Divine Power

 DEVOTION

GENESIS

DIVINE POWER

Gen 19:3-11

3 But he insisted so strongly that they did go with him and entered his house. He prepared a meal for them, baking bread without yeast, and they ate. 4 Before they had gone to bed, all the men from every part of the city of Sodom — both young and old — surrounded the house. 5 They called to Lot, "Where are the men who came to you tonight? Bring them out to us so that we can have sex with them." 6 Lot went outside to meet them and shut the door behind him 7 and said, "No, my friends. Don't do this wicked thing. 8 Look, I have two daughters who have never slept with a man. Let me bring them out to you, and you can do what you like with them. But don't do anything to these men, for they have come under the protection of my roof." 9 "Get out of our way," they replied. And they said, "This fellow came here as an alien, and now he wants to play the judge! We'll treat you worse than them." They kept bringing pressure on Lot and moved forward to break down the door. 10 But the men inside reached out and pulled Lot back into the house and shut the door. 11 Then they struck the men who were at the door of the house, young and old, with blindness so that they could not find the door.

NIV

How wicked can men become that they would want to take strangers, visitors to this town and want to abuse them by forcible raping men for their own male pleasures. We are getting the picture of the city of Sodom, in fact, that is where we get the English word sodomy. However, the real story, the truth to glean from this portion of the narrative is that Lot made a gallant effort to stop the men of the town from barging into his home and taking the men by force. Lot even offered his two virgin daughters as a way to appease the men, but they were not interested in having women, they only desired the two men. This must have been both a sad and frightening day in the life of Lot and his family. The rage of these men of Sodom even turned on Lot. It would appear he had been accepted in the town, even welcome enough to sit at the gate. But as he made his appeal to them, it was useless. However, we see the divine intervening where human power is useless. First, the two reached out the door and pulled Lot back into the house. We would have thought when they opened the door to pull Lot back into the house it would have been the time for the town's men to storm the door. But, that was not the case, because they no longer could see the door, for after the two divine people, called angels in this narrative, stuck the townsmen blind. Here is the power of God at work when human efforts can only fail. We could learn a powerful lesson here. So often we try or want to live by our own abilities, as weak as they may be. We think we have some power over the things of this world. So many have multitudes of causes that they both demonstrate for or against, agendas they want enacted to save the planet, some species that might become extinct in the next hundred years, or some trees that should not be cut down because of a bird that lives in that area. Then we have the human causes regarding all sorts of perversions God speaks against, but they insist the human cause is greater than God if he even exists. Nevertheless, we see the divine intervening when human effort fails, and the power of God enacted against those wicked men. Let us always be aware of the power of God, and live within his divine protection, and with the knowledge that all things are possible with God, especially in light of our powerlessness. Just from a logical human perspective, we think that it would behoove us to always be living by faith in God rather than in self. It is always right to think of the power of the divine.