Fleeing to Live
Genesis 19:16-29 - New International
Version (NIV)
16 When he hesitated, the men grasped his hand and the hands of
his wife and of his two daughters and led them safely out of the city, for
the Lord was merciful to them. 17 As soon as they had brought them out, one of them said, “Flee for
your lives! Don’t look back, and don’t stop anywhere in the
plain! Flee to the mountains or you will be swept away!”
18 But Lot said to them, “No, my lords, please! 19 Your servant
has found favor in your eyes, and you have shown great
kindness to me in sparing my life. But I can’t flee to the
mountains; this disaster will overtake me, and I’ll die. 20 Look,
here is a town near enough to run to, and it is small. Let me flee to it—it is
very small, isn’t it? Then my life will be spared.”
21 He said to him, “Very well, I will grant this request too; I
will not overthrow the town you speak of. 22 But flee
there quickly, because I cannot do anything until you reach it.” (That is why
the town was called Zoar.)
23 By the time Lot reached Zoar, the sun had risen over the
land. 24 Then the Lord rained
down burning sulfur on Sodom and Gomorrah—from the Lord out of the heavens. 25 Thus
he overthrew those cities and the entire plain, destroying all those
living in the cities—and also the vegetation in the land. 26 But
Lot’s wife looked back, and she became a pillar of salt.
27 Early the next morning Abraham got up and returned to the place
where he had stood before the Lord. 28 He
looked down toward Sodom and Gomorrah, toward all the land of the plain, and he
saw dense smoke rising from the land, like smoke from a furnace.
29 So when God destroyed the cities of the plain, he
remembered Abraham, and he brought Lot out of the catastrophe that
overthrew the cities where Lot had lived.
Where does the angel tell Lot, his wife
and daughters to “flee to” (verse 17)?
How does Lot respond (verse 18)?
Why does Lot not want to go to the mountains (verse
19)?
Where does Lot want to go (verse 20)?
How does the angel respond (verse 21)?
Why did the angel want Lot to “flee there
quickly” (verse 22)?
What had risen “by the time Lot reached
Zoar” (verse 23)?
What rained on Sodom and Gomorrah (verse 24)?
What happened to “all those living in the
cities-and also the vegetation” (verse 25)?
Why did Lot’s wife become a “pillar of salt”
(verse 26)?
What did Abraham see “early the next
morning” (verses 27 and 28)?
Who did God remember when “he brought Lot
out of the catastrophe that overthrew the cities where Lot had lived”
(verse 29)?
In
your opinion, what is the basic message of this passage?
In your opinion, what does this passage reveal
about how God calls people to flee from destruction?
Isaiah
1:7-16 - New
International Version (NIV)
7 Your country is
desolate,
your cities burned with fire;
your fields are being stripped by foreigners
right before you,
laid waste as when overthrown by strangers.
8 Daughter Zion is left
like a shelter in a vineyard,
like a hut in a cucumber field,
like a city under siege.
9 Unless the Lord Almighty
had left us some survivors,
we would have become like Sodom,
we would have been like Gomorrah.
10 Hear the word of
the Lord,
you rulers of Sodom;
listen to the instruction of our God,
you people of Gomorrah!
11 “The multitude of your sacrifices—
what are they to me?” says the Lord.
“I have more than enough of burnt offerings,
of rams and the fat of fattened animals;
I have no pleasure
in the blood of bulls and lambs and goats.
12 When you come to appear before me,
who has asked this of you,
this trampling of my courts?
13 Stop bringing meaningless offerings!
Your incense is detestable to me.
New Moons, Sabbaths and convocations—
I cannot bear your worthless assemblies.
14 Your New Moon feasts and your appointed festivals
I hate with all my being.
They have become a burden to me;
I am weary of bearing them.
15 When you spread out your hands in prayer,
I hide my eyes from you;
even when you offer many prayers,
I am not listening.
Your hands are full of blood!
16 Wash and make yourselves clean.
Take your evil deeds out of my sight;
stop doing wrong.
How does Isaiah describe “your country” (verse
7)?
Who is “left like a shelter in a vineyard” (verse
8)?
Why was it not “like Sodom . . . like Gomorrah”
(verse 9)?
In your opinion, who was Isaiah talking to when he
said “hear the word of the Lord, you rulers of Sodom” (verse 10)?
What does the Lord “have no pleasure” in (verse
11)?
What are the people to “stop bringing” (verse
13)?
How does the Lord feel about “your New Moon feasts
and your appointed festivals” (verse 14)?
When does the Lord “hide my eyes from you”
(verse 15)?
How are the Israelites to behave (verse 16)?
In your opinion, what is the basic message of this passage?
In your opinion, what
does this passage reveal about how God calls people to flee from destruction?
In
your opinion, why is a punishment like Sodom and Gomorrah received in Genesis
19:16-29 being revealed for people who bring God offerings and celebrate God’s
festivals in Isaiah 1:7-16?
Luke 17:26-33 – New International Version (NIV)
26 “Just as it was in the days of Noah, so also will it be in
the days of the Son of Man. 27 People were eating,
drinking, marrying and being given in marriage up to the day Noah entered the
ark. Then the flood came and destroyed them all.
28 “It was the same in the days of Lot. People were eating and
drinking, buying and selling, planting and building. 29 But
the day Lot left Sodom, fire and sulfur rained down from heaven and destroyed
them all.
30 “It will be just like this on the day the Son of Man is
revealed. 31 On that day no one who is on the housetop,
with possessions inside, should go down to get them. Likewise, no one in the
field should go back for anything. 32 Remember Lot’s
wife! 33 Whoever tries to keep their life will lose it,
and whoever loses their life will preserve it.
What
will it be like “in the days of the Son of Man” (verse 26)?
When
were people “eating, drinking, marrying and being given in marriage” (verse
27)?
What
was happening “in the days of Lot” (verse 28)?
When
did “fire and sulfur” rain down from heaven (verse 29)?
What will it be like “on the day the Son of Man is
revealed” (verse 30)?
In your opinion, why should no one go back for “possessions”
(verse 31)?
Who should be
remembered (verse 32)?
Who will lose their
life (verse 33)?
In your opinion, what
is the basic message of this passage?
In your opinion, what does this passage reveal
about how God calls people to flee from destruction?
In your opinion, why
does Jesus in Luke 17:26-33 mention Lot’s wife who avoided the catastrophe of
Genesis 19:16-29?
In
your opinion, how is the Lord leaving some survivors in the disaster that Isaiah
1:7-16 prophesies offer hope for us as we read about the “days of the Son of
Man” in Luke 17:26-33?
Romans 9:22-29 – New International
Version (NIV)
22 What if God, although choosing to show his wrath and make his
power known, bore with great patience the objects of his wrath—prepared
for destruction? 23 What if he did this to make the riches
of his glory known to the objects of his mercy, whom he prepared in
advance for glory— 24 even us, whom he also
called, not only from the Jews but also from the Gentiles? 25 As
he says in Hosea:
“I will call them ‘my people’ who are not
my people;
and I will call her ‘my loved one’ who is not my loved
one,”
26 and,
“In the very place where it was said to them,
‘You are not my people,’
there they will be called ‘children of the living
God.’”
27 Isaiah cries out concerning Israel:
“Though the number of the Israelites be like the sand by the sea,
only the remnant will be saved.
28 For the Lord will carry out
his sentence on earth with speed and finality.”
29 It is just as Isaiah said previously:
“Unless the Lord Almighty
had left us descendants,
we would have become like Sodom,
we would have been like Gomorrah.”
Who did God bear “with great patience” (verse 22)?
What
did God prepare for “the objects of his mercy” (verse 23)?
Where
were the “objects of his mercy” called from (verse 24)?
Who
does Hosea say God will call “my people” (verse 25)?
Where
will they be called “children of the living God” (verse 26)?
How
many Israelites will be saved (verse 27)?
What
will be carried out “with speed and finality” (verse 28)?
Why
did we not become like Sodom and Gomorrah (verse 29)?
In
your opinion, what is the basic message of this passage?
In your opinion, what does this passage reveal
about how God calls people to flee from destruction?
In your opinion, what do the ineffective
prayers and gifts of those who are condemned in Isaiah 1:7-16 help us
understand about what did not contribute to the transformation of those who
were prepared for destruction but became “objects of his mercy” in Romans
9:22-29?
In your opinion, how does Jesus statement
in Luke 17:26-33 that “whoever tries to keep their life will lose it, and
whoever loses their life will preserve it” help us understand how Romans
9:22-29 can say “I will call them ‘my people’ who are not my people”?
In
your opinion, what do these passages from Genesis, Isaiah, Luke and Romans
teach us about how to view the daily circumstances we are in?
In your
opinion, why is it necessary to lose our lives in order to live?
(sprucewhispers.blogspot.com)
