Hello and welcome to our broadcast. We're in the book of Genesis. Have your Bible ready if you can. Well, we're looking in Genesis chapter 12. It says, Now the Lord had said unto Abraham, Get thee out of thy country, and from thy kindred, and from thy father's house into a land, that I will show thee, and I will make of thee a great nation, and I will bless thee, and make thy name great, and thou shalt be a blessing. And I will bless them that bless thee, and curse him that curses thee, and in thee shall all the families of the earth be blessed." And so we see in this portion of scripture God is starting something brand new and that has of course to do with the nation of Israel and this is where the nation of Israel begins. Abraham is mentioned more than 300 times in the Bible. He is actually the father of the nation of Israel. Noah's sons Shem has, at this time, lived for 150 years after Abraham was born, so he's on the scene. Shem lived along with Methuselah for 98 years, and Methuselah lived along with Adam for 243 years. And so people say, well, how was the instructions and commands of God handed down along this period of time? That's exactly how they were handed down. God always had some remnant. He always had some people, like Abraham, like Shem, like Methuselah, who were ready to do things the way that God wanted to do them. He always had a representative here like that. It's usually a small remnant, and it's a small remnant today that want to do things the way God wants them to be done. Well, we find out that God says here in Genesis chapter 12 that Abraham was supposed to leave and he was supposed to go to Canaan. Now, we find he didn't completely obey things. You notice in verse 1 it says, The Lord had said unto Abraham, Get thee out of thy country from thy kindred. He didn't go completely the way God said to do. He took his father, who we saw in our last broadcast was an idolater, And he took Lot, his nephew, who was not one who lived for the Lord at all either. He ends up in Sodom and Gomorrah. Well, we saw in our last broadcast that Abraham allowed his father to lead the journey as far as Horan, and he took his nephew Lot with him, which he had been told not to do that, but he wasn't completely obedient, but at least he was on his way. Well, God separated Abraham from his former life and the people who were not part of God's remnant. And that was, of course, in Ur, the Chaldees. Ur was a very prosperous city, very advanced in that age. It was also a city given over to idolatry. And as we said in our previous broadcast, even Abraham's father worship these gods as we read in Joshua chapter 24 and verse number 2. Now, notice the I wills here. God promises him in Genesis 12, 1 through 3. He said, I will show thee what you need to do. I will make of thee a great nation. I will bless thee and make thy name great. I will bless them that bless thee. And so he's got the promise of God on his life. Well, as we go down through this chapter, we find from verses 10 through 20 that he gets out of the will of God. He starts to make some choices that are not good choices, and so he is, of course, the devil's been influencing all over since the Garden of Eden, and an influence is to get us to change our behavior and to do something contrary to what God wants to do. Well, what did he do? We read here in verse number 10 that there was a famine in the land, and Abram went down into Egypt to sojourn there, for the famine was grievous in the land. He went down. Whenever the Bible talks about going to Egypt, which is a picture of the world, it always refers to going down. You'll notice when he comes back out in chapter 13, verse number 1, it says Abraham went up out of Egypt, he and his wife. and all that he had and a lot with him into the south. And so here we find there is a famine. Abraham takes things into his own hands here instead of relying on the Lord. And he goes down into Egypt to sojourn there for the famine was grievous in the land. And it came to pass, when he was come near to enter into Egypt, that he said unto Sarai his wife, Behold now, I know that thou art a fair woman to look upon. Well, she would like to hear that part. That was nice. But he goes on to say, Therefore, it shall come to pass, when the Egyptians shall see thee, that they shall say that this is his wife, and they will kill me. But they will save thee alive. Say, I pray thee, that thou art my sister, that it may be well with me for thy sake, and my soul shall live because of thee." What is the matter with this man's head? Does he think for one minute that this beautiful wife of his is going to be taken in by Pharaoh to be his cook? He's going to have more plans than that. And here it is, this man of God, he's saying, well, you know, you just go sacrifice your life. At least I can live. How does he get off track like this? Well, maybe we can figure it out. Let's keep reading. It came to pass that when Abram was come into Egypt, the Egyptians beheld the woman, that she was very fair. And the princes also of Pharaoh saw her and commended her before Pharaoh. And the woman was taken into Pharaoh's house. Oh, and he had treated Abraham well for her sake. Well, keep thinking now. He thinks it's his sister. And he gave him sheep, and oxen, and asses, and menservants, and maidservants, and she-asses, and camels. Well, thank you very much, Abraham. I give you all this stuff. Thanks for your sister. Well, not a sister. Well, the Bible says in verse 17, the Lord plagued Pharaoh and his house with great plagues because of Sarai, Abraham's wife. And Pharaoh called Abram and said, What is this that thou hast done unto me? Why didst thou not tell me that she was thy wife? Why sayest thou she is my sister, so I might have taken her to me to wife? Now therefore, behold thy wife, take her, and go thy way. And Pharaoh commanded his men concerning him, and they sent him away, and his wife, and all that he had." Bad choice to go down there to Egypt. Bad choice to lie about who your wife was. Make some bad choices. Now, we're all free to make choices. We can choose to do anything we want to do. I can go out and get in my car and drive through town here. I can go 100 miles an hour. I can go through every stop light and every stop street. I can just do whatever I want. I can run up on the sidewalk and knock over some mailboxes if I want. I'm free. I can do that. But I'm not free to choose the consequences. We need to make wise choices in life. Well, he made a bad one here, and one of the things that happened of it as a result was he was out of fellowship with God. Number two, he became a liar. Number three, he lost his testimony with the unsaved. Not only that, he influenced his nephew Lot, who developed a taste for Egypt, as we will see. And that was one of the reasons why Lot got way off track in the way that he did. He had developed, he said, oh, that land over there, it's just like Egypt. And he ended up in Sodom and Gomorrah. Not only that, Abraham's son Isaac would later follow his father's example and do exactly the same thing. And the worst part of it all was while they were down there in Egypt, it says that Pharaoh gave Abraham all this stuff that he had there because he wanted to give something for Sarah. So what did he get? Well, one of the things was maidservants. Guess who was in that group? Hagar. And so they brought Hagar back. And you remember the story where finally after they, you know, Sarah was 99 years old, it didn't look like they were going to have this promised son. Well, maybe you should have a son by Hagar, my handmaid, which she had picked up in Egypt. And so Abraham did, and now we have two children. We have the promised son later on, and we have the son by Agar, and they're both the seed of Abraham. And God had said, I'm going to bless your seed, and so he did. And ever since then, because of this situation, we have the whole problem in the Middle East where those two boys have been fighting ever since of who really owns that property over there and who it belongs to. All happened because of a decision that Abraham made to go down into Egypt? Well, we read in chapter 13 about God's mercy. We're thankful that we have a merciful God, and he did not cast Abraham away. He was lovingly chastened for the things that he did and returned to fellowship. But he had to repent, he had to retrace his steps, and he had to return to the place of fellowship where he had left it. Now, we read in chapter 13, verse number 1, Abraham went up out of Egypt, he and his wife and all that he had, and lot with him into the south. And Abraham was very rich in cattle and in silver and in gold, and he went on his journey from the south even to Bethel. Oh yes, back to Bethel. That is where he was in fellowship with God. He had to return, he had to retrace his steps, he had to repent, and then he was in fellowship with God once again. That's all we need to do. The Bible says if we confess our sins, He is faithful and just to forgive us our sins and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness. And so, we got Abraham back on track. In verse number four, he said he went unto the place of the altar which he had made there at the first, and there Abraham called on the name of the Lord. Well, now we have these two words in verse number five, and Lot. Yeah, he brought Lot with him. He wasn't supposed to bring any family with him, but he did. And Lot also, which went with Abraham, had flocks and herds and tents, and the land was not able to bear them that they might dwell together, for their substance was great, so they could not dwell together. And there was a strife between the herdmen of Abram's cattle and the herdmen of Lot's cattle, and the Canaanite and the Parasite dwelt then in the land. Yeah, they're watching these people with their little family feud. That's not good. And Abraham said unto Lot, Let there be no strife. I pray thee between me and thee, and between my herdmen and thy herdmen, For we be brethren. Is not the whole land before thee? Separate thyself, I pray thee, from me. If thou wilt take the left hand, then I will go to the right. Or if thou depart to the right hand, then I will go to the left." He says to this young nephew of his, you go ahead and just choose whichever you want. You can have first choice and I'll go the other direction. Well, look what happened. Verse 10, Lot lifted up his eyes and beheld all the plain of Jordan, that it was well watered everywhere before the Lord destroyed Sodom and Gomorrah, even as the garden of the Lord, like the land of Egypt. Yes, that's where he picked up his desire for the things of Egypt when Abraham took them down into Egypt. What a mistake! Well, then Lot chose them all the plain of Jordan, and Lot journeyed east, and they separated themselves, the one from the other. Abraham dwelt in the land of Canaan, and Lot dwelt in the cities of the plain, and pitched his tent towards Sodom. Well, you can see the downhill stretch of Lot is not quick. He takes his time. Slowly, the devil influences him one thing after another. In verse number 10, we read, he looked toward Sodom. In verse number 11, he journeyed toward Sodom. Verse 12, he pitched his tent toward Sodom. Yeah, just looking that way. Well, by the time we get to chapter 14, verse number 12, he dwelt in Sodom. In chapter 19 and verse 1 he sat in the gate of Sodom, that is in the government, and also we find him referring to the Sodomites as brethren. And it continues to get worse before the story is over. We'll find him in a cave having an immoral relationship with his own daughters. Who would ever guess? Now, this fellow was a believer in 2 Peter chapter 2 verse number 6. God speaks about turning the cities of Sodom and Gomorrah into ashes. and condemned them with an overthrow, making them an example of those that after should live ungodly, and delivered just lot vexed with the filthy conversation of the wicked. That word, just, has been translated righteous 41 times. Lot was a believer. He wasn't much of a believer. The Bible says God will have vessels to honor and vessels to dishonor. Lot's not totally worthless. He can always serve as a bad example, and that's all he was. Here's a question. What are you? Well, Lot ended up in this mess because he followed the lust of the eyes. He said, wow, it looks pretty good over there. I think I'm going to go with that. And then we find by the time we get to chapter 13, he's living in peaceful coexistence with these wicked people. He never sought any direction from God. There's no indication that he prayed about anything. Well, there you have it. Plain and simple. You get away from God. That's what happens when you start looking in the wrong direction. Well, we'll be back again on the next broadcast tomorrow. Be sure and tune in. We'll try to make it plain and we will try to make it simple.