He lost it. Thank you. Yeah. All right, good evening. Good to see you guys here this evening. If you've got your Bibles, turn with me to Genesis 19. And that's where we'll be spending our time tonight. We're going back to our study for the second week of what does the Bible say about homosexuality. And I know this isn't a... And what we're doing is we're going to open up the Bible. We're going to examine it and say, what does the Bible say about this? Again, we're not asking psychiatrists or psychologists. We're not asking the culture, not asking the academics, the educators, not asking the people in the universities. We're not asking our friends or our family what they say. We're opening up the Bible. We're saying, what does the Bible say about this issue? Because we should do that with every issue. We want to know what the Bible says. And I know this isn't a fun issue to talk about, but I know it's a necessary issue for us to talk about. There's not very many people that know, especially in our day, what the Bible says about this. So we need to know this. The Bible speaks openly. The Bible speaks very clearly about this. So I think it's a good chance for people who don't believe like we believe to understand what the Bible says. But I also think it's a good chance for those of us here who believe these things and take a stand on these things to be able to defend what we believe. And we can defend this very clearly, and I think very powerfully, but also very lovingly from the Bible. The Bible speaks to this issue. And tonight we go to the most famous place that speaks to homosexuality. If I ask you for one place in the entire Old Testament that speaks of homosexuality, everybody in here would say Genesis 19, Sodom and Gomorrah. And so that's what we're going to look at tonight, Genesis 19. I'm going to show you the most famous passage in the Bible on homosexuality. And we're going to see that God destroys this very, very sinful city. And I've titled the sermon tonight because I think God takes this city and makes it stand out in all history as his ultimate warning against homosexuality. So I'm not going to read this passage yet to you. It's a long passage. It's 29 verses. I don't want to do that to you. I could read a handful, but I don't want to just pick and choose a handful of verses to start out with. So what I want to do is I want to pray, and then we'll go ahead and open up, and we're going to look at God's ultimate warning. And this is, it stands out as God's ultimate warning. So let's pray together, and we'll study this passage. come to you as humbly as we can, asking for your help, asking for your wisdom, asking for your guidance, asking for your knowledge. We want to know what the Bible says about a very touchy subject. We want to know what the Bible teaches. So we turn to Genesis 19, God, and we ask that you would show us by your spirit, who is the great interpreter, the inspirer of scripture. We ask that by your spirit you would show us what this passage says, that we would not do it in our own wisdom and our own understanding, but by the spirit and the power of God. And help me, God, to teach this well. And we ask and pray these things in Jesus' name. Amen. Most cities have a reputation for something in some way. And I can probably, and I will, I'm going to name some cities, and you tell me what they are known for. You don't have to speak it out loud. Maybe if you want to throw some of that, I don't want you to get it wrong and embarrass yourself. So I've got all the right answers. I've got the cheat code up here. So I'm going to throw out a city, and I think you'll know in your head, in your mind, what these cities are known for. The first one, New York City. It is known as the city that never sleeps. I'll give you another one. Los Angeles is known as the city of angels. See, you guys don't want to get it wrong, but you know what it says. Chicago is known as the? The Bears. The Bears, okay. I wasn't going to say that, but we can be known as the Bears, or the Cubs, or the Bulls, or people call it the Windy City, however you want to go with it. Some people say different. Johnny says obviously different there. Las Vegas is known as? Sin City. Salt Lake City is known for... I was going to say Salt Lake, but if you want to say Mormons, you can say Mormons. So each one of these cities are known for something, having a reputation for something. And I think one of the few cities in the Bible that if I was to name it, you would say it has a reputation for this. Everybody knows that Sodom and Gomorrah has a bad reputation. Everybody has heard of that city, of the cities, Sodom and Gomorrah. They're famous, or you can even call them infamous cities, that are known for, and as you look in the Old Testament, they are known for, every time they're mentioned in the Old Testament, they are mentioned as synonymous with an extremely wicked place. They're known for sinfulness. I mean, this is all through the Old Testament. They are known over and over as a comparison of God done something, or man did something incredibly sinful in that place. That's all throughout the Old Testament. As you see the name Sodom and Gomorrah mentioned, it's always a wicked and sinful example. And then as you go to the New Testament, Jesus mentions it four times. Sodom or Sodom and Gomorrah, four different times. And he doesn't necessarily use it as an example of a place that did something incredibly sinful. He shows it as a place where God had an incredible judgment. That's the way he shows it. He makes the city stand out as a place where God did something incredible in this city. God did something that nobody has ever forgotten and will never forget what happened in this city. This city stands out in the Old Testament and in the New Testament as a place of sin, judgment, and wrath. Just as Chicago is Bear City or Windy City, Los Angeles is a city of angels, Las Vegas is Sin City. I mean, you can go through all New York City, the city that never sleeps. Sodom and Gomorrah stands out as a place of wickedness, sinfulness, judgment, and wrath. They are known for that and that alone. So we turn to this, and this is, again, a city that stands out as a reminder for all people in all times of God's fierce judgment against sin. And what we want to do here tonight, as we look at these cities, Sodom and Gomorrah, we want to look at them and say, as we hear this, it's a warning to us. As we see the judgment and we see the sin, it ought to make our ears perk up. It ought to make us sit on the edge of our seat and ask a couple of questions. And the questions ought to be, what was that sin and are we committing it? I mean, that's what we need to do. We're looking at these cities and God's judgment on these two cities. And these cities stand out as a warning of what God can do and what God will do. So we need to say, are we committing the same sin that they're committing? And I think the answer might be America's becoming known for what these cities are known for. That's dangerous. Because if we are committing the sin they're committing, then we may be in danger of the judgment that they faced. So we need to see these cities. We need to understand these cities. We need to hear this warning. We have a culture today that's not sounding out this warning. And we need to sound out this warning. And we need to hear this. So what I want to do here tonight is I want to show you God's ultimate warning. And I believe, and I believe I can prove it from the Bible, not from my own understanding or my own beliefs or what I've thought or my opinion. I believe that we can prove from the Bible that this is God's ultimate warning against homosexuality. So let's look at this. I've broken the passage down into three points, and I want to show you the first one, the wickedness of Sodom. The wickedness of Sodom. And what we're going to do here is ask this question. Before I even read it, I want you to be thinking about it. What was the sin in Sodom and Gomorrah? What was the sin in Sodom and Gomorrah? Because it's very clear that what they did here is wicked. Let's try to figure out what the sin was. So again, we can look at our own country, our own nation, and say, are we committing the same sin they were? We need this. So let's start with it as we look at the wickedness of Sodom. I want to start in verse 1. And we're going to work our way through all 29 verses. So I've got to get through this. But starting in verse 1, it says, and there came two angels to Sodom at evening. And Lot said in the gate of Sodom, Lot being Abram's nephew, and Lot seeing them rose up to meet them and he bowed himself with his face toward the ground. So these angels have shown up in Sodom and they've not showed up to investigate what's going on there. God knows exactly what's going on there. These angels have showed up to prosecute what's going on there. You say, how do they know what's going on? If you go back into chapter 18, it says in verse 20 that the Lord said, because the cry of Sodom and Gomorrah is great and because their sin is very grievous, God knows what's going on. He doesn't need to send angels to investigate to see what's going on. He sends these angels to prosecute and to punish a sin. You see, let me show you again verse 13 of the same chapter 19. It says, for we will destroy this place. Because the cry of them is waxing great before the face of the Lord, and the Lord hath sent us to destroy it." God knows what's going on, and he sent angels there to destroy it. So let's keep reading. And he said, Behold now, my lords, turn in. A lot talking to these angels. I pray you into your servant's house and tell you all night and wash your feet and you shall rise up early and go on your ways. And they said, nay, but we will abide in the street. We're going to stay on the street all night. And he pressed upon them greatly. And they turned in unto him and entered into his house. And he made them a great feast. Again, they were eating here. Eating was a big part of their lifestyle. And he baked unleavened bread for them and they ate. But before they laid down, the men of the city, even the men of Sodom, surrounded the house, both old and young, all the people from all the quarters. So these men, as Lot has met them, taken care of them, fed them, sent them to bed, time for all good angels to go to bed. You guys go on. I think Lot knew what was on its way. You guys go to bed, you'll stay here all night long, you'll get up in the morning when everybody's still asleep and there's not people out in the streets, and you'll get up and you'll be safe. It was his job to be hospitable, to open his home, and to take care of these men. So that crowd of men show up, men of all ages, men of all rank. It actually says there, old and young, all the people from every quarter. My understanding is this is every man in town. is surrounding the house of Lot and these angels. And in verse 5 you say, why are they surrounding them? And they called unto Lot and said unto him, Where are the men which came into thee this night? Bring them out unto us that we may know them. If you follow Johnny through the book of Genesis and Sunday school, you know that to know them meant that they wanted to have sex with him. Man with man. That's what they were asking for. And Lot begins to negotiate in verse six. And he's not very good at negotiating. And Lot went out under the door to them and he shut the door after him. I can see him kind of sneaking out the door and shutting it behind them so they can't get in. And he begins to negotiate. And he said, I pray you brethren, do not do so wickedly. Don't you do something that wicked. And I want you to know this, and I'm going to say this several times because there's people in the culture today that would say that the wickedness wasn't that they wanted to be man with man, but that man wanted to rape man. The first thing they asked for was to know them. After the negotiation didn't work, they wanted to rape them. The first thing they wanted to do was just to know them. That's not rape. And he called it wicked. Don't do so wickedly. He said, behold now, and this is probably one of the worst things, the most disturbing things you'll ever see in the Bible. He said, Behold now, I've got two daughters, which have not known a man. Let me, I pray you, bring them out unto you, and you do ye to them as is good in your eyes. Only unto these men do nothing, for therefore came they under the shadow of my roof. He said, I'll give you my daughters. You can do whatever you want to my daughters, but don't touch these men. I'm going to trade you two daughters for two men. Don't touch the men. And these people were so wicked that these men would rather have two strange men than two women. It's terrible with Lot. So the question is, and let's finish it out, but the men put forth their hand and pulled Lot into the house, verse 9, and they said, stand back. And they said again, this one fellow came into sojourn and he will need to be adjudged. Now we will deal worse with thee than with them. So that's what they're saying. We're going to deal with Lot the same way we're going to deal with these two men. Get out of our way. No more playing nice. We'll get them. We'll make them do it. And they pressed sore upon the men, even Lot. and came near just breaking the door down. I can picture this in my head. I can see it. But the angels put forth their hand and pulled Lot into the house to them, and they shut the door. And they smoked the men that were at the door of the house with blindness, both small and great, since they wearied themselves to find the door. They were confused. They were blind. They were walking around not knowing where they were going and couldn't get in. They were struck with blindness. So the question now is, and I'll stop there, he called it wickedness in verse 7. What was this wickedness? And it may take me a few minutes to get through this passage, but I want you to bear with me. What was the wickedness that they were trying to do? And I ask you that tonight, and I think upon simple reading without knowing even the cultural context or without even knowing the language. I mean, you say, I don't know Hebrew. I can't really figure out what they want to do here. People call us so simple, right? We're just so backwards, and we don't know anything. There's something more going on here. But in simple reading, without knowing the Hebrew or the context or any of the background, What is the sin here? I think it's easy. We would say the sin was homosexuality. That's a simple reading. I think it would take, and I want to be as nice as I can, it would take a real dum-dum, that's the nice way of saying it, to figure anything else out from this. And there's a lot of dum-dums out there. Who's trying to figure something else out? A lot of dum-dums. And they call those dum-dums scholars. who think they're wise, but have made themselves to be fools. And what they say is, these scholars, these academia, what they say is, this wasn't nothing bad. This was a hospitality issue. They turn to Ezekiel 16, and I really don't want to take you there, but I will. Because I want to prove my point. Because these are what the scholars say. They said this is a complex book and who can understand it? Look at what Ezekiel 16 said. Watch this. Verse 48 says, 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. Behold, this was the sin of thy sister Sodom. Pride. Fullness of bread. Abundance of idleness was in her and in her daughters. Neither did she strengthen the hand of the poor and of the needy. You see that? They take that verse and they say, obviously it's a sin of inhospitable people. They wouldn't open the door. They wasn't very nice. They wasn't kind. It wasn't homosexuality. It had to be inhospitality. But just like these scholars, they don't know how to read. Look at verse 47. Said yet hast thou not walked after their ways, nor done after their abominations. Verse 49, behold, verse 50, and they were haughty. These are the verses before and after. And they were haughty and committed abomination before me. Therefore I took them away as I saw good. And verse 51, abominations. Verse 51, abominations. It just keeps going down through there. They committed abominations. And you say, what's that abomination? You don't have to turn there. Leviticus 18, Leviticus 20 says that the abomination before God is when a man wants to lay with a man. Same word, I'm using the Hebrew language, abomination. Something that God is disgusted by. Something that God despises. Something that makes God sick to see it and to hear it. It's an abomination. That was the sin. And, get this, anybody who says it's anything other than homosexuality is just trying to convince themselves it doesn't mean what it actually says so they don't have to obey it. It's as simple a reading as it can get. And anytime you hear somebody say, the Bible says this, but it really means this, get ready for some kind of nonsense. Bunch of dum-dums. So what is the sin? I'll say the sin of Sodom was many. The sins of Sodom were many, but the sin of Sodom was homosexuality. Clue number one, I'm just going to go through the clues here. And we'll move on. I have to make this point. Clue number one, they wanted to know him. Man wanted to know man. That's homosexuality. Clue number one. Clue number two, Locke called it wickedness. Number two. Clue number three, Lot offered his daughters, do to my daughters what you wanted to do to these men. It's homosexuality. Ezekiel 16 again calls it an abomination, what happened there. That's clue number four. Something extremely wicked, extremely heinous, unlike any other sin in the world is an abomination. You want another clue? I've given you four. Let me give you a fifth one. Jude chapter 7. This is where I slam dunk on the dum-dums. Jude, Revelation, if you don't know where that's at. The scholars might not know. They don't know where Jude is. They've never read this. It says, even as Sodom and Gomorrah, and the cities about them in like manner, giving themselves over to fornication and going after strange flesh, which is homosexuality, are set forth as an example of suffering the vengeance of eternal fire. I mean, that's a slam dunk. I've given you now five clues that the sin of Sodom and Gomorrah was homosexuality. That's as clear as it gets. The Bible clearly teaches that the sin of Genesis chapter 19, Sodom and Gomorrah, was homosexuality. It was rampant then. It was culturally accepted then. It was culturally applauded then. It appears to be that everybody in Sodom and Gomorrah accepted it but one man named Lot. It says all the men. That may even include his own sons-in-law. It was a thriving homosexual culture. That was the sin of Sodom. And it's become the sin of our nation. We have gay pride flags flying. We have gay pride parades. We have gay pride months. I don't know what month it is, but there's a gay pride month. When a society openly flaunts sin the way we openly flaunt sin, not even trying to conceal it, we are totally corrupt and at the bottom of the barrel. We are no different than Sodom and Gomorrah. We have a thriving homosexual culture in America today. And we had a president just two presidents ago who lit up the entire White House in a rainbow flag. So we've seen the sin, and we're committing the sin as a nation. So now let me give you point number two. I hope I've made my point. We'll look at Leviticus next week. I don't want to get too far into that. We've seen the sin. We've seen the wickedness. Now let me show you the warning. Because there's a warning here in the middle part of this passage where God shows some mercy. I love that God shows mercy here. Look what he says in verse 12. And the men said unto Lot, here's what we're going to do. Here's what's going to happen. The man said unto Lot, Hast thou here any besides? And what he's saying there is, do you have any family? Do you have any family caught in this? And I was talking to a guy earlier last week, later last week, who said, I bet you everybody in your church, he doesn't go here, knows somebody who knows somebody or has somebody in their little circle who is caught up in this. And I said, probably. We all know somebody. So he says, you got family here? That's what he says in verse 12. Son-in-law, and our sons, and our daughters, and whatsoever that hast in the city, then what you need to do is get them out of here. That's what he says. Get them out of this place. For we will destroy this place. Because the cry of them is waxing great before the face of the Lord. And the Lord has sent us to destroy it. So get all your relatives and get them out of here. Another exodus. You don't belong here. Judgment's coming here. Grab everybody that you can and get them out. And Lot tries, and I see us in verse 14, that we go out and we speak to them and we do our best to see them saved. That's mercy that God allows us to go and say, you need to get out. The judgment is coming. Lot doesn't go out and say, I know that you can live however you want to live and it's okay. Law doesn't go out and say, I know it's hateful for me to say. I know it might harm you or hurt your feelings for me to say that your lifestyle is wrong. I know it might get me ostracized. I know that it might get me kicked off of social media. I know it's not acceptable. So I'm just going to zip my lips, go my way and let judgment fall on people that I care about. That's not what he did. And that's not what we are supposed to do. He goes out and watch what he does. And I believe he does it with tears in his eyes. And when we go out and we try to pull people, like Jude said, out of the fire of judgment, we're doing it not with a bashing and a beating and a I told you so and you awful thing. We do it with tears in our eyes. Judgment's going to fall on you. That's how we do it. So he goes and watch what he does. Lot went out. He spoke to his sons-in-laws. And I believe his sons-in-laws might have been in that crowd that came to his house that night. They might have been the ones who heard about it. My father-in-law's got a couple of dudes there. Let's go. So he goes. And look what he does. His sons-in-laws, which married his daughters, and he said, up, get out of here. God's going to destroy this city. But he seemed as one that mocked unto his sons-in-laws. It's like they're laughing at him. It's like they're making fun of him. It's like they're calling him a caveman. It's like they're saying, judgment? Fire and brimstone? That's not very scholarly of you. Right? But he seemed as one that mocked unto his sons-in-laws. And when the morning rose, the angels hastened Lot, saying, get up, take your wife and your two daughters, which are here, lest thou be consumed in the iniquity of the city, unless you go down with it. I'm getting somewhere with that. And while he lingered, this is the mercy of God, because we all deserve the fate of Sodom. But God pulls Lot. his wife and his two daughters out of the fires. That's mercy. He didn't want to go. I want to say something here just a second, but watching verse 16, he lingered, he hung around. The men got their hands on him, the hand on his wife and upon his two daughters and the Lord being, did you see that? The Lord being merciful unto him. And they pulled him out and set him outside the city. They had to drag him, kicking and screaming. Lot starts negotiating again. He said, I don't want to go far. I want to go where I can still see Sodom and Gomorrah. And you know what the problem there is? I don't want to read all of it. But he says, oh not so, my lord, in verse 18. Behold, thou servant has found grace, and now has magnified mercy, verse 19. Thou showed it in saving my life. I cannot escape to the mountain, lest some evil take me and I die. Behold now, this city is near to flee unto. Let me go there. Let me be close. Let me go to this little one. Oh, let me escape thither. Is that not a little one? Oh, my soul shall live here. He's negotiating with the angels. Don't make me go too far away. I want to stay close to Sodom and Gomorrah. You know what the problem here is? Lot was out of Sodom, but Sodom wasn't out of Lot. So here's the danger for us. The angels do it, they let him go, and he ends up in Zoar. You know what the danger for us is in this? That we end up being so influenced by the culture just like Lot was. Lot lived in it. Hang with me on this, guys. This is important. Lot lived in it. Lot had family involved in it. Lot offered his daughters. I mean, that's proof that he's just right in along with their sinful ways. Lot didn't want to leave. We'll see in a minute, Lot's wife didn't want to leave. Lot didn't know which side he wanted to be on. Lot was surrounded by it, influenced by it, and Lot had even become comfortable with it. To those angels that showed up, Lot was just going right along with everybody else. And I think the only reason Lot got out was because Abraham prayed for him in Genesis chapter 18. We'll see at the end of this that God remembered Abraham's prayer. That's how he got pulled out. He had somebody praying for him. So Lot's going to ride along with this. He had the stench of this sinful city all over him. He was influenced by it. And I believe that we have been, all to some degree or another, been influenced by the stench of the sin in our culture. Every one of us. You say, no, no, no, no, not me, Josh. I thought about it this week, I said every single one of us has. 50 years ago, you bring somebody from, and 50 years ago, I would think that was 1950, but now it's not 1950 anymore, it's 1970. Let's go back 70 years. I'm getting old. Let's go back to the 1950s. And bring somebody from that era into this era, and if they walked the streets that we walk today, and watched the TV shows that we watch today, you know how they would react? It would be, what is this? What has happened here? And we walk the streets, and we go see Target, and their bathrooms set up the way they are, and we see it all over our TVs. Everywhere we turn. And we don't do any more. Imagine 10 years from now that when my kids see this walking down the street and my kids see it on TV, now we say, that's bad. 70 years ago it was, oh no, what's that? Now it's, 10 years from now, 20 years from now, it'll be normal stuff. We're all influenced by this. There's no shock to it anymore. It's open, accepted, it's celebrated, it's normal everyday life now. There's a book written in 1989, I don't have time to get into it, I'll go over it at some point. This two-part series has become a four-part series and I might even take it to an eight-part series. There's a book written in 1989 about how to make homosexuality acceptable in the culture. And they have done every single step of that book. It started with, make us look pitiful as victims of the AIDS virus. Then step two was, let's compare it to race and to slavery. It's just going down the line of what they meant to do. So we have a culture that's being swept away by it. Our culture readily accepts what God calls an abomination. Our culture is being swept away by the practice of it, the acceptance of it, and they are silencing everybody who says anything against it. You want to know how influenced we are? It's now unacceptable or it's risky for me to preach this sermon tonight. 70 years ago, this would not be a risky sermon. I knew exactly what I was getting myself into when I stood up in this pulpit tonight. I looked at Steph sitting right back there as I walked up. She said, what's wrong? I said, I'm shaking in my boots. I know what the cost is to this. That's the influence of this culture on all of us. And we must not be influenced. We must not let our kids be influenced. My kids will be biblically informed on this issue, but my kids will be sheltered from it every bit I can keep them from it. And we better not listen to the lie that it's wrong for us to shelter our kids. I am commanded to shelter my kids from sin like this right here. They will not watch sin like this. They will not hear sin like this. They will not see sin like this. And I'll get made fun of and say, you're just sheltering your kids. They'll never be ready for the world. No, I'm sheltering my kids because I don't want them to be like the world. Because there's a very great danger of being influenced, so influenced by a culture, that you end up being burnt up in that culture. Just like Lot's wife's getting ready to. So that's the warning. Let me show you the wrath, and I'll close. I've showed you the wickedness of Sodom, and I think I've made it very clear that it was homosexuality. I've showed you the warning, the judgment's coming, and that's what we say, the judgment's on its way. And then now the wrath of Sodom. Here's the judgment. It shows up starting in verse 24. Then the Lord. Did exactly what he sent the angels to do. The Lord reigned upon Sodom and upon Gomorrah. Brimstone and fire from the Lord out of heaven, unlike any city has ever been destroyed in the history of the world. Cities have been destroyed, not like this one. Yeah. Fire and brimstone. wiped out these two cities, and I want to say, watch what it did. And he overthrew those cities. And who's the he? You've got to go back to the antecedent there. And the antecedent is the Lord reigned upon the Sodom and Gomorrah, and the Lord reigned out of heaven. So the he is, he overthrew those cities, and all the plain, and all the inhabitants of the cities, and they with that which grew upon the ground. God did that. Our culture today would say God is hateful. God is intolerant. God is judgmental. But this is what God does. He warns them. It's on its way. They don't listen and judgment falls upon two cities. Upon every inhabitant in that city. Upon women. Upon men. Upon children. Upon the ground that they walked on. Judgment rained down. That's what happened. That's why this city stands out in all time. The sin of that city had totally consumed that city and God destroyed it. Now watch what happens and I'm getting and we're getting doing good on time. God warned, God offered mercy, but they wouldn't listen. Get this, they didn't have a Bible like we have a Bible. How much more are we guilty than they? Now we look at this story and you know what we say? That's not homosexuality. Judgment's not coming. Let them do whatever they want to do. That's the most unloving thing we can do when judgment's on its way. Watch what happens with Lot's wife. Verse 26, but his wife looked back from behind him. And she became a pillar of salt. She tried to be And there's a lot of Christians trying to do this right now, trying to be on both ends. And you can't do it. It don't work. You'll end up being consumed by the judgment that falls upon the culture. Where do you stand on this? It's exactly why I'm preaching this series. I've got several reasons. I want to inform you. I want to warn them. And I want to let everybody in the world know exactly where I stand on this issue. I don't want to be Lot's wife. Jesus even warned about that, about Lot's wife. I don't want to be like Lot's wife where I'm sitting over here and there's people saying, I wonder what Josh thinks about this issue. Like it or leave it, I know where Josh stands on this issue. Here we are. Where do you stand on the issue? Are you willing to stand up on this issue? The Bible's clear. We need to be clear. I think there's lines being drawn right now. And this is the front line of the battle. And I understand that this puts me at the very front line of the very front line of the battle. I understand that. And you guys going to a church like this, this puts us on the front line of the front line of the battle. That's what somebody told me this week, that it might have been, somebody might have purposely turned the lights out on us the other day. I said, you know what, maybe. At least it wasn't a dead cat. Now watch what happens, and I'll close. Verse 27, and Abraham got up early in the morning to the place where he stood before the Lord. And he looked toward Sodom and Gomorrah and toward all the land of the plain and beheld, and lo, the smoke of the country went up as the smoke of a furnace. I believe we are right now looking over America and starting to see the fires of judgment, smoke from the fires of judgment in our nation. Verse 29, it came to pass when God destroyed the cities of the plain, that God remembered what Abraham asked for. And he sent Lot out of the midst of the overthrow, when he overthrew the cities in which Lot dwelt. It goes all the way back to chapter 18, when Abraham was talking to God, if there's 10 righteous, will you not destroy the city? And there was that one, and he's called in the New Testament, Righteous Lot. I don't think it's because he was righteous. I think it's because God made him righteous. And Abraham prayed for him, and God saved him, and God saved his two daughters, and judgment came. And this smoke stands as a warning to Israel and to every generation. Watch this. This was a warning to Israel. I just want to read this. I didn't plan on it, but I've read chapter 18 this week. Look at verse 17. Let's read verse 16. And the men rose up from thence, and looked toward Sodom. And Abraham went with them to bring them on the way. And the Lord said, Shall I hide Abraham from that thing which I do? saying that Abraham shall surely become a great and mighty nation and all the nations of the earth shall be blessed from him. For I know him that he will command his children and his household after him, and they shall keep the way of the Lord to do justice and judgment that the Lord may bring upon Abraham that which you have spoken of him. He said, I know that Abraham will warn everybody in the next generation not to be like this. So here's what God thinks about that sin. You said, well Josh, that's just Old Testament. I don't think it is. I think you can turn to Romans chapter one and the New Testament does not pull back on this. I think you can turn to first Corinthians six, nine and 10 and the New Testament does not pull back on this. I think you can turn to first Timothy one, eight and 11 and the New Testament does not pull back on this. I think you can turn to Revelation 21, eight and the New Testament does not pull back on this. If not, it presses the gas even a little bit harder. You say, Josh, what do we do with something like this? Let me give you three things to take home with you, and we'll close. Number one is we do not hate homosexuals. We don't bash them. We don't call them names. We are not mean to them. Our job is not to make them feel any more sinful than what they already are. We don't hate them. Number two, we hold fast to the truth. We must not call wicked good. We must not be more tolerant of sin than God is. This is again the front line of the battle, and it's our job to hold the line. Our turn in this generation to hold the line of what the Word of God says on this issue. But we do warn that's number three. Like a lot, do you have any family in Sodom? Any friends in Sodom? Any loved ones in Sodom? Not even saying that they are homosexuals, but maybe, and it's becoming more and more, and this is something I can't handle much of. I understand that a lost person can go that way and believe these things, and that's what a sinner does. But you've got Christians that are now falling into this same thing. Maybe not the act, but they're accepting it. They're saying it's OK. They're capitulating on what the Bible says. So you've got family who's either in the act or accepting it, we need to warn. It's our job. Go. Go and warn, he says. Get up. Get out of this place. Get out of this. There's judgment coming. And I think that is, again, that's the most loving thing that we can do. Not be accepting of it, but preach to them that judgment's on the way. And the only way out, there's mercy that is available for you in your sin if you'll turn to Jesus. And watch this. And I'll close. This isn't in my notes, but I wanted this. This is something I wanted to get across. There are a few events like Sodom and Gomorrah in the entire history of the world where judgment rained down on the earth. And they all stand out. First one, and you guys can name these, and I may miss some, but these stand out to me. Noah and the flood. God rained down judgment in water. Sodom and Gomorrah, God rained down judgment in fire and brimstone. And then you turn to the New Testament and God rained down judgment upon his own son upon a cross. And that stands out in history as the place where my sins were taken care of. And God poured down judgment on his own son on my behalf. That's the greatest event in the history of the world. You say, well, Josh, what's the fourth one? That if you don't get saved by the grace and the blood of Jesus at that event, there's an even greater event of judgment coming in the future. That'll be so much worse than any of these you've ever seen. And that's what we warn people of. Don't fall prey to that judgment when you can look back to this judgment at the cross and be saved of all your sins, no matter what they are. There's mercy available at the cross. The judgments coming. It's on its way. So that's what the Bible says in Genesis 19. About homosexuality. Let's pray father. I tried to be clear. I tried to be loving, kind, gracious. Truthful. And I pray that came across that way. I want to be true to what your word says, but I want to do with tears in my eyes and open arms as anyone who comes can be saved. So God, please, my prayer is that you would use this sermon or a series of sermons on this issue to pull people from the fires of this sin. Or to change people's minds on this sin. Or to give us in the church more confidence in what your word says and what we believe. Please, God, teach us. Please, God, use us. There are churches that are not speaking up on this issue. Help us to be that church that stands. For what is right and what is true. And let it never be said of us, God, that we are mean. Cold hearted. Bashing. but that we offer mercy to those in their sin. And we ask and we pray these things in Jesus name.