Abraham and Lot.

GENESIS XIII.

ON a former occasion we considered the narrative given in the twelfth of Genesis respecting the faithless departure of Abraham from the guidance of his heavenly Friend, until, having abandoned Canaan, the land of his hope, he found himself in Egypt, stripped of every thing that ought to have been dear to him; yet, still by persistence in his sin, involving himself more and more deeply in falsehood and guilt. There was One only who could effectually pity: One only who could rescue. And He did pity. God, though unsought, interfered to rescue His fallen servant, and brought him back into Canaan again; even to the very place where his sinful wanderings commenced. There last, he had builded an altar and invoked the name of the Lord, and thither he was caused to return, and there again Abraham called on the name of the Lord.

The Scripture speaks not of his contrition: but we may be sure it was very deep. "Wash me throughly from mine iniquity, and cleanse me from my sin, for I acknowledge mine iniquity, and my sin is ever before me"-was no doubt the language of his soul; for God never restores His servants after they have fallen, so as for His name to be again magnified in them, without first humbling them and bringing their hearts very low in deep and abiding contrition. The subsequent history of Abraham supplies abundant evidence of a subdued and chastened spirit. In separating Abraham it was the design of God not only to protect him and ultimately crown him with blessing, it was also His purpose to make Abraham His honoured servant among men, and to glorify in him His holy name.

An occasion for the trial of Abraham's faith soon presented itself. The favour of God had rested abundantly both on Abraham and on Lot in giving them flocks, and herds, and tents, and much prosperity. They were rich; but their riches had not been acquired by violence or

by evil. Their prosperity was the gift of God; nor had they through inordinate occupation with the gift forsaken or forgotten the Giver. Yet when the child of faith, pilgrim as he is and sojourner in a world that knows not God, finds himself surrounded by great outward prosperity, he has no little reason to fear. Riches become a curse and not a blessing, unless they are used for God: and for this no ordinary faithfulness, and wisdom, and grace, are needed. The snares of Satan for the people of God are generally laid in connexion with some outward blessings that the providence of God has given. So was it in the history before us. It was the abundance of the possessions of Lot and of Abraham that gave occasion of strife to their servants. The soul of Abraham was grieved. He spoke to Lot and proferred to him separation. "And Abraham said unto Lot, Let there be no strife, I pray thee, between me and thee, and between my herdmen and thy herdmen; for we be brethren. Is not the whole land before thee? Separate thyself, I pray thee; if thou wilt take the left hand, then I will go to the right; or if thou depart to the right hand, then I will go to the left."

No words can more plainly shew the unselfishness and generosity of the heart of Abraham. Although he was the elder and the chief -the person who had every title to choose and to command, yet he willingly relinquished all his rights, content to depart, or content to remain, as Lot, his brother's son, might determine. "If thou wilt take the left hand, then I will go to the right; or if thou depart to the right hand, then I will go to the left." It was a question of little moment to Abraham where the tent of his pilgrimage was pitched. He was seeking a heavenly city.

And now, if Lot had been wise with heavenly wisdom, what would have been his reply? Would he not have shrunk from the very sound of the word "separation ?" Abraham and Lot were brethren -near kinsmen in the flesh, but yet more, brethren in tribulation, for they were pilgrims and sojourners in a strange country, surrounded too by many enemies, for the Canaanite and Perizzite were still in the land. Was this a time for Lot to separate from Abraham? Nor was this all. Abraham, as Lot well knew, was the called of God. To him God had spoken: him God had made the depositary of the promises to him God had said, "I will bless thee and make thy name great, and thou shalt be a blessing,

and in thee shall all families of the earth be blessed." God had brought Abraham into a relation to Himself in which no one else, throughout the whole

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earth, stood and therefore to separate from Abraham was virtually to separate from that peculiar care and guidance of God, of which Abraham was the subject. Faith (if faith had been in any thing like lively exercise in the soul of Lot) would instantly have recognised this, and would, in a moment, have resigned flocks, herds, servants, and all other such like things, rather than abandon him whom God had separated to Himself for present and for everlasting blessing. But faith was not lively in the soul of Lot. Nature was practically ruling there. The sinfulness of quitting the side of Abraham (if the thought of sinfulness occurred to him at all) weighed like chaff in the balance in comparison with the loveliness of that fair plain, so near, so pleasant, which Lot saw before him, smiling with Eden-like beauty. Perhaps he had long coveted it—perhaps he had long fretted against the chain that bound him so closely to the steps of Abraham. And this Abraham may have known.

It is impossible, with certainty, to determine what it was that induced Abraham to propose to Lot separation. It may have been weakness in Abraham. It may have been that he was conscious that Lot desired to be set free from the bond that bound him, and Abraham may have shrunk from the painfulness of perpetually thwarting the desires of Lot's heart. Few things are more distressing to the sensitive heart than to constrain the adherence of those who are longing to depart. Abraham was not above the weakness of humanity, and he may have wrongly yielded to the desire of gratifying the inclinations of his friend. This is possible. But it is far more probable that Abraham, in accordance with the will of God, proposed to Lot a course by which Lot who needed discipline, was to be disciplined, and chastened, and taught. When the heart is obstinately bent on following a self-devised path of folly, God may judicially appoint that the desired path shall be trodden until its results shall have been made apparent, and the bitter lesson of experience learned. When Israel chose to question whether the land of which God had spoken to them as "good"-was really such as the Lord had said, and thought of sending spies to view it, (Deut. i. 22) the Lord hindered not the unbelieving mission-on the contrary, He commanded Moses to choose spies and send them, that Israel might reap the fruits of their folly, and learn that it had been better to have confided simply in the assurances of God, than to seek to test His veracity, and to measure the capabilities of His power by appealing to those whose hearts, dark, timid, and unbelieving, could neither see

any thing in the light of faith, nor hope for any thing that exceeded the capacities of their own impotency. Thus too, when Israel murmured and desired a king-a king was given, but sorrow upon sorrow followed. The judicial inflictions of the hand of God are not unfrequently occasioned by the self-will or fretfulness of those on whom they are sent. It may have been thus in the case of Lot. It may have been that God designed, through Abraham, to propose to Lot something that He knew that the folly of Lot's heart (folly perhaps long cherished) would welcome.

The proposal was welcomed. "Lot lifted "Lot lifted up his eyes, and beheld all the plain of Jordan, that it was well watered every where, before the Lord destroyed Sodom and Gomorrah, even as the garden of the Lord, like the land of Egypt, as thou comest from Zoar." Such was the scene presented to the eye of Lot. It was like the garden of the Lord-like Eden. But it was not Eden. The beauty which Lot beheld was but a garment of outward loveliness resting upon something in which God had ceased to delight. Those plains, however lovely, were but part of a fallen earth, groaning under the iniquity of the inhabitants thereof and ripening for judgment. They might seem in loveliness to rival Eden; but so did Egypt-" as the garden of the Lord, like the land of Egypt." It is Egypt still-the land of unregenerate man—a land not of blessing, but of judgment. Nor was it otherwise with the fair-watered plain of Jordan.

Others before Lot had been attracted by their loveliness, and had come and dwelt there. There were cities called "cities of the plain," and their characteristics were drawn not from Eden in its innocency, but from Sodom in its abominations. This was the sphere that Lot chose for his habitation-for this he separated himself from Abraham, God's servant, and God's friend. "Lot chose him all the plain of Jordan; and Lot journeyed east: and they separated themselves the one from the other. Abraham dwelled in the land of Canaan, and Lot dwelled in the cities of the plain, and pitched his tent toward Sodom. But the men of Sodom were wicked and sinners before the Lord exceedingly." Was Lot ignorant of the character of Sodom? Did he not know that the men of Sodom were wicked and sinners before the Lord exceedingly? Doubtless he knew it all. The iniquity of Sodom was not hidden it was manifested and had come abroad. Yet Lot feared not to draw nigh to that abyss of evil. He feared not to be brought into its presence. He chose it for himself as his near neighbour. What else could be expected? He who has

ceased to feel the joy and the comfort of the near presence of good, may be expected to have his sensibilities proportionably deadened as respects contiguity to evil. Lot had failed to value, as he should have valued, the blessedness of fellowship with Abraham: it was not likely, therefore, that he would appreciate as he ought, the sin of approximation to Sodom. For the sake of his flocks and herds, and the fair well watered plain he was content to leave the light, and peace, and truth of the tent and altar of Abraham, and to draw nigh to the habitation of those who, because of the greatness of their wickedness, were about "to be set forth as an example of eternal fire, suffering vengeance."

There could have been little in the sight of his flocks and herds, or in the beauty of the plain of Jordan really to comfort the soul of Lot as he went on journeying towards Sodom. He might, it is true, have occupied himself with these things; but they could not really comfort him. The pilgrim and the stranger can draw no true comfort from any thing in which his conscience finds no token of the sanction and approval of his God. Lot had little of this comfort: but mark the contrasted place of Abraham. No sooner had Lot departed than God drew near to Abraham to comfort and to encourage him. "And the Lord said unto Abraham, after that Lot was separated from him, Lift up now thine eyes, and look from the place where thou art northward, and southward, and eastward, and westward; for all the land which thou seest, to thee will I give it, and to thy seed for ever. And I will make thy seed as the dust of the earth, then shall thy seed also be numbered. Arise, walk through the land in the length of it and in the breadth of it; for I will give it unto thee."

Long time had passed, and many a bitter sorrow had been known by Abraham since God had last spoken to him after this manner. His heart was, no doubt sorrowful (for he must have felt the departure of his kinsman) when his loneliness was thus cheered by the voice of his heavenly friend. The gift promised was precious, but more precious was the love that gave it. The promised gift too was future and was to be long delayed, but the love was present, and it was faithful love. Abraham knew it as that which had watched over him and would watch over him still, until all its designs of blessing were to the full accomplished. How sweet such love, and how needful such comfort to one who had to wait in patience of hope for joys yet distant, and has in the meanwhile to prove the sorrow of being a stranger and a pilgrim in a world where evil reigns-a world where the dark