“Redemption Prevails”

Genesis 19:29-38

 

We have been reading through the book of Genesis and today we are completing the story of Lot and his family. He and his daughters have made it out of Sodom and Gomorrah alive, barely. Last week we read how God sent down fire and brimstone over all the valley because of the crookedness of the city. Evil had taken over and cries of help had been sent to Yahweh. On the way to check out just how bad the city was, Yahweh and His messengers stopped to have lunch with Abraham who pleaded for at least ten righteous people to be saved. God sent his messengers to investigate and they discovered the prayers were real. However, only three people managed to survive. 

 

Our Scripture today provides the story of what happens when Lot was given his choice for escape. 

Remember, the messengers told Lot to run for the mountains and they would be saved. Instead, Lot pleaded to be allowed to go to the town of Zoar instead. Zoar was the city of a Canaanite king and for some reason Lot thought it was a good idea to go there? As we are reading, this story should hyperlink us back to the story of Cain. Cain didn’t want to accept God’s sign of protection either, remember he claimed he couldn’t bear it. Cain wanted to provide his own protection, so he built a city. This also hyperlinks us back to a similar situation that occurred after the flood. So for Lot to have a better plan of salvation for him and his family involving this little city fits right in with this motif. 

 

Lot and his daughters make it to Zoar and guess what? They don’t stay there for very long. They actually went up to the mountain the messengers suggested anyway. We read that Lot was afraid to stay in Zoar. 

So, he and his daughters chose to go live in a cave. Again, we need to put on our ancient Hebrew language hat on. The word for “cave” is a noun form of the Hebrew word, “naked.” The closest translation in English would be something like “an exposure in the rock” as in a ledge or something you could get on. This brings us to another hyperlink as we read that Lot went up to a “high place” and found a “naked exposure” and they live in a place of “nakedness.” These words are to bring us to a place where we know something bad is about to happen. 

 

Next we have the firstborn daughter talking to the younger daughter and she has come up with a plan. The oldest daughter looks around and thinks something like this, “Wow, our father’s really old and I think we are the only ones left. There isn’t a man around in order for us to have children, so….” 

She comes up with an idea to get her father drunk, then each daughter will take turns having sex with him. That’s her plan to keep the family going. 

 

Hyperlink! This scene should bring us right back to Ham and Noah in a tent.

 

Let’s put this in perspective. 

What was God’s purpose of saving Noah and his family in the ark? To keep human seed alive. 

What was God’s purpose of saving Lot and his family? 

To keep their seed alive. 

Somehow, humans keep usurping God’s plan with their own ideas and coming up with a “better” plan rather than waiting on the Lord. 

 

It happens over and over again. Verse 33, 

“That night they got their father to drink wine, and the older daughter went in and slept with him. He was not aware of it when she lay down or when she got up.”

Do you remember in the Noah story when Noah woke up he knew what his son did to him? Well, Lot must have been really drunk because he didn’t have a clue. 

The next night, they get their father drunk again, but this time the younger daughter slept with Lot in order to preserve their family line. Again, Lot was not aware. I’m not sure where the older daughter came up with this scheme, because as far as I know, there is not one cultural comparative in the world where it’s acceptable for a father to impregnate his daughter. Even by the standards of Sodom and Gomorrah, this was not okay. Nevertheless, both daughters became pregnant and gave birth to sons. The oldest daughter names her son, “Moab” which is spelled like the Hebrew word “from the father.” 

He was the father of the Moabites. The younger daughter gave birth to a son and she named him “Ammon” which is a Semitic word for “relative.” He became the father of the Ammonites. 

Quite the narrative, don’t you think?!

 

Let’s take a look at what the results of choosing your own way of salvation looks like for these characters. Remember Ham, he was the father of the Canaanites and remember his grandson, Nimrod, which led us to Babylon and Assyria? Well, there is something similar going on with this story, but with a twist. 

This birth story creates some of the most notorious enemies of the sons of Israel. Moab becomes father of the Moabites, who turn out to be not so good. As for the Ammonites, his brother’s family, they become enemies. 

We will read about one Ammonite, in 1 Samuel 11:1-15, Nahash, whose name means “snake,”. He shows up and gouges out the eyes and takes away the sight of the Israelites. 

Mind you, it’s not that Lot’s daughter’s decision was malicious. She trusted only in what she saw and she thought she was doing something good. But the results of not waiting on God for His plan last for generations.

 

Oh, and remember I said there would be a twist. 

It’s not like God still wasn’t in control? 

 

The descendants of the Moabites and Ammonites will form the kingdoms on the east side of the Jordan. They become the mirror images of the Canaanites on the west side of the Jordan. 

Although because they were actual descendants and family with Abraham, they were not always in opposition. There were times of resolution and perhaps even reconciliation.

There is one Moabite in particular who does something really interesting. Her name is Ruth. She was a Moabite who married into a family line that had left the land because of famine. She and her mother-in-law were left as widows.

Ruth chose to follow her mother-in-law when she returned to Bethlehem. Let’s go to that story of Ruth, to the nighttime scene at a threshing floor where Ruth goes to uncover the feet of the man who was of the line of David. She asks him if she can take shelter under the refuge of his wings. This man’s name is Boaz and when he wakes up, he responds, 

“Oh dear, I’ll totally do this, but don’t let anybody know you were here, because this is a really awkward situation that we are in.” Notice the twist on Ruth’s echoing of the strange scene of the Moabites? This time there was no illicit sex, there’s just loyal love to the family members, and to Naomi, his aunt. 

Out of this lineage of David, we receive Jesus, the Messiah. 

Redemption prevails. 

Today we have read one of the saddest and most distorted scenes in the Bible. Yet, check out what God does with the evil that humans do, He brings forth moral goodness, He brings for the Messiah. That’s exactly what God does best. 

Check in time. 

 

The narrative of God’s love, otherwise known as the Bible, has many sad and morally distorted stories. 

When we think about it, so do each of our lives. There is not one of us that when we look back over our lives and our family history doesn’t have one or two, or more, sad and morally distorted stories. 

 

Yet, whenever there has been someone who has been willing to trust in God, we will find a “twist.” And that twist involves a loving God who seeks only to redeem. Because God is so good, He committed to bring life, no matter what. John 3:16-18, The Message

 

“This is how much God loved the world: He gave his Son, his one and only Son. And this is why: so that no one need be destroyed; by believing in him, anyone can have a whole and lasting life. God didn’t go to all the trouble of sending his Son merely to point an accusing finger, telling the world how bad it was. He came to help, to put the world right again. 

Anyone who trusts in him is acquitted; anyone who refuses to trust him has long since been under the death sentence without knowing it.”

 

Here is what is more exciting! When believers intercede and commence prayer, we are inviting God’s redemptive power to come into the situation. 

 

You can’t get any better than that. 

 

Let’s pray.