But mark the grave difference between the two men. The Lord Himself visited Abraham, sat with him, and partook readily of his hospitality. This was a high honor indeed, a rare privilege--a privilege which Lot never knew, an honor to which he never attained. The Lord never visited him in Sodom; He merely sent His angels, His ministers of power, the agents of His government. And even they, at first, sternly refused to enter Lot's house or to partake of his proffered hospitality. Their withering reply was, "Nay, but we will abide in the street all night." And when they did enter his house, it was only to protect him from the lawless violence with which he was surrounded, and to drag him out of the wretched circumstances into which, for worldly gain and position, he had plunged himself. Could contrast be more vivid?
But further, the Lord delighted in Abraham, manifested Himself to him, opened His mind to him, told him of His plans and purposes--what He was about to do with Sodom. "Shall I," said He, "hide from Abraham that thing which I do; seeing that Abraham shall surely become a great and mighty nation, and all the nations of the earth shall be blessed in him? For _I know him, that he will command his children and his household after him, and they shall keep the way of the Lord, to do justice and judgment_, that the Lord may bring upon Abraham that which he hath spoken of him."
We could hardly have a more telling illustration of John xiv. 21, 23, although the scene occurred two thousand years before the words were uttered. Have we aught like this in the history of Lot? Alas! no. It could not be. He had no nearness to God, no knowledge of His mind, no insight into His plans and purposes. How could he? Sunk, as he was, in the low moral depths of Sodom, how could he know the mind of God? Blinded by the murky atmosphere which inwrapped the guilty cities of the plain, how could he see into the future? Utterly impossible. If a man is mixed up with the world, he can only see things from the world's stand-point; he can only measure things by the world's standard, and think of them with the world's thoughts. Hence it is that the Church, in its Sardis condition, is _threatened_ with the coming of the Lord as a thief, instead of being _cheered_ with the hope of His coming as the bright and morning star. If the professing church has sunk to the world's level--as, alas! she has--she can only contemplate the future from the world's point of view. This accounts for the feeling of dread with which the great majority of professing Christians look at the subject of the Lord's coming. They are looking for Him as a thief, instead of the blessed Bridegroom of their hearts. How few there are, comparatively, who _love His appearing_! The great majority of professors (we grieve to have to pen the words) find their type in Lot rather than in Abraham. The Church has departed from her proper ground; she has gone down from her true moral elevation, and mingled herself with that world which hates and despises her absent Lord.
Still, thank God, there are "a few names, even in Sardis, which have not defiled their garments"--a few living stones, amid the smouldering ashes of lifeless profession--a few lights twinkling amid the moral gloom of cold, nominal, heartless, worldly Christianity. And not only so, but in the Laodicean phase of the Church's history, which presents a still lower and more hopeless condition of things, when the whole professing body is about to be spued out of the mouth of "the faithful and true witness"--even at this advanced stage of failure and departure, those gracious words fall, with soul-stirring power, on the attentive ear, "Behold, I stand at the door, and knock: if _any man_ hear My voice, and open the door, I will come in _to him_, and will sup with him, and he with Me."[7]
[7] To apply the solemn address of Christ to the church of Laodicea, as we sometimes find it done in modern evangelical preaching, to the case of the sinner, is a great mistake. No doubt, what the preacher means is right enough, but it is not presented here. It is not Christ knocking at the door of a sinner's heart, but knocking at the door of the professing church. What a fact is this! How full of deep and awful solemnity as regards the church! What an end to come to!--Christ outside! But what grace, as regards Christ, for He is knocking! He wants to come in; He is still lingering, in patient grace and changeless love, ready to come in to any faithful individual heart that will only open to Him. "If any man"--even one! In Sardis, He could speak _positively_ of "_a few_;" in Laodicea, He can only speak _doubtfully_ as to finding _one_. But should there be even one, He will come in to him, and sup with him. Precious Saviour! Faithful Lover of our souls! "Jesus Christ, the same yesterday, to-day, and forever."