In this sermon, the preacher focuses on the story of Lot, Abraham's nephew, as described in Genesis 13, 18, and 19. The sermon begins with Abram's hospitality towards three men who visit him, emphasizing his willingness to serve and honor them. The preacher then highlights Lot's actions when he encounters the wicked men of Sodom, pleading with them to stop their evil intentions. However, the men reject Lot's authority and threaten him. Ultimately, Lot is saved by the heavenly messengers who blind the wicked men and protect him inside his house.

Today I'd like to speak about somebody who started well, but he ended in a very sad way. And that is Lot. Good Lord. Abraham's nephew. Because Lot was Abram's brother's son. I'm taking from Genesis chapter 13 and then Genesis 18 and 19. It's quite a long passage and so I will not be able to read all of it. One day Abram was visited by three men. It was during a time when it was hot. And he was seated at the opening of his tent. There was quite a big tree there, an oak tree on which he sat. When he saw them, he ran to them, he bowed down before them, and he invited them to come to his place to have something to eat and to be refreshed. And as they were seated, he ran to his wife Sarah and he said, Sarah, quickly, take some flour, bake some bread and also I want the fattened calf to be slaughtered for these people. And so he ran to his servant and he also said to his servant to quickly prepare the fattened calf because he's got some visitors. I wouldn't like to talk, go into it, who they were, but we leave that for today. They came from God and he bowed to them. God saw Sodom and Gomorrah. And they forsook Abraham and they entered into sin, into carnality. God had said that if we do not honor and recognize him as God, God will give men over to all types of perversity and even homosexuality. And so it was also in Sodom and Gomorrah, they were inflamed with lust, men towards other men, women towards other women, young and old amongst them all, it was like that. And then there was a great noise of this and a stench of this that rose up to God in heaven because even if we do things here on earth, the noise of that reaches God. And so he said to his servant, if we do not honor and recognize him as God, God will give men over to all types of perversity and even homosexuality. There was a great outcry in heaven, heard in heaven because of their sin. For example, also what happened to Abel and Cain. When Cain said to his brother Abel, let's go out into the fields and there he murdered him. After that, God said, the blood of your brother Abel is crying out to me in heaven. Whatever you do here on earth, your sins cry out in heaven. Now that today shouldn't confuse us, we should be able to understand it with modern technology and communication that there is today. For example, if somebody speaks in the USA, then that gets broadcast on TV all over the world and you can hear him here as well. Well, God has got his own television system in heaven. And so he said to his servant, if we do not honor and recognize him as God, God will give men over to all types of perversity and even homosexuality. One very wise mother taught her daughter and said, my child, you have got a body in heaven as well, just as you've got a body here on earth. And whatever your body here on earth does, your body in heaven does. And it does it before God and all his holy angels. And that child never forgot that. She always remembered it, that whatever she does here on earth, she is doing in heaven as well, before the sight of God. Cain, when he had murdered his brother Abel, God saw that. But greater than that even, that blood that was shed cried out to God in heaven. Now, this homosexuality of these Sodomites and those in Gomorrah, they lived in a very plain and a wonderful area. It was in the plains, very fertile. And then God said, I am sick and tired of this sin, of these people. I am going to send them rain from heaven, but not rain as in rain, but it's going to rain fire and brimstone down from heaven. And God said, but how can I hide anything from my servant Abraham, that I am going to destroy these people because of their sin. Because Abraham doesn't hide anything from me. God said, I have known Abraham. In the Hebrew language, that word has got a very deep meaning. It is said that Adam knew his wife Eve, and then she bore him a child. That is the most intimate fellowship there can be. And God said, Abraham doesn't hide anything from me. He is totally transparent before me. Shall I then hide from Abraham what I am about to do? And so these three men, just before they left, said to Abraham what God was about to do. That God was going to send down fire and brimstone on Sodom and Gomorrah, and destroy those cities, those evil cities, who could constantly, from sunrise to sunset, all the time, only think about sex. Whatever they did was totally saturated with sex. Their thoughts, all they could do and think was sex. And God said, instead of there being an improvement in Sodom and Gomorrah, in their lifestyle, in their morality, it only goes down and it gets worse into the mire and clay of sin. And then God said, the following day, there will be rain from heaven, but not of water, of fire and brimstone. And then Abraham asked of God, he said, will you sweep away the righteous with the unrighteous, with the wicked? Will they be destroyed together? And Abraham asked of God, he said, oh God, if there were to be fifty righteous people in those cities, will you really sweep away those cities and not spare it for the sake of those fifty righteous people? And God answered, if fifty righteous people were to be found, I will not destroy Sodom and Gomorrah. And then Abraham thought about that and he thought, well, maybe I am too high. He said, oh God, what if there are five less, if there are only forty-five? Or forty? Or thirty? Or twenty? Or only ten? And God said, if only ten righteous people were to be found, I will not destroy Sodom and Gomorrah. So do you realize that God hasn't yet destroyed South Africa, must be because there are still a few righteous people to be found. So do you realize that God hasn't yet destroyed South Africa, must be because there are still a few righteous people to be found. Homosexuality is rife in South Africa. To such an extent that laws are even promulgated where homosexuals can get married to one another. And if you speak against homosexuality, then you are guilty of a crime that you are going against that law. In some countries, servants of God are even jailed, those who criticize and speak against homosexuality. But if a few righteous people are found, then God doesn't destroy that country because of them. Now I say, and I say that lot started well but ended badly. One day Abraham called his nephew Lot to him. They were both, they had both herds, their herds and flocks were blessed, God had blessed both of them, God had blessed Lot because of Father Abraham. And the grazing became too little for both of their flocks and so one day Abraham called Lot and he said, it's not good if our herdsmen quarrel. He said, Lot, you decide now. You choose the direction that you want to go. If you go to the East, I go to the West. If you go to the North, I go to the South. But he said, Lot, there should not be disunity amongst us. There shouldn't be any quarreling. Abraham as a man of God knew that if God's children are not one and totally united, that is where Satan comes in amongst them. And I wondered, but what was this quarreling all about? And what type of quarreling was it? And what did that word in the original Hebrew language really mean? Yes, it speaks about quarreling and infighting. But always when this word quarreling is used, it has the connotation of defending yourself. Where a person always defends himself. To hear, do you understand what this word means? Where you're not one with the other, you defend yourself. You say, I'm right, that person is wrong. Now I can talk about it. I can speak about it. And Abraham said, such a thing is not allowed amongst God's people. Go to the East, I'll go to the West. Go to the North. The best is to separate those people. We don't need people that can gossip, talk about others, living in disunity. We don't want them here. They're a curse to us. We don't want them here. They're a curse to us. There's also another word that is related to this, which has the connotation or the meaning where you think yourself better than others. And that is why you find that you've got the right to speak about them. Genesis 4 verse 23. And in Genesis 4 verse 23, we read it about this man who always saw that he was right and the others were wrong. Now Abraham's herdsmen, they found fault with the herdsmen of Lot and vice versa as well. And they would say, well, they've got better grazing than what we've got, and they always want the best, and then we can't have it. And all of that is contained in this word where they quarreled, where a person justifies himself or a person sees himself as better than the other one being at fault. And so Abraham, man of God, spoke to his nephew Lot, and he said, you choose now. He made himself to be the smallest and the least, and he gave Lot the first choice. Lot's response should have been, Father Abraham, let not my will happen, but you decide and I'll do what you say. And so Lot lifted up his eyes, and he looked around him, and he then chose for himself. He made his own choice, and he saw the plains of Sodom and Gomorrah, that they were like a well-watered garden. He said, oh, my sheep and my flocks, they will get such good grazing there, they will grow fat, and I will be well off, and I will prosper much better than when I'm here with Father Abraham. He wasn't concerned about their immorality and their prostitution, even as you have prostitution in South Africa today and in the world, where young people sell their bodies for money. Well, those things belong to Sodom and Gomorrah. And where you get job offers, where you don't need any qualifications, and you think, well, this is a job opportunity to go and sit in an office. In the meantime, it's to get involved in prostitution. And so Lot went and dwelt in Sodom and Gomorrah and the plains of those cities, and the Bible says that his soul was vexed day and night because of their wickedness. And it wasn't easy for him to go away from that place. Because his wife was very attached to that place. She loved those cities. She loved their lifestyle. She loved the atmosphere there. Do you hear that, you wives? And so her children grew up there, and if children grow up in a place like that, they become influenced by the atmosphere there, and the spirit there, and they even got themselves some husbands-to-be from that area. They got engaged to them. And I wondered, Lot, even though your wife loved that place so much, why didn't you bid her farewell, said goodbye to her, left her there, and went off? I said, Lot, how could you allow such a thing to happen? How could you allow such a thing as the head of the home of your family, the father of your children, to allow your daughters to live in such a place, to be educated there, to be influenced, and to be married by men of that place? Lot, how on earth could you allow something like that? What came into you? He said, Oh God, let me not fly to the mountains because I might perish on the way. Let me rather go to this little city. You see why his servants were like that, and his wife and children, because he was like that, even though he was a righteous man. And God said of Abraham, I have known Abraham. There is an intimate fellowship between us, and I know that Abraham will have the authority to command his family, his children, and his servants to obey my commands. Abraham had authority to command his children and his servants to do something, and they did it. How did he get that authority? By hiding nothing from God, walking in the light. And these heavenly messengers said to Abraham, we are leaving, we are going there to Lot, because we are going to tell him about those cities that are going to be destroyed. They went there, and Lot also welcomed them very well as a righteous man. And he invited them into his home, and they said, no, we will just sleep here on the city plain. He said, no, these are wicked times, and he pleaded with them until eventually they gave in and they came to him. And after they had eaten supper, before they had gone to bed, their house was surrounded by a big crowd of men. They were young and old, and they said, bring these visitors of yours out to us. Bring them out to us so that we can have sex with them. Do you see how they were like wild animals? Even wild animals don't do that, but do you see how degraded a person becomes that turns his back on God? And they had a big demonstration there, beating on the door, shouting and saying, Lot, open for us. And so Lot excused himself from his visitors. He said, just excuse me for a moment. And so he went out to go and speak to these men outside. And so Lot went to these men, and he said, please, I plead with you, stop with this which you intend to do. Don't do anything to these men, for they have come under my roof for protection. And then these people started shouting at Lot and said, now you make yourself out to be a judge over us. And you've just come recently, you're not even from this place, you're an alien. Get out of our way. And they pressed against them, and these other men inside Lot's house realized that they were maybe even going to kill Lot. And so these heavenly messengers inside reached out to Lot. And they pulled him into the house and shut the door, and then they struck all these men, young and old, with blindness. They'd wanted to break down the door, but now they couldn't find the door anymore, and they went round and round the house, not being able to find the door. And then these messengers said to Lot, they said, we have come as messengers from heaven, we have come to destroy Sodom and Gomorrah. By dawn, and you need to get out of this place. And he said that the outcry to the Lord against its people has become so great that he sent us to destroy it. And he said, haven't you got any people here in this city that belong to you? And he said he's got some sons-in-law that are pledged to be married to his daughters. And he went to them, Lot, and he tried to convince them, and he said, hurry, you must come with me to flee from this place. God is going to destroy this place at sunrise because of its wickedness. And they thought he was joking. And they laughed at him, and they thought, well, maybe Lot is drunk. That's why he's speaking like that. And he said, don't play the fool with us. We don't believe that, that fire would come down from heaven, from God, and destroy everything. There's no such thing. And he said, I don't believe that fire would come down from heaven, from God, and destroy everything. And he said, I don't believe that fire would come down from heaven, from God, and destroy everything. We've got to flee from this place. We must hurry. And you have to leave your husbands-to-be or your boyfriends behind. And let's flee. Maybe there are some amongst us that have got boyfriends, and rather than separating from their boyfriends, they rather choose to separate from their family, from their home, to separate from their opportunities to be educated. And such people are citizens of Sodom and Gomorrah. And the next morning, Lot hesitated. He lingered. He dragged his feet. He wasn't sharp in that which God had said to him and commanded to him. He was blunt. I don't know whether he perhaps doubted. And when he hesitated, the men, the angels, they grasped his hand, and that of his wife and his daughters, and they said to them, hurry, we must flee. God is only holding back his judgment because of you. And they left with him. And as soon as they had let them out into safety, they said to them, now flee for your lives and don't look back. But then Lot's wife looked back. I feel sorry for such a man who has married to such a wife. You young men, you're in such a hurry to get married, but you don't realize that that wife to whom you'll get married might be like a millstone around your neck and will hold you back from attaining to that that God wants you to attain to.