We're turning this morning in our Bibles to Genesis chapter 19. On vacation, I wrestled with what to do. Typically, at this time of year, I know a series of Christmas sermons come out, and I thought, this has got to be one of the best Christmas sermons we've come to in Genesis chapter 19. So, we are going to consider Lot and his daughters in the cave. Genesis 19, verses 30 through 38. And by the time we're done, I trust you will see the story and be amazed as I was of the whole story. If you're visiting, we're working through the book of Genesis. It's found on page 18 in your pew Bible. We will be considering verses 30 through 38. Let's hear the word of the Lord. Now Lot went up out of Zoar and lived in the hills with his two daughters, for he was afraid to live in Zoar. So he lived in a cave with his two daughters. And the firstborn said to the younger, Our father is old, and there is not a man on earth to come into us after the manner of all the earth. Come, let us make our father drink wine, and we will lie with him that we may preserve offspring from our father. So they made their father drink wine that night, and the firstborn went in and lay with their father. He did not know when she lay down or when she arose. The next day the firstborn said to the younger, Behold, I lay last night with my father. Let us make him drink wine tonight also. Then you go in and lie with him that we may preserve offspring from our father. So they made their father drink wine that night also. And the younger arose and lay with him. And he did not know when she lay down or when she arose. Thus both the daughters of Lot became pregnant by their father. The firstborn bore a son and called his name Moab. He's the father of the Moabites to this day. The younger also bore a son and called his name Ben-Ami. He's the father of the Ammonites to this day. May the Lord bless the hearing of his word. All of you are uncomfortable right now. I did not want to preach this. Who in the world wants to preach this? If you were to list the top three most twisted stories in the Old Testament, I think this chalks in at number two or three. Judges 19 would probably be number one. The Tamar incident, probably number two. I think I give this three. The one we've come today to, this section in Genesis chapter 19, I mean, we have been into some very challenging things in the book of Genesis. Last time we encountered, I mean, we encountered homosexuality and rape and today incest. This is the most uncomfortable stuff a pastor has to address. And you come to passages like this and you begin with the kind of question, why is God revealing this to us? Why is God telling us about this? Why does God want this preached? Is it even profitable for us? The well-known scholar C.H. Leupold said, this cannot be a text for a sermon. I want to test that today. Wouldn't you, if you were asking the Lord, say something like, you know, Lord, there's little ears. I'm concerned about, I have children. And I'm very sensitive to that. And I know you've told the preacher to preach the whole counsel of God, it. What good is this? How is this helpful? Is it profitable to talk about such things? I think James Boyce gave a really helpful answer. He said this, someone may say, well, the account is probably all right for adults, but what we object to is it being made known to children. Let me ask, where would you rather your children learn the facts of life? Children are going to know them sooner or later. And in our corrupt society, it's probably going to be much sooner than later. Would you rather them learn such things from secular books or people or from the Word of God? It's a great question. I quote that because I believe in the wisdom of God and that God has a great purpose for this today, a healthy purpose for this today. Because a great contrast has been shown to us looking at the story of Abraham and the story of Lot. And you remember what the Lord said about Abraham. I have known Abraham that he may command his, notice who comes into this mix, children. That they may know the way of the Lord, that this father may teach his children the way of the Lord. And the great contrast was set side by side. then you had Lot who threw his children to Sodom and didn't instruct them. The fact before us today is that we are dealing with an incident that is quite unspeakable. It is incest. And I believe God has set apart passages like this to have us think about today how serious we take the problem of our sin. It's the kind of passage that's going to take us way down, and then we're going to be way up by the very end. So you can anticipate that. But I'm making the case this morning that this is meaningful. The Lord puts these kinds of passages before us, and it's in these very kinds of passages that are uncomfortable and messy and dirty that we get the greatest message of grace and gospel. In fact, I'm going to make the case that we have the Christmas story here. And I'd be curious if any other pastor thinks that. I want you to think about this scene today with me for a moment. I have questions about Lot. I have real questions about Lot. Can a man like this be saved? You know, Lot has been a challenge for me. Is it even possible for a man like Lot to be saved? I mean, haven't you asked that along the way? The guy has been a complete mess. He has been a total failure. What happened to Lot? Why does God want this in front of us? If we believe that Lot, which is the shocking message of the New Testament, if we believe that Lot is a righteous man, how could God work this for good? Because he says for the righteous and those whom he has called, everything works for good. Can God work this for good? Do we even want to begin to say that God could work this, what I just read, for good? And if you can answer that from this text today by the time we're done, and I believe you'll begin to start to understand the Christian story and the Christmas story as God desires for us to understand it and believe it and receive it. Free from sentimentality and free from sanitization that we give to it at this time of year. Let's look at this. It'll be great for coming to the table. The story of Lot has been a challenge. One of the things about Genesis that moves me is that so many of the characters that are introduced to us, they don't finish well. And that's a teaching point in and of itself. We'll look at this as we go through. A lot of these figures do not finish well. And I come back to what the Heidelberg Catechism says because it really does nail it when it says that the holiest in this life only make a small step in this sanctification. if that's the case, what about the least holy? I mean, we're talking about the holiest in this life. What about the least holy? What do they do in this life? I think Lot can help us with that. In verse 30, we read that Lot went up out of Zoar and dwelt in the mountains, and his two daughters were with him, for he was afraid to dwell in Zoar. So he and his daughters go out and they dwell in this cave. God had just rained down fire and brimstone on Sodom. And we studied that. Over in the opposite direction, at this very moment, Abraham has risen up. And Abraham is, remember, looking out at the ashes of Sodom and Gomorrah. And we had a beautiful statement there in Genesis chapter 19 that God remembered Abraham. And that God had remembered what He said He would do. It was the same covenantal word. It was an emphasis that was given all the way back after the flood. The same thing was said of Noah, that God remembered Noah. And Abraham had interceded for essentially Lot. And God had answered Abraham. Lot's been delivered. So it's an amazing section here to consider. But they're not together. Why Lot has not gone back to Abraham bewilders me. I can't figure that out. He has stayed away from Father Abraham. The contrast to show you that has been very vivid, hasn't it? Lot had been with great Father Abraham, but driven by a love for the world, he departed. And remember, by the time it was all said and done, not only had he, Psalm 1, walked in the path of the wicked and stood in the counsel of the ungodly, he was sitting in the seat of the scornful of sinners in Sodom's gate when we opened up chapter 19. So the New Testament gives us some insight into all this because we were confused about Lot. What's the story with Lot? And the New Testament says, makes the amazing statement, he is a righteous man. And the only way you can understand that is to say it's an imputed righteousness it's not an inherent righteousness and boy we see that clearly with lot he was the new testament says the only thing i get is that he was distressed by what was going on in sodom so in other words he was he had a lot of inward turmoil about all that was happening in sodom but outwardly he wouldn't let sodom go he would not let sodom go and so remember what happened last time. Lot begged the angels, who essentially had to pull him out, grab him by the arm. He begged the angels, and he said, can we stay? Just give me, Zoe, I want a little bit of Sodom. It's just a little one. Let me stay. And it wasn't that he was just tied there for family's sake. He still wanted to go after he'd been pulled out he loved sodom well verse 30 tells us that lot had to flee in dread from sodom from zoar most likely because he was a marked man and when you're the only one that made it out it's not going to fare well for you so he escapes out of there into a cave and this is the last scene we ever read about Lot. He drops off the pages of Scripture in the Old Testament, and I know no more of what happened to Lot other than this cave scene. Caves, you know, were burial places. One pastor called Lot spiritually entombed, living a degenerated death-like existence, sinking into ever deeper depression and corruption. And now we come to the darkest moment of his life and that's where the narrative ends how low can he go this is verse 31 and the firstborn said to the younger our father is old and there's not a man on earth to come into us after the manner of all the earth come let us make our father drink wine and we will lie with him come that we may preserve our offspring from our father so they made him drink their father drink wine that night and the firstborn went in and lay with the father and he did not know when she lay down or when she arose and then this happens again with the other daughter twisted absolutely twisted they desired to preserve the seed they desired to have sons go on and maintain the father's name Maybe they thought that God had wiped out the whole world at this point. I don't know. But whatever the case, they devised this plan and schemed, and they got their father drunk, and incest happens that night in the cave. It's important to state that all the codes, the civil codes of the time, condemned this. The codes of Hammurabi, the Hittite law, they all condemned this and attached the death penalty to it. God's law would too. And if we think that Lot was innocent in this, we've really not read it correctly. It's not that he didn't know what's going on. He's not unconscious. You don't do this when you're unconscious. It is that the wine had completely blocked him and putting him into this intoxicated state, and he didn't have the ability to exercise judgment any longer. That's what alcohol does. So one of the themes of Genesis here that we've been looking at is this pattern we've seen over and over. Noah in the tent, this fall-like pattern that's continuing to show us the fallen state of man just after deliverance. But I want us to think for a minute here about the bigger message that's going on. One of you walked up two weeks ago after the sermon and you said to me, you said, Lot is truly baffling to me, Pastor. There's not one good work recorded. There's not one good work recorded. He doesn't seem to fit the Romans 8 man, does he? He's not mortifying the deeds. What do you think God's teaching us? That's the only thing I can come with when I reflect on the life of Lot. What is God teaching us about him? That's what I want to really explore. Outside of Lot, who would you say, or outside of even, if we're looking at the sorrows of people in the Bible, outside of the Lord Jesus Christ, who was the man that you would say in the Bible, the single man that was filled with the most sorrow in life? You all would say Job. Of course you would. I mean, I can kind of handle the story of Job. You know why I can handle the story of Job? Because it ends well. It all ended well by the end of Job. It's an amazing story. At least I have it written down for me how it ended for him. Have you ever considered in your life the sufferings of Lot? Have you ever considered it? God put him down for a reason. And it's one thing to endure hardship and affliction When God simply decides in His providence to take it all away, that's a tough, tough thing to deal with. And you all, some of you have had to really deal with that in life. You haven't understood in God's providence why things happen the way that they do. You haven't understood why God took so-and-so the way that He did, and you've suffered loss, and it's been painful. I understand that. We have Job for a reason. But Lot, this is an incredible story of suffering. Consider it. He's alone. He's taken to the bottle with no restraint. He's just lost his sons-in-law. He's just lost his wife. All of his possessions have been ripped away. His home is gone. Everybody hates him. People want to kill him, and he's in a cave. It's a quite different scenario when you have hardship and affliction because you are suffering the loss of it all because of your own foolish choices in life. That's a different pill to swallow. I mean, this is bad decision-making the whole way through. Family destroyed by fire, home ripped away, all he has left on him. This is the imagery here. Think of him alone in an entombed, entombed in a cave, only with the clothes on his back and some alcohol and his daughters. And I think the first thing the Lord is teaching us here is to look at what you can do to your life. Look at what you can do to your life. The great contrast that has been drawn here is between Abraham and Lot. And it's teaching us the painful consequences of trying to live by sight. And I believe the Lord is giving us a real sense here because we are all about covering. We are all about uncovering. And the Bible keeps uncovering what we're trying to cover all over the place. And today we're here, we're coming to the table, and we all look nice. We are always making things look better than what they really are, and we cover what's really going on in the human heart. All of you, be scary to expose it today. And here, all of a sudden, we're feeling how damaging and painful the effects of sin are. And not only just how painful at the moment, but how far and long-reaching they are. What did Lot try to do? He ended up trying to controls life and here we go he ends up just like jonah entombed at the very bottom in a dark cave just like at the bottom of the ocean in a fish which jonah calls hell so the suffering of lot i don't think has been recognized enough i've come to realize though especially with looking at lot that there's something else that's even worse i told you we're going down down down and then we'll go up this goes a little bit further down when you consider the consequences of sin i've come to realize as a pastor we talk a lot about the means of grace we talk a lot about the means of grace in preaching and amen this is why god has this this is what you're coming to today to receive grace from him but do we talk enough also about the means of the father do we talk enough about the means of the father abraham i'm knowing you to command your children in the way of the lord that's why i'm i'm setting you apart to me that you would train your children in the way of the lord as i look at the scriptures though and i see this this emphasis on the father and here we're seeing consequences of actions notice what's happened here children value what the parents value that's why i'm i've seen this in the life of the ministry when children walk off and abandon the church and they speak ill about the church oftentimes what has happened is that was the parents attitude about the church that's why oftentimes it happened there was no value to it. Why do I say all that? How could the daughters begin to suggest this? That's the question that I'm wrestling with. How could the daughters begin to suggest this? And the thing that you come up with here is this. This is not the beginning of a problem. This is the end of a long problem. Lot's daughters were products of Sodom. and the new testament says that sodom was filled with all kinds of sensual conduct and lawless deeds they were entrenched in a society that was constantly presenting before them violence sexual immorality and the worst kind of the worst kind cruelty and drunkenness and sensual things this was the norm the cultural norm of sodom and what do you think happens to those who are raised in this they're invaded with it and it's not just the problem of the culture it's the problem of the human heart you can't block it as much as we all want to from our children they were doing the things they were trained to accept and the point is when we come to a passage like this that is so geographically perverse that for them it was no big deal it was no big deal they weren't nervous about suggesting this think about it where is the line of morality pushed go back we've done this a little bit but i haven't pushed it this far 1930s and 40s what was the line of morality it was adultery wasn't it i mean that was where in a society you would have said hey come on that's wrong is that wrong today keep going it's not adultery where is it now we legalize all sorts of things is it prostitution polygamy i've seen tv shows now with this See the line going back and back and back? Child abuse, pedophilia. Look, in Roman culture, that was the norm. And society's heading there. Now, why am I raising all of this today? Who is given to curb this and to stop this in children? You. And if we don't talk to our children about these things, who will? If the church is silent, who will? If the Father is silent, who will? I often would hear as a pastor, well, our children just have to learn the hard way. Why do they have to learn the hard way? Why? If you learn the hard way, then don't you want to keep them from learning the hard way? It's not hypocrisy, that's good parenting. The daughters didn't take seriously this because it was their father who tried to hand them over to the men of Sodom to do whatever they wanted to do. Remember? Do you understand now a little bit what God is showing us through the life of Lot? Uncomfortable as it is, I was reflecting a lot on the life of Lot, and I thought to myself about what Jesus said, whoever seeks to save his life will lose it, and whoever loses his life for my sake will save it. It's a remarkable thing because in the contact text, all I've seen is Lot trying to hold on to his life. And when I read a statement like that by our Lord, I used to think, I used to think that just meant, well, I guess I need to set myself to start losing my life. But that's the one thing I can't do. Because all of you, including your pastor are desperately holding on to it and we hold tight it's a remarkable thing we have promise to us think about it i has not seen nor ear heard nor entered in the heart of man the things that god has prepared for those who love him we get a brand new resurrected body we get to be with the lord where there's no more sin and misery and yet we're holding tight to this and we make plans and we try to root ourselves down and you should ask the question then what has really happened to lot well here's there the story turns for you maybe it's the question what has the lord done for lot that's the question now we should begin to explore the answer to that is he's rescued him. You say, how in the world has he rescued him? What do you look at this mess? Lot tried to live gaining the world, and what did God just do for him? Pulled him out of it and stripped it all. He has nothing left. His wealth, his status, his dignity, his wife, The world, it's all been taken from him. Clear chastening. But for what end? We could walk away and think, well, how depressing for Lot. You ever ask the question, what happened to him? What ended up happening to Lot? This is the last scene in the Old Testament of Lot. Could God really clean up a mess like this? Could God really clean up a mess like this? Could He forgive sins like this? Could God rescue a man like this? And now I'm ready to say the Lord jumps into this scene like you've never seen Him jump into a scene ever before. What did God do for Lot? He didn't abandon him. And I can say that with absolute confidence. How can I say that? Everyone look carefully at verse 37. The firstborn bore a son and called his name Moab. He's the father of the Moabites to this day. The younger also bore a son and called his name Ben-Ami, son of the kinsman. He's a father of the people of Ammon to this day. What essentially happened is Sodom was reborn that night. Sodom was reborn. And these two peoples would be great thorns in Abraham's side. and the children of Israel. Moab would seduce the children of Israel to sexual immorality. I mean, the pattern just continued, right? But one day, a family of Israel moved to the land of Moab. And there was a young gal there by the name of Ruth. You remember? And this little Moabitess woman returned back to israel and she said and we read i'm clinging to you i will go wherever you go remember she said this to naomi your people shall be my people where you die i will die and there i will be buried so the lord do so to me and more also if anything but death parts us you know who that was that was a daughter of lot and a kinsman redeemer named boaz a son of abraham redeemed lot's daughter and here is the christmas story like i said i hope i'm not sounding too arrogant that i don't know if you've ever heard like it before it would be through a daughter of lot, that your Messiah would come. In the cave, in an incestuous act, the Messiah would come from that. Matthew 1, the book of the genealogy of Jesus Christ, the son of David, the son of Abraham. Solomon begot Boaz by Rahab. Boaz begot Obed by Ruth. Obed begot Jesse and Jesse begot David the king. You see why there's emphasis here in the line? It was through Ruth the Moabitess who redeemed Boaz, through redeemed Boaz, who redeemed her, Boaz did, that Jesus Christ would come and He bought her back. And the great story that we celebrate is that Christ has come and that Christ has redeemed and Christ has claimed worldly sinners like Lot. And the story that we celebrate is that God's love is for wandering sinners, coming after them and redeeming them, redeeming them from this kind of mess to this kind of degree. And that's what's pictured today in the story of Lot. You see, the Lord wants us to see how he stepped into and came from this kind of mess. A cave incident. He who knew no sin was willing to be identified with these kinds of sinners. And I asked the question this morning, are you beginning to grasp this gospel? Everyone said gospel, gospel, gospel, gospel. I'm asking, are you beginning to really grasp it? You are foul. I am foul. We're all messed up. And you could take passages like this and you could go. You could say like C.H. Lupe, not a text to be preached. Or you could ask, what God is really teaching you here? Who is in this genealogy? Tamar the prostitute. Rahab the harlot, Ruth the Moabitess, Bathsheba the adulteress. That's your family. That's your family. Those are the skeletons none of you'd want to bring out. And that's the Christmas story. You see, we can't sanitize it. Trust me, your children are getting sought and pushed on them left and right. The antidote to that is this, to see what Jesus did for sinners, to see that Jesus came for sinners and that he identifies with sinners and that he rescues them from the tombs that we are in spiritually and that God would care to give his son even for life and to clean up a mess like this to tell us that whatever Satan means for evil, God will work for good. This Jesus who knew no sin became sin for us and identified with us that we today might be the righteousness of God in him that's our Christ that's our savior and he wants you to know that he has a table spread for you in the wilderness of good wine not the wine like what lot went after the wine of salvation the wine of freedom the wine of gospel I think every time at this year as I've been in the ministry everyone is full of all kinds of stress as Christians many of you are facing things right now and you can't figure it out it's it's a kind of burden worldliness stress and you don't know what's going on. It always hits at these times of year. I have seen it. I've lived it. I know it. Greatest pressures. And we're tempted heavily to follow the path of life. And sin comes out. But Jesus has another message for us today. He's committed to the project. He's committed to the project. He's committed to the project of taking your life in raising you brand new that you would not follow like this and what's put before you today. Lot's an example of what not to do. And we have a great example in Father Abraham who was set apart and trained his children to know the Lord, to love the Lord. But the good news here is that the Lord can pull us out of the greatest of messes. I mean, look at the mess. He can redeem your sons and your daughters. If you have children who've run, talk to them. He has the power to do it. He can go into a cave scene like this and rescue. And if God can do that, that the Son of God would come from this line, there is absolutely no mess that we can create in this life that He cannot deliver us from. but you should confess your sins and you should trust him and you should come to him with a broken and contrite heart. He'll identify with you and he'll give you a place at his table. Now we're beginning to understand the Christmas story. Let's pray. Oh Lord, our God, we praise you today and we thank you that you have identified and rescued and saved and delivered from messes like this and we're no better this is the problem of the human heart and we ask lord that you would intervene and that you today would strengthen us in grace to see clearly as we ought to see and marvel at your love and understand the depths to which you have come and gone to to pull us out of these caves that we all run to. Forgive us and strengthen us and now as we come to your table, give us faith to believe and to trust you. In Jesus' name we pray, amen.