It’s a well known Old Testament story. In Genesis 19 two angels show up at the gate of Sodom where they find Lot sitting there doing…well…the Bible doesn’t tell us but he is there. He immediately stands up and invites these angels to spend the night at his house. Eventually the angels agree to do so but their evening is interrupted when the men of Sodom surround the house looking for trouble. In the end, the Angels escape, dragging Lot and his family behind them, and God destroys the cities of Sodom and Gomorrah.
Before this all happened, these same angels visited Abraham (Genesis 18). This time the LORD was with them and Abraham saw three men approaching. During their visit with Abraham, God tells him what He has in store for Sodom and Gomorrah. Abraham intercedes on behalf of the cities, with God eventually promising that if He finds ten righteous people in Sodom He will spare the city. Imagine, had there been ten people who feared God, God would have spared the city. But there were not ten and Sodom and Gomorrah were destroyed.
The Gospel tells us that salvation is available to all because of ONE righteous man. The Bible tells us that as God surveys the earth, He finds zero righteous people. In fact, all of our good deeds and good living are but filthy rags before the Lord (Isaiah 64:6). All have sinned (Romans 3:23) and none of us can pay the price needed to avoid the punishment we deserve because of our sin. Like the men of Sodom we all should face destruction and there are not ten righteous for whom God would spare us. But there is one: Jesus Christ whose death on the cross paid for all of our sins.
The presence of ten righteous people would have protected Sodom. Today, there is one righteous man through whom salvation is available. In Christ Jesus we are saved by One.
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