24. Then the Lord rained upon Sodom and upon Gomorrah brimstone and fire from the Lord out of heaven; 25. And he overthrew those cities, and all the plain, and all the inhabitants of the cities, and that which grew upon the ground.
Then, when Lot was got safe into Zoar, then this ruin came; for good men are taken away from the evil to come. Then, when the sun was risen bright and clear, promising a fair day, then this storm arose, to show that it was not from natural causes. Concerning this destruction, observe,
1. That God was the immediate Author of it. It was destruction from the Almighty, The Lord rained,—from the Lord, v. 24, that is, God from himself, by his own immediate power, and not in the common course of nature. Or, God the Son from God the Father; for the Father has committed all judgment to the Son. Note, He that is the Saviour, will be the Destroyer of those that reject the salvation.
2. That it was a strange punishment. Job 31. 3. Never was the like before or since. Hell was rained from Heaven upon them. Fire and brimstone, and a horrible tempest, this was the portion of their cup, Ps. 11. 6; not a flash of lightning, which is destructive enough, when God gives it commission, but a shower of lightning. Brimstone was scattered upon their habitation, Job. 18. 15, and then the fire soon fastened upon them. God could have drowned them, as he did the old world; but he would show that he has many arrows in his quiver, fire as well as water.
3. That it was a judgment that laid all waste; it overthrew the cities, and destroyed all the inhabitants of them, the plain, and all that grew upon the ground, v. 25. It was an utter ruin, and irreparable; that fruitful valley remains to this day a great lake, or dead sea; it is called the Salt Sea, Numb. 34. 12. Travellers say that it is about thirty miles long, and ten miles broad; it has no living creature in it; it is not moved by the wind; the smell of it is offensive; things do not easily sink in it. The Greeks call it Asphaltites, for a sort of pitch which it casts up. Jordan falls into it, and is lost there.
4. That it was a punishment that answered to their sin. Burning lusts against nature were justly punished with this preternatural burning. They that went after strange flesh, were destroyed by strange fire, Jude 7. They persecuted the angels with their rabble, and made Lot afraid; and now God persecuted them with his tempest, and made them afraid with his storm, Ps. 83. 15.
5. That it was designed for a standing revelation of the wrath of God against sin and sinners in all ages: it is, accordingly, often referred to in the scripture, and made a pattern of the ruin of Israel, Deut. 29. 23. of Babylon, Isa. 13. 19. of Edom, Jer. 49. 18. of Moab and Ammon, Zeph. 2. 9. Nay, it was typical of the vengeance of eternal fire, Jude 7, and the ruin of all that live ungodly, 2 Pet. 2. 6, especially, that despise the gospel. Matt. 10. 15. It is in allusion to this destruction, that the place of the damned is often represented by a lake that burns, as Sodom did, with fire and brimstone. Let us learn from it, (1.) The evil of sin, and the hurtful nature of it. Iniquity tends to ruin. (2.) The terrors of the Lord. See what a fearful thing it is to fall into the hands of the living God!
26. But his wife looked back from behind him, and she became a pillar of salt.
This also is written for our admonition; our Saviour refers to it, Luke 17. 32, Remember Lot's wife. As by the example of Sodom, the wicked are warned to turn from their wickedness; so by the example of Lot's wife, the righteous are warned not to turn from their righteousness. See Ezek. 3. 18, 20. We have here,
1. The sin of Lot's wife: she looked back from behind him. This seemed a small thing, but we are sure, by the punishment of it, that it was a great sin, and exceeding sinful. (1.) She disobeyed an express command, and so sinned after the similitude of Adam's transgression which ruined us all. (2.) Unbelief was at the bottom of it; she questioned whether Sodom would be destroyed, and thought she still might have been safe in it. (3.) She looked back upon her neighbours whom she had left behind, with more concern than was fit, now that their day of grace was over, and Divine Justice was glorifying itself in their ruin. See Isa. 66. 24. (4.) Probably, she hankered after her house and goods in Sodom, and was loath to leave them. Christ intimates this to be her sin, Luke 17. 31, 32. she too much regarded her stuff. (5.) Her looking back bespoke an inclination to go back; and therefore our Saviour uses it as a warning against apostasy from our christian profession. We have all renounced the world and the flesh, and have set our faces heavenward; we are in the plain, upon our probation; and it is at our peril, if we return into the interests we profess to have abandoned. Drawing back is to perdition, and looking back is towards it. Let us therefore fear, Heb. 4. 1.
2. The punishment of Lot's wife for this sin. She was struck dead in the place; yet her body did not fall down, but stood fixed and erect like a pillar or monument, not liable to waste or decay as human bodies exposed to the air are, but metamorphosed into a metallic substance which would last perpetually. Come, behold the goodness and severity of God, Rom. 11. 22; toward Lot that went forward, goodness; toward his wife that looked back, severity. Though she was nearly related to a righteous man, though better than her neighbours, and though a monument of distinguishing mercy in her deliverance out of Sodom, yet God did not connive at her disobedience; for great privileges will not secure us from the wrath of Goa, if we do not carefully and faithfully improve them. This pillar of salt should season us. Since it is such a dangerous thing to look back, let us always press forward, Phil. 3. 13, 14.
27. And Abraham gat up early in the morning to the place where he stood before the Lord: 28. 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. 29. And it came to pass, when God destroyed the cities of the plain, that God remembered Abraham, and sent Lot out of the midst of the overthrow, when he overthrew the cities in the which Lot dwelt.
Our communion with God consists in our gracious regard to him, and his gracious regard to us; we have here therefore the communion that was between God and Abraham, in the event concerning Sodom, as before, in the consultation concerning it; for communion with God is to be kept up in providences as well as in ordinances.
1. Here is Abraham's pious regard to God in this event, in two things; (1.) A careful expectation of the event, v. 27, He gat up early to look toward Sodom; and, to intimate that his design herein was to see what became of his prayers, he went to the very place where he had stood before the Lord, and set himself there, as upon his watch-tower, Hab. 2
