poverty, because they're needy. You are indifferent to the plight of those who are suffering, because you're preoccupied with yourselves.
That was the condition of His people, and the best picture I can tell you about Sodom, right before I destroyed it. It's to do with the heart, and the care for people. When the heart is full of pride, and there's brokenness, and wounding… homosexuality is a by-product of those things.
2 Peter 2:7 – “He rescued Lot, a righteous man, who was distressed by the depraved conduct of the lawless”.
Lot was distressed by what was going on. God rescued Lot, a righteous man (a believer). He was a good man, who was distressed by the depraved conduct of the lawless. He was worn down, treated roughly, and was in exceeding anguish. He looked at the news every day, and was really troubled by the things he saw going on in his own city. Some people are not even troubled by what goes on in their own city, not even aware of it; but he was troubled by it - deeply. He was in a distress inside, because he was a good, righteous man, and he saw that what was happening was really wrong.