Many believers are content to just barely scrape into heaven by the skin of their teeth. Your salvation is NOT earned by personal good works, but has already been earned FOR YOU by Christ’s own work of sacrificing Himself on Calvary. But so many of My children have little or no interest in serving Me out of gratitude for all I have done for them. They only want Me to go on serving them. So they linger at My table, grabbing all the sweets and neglecting the solid meat of My Word which would help them grow into full-fledged spiritual adults.
Consider Lot. He is spoken of in Scripture as a righteous man (2 Pet.2:7). Lot was so righteous that the perverted culture of his chosen habitation actually got on his nerves. But not enough to induce him to flee wicked Sodom and make a new start elsewhere.
Oblivious to the spiritual dangers of life in Sodom, Lot continued sojourning in that filthy city, even making himself a person of great reputation among the inhabitants. He raised his family there, allowing his children to mix and mingle with the sordid souls who wrongfully influenced them. His wife loved the city and Lot grew to love it as well.
Only when there was actual PHYSICAL danger to himself did Lot begin to wonder if he’d chosen the wrong place to live. I sent angels to warn Lot and his family to get out of the city because I was about to destroy it with fire and brimstone. Even as Lot entertained the angels, homosexuals pounded on his door and demanded to have sex with these divine beings. Lot did not want to violate the ancient laws of hospitality by exposing his guests to danger. So he offered to toss out his own virgin daughters for the pleasure of the mob. But they didn’t want these girls. They wanted the good-looking angels. They tried to tear the door down, but my angels smote them with blindness so they’d go away.
Despite all this evidence of the corruption of Sodom, Lot still had to be dragged out of the city by the mighty angels. The angels pulled his wife away from the city too, but they couldn’t stop her from WILLFULLY disobeying the angels and turning her head to look back at the smoking city. She lost her life and her soul that very day.
Later Lot let his daughters make him drunk and have sex with him, though he was unaware this was happening to him. If only Lot’s sense of basic decency hadn’t been tarnished by life in wicked Sodom! Any man who offers to throw out his own children to a sex-crazed mob has already shown signs of spiritual deterioration. Lot was ashamed when he found out what happened. But not nearly so stunned as he would have been if he hadn’t been brainwashed by Sodom. Sin makes you increasingly insensitive to the sweet drawings of My Spirit. It makes you deaf to My Voice. It hardens you against any conviction of personal sin and blinds you to your need to repent.
Too late for regrets. Sin always begets further trouble and heartache. Lot’s girls gave birth to Moab and Ben-ammi, the ancestors of the Moabites and the Ammonites, two peoples which proved later on to be a thorn in Israel’s side. But I showed mercy even in judgment. Ruth the Moabitess was a good woman who gave birth to one of Christ’s ancestors.
Lot was a self-seeking individual who always looked out for number one. When Abraham offered him first choice of pasture land, Lot selfishly chose all the well-watered plain of Jordan (Gen.13:10), leaving Abraham, the older man, to take what was left. But I blessed Abraham mightily for his graciousness and obedience to Me, and reassured him that he would eventually have his own descendants to occupy ALL the Promised Land (Gen.13:15).
Lot’s wife looked back. But many forget that before Lot could be in that situation where his own wife would die for looking back at Sodom, that none of this would have happened to his own family if Lot hadn’t first pitched his tent toward Sodom (Gen.13:12). So many believers today aren’t exactly partying with the world, it’s just their hearts that wish they were there. So they get closer and closer to the sordid scene of this present dark world, while drifting further and further away from the things of My Kingdom. And before you know it, they’re in the city as full-fledged citizens and the heavy gates of the city of sin have shut on them to keep them in. The devil will lie to you and tell you you can leave anytime you wish. But like a bug in a spider’s web you’re trapped and unable to get away.
In My mercy I send My messengers to warn backslidden believers to escape the danger they’re in. But it often takes a great miracle to awaken them to the dangers of the wrath to come.
If you died today, are you absolutely certain that you would go to heaven? You can be! TRUST JESUS NOW
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