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6-19-2022 Weekly Message

Meditation of the Week: Psalm 91:1-16

Text: Genesis 18:1-15; 19:1-11

Sermon Title: Two Kinds of Christians Living in the End Times

        In the example of Abraham and Lot, we see two types of Christians living on the eve of the Rapture and the Great Tribulation. Abraham was a man who lived a life of obedience to God’s Word. But Lot was a man who followed the lusts of his own flesh.

         Abraham, when God called him and  told him to leave his native relatives and his father’s house, he left there and entered the land of Canaan, where God led him.  Although the land God had spoken of was a rugged mountain, he continued to dwell there.

        When God called him, he said, ” And I will make of thee a great nation, and I will bless thee, and make thy name great; and thou shalt be a blessing:

3 And I will bless them that bless thee, and curse him that curseth thee: and in thee shall all families of the earth be blessed.” (Genesis 12:2-3). When he was 75 years old, he left. At that time, he had no children, but he believed the word of God and left.

         Many years later, the word of God came to him in a vision:

” After these things the word of the LORD came unto Abram in a vision, saying, Fear not, Abram: I am thy shield, and thy exceeding great reward.” (Genesis 15:1).

         He told God to remind him that he had been childless for a long time:

“Behold, to me thou hast given no seed: and, lo, one born in my house is mine heir.” (Genesis 15:3).

      Then the word of the Lord came to him, saying, ” This shall not be thine heir; but he that shall come forth out of thine own bowels shall be thine heir.” (Genesis 15:4).

         At this time God took Abram outside and said:

” Look now toward heaven, and tell the stars, if thou be able to number them: and he said unto him, So shall thy seed be.” (Genesis 15:5).

        Although he was too old to be able to produce children according to the carnal thoughts, he abandoned his thoughts and believed the word of the Lord God. At this time, when Abram believed the word of the Lord God, God counted it as righteousness.

       Abram was a man of faith. The LORD God spoke to him, his children shall be as many as stars in heaven knowing him without any child yet, and he was too old to bear children.  

         What he believed was not in his own thoughts, but in the Almighty God. Apostle Paul testified of his faith:

” (As it is written, I have made thee a father of many nations,) before him whom he believed, even God, who quickeneth the dead, and calleth those things which be not as though they were.

18 Who against hope believed in hope, that he might become the father of many nations, according to that which was spoken, So shall thy seed be.

19 And being not weak in faith, he considered not his own body now dead, when he was about an hundred years old, neither yet the deadness of Sara’s womb:

20 He staggered not at the promise of God through unbelief; but was strong in faith, giving glory to God;

21 And being fully persuaded that, what he had promised, he was able also to perform.” (Romans 4:17-22).

         He also testified of being justified toward Christians living in the end times:

” Now it was not written for his sake alone, that it was imputed to him;

24 But for us also, to whom it shall be imputed, if we believe on him that raised up Jesus our Lord from the dead;

25 Who was delivered for our offences, and was raised again for our justification.” (Romans 4:23-25).

          When Abram was ninety-nine years old, the Lord God came to Abram in human form with two angels. It was to make a promise that the son he had promised would come out the following year, when he is to be hundred years old:

“I will certainly return unto thee according to the time of life; and, lo, Sarah thy wife shall have a son. And Sarah heard it in the tent door, which was behind him.” (Genesis 18:10).

        But the two men who came with the Lord were angels sent to judge Sodom and Gomorrah with fire. When Abram heard this, he thought of his nephew Lot in Sodom and begged the Lord, but he had no choice but to mourn, knowing that there were less than ten  righteous people in Sodom, so that Sodom could not escape from judgment. But the Lord God, who knew Abraham’s heart, took his plea to heart and saved Lot. When God destroyed the cities of the plain, God remembered Abraham, and when he destroyed the cities in which Lot lived, he sent Lot out of the midst of destroying them” (Genesis 19:29).

          Lot and his wife did not live according to the word of God, but according to the lusts of the flesh:

” And Lot lifted up his eyes, and beheld all the plain of Jordan, that it was well watered every where, before the LORD destroyed Sodom and Gomorrah, even as the garden of the LORD, like the land of Egypt, as thou comest unto Zoar.

11 Then Lot chose him all the plain of Jordan; and Lot journeyed east: and they separated themselves the one from the other.

12 Abram dwelled in the land of Canaan, and Lot dwelled in the cities of the plain, and pitched his tent toward Sodom.

13 But the men of Sodom were wicked and sinners before the LORD exceedingly.” (Genesis 13:10-13).

      We are able to know that the judgment of God is very nigh according to the scriptures. We have to understand that Christians cannot avoid the judgment of God unto destruction, unless they not understand the word of God toward them as Jesus said:

“Enter ye in at the strait gate: for wide is the gate, and broad is the way, that leadeth to destruction, and many there be which go in thereat:

14 Because strait is the gate, and narrow is the way, which leadeth unto life, and few there be that find it. ” (Matt. 7:13-14)

        However, although many Christians are aware of this fact, they are unable to enter the strait gate because of the lust of the flesh, the lust of the eyes, and the pride of life. Jesus also said of this this:

“Strive to enter in at the strait gate: for many, I say unto you, will seek to enter in, and shall not be able.

25 When once the master of the house is risen up, and hath shut to the door, and ye begin to stand without, and to knock at the door, saying, Lord, Lord, open unto us; and he shall answer and say unto you, I know you not whence ye are:” (Luke 13:24:25).

         Abraham was a man who went through the narrow gate and walked the narrow way while obeying God’s word, but God gave Lot an opportunity so that he could come out of the broad way he had chosen, but he could not turn back and was destroyed.

         Abraham is a model of the bride of Christ who meets the Lord by being raptured on the day of the Christ when Christ appears, but Lot is the model of Christian who lives according to the flesh, but does not  Christ’s and cannot be raptured. . Apostle Paul testified more than once about whom to be raptured who is Christ’s:

” For as in Adam all die, even so in Christ shall all be made alive.

23 But every man in his own order: Christ the firstfruits; afterward they that are Christ’s at his coming.…… And they that are Christ’s have crucified the flesh with the affections and lusts.” (1 Corinthians 15:22-23; Galatians 5:24).

          Apostles Peter and Jude bear a warning message to Christians living in the end times in the day of judgment on the whole world:

“And turning the cities of Sodom and Gomorrha into ashes condemned them with an overthrow, making them an ensample unto those that after should live ungodly;….. Even as Sodom and Gomorrha, and the cities about them in like manner, giving themselves over to fornication, and going after strange flesh, are set forth for an example, suffering the vengeance of eternal fire.” (2 Peter 2:6; Jude 1:7).

amen! Hallelujah!