Brief synopsis of the readings: We read from Genesis about the destruction of the cities Sodom and Gomorrah (though the actual destruction happened in the next chapter and is not included in this reading). God and Abraham dialogue about an outcry for their destruction. God appears determined to destroy them for their wickedness but Abraham begins to question God. First he asks God if he will spare the citizens of Sodom and Gomorrah if there are 50 righteous people (among all the wicked) and God agrees to spare them for the sake of the 50. Abraham then asks if God will spare these cities if there are 45, and then 40, and then 30, and then 20, and then 10. The reading ends there. God promises to spare the cities if there are only 10 who are righteous. Luke’s Gospel begins with Jesus’ disciples asking him how to pray. Jesus answers them by reciting the prayer was all know as the “Our Father” or the “Lord’s Prayer.” Then he told them a parable: imagine yourself going to a friend’s house in the middle of the night asking to borrow some food for guests who have arrived. The friend at first refuses, but relents only because you are so persistent. Jesus then expands this parable to tell his disciples that God will always give them what they need and finishes with this quotation: “If you then, who are evil, know how to give your children what is good, how much more will the heavenly Father give the Holy Spirit to those who ask him?”
What do you think about when you hear the phrase “Sodom and Gomorrah?” I think most of us can identify these two cities in the Book of Genesis that God destroyed for their wickedness. Additionally many view their destruction as punishment for homosexual behavior (gay men and women have often been labeled “sodomites” and sodomy laws in our history have normally criminalized homosexuality). As a matter of fact, in 1965, the Christian evangelist Billy Graham’s wife Ruth commented: “If God doesn’t soon bring judgment upon America, he’ll have to go back and apologize to Sodom and Gomorrah.”
This won’t surprise anyone who knows me, but I’m going to take this in the opposite direction. Sodom and Gomorrah may popularly occupy a place that speaks of God’s anger and justice, but I believe these readings speak to us of God’s mercy.
The relationship between God and Abraham continues to fascinate me only because it must have taken Abraham most of his life to figure it out. Abraham (called “Abram” when he was first called) lived a life that he expected to be predictable. But he and his wife (who were not able to have children) were called to leave their home and travel to a new land and parent a new nation. We have it easy because we can draw a line between Abraham (and Sarah) and ourselves, regardless if we are Jews, or Christians, or Muslims.
As God judged Sodom and Gomorrah, we can easily (and perhaps too easily) view it through the lens of wickedness and sin, but I don’t think Abraham did. I think Abraham, who was still struggling to understand the concept of one God rather than several gods, worked hard to understand God’s mind and God’s will.
Because Abraham’s world did not turn on individual judgement but on corporate judgement. Five hundred years after Martin Luther’s claim about a “personal relationship with the Lord” we have often forgotten that the people of Genesis accepted the fact that judgement was not individual but corporate.
Many of you know that I’m a history buff and I read a scary number of books, particularly about the Middle Ages. Back then, if you were an ordinary farmer who was ruled by a local king, you would likely be pressed into military services for part of your life. If, during the course of battle, you were captured you may have been claimed as a slave. It didn’t matter what you thought about your king, or whether or not you were a good person. You could easily be sold as a slave and spend the rest of your life living where you don’t want, doing what you don’t want, with no hope for a better future. You’re a slave even though you did nothing to deserve it.
But Abraham, for reasons we can’t fully understand, chose a different path. He looked at Sodom and Gomorrah not as “wicked cities” that God should judge, but as cities populated by people. Some of them were wicked, and some of them were not. And so he asks the question: how wicked does a city have to be to deserve destruction?
How wicked does a city have to be for everyone to be destroyed? Of course, the great unanswered question is why God didn’t only take the wicked among them, and that question is left unanswered.
Abraham doesn’t ask about God’s justice, but instead asks about God’s mercy. It’s assumed that not everyone in the city is wicked and I think most contemporaries thought nothing of God destroying both cities and everyone in them. I love Abraham because he had the courage to ask God about the limits of God’s mercy and keeps asking. Only because he keeps “pushing the envelope” do we begin to understand the how much God loves us.
God’s love only continues in Luke’s Gospel. For many of us the Lord’s Prayer is as familiar to us as any prayer: we learned this prayer first. Unfortunately it makes it too easy to pray it without really listening to it, but it follows a pattern. It begins with an acknowledgement of God’s power and our need to trust in that power. We then ask for what we need (including forgiveness) and promise to try to live in a way that honors God.
And while we pray this prayer often we always fall short. We promise to love God, recognize our dependance, forgive others, and ask that we be protected.
But Jesus doesn’t stop there. He goes on to speak about how God’s mercy can dwarf ours. We try, with our friends, our spouses, and (especially) our children, to be our best. And we fail. Sometimes our actions are driven by our impatience, our prejudices, or our weariness and we hurt those we love. And (let’s face it) sometimes we feel guilt that causes us to give our children what they want instead of what they need.
But God, who knows us best, will always give us what we need, even when it’s not what we want.But we can’t forget that God’s love is embedded in mercy, and we are called to do the same.
And hopefully we can look at Sodom and Gomorrah with more mercy and less judgement.