Its Not Enough To Simply Refrain From Evil

       When Christians consider the Biblical character of Lot, Abraham’s nephew, we correctly note the foolishness of his decision to move his family to the vicinity of Sodom and Gomorrah and then into the city of Sodom itself. In 2 Peter 2.7-8, however, the apostle Peter gives us additional insight into Lot’s character beyond what’s revealed in the Genesis account. “He [God] rescued righteous Lot, greatly distressed by the sensual conduct of the wicked (for as that righteous man lived among them day after day, he was tormenting his righteous soul over their lawless deeds that he saw and heard).” Not only is Lot called “righteous” (three times!), his righteousness is specifically tied to the pain and anguish he felt over the actions of Sodom’s population. Although his family became desensitized to the wicked lifestyle around him, Lot maintained a horror of sin.

In Ezekiel 9, Ezekiel saw a vision in which the population of unrighteous Jerusalem was destroyed by angelic executioners. Just before that occurred, God commanded a man clothed in white to pass through the city and mark the foreheads of the people God would spare. They were people “who sigh and groan over all the abominations that are committed in it” (Ezekiel 9.4). The defining characteristic of the saved ones was their anguish over evil, not just their abstinence from it.

In Jeremiah 23.9-10, Jeremiah reflected on the lives of men in Judah: “My heart is broken within me; all my bones shake; I am like a drunken man, like a man overcome by wine, because of the Lord and because of his holy words. For the land is full of adulterers; because of the curse the land mourns, and the pastures of the wilderness are dried up.” These are not simply the musings of an overemotional man. Jeremiah attributed his broken heart to the fact that he viewed his fellow Israelites through the eyes of God.

Are we pained by the sins around us or do we simply shrug with resignation? For example, as our culture attempts to fundamentally redefine gender and marriage for the first time in recorded history, are we truly grieved by this frontal assault on God’s created order? If righteousness must be passionately practiced, wickedness must be rejected with equal zeal. Certainly our fellow men must be treated with the inherent respect due to people created in God’s image (Genesis 1.26-27), regardless of their beliefs, but that does not prevent us from living with grief about their sin. Certainly Christians are supposed to live with joy in their hearts over God’s triumph in Christ, but that joy is also mixed with groaning over the current state of the world (Romans 8.20-23). It is not enough for us to simply refrain from participating in the darkness around us. God’s holy people are called to feel the weight of sin as He does so we can become intercessors like Jesus.

Nathan