Sin Doesn't Share, Part 1

Photo by Ricardo Gomez Angel on Unsplash
Sin is a great trapper. Do you know what a trapper does? A trapper hunts in a seemingly passive way. It would seem that all they do is place traps down and hope animals walk into them, but there is a lot more to it than that. They observe animal tracks, place the trap in such as way that it is disguised. Food is carefully chosen to attract the animal. The prey is sized up to be sure to get the right cage, and of course the trapper places it when they know they won't be seen. It is a very active and effective process. Get the animal to go where it wouldn't go normally by offering it something it wants in a place that looks perfectly safe. 

Sin works the same way. Sin offers you something that looks good and useful. It seems safe, without consequence, and entirely reversible. It's like the mechanic who got addicted to drinking break fluid; he can stop whenever he wants. But this is the fundamental lie of sin. It can give you want you want, no, what you *need* without consequences. Sin doesn't share. It only takes. And that is what we are going to see today as we focus on the fate of Lot in this chapter. We will look at two points: Sin will imprison you, so don't accommodate it. and God's Grace will free you, so embrace it.  
### Sin will imprison you, so don't accommodate it

Let's take a look at Lot. How did this happen?! How did we go from nephew of Abraham to the guy known for offering up his daughters to be violated? Well, like most sins, it started with one choice. J.C. Ryle in his book *Holiness* makes this point. It all starts when Lot decides to leave Abraham for the fields of Sodom with no thought to what this might do to his soul: "He thought of his worldly profit, and not of his soul." (208). Lot looked at Sodom, with all of its wickedness, and only saw the grass and what that could mean for his flocks. "Hey, we need food, and if a compromise with the world is needed, so be it." The trap was set and the bait was material prosperity. It was clear what this city was known for. God looks at homosexuality with great wrath and judgment. Yet Lot doesn't seem to think that this is a big deal, and sets up to live there without consideration of this. It's not like he is going here with the idea of being a missionary. 

Where does this leave us? Am I saying that anyone who chooses to live in California is like Lot? No. But what I am saying is that we need to think about what our decisions are going to do to our souls before we think about what it will do for our savings. Be intentionally Biblical in your choices. Why do you watch what you watch? Read what you read? Post on what you post? Are you doing those things because you kinda fell into them? How are your daily choices in life affecting your soul? It has been well said, "Live by design, not by default." When you live by default, you are just accepting the choices that someone else has made. Maybe those were good choices, and maybe those choices are even still good, but the only way you know that is by comparing them against God's Word. 

Why stress this? After all, most decisions once you've made them you can go back on. If you start watching a show that isn't good you can stop. You can move to an area and then move out! Why place such scrutiny on your life?

The answer is because you can get used to sin. Let's go back to Lot. At first, he just pitched his tent outside the city limits at the end of chapter 13. In chapter 14 he was carried off by the warring tribes of the Canaanites because he moved to living inside the city. We can calculate how long he has been living in the city by what is happening in Abraham's life. Chapter 15 is the covenant with Abraham and the promise of a son, and then twenty plus years later we get to chapter 17. This means that Lot has been living in Sodom for the better part of two decades plus! Now, in chapter 19, when the angels come to Sodom, Lot meets them while he is sitting at the gate! 

Sitting at the gate is a significant detail. The gate of a city was like having a seat at city hall. You are there because you are in some kind of leadership position. In order to be placed in leadership as an outsider in a city, Lot has had to be doing some compromising and looking the other way. He didn't get here condemning the city's sin. Further, as we will see later, Lot's daughters are due to be married to the people of Sodom (v 14), so the ties to the city are tightly woven. 

It seems as though Lot has carved himself a pretty good life here in Sodom. Good grass, urban living, and a seat at the government table. It looks like Lot got it all. However, as one scholar notes, "One may say that, if people crave the best of this world along with the world to come, they may receive neither. One's loves often betray one's loyalties" (Ross, 365). We are going to see exactly this play out when it is time to choose.  

Lot has invited the two angels to stay in his home, and this has not escaped the notice of the men of the city. They announce what they plan to do: violate Lot's guests. Now, Lot here at least holds up the ideals of hospitality. Being kind to strangers was a big deal in Israelite culture, and protection of guests rated highly in Lot's mind. All good so far! You don't want to bring people into your house and then expose them to danger. He goes out to confront them and tells them that their actions are wicked (although, note the fact that he calls them "brothers."). Again, bold! 

But then we get to verse 8 where Lot offers up his daughters. This is an unmitigated failure. But Sodom taught him that sexual misbehavior isn't that big of a deal. As a city leader, he doesn't want to disappoint the citizenry, but he can't allow this wickedness to move forward. He has at least that. But he tries to find a middle way. Maybe the people can have their lusts satisfied, guests protected, and as always, there will be a little damage. That is very twisted thinking. You don't get there in a week. This is twenty years of Sodom thinking. One thing that one scholar points out is that Lot doesn't even pray. While he doesn't know it yet, there are angels just on the other side of the door! How many times do we pass on our most able weapon of prayer (Rick Phillips, 641)! 

Do you remember being shocked at behavior? I mean, we shake our heads at Pride month and the rainbows everywhere, but it has stopped being surprising. Well meaning Christians have even talked about this sin being just like all the others. Sin is sin, we say. What is about to happen here to Sodom tells us that there are categories of sin. God hasn't turned every city into the Dead Sea. Romans 1 sees this sin as contrary to nature and the final stop of a mind that has turned against God. Paul in 1 Corinthians 6:18 sees sexual sin of any kind as a sin against the body unlike other sins. We can't forget that. Our culture, even some churches, are trying to downplay that. We can't. 

So how do we properly see sin like this as heinous without making the opposite error of assuming that our sin is no big deal, even if it isn't *as* bad? 

I would encourage you to think of sin the same way you think about cancer. When someone tells you that they have been diagnosed with cancer you lean forward with concern, and if they are a family member, you make sure that they are pursuing every avenue possible to get rid of it. You would never say to them, "Well, millions of people get cancer every year." You take it seriously. Sin is no less dangerous. Are there degrees of sin? Yes, just like there are degrees of cancer. Brain cancer will kill you very quickly, but skin cancer can kill you too if you ignore it. The longer even a small skin cancer sits there the longer it takes to recover. And while I don't want to stretch this analogy too much, sin works much the same way. The longer you let it sit without repentance, the harder it is to get rid of it. 

Let's go back to Lot for a second to see how that works. Lot has been comfortable in Sodom for a good twenty years now. This was an outgrowth of a short-sighted decision to move away from God's blessing (albeit hidden blessing) towards something that he could see. To repent of that decision two weeks in would involve just pulling up the tent poles and moving back home. Nothing gained, nothing truly lost. 

Now, what does it look like for Lot to repent of this sin currently surrounded by Sodomites? Well, this would be taking his life into his hands. It wouldn't be offering his daughters, it would be going down fighting (Belcher, 143)! Assuming he survived that, it would be leaving behind his daughters' future husbands, the loss of his leadership position, his house, and really his entire way of life!  

So what do we take away from this? How do we resist accommodation of sin? Well, we have to see a vision and gain a love for righteousness. We accommodate sin because often we feel that we need something sinful in order to be ok. All you need is what is contained in the first question of the Heidelburg catechism:  "What is your only comfort in life and in death?"

"That I am not my own, but belong—body and soul, in life and in death—to my faithful Savior, Jesus Christ. He has fully paid for all my sins with His precious blood, and has set me free from the tyranny of the devil. He also watches over me in such a way that not a hair can fall from my head without the will of my Father in heaven; in fact, all things must work together for my salvation. Because I belong to Him, Christ, by His Holy Spirit, assures me of eternal life and makes me wholeheartedly willing and ready from now on to live for Him."

There is no freer person on earth than the person who understands and lives that. 

Lest we think that, "Well, wrestling against sin isn't worth it because the wicked are always doing better than I am!" Read Psalm 73, and you will see that the Bible has already anticipated and dealt with that question! 

It has been said that there is nothing more threatening than a man with nothing to lose. I would say that there is nothing more peaceful than a man with nothing left to gain. If you have Christ, even death itself is gain (Phil. 1:21 "For to me to live is Christ, and to die is gain."). Grasping that is what gives you the freedom to stay out of the trap. 

Once you have embraced that freedom, preach that freedom. We can come away from this chapter assuming that if someone has fallen into the sin of Sodom that there is just no hope for them, but that isn't true. In 1 Corinthians 6:9-11, we are given a list of sins that keep you out of heaven, a list of cancers, if you will, that will kill you. Included on there is homosexuality along with greed. What is the solution? "But! you were washed." There is hope for the greedy and the gay. Homosexuality is no more unchangeable than greed is. Because the power isn't in the sin, it is in the Savior. Now, it may be that turning away from a sinful pattern of decades will take a long time. Sometimes God will remind us to be dependent on Him by allowing us to struggle a long time with the consequences of our sin. But we don't need consequences removed in order to be ok. We need our sin removed from God's sight. 

In Christ, we have exactly that. So if you are struggling with these desires, be honest. Come to Christ. He is the only one powerful enough to not only forgive, but overcome your sin. This isn't going to be an easy process. This is not a magic pill. It is a promise for Christ to walk with you taking you as you are but not leaving you as you are. Let me assure you, just like Lot, you can't have sin and Jesus. Both are going to make you choose. Sin doesn't share, and neither does Jesus, blessedly. Jesus wants all of you.