WORSE THAN SODOM

TEXT: EZEKIEL 16:44-52.
🔑KEY VERSE “As I live, saith the Lord GOD, Sodom thy sister hath not done, she nor her daughters, as thou hast done, thou and thy daughters” (EZEKIEL 16:48).

It was reported recently on BBC that a Prime Minister in a European country officially married his male partner a few months after his country’s parliament lifted the gay marriage ban. He became the second EU leader to marry a same-sex partner while in office.

From the passage, Prophet Ezekiel denounced Judah as a nation whose abominations were worse than those of Sodom because they had surpassed other nations and their abominable practices. He decried the apparent lack of feelings or guilt among the inhabitants of Judah and Israel. Israel and her sister, Judah, were involved in the worship of other gods. They worshipped the Canaanite Baal whose worship was a rampage of gluttony, drunkenness and ritual prostitution. They burnt their children and sacrificed to strange gods and imbibed all the immoral lifestyles of other nations to provoke God to anger.

Today, the present world has overtaken Sodom and Gomorrah in immorality and wickedness.

Man has degraded himself to the point of getting married to animals. The LGBT (lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender) community is ever increasing with new abominable sexual orientations added every day. The world classifies all these under the caption of “human rights” and the need to accept others’ diversity. This is exactly what happened in Judah at this time. Ezekiel was a conservative prophet who condemns everything done in the nation.

Like Ezekiel, we must condemn the immorality of the current age and not allow ourselves to be polluted and caught in its web. This is the only way we can escape being punished with them on the judgement day.

✍THOUGHT FOR THE DAY Come out from present-day Sodom.

BIBLE IN A YEAR COLOSSIANS 1-4.

MEDITATION

Another look at Sodom

1. Sodom, and other adjoining cities like Gomorrah (daughters), in the text is figuratively described as the sister nation of the backslidden Judah v46.
2. The sins of Sodom were many except that Sodomy was the strangest and the newly “invented” sin at that time. Sins of Sodom:
   a. Sodomy or homosexuality, Genesis 19:4,5.
   b. Attempted rape v9.
   c. Pride and arrogance v49.
   d. “Fullness of bread” or prosperity with unwillingness to share with the poor or needy v49. Prosperity might have been a cause of their pride and arrogance just like prospered nations today think and act as if they don’t need God.
   e. Idleness. This includes a life of pleasure and leisure. Their prosperity might have contributed v49. Both poverty and prosperity have their peculiar temptations if not subjected to the word of God.
   f. Haughtiness or superiority complex. Their prosperity might be the cause. Nowadays poor men also can be guilty of superiority complex. It is a problem of human nature.
   g. Abominations v51.
   h. Fornication Jude 7.
   i. “Going after strange flesh” or unnatural relationships Jude 7. Perhaps bestiality was part of their unnatural sins apart from Sodomy.
   Check up if you are totally freed from all those sins.
3. Judah, in spite of the devastating judgements on Sodom and Samaria, which automatically sent them from fire on earth to the fire of hell, committed more sins than Sodom vv47,51.
   Q If God destroyed Sodom with fire and brimstone, why will God not judge Judah who did worse? v52.
   Q If our nations today have invented new sins and multiplied ancient sins than that of Sodom, the implication is that the nations are romancing with imminent devastation greater than what atomic or nuclear bombs can cause. No nation is safe again. A sinner can just drop dead and open his/her eyes eternal hell fire at any moment. Pockets of destructions in the world are some of the consequences of man’s evil nature and practices.
   Needed Personal repentance from sin and cleansing of the heart by the blood of Jesus.
   Ask for a deep heart cleansing by the blood of Jesus and continuous victory over the sins of Sodom
   Pray for mercy on your nation and ask for the Spirit of repentance on your nation and community
   Ask for conviction of sin and revival of righteousness in our Churches
   Ask God to use you as an agent of saving others more than ever before

HYMN Wash me O Lamb of God