God Protects his People

I'm following This plan takes you through the bible in two years. Todays' reading is :Gn 18.16-19.38 Ps 12.

Genesis 18: 16-19:38
I have always found this passage interesting. It always strikes me as Abraham bargaining with the Lord. What if 50, what if 45, what if.... and then finally what if 10? and then the Lord stops him there. For 10 people he will not destroy the city of Sodom.

And to think...that 10 were not found. And Lot does as Abraham does...being told to go one place he says no oh, I can't go there...let me go here to Zoar instead...and once again, that bargaining is okay.

It still seems odd to me to be bargaining with God. It's God. You don't say to God, do this instead. Or I don't want to go where you are sending me...send me here instead as it suits who I am better. God says this thing will happen, or this place I am sending you to, and if you are an obedient child of God you simply accept and obey. Hmmm...

I can understand Abraham. He sees this big city of Sodom and knows Lot and his family lives there and doesn't want to see it destroyed...but at the same time he would have known what a wicked city it was and would know that God wouldn't take such a step lightly.

I don't really get it...to me this is always a difficult passage to really understand.

And Lot...didn't really want to leave, but the angels forced him to do so.

¹⁶But he lingered. So the men seized him and his wife and his two daughters by the hand, the LORD being merciful to him, and they brought him out and set him outside the city.

And then his wife looked back and paid the ultimate price for doing so. Such a sad thing. But shows God's mercy right? Even though he didn't really want to leave and knew that leaving would be a good thing it was still difficult for him to leave his home where he had built his life. We as people cling to things sometimes that aren't so very good for us...and God in his mercy will often draw us away from it.

Psalm 12
wow...this psalm fits in well with today's reading doesn't it?

¹Save, O LORD, for the godly one is gone;
for the faithful have vanished from among the children of man.
²Everyone utters lies to his neighbor;
with flattering lips and a double heart they speak.

³May the LORD cut off all flattering lips,
the tongue that makes great boasts,
⁴those who say, "With our tongue we will prevail,
our lips are with us; who is master over us?"

⁵"Because the poor are plundered, because the needy groan,
I will now arise," says the LORD;
"I will place him in the safety for which he longs."
⁶ The words of the LORD are pure words,
like silver refined in a furnace on the ground,
purified seven times.

⁷You, O LORD, will keep them;
you will guard us from this generation forever.
⁸On every side the wicked prowl,
as vileness is exalted among the children of man.

God protects his people doesn't he? Saving them from the wicked that prowl around.