And Abraham drew near, and said, Wilt thou also cause the righteous to perish with the wicked?
God has just told Abraham what He is about to do with Sodom, and instead of walking away he stays and pleads. His question raises two of ours: what gave Abraham the freedom to speak like this, and who did he mean by "the righteous"?
One writer reads the words "drew near" as the peak of Abraham's closeness to God. God had already trusted him with His plans.
Chapters 18 and 19 record a most elevated and striking example of the intimacy of Abraham's communion with God. There he is let into the secrets of God's governmental dealings with the cities of the plain, and the Lord Himself says, "Shall I hide from Abraham what I am about to do?" ... What in the Old Testament speaks of greater intimacy than the further record, "But Abraham still stood before the Lord, and Abraham drew near and said …"?
God shares His mind first, and intercession grows out of that.
With a friend I speak of what I have on my heart, not just of my business with him. And then, as he has received these messages from God, so he intercedes with God. He is a stranger in the place of promise, and on high in communion with Him. ... His faith associates him with the mind and character of God.
Earlier in the chapter God had promised Abraham a son. That settled matter leaves his heart free.
"He drew near" and says, "Will you indeed sweep away the righteous with the wicked?" Note this: it is no longer a question about himself, or about the son. The son was soon to come. All this was settled. He rests upon it, his heart is perfectly free. He has no longer a single want for himself; not one request remains to be spread before Jehovah. His heart is drawn out in a spirit of grace, which answers to the grace of the Lord towards himself.
Abraham names no one in his plea. So who are "the righteous" he is pleading for?
Like a genuine man of faith, he takes advantage of his place in the presence of God to intercede for a brother. That brother's worldliness had plunged him into the very middle of the place God was about to give over to everlasting destruction. "Then Abraham drew near and said, 'Will you indeed sweep away the righteous with the wicked?'" (v. 23) "The righteous!" To whom can he refer? Can it be to the man who had so deliberately turned aside out of the path of faith to make his home at Sodom? Yes; he speaks of Lot — he calls him "righteous."
That verdict meant setting aside everything Lot had done to him.
How high above "the things that are seen" Abraham's soul must have been lifted! He could forget the strife and the departure, the worldliness and evil of Lot, and still plead for him as "a righteous soul."
One writer finds a doubt hidden inside the plea, and turns it back on us.
How strange the implied doubt here in Abraham's mind! ... An Abraham praying the Judge of all the earth to do right! Is it not a first principle that of course He must? How could he doubt? we say. Beloved, do we never? And how much more do we know of God than Abraham possibly could! How much of our praying, if we looked closely at it, comes down to this — asking God to do right!
The prayer ended because Abraham stopped, not because God did.
He intercedes on the ground that it is impossible to destroy the righteous with the wicked. So he pleads with God to spare the city if fifty righteous men are found in it. Then he comes down to forty-five, forty, thirty, twenty, and at last to only ten. Each time God, in His grace, grants what he asks. At last it is Abraham's faith that fails to draw on the grace of God — the grace that, where sin abounds, does much more abound.
Notice who is not praying: Lot, inside the city.
Lot could not intercede with God as Abraham did. He did not know what it was to draw near to God. He was too deeply involved in Sodom's affairs to have communion with God. We cannot intercede with God for evildoers unless we are separate from them and know the intimacy of communion with God.
- Draw near first. God confides in Abraham before Abraham pleads. Intimacy is the soil intercession grows in.
- Draw near empty. God had settled his own future, so he had nothing left to ask for himself. A satisfied heart is free to spend itself on others.
- Draw near for the undeserving. The "righteous" he pleads for is Lot, the relative who walked out on him and settled in Sodom.
- Draw near honestly. His question to the Judge of all the earth carries a hidden doubt — the same doubt that fills much of our own praying.
- Draw near further. God granted every step down from fifty to ten. The limit was Abraham's faith, never God's grace.
There are perhaps fifty righteous within the city wilt thou also destroy and not forgive the place for the sake of the fifty righteous that are therein?
God has just told Abraham what He is about to do to Sodom. Abraham stays and begins to plead. He starts at fifty righteous people who might be inside the city. His question is whether judgment sweeps away the good with the guilty. Can a few righteous people hold back destruction from a whole place?
Abraham stands unusually close to God. Notice what he does with that place: he asks nothing for himself.
How does Abraham use his favoured position? Does he use it to strengthen and secure the future of his own family? The natural heart would have pushed him at once to use his advantage that way... Instead, he gave not a thought to himself or his house. Like a true man of faith, he uses his place in God's presence to plead for a brother. That brother's love of the world had dropped him into the very middle of a place God was about to give over to everlasting destruction.
Another writer treats this as a pattern.
Whenever God reveals His plans to faith, it brings out the spirit of intercession... So here Abraham pleads with the Lord to spare the city.
Abraham never says the name "Lot." Commentators agree he means his nephew, who lived in Sodom.
Note how persistent Abraham is about Lot and Sodom. I wish we Christians were half as persistent! ... The Lord replies that if there are fifty righteous, the city will be saved. And if there are only forty, Lord? Yes! And if there are only thirty? Yes! And if there are only twenty? Yes! And if there are only ten, Lord? Yes! And then he stops. ... All the while he was thinking of Lot. The thought in his heart was: Lot is a righteous man, though in a wrong position, and there are sure to be a few more like him to make up the necessary ten.
Abraham's opening figure was not random.
As Abraham pleads with the Lord, we know he has Lot chiefly in mind. Yet he clearly could not bring himself to think that Lot might be the only righteous person in Sodom... He cannot imagine the Judge of all the earth making the righteous suffer along with the wicked. The Judge will surely do right. Fifty would be a very small share of the city. Yet Abraham probably remembered that God saved only eight people out of the whole world when He destroyed it by a flood.
Abraham's plea rests on a principle. Commentators apply it to the world today.
God had to provide for Lot before the fiery storm could fall... For the sake of the righteous, God spares the wicked. "You are the salt of the earth."... And God preserves the world today because His children are in it.
Another writer weighs what one godly life is worth to God — and how Sodom actually ended.
See how much weight one godly person carries with God. Here was this big wicked Sodom. Its sins were too terrible to speak about, crying out to heaven for vengeance. Yet ten godly people in that mass of sin and wickedness would have saved the guilty city. But there were not ten. The few in it were thrust out — four people in all — and one died just outside its walls. So the city was destroyed.
God says yes at every step down. What ends the conversation is not God's patience but Abraham's nerve.
Why "this once"? Sadly, our faith never reaches up to the grace of God. We grow weary and fail, not He. We receive enough, through His grace, for our blessing, but we rarely go deep into it... God's grace went far beyond what Abraham asked. It reached down after all to that one person who lay on Abraham's heart, though Abraham had not the courage to say so.
The ceiling on this prayer points forward to One whose pleading has no ceiling.
He said, "I will speak yet but this once," and there he stopped short. It was as if he feared he had drawn too large a sum from the treasury of infinite grace — or had forgotten that God's bank has never yet refused faith's cheque... He stopped asking, and God stopped giving. Not so our blessed Intercessor. Of Him it can be said, "He is able to save to the uttermost... since he always lives to make intercession."
- Nearness — Abraham used his closeness to God for someone else's rescue, not his own gain.
- Number — fifty was Abraham's hopeful guess. Behind every figure he named stood one man: Lot.
- Value — God would spare a whole wicked city for a few righteous people. That is how believers act as salt today.
- Answer — God said yes at every step down, from fifty to ten.
- Limit — the prayer stopped because Abraham's faith gave out, not God's grace. That ceiling points to an Intercessor who saves to the uttermost.
Far be it from thee to do so, to slay the righteous with the wicked, that the righteous should be as the wicked -- far be it from thee! Will not the Judge of all the earth do right?
Abraham stands before the LORD and pleads for a city already under sentence. He does not argue that Sodom deserves better. He appeals to what God is — and troubled people have asked his question ever since.
(Some quotes use an older translation, where "do right" stands for the ESV's "do what is just.")
Nothing in the world around Abraham showed God openly ruling it. The title he uses is something faith saw, not something the eye could see.
It was faith in Abraham that recognised God as the Judge of all the earth, for then, as now, God was not openly the Judge of all the earth. He was acting behind the scenes, yet dealing with evil in His government when He judged it necessary. The day is coming, in the world to come, when it will be shown openly that God is the Judge of all. He will not let evil raise its head as it has done down the centuries.
"Judge" here is not a picture of a final courtroom scene at the end of all things. It has to do with God's rule over the earth itself.
This surely does not refer to God sitting in formal judgment, as at the great white throne, but as the One who will govern the earth in righteousness. So Abraham speaks of God as Judge, when he says, "Shall not the Judge of all the earth do right?"… Under man's rule righteousness is too often separated from judgment. Under God, the Judge of all, righteousness will return to judgment.
The two sides of this conversation are not the same, and one writer sets them side by side.
Jehovah comes down in grace to find, if possible, some reason why mercy might still hold back justice. "I will go down now, and see whether they have done altogether according to the cry of it, and if not, I will know." Jehovah comes in grace, Abraham urges righteousness — "Will you destroy the righteous with the wicked? … far be it from you. Shall not the judge of all the earth do right? Let not the Lord be angry."
The question is famous for its confidence. One writer noticed the opposite — that a man had to ask it at all.
How strange the implied doubt here in Abraham's mind! What poor weak questions do not these minds of ours raise! An Abraham praying the Judge of all the earth to do right! Is it not a first principle that of course He must? How could he doubt? we say. Beloved, do we never?… If we looked closely at our prayers, how much of them would come down to this — asking God to do right!… when everything on earth seems as if it were going wrong… has the bitter question never sprung up in our hearts, even if it never reached our lips?
Abraham lowered his number step by step, then closed with "let me speak but this once." He never named the one man he was really praying for.
Why "this once"? Alas! our faith never reaches up to the grace of God. We weary and fail, not He… Jehovah answered in full all that Abraham's faith and confidence in His grace attempted. Yet His grace went far beyond that, for it came down after all to the one person who lay on Abraham's heart, though Abraham had not the boldness to say so. But Jehovah knew it; and while He surely did not spare that wicked place — and His righteous government meant it had to stand as an example of divine judgment — He still rescued that righteous soul despite his faults.
Abraham's question has gone on steadying people long after Sodom.
Abraham had boldly said to the Lord, "Shall not the Judge of all the earth do right?" — words for which we have all been deeply thankful, words that give us peace of mind as to God's governmental dealings in this sad world.
- Right — recognised. Abraham's title for God was an act of faith. God was governing the earth from behind the scenes. One day that rule will be open for all to see.
- Right — not final. This is God's rule over the earth in righteousness, not the final courtroom. Under His rule, righteousness and judgment come back together.
- Right — invited. God came down in grace, looking for a reason to spare. Abraham pressed the standard of righteousness, and God met him at every step.
- Right — doubted. Even a man of faith had to ask the question. Much of our praying is the same request: that God would do what is right when life looks wrong.
- Right — exceeded. Abraham's faith stopped at ten. God's grace went lower still and rescued the one man he never dared to name.
And Jehovah said, If I find at Sodom fifty righteous within the city, then I will forgive all the place for their sakes.
Abraham has just asked whether the Judge of all the earth will sweep away the righteous with the wicked. Here God answers him. A whole city is held back from ruin because of a handful of people inside it. The answer raises the question that runs through the rest of the chapter: how far will God's grace go, and who sets the limit?
Abraham's plea was not cool argument. It came from a heart stirred by what was about to fall on the plain where his relative lived. God's reply meets that earnestness without a word of correction.
He pleads as one whose heart felt deeply. When our hearts are engaged, we do not do the work badly. That is the real secret of it... It was so with Abraham. He intercedes earnestly, and he keeps on. He puts that thought into words: "Shall not the Judge of all the earth do what is just?" Of course He will. And here we have the answer of grace: "If I find at Sodom fifty righteous in the city, I will spare the whole place for their sake."
Fifty people in a wicked city is a tiny fraction. Yet God says that fraction would be enough to spare everyone around them. Commentators read it as a picture of what believers do in the world right now.
The Lord gives Abraham full assurance that He would not destroy the city if He found fifty righteous there. This surely reminds us that believers are "the salt of the earth" (Matt. 5:13). Their presence protects the world from the judgment that looks so near. At the Rapture, the Lord will take all believers into His presence. Then this preserving character will be gone, and judgment will fall in all its terror on the ungodly world.
The phrase "for their sake" points to a principle in how God governs the world. The rescue in view is rescue from disaster in this life. It rests on God's delight in the godly.
It is true that the atoning sufferings of Christ are absolutely necessary for the blessing of men. Still, in the way God governs the earth, He gives earthly deliverance and blessing because He delights in the godly. We see this principle illustrated in the history of Sodom. Abraham asks God to spare Sodom from destruction in this life if ten righteous men are found in the city. And God was ready to do it.
Abraham can plead like this because God confided in him first. He is not bargaining with a stranger.
God then treats him as a friend. He tells him, not what concerns Abraham himself, but what concerns the world. With a friend I speak of what I have on my heart, not just of my business with him. And because Abraham has received these communications from God, he now intercedes with God — a stranger in the place of promise, yet on high in communion with Him. And this is even more the place of the saints now, through the Holy Spirit: they have the full communication of God's mind and ways in the word, and the Lord is coming to take them up. That is the scene they live in by faith, and intercession is founded on it... His faith associates him with the mind and character of God.
Each time Abraham lowers the number, God agrees. Nothing here shows God growing reluctant. The conversation ends because Abraham stops.
Divine power waited on faith — faith measured the active resources of God on the occasion... For as long as Abraham stood interceding, the Lord stood promising.
God did not spare the city in the end. Yet His mercy reached further than Abraham's asking did. It reached the one man Abraham had in mind but never dared to name.
Alas! our faith never reaches up to the grace of God. We weary and fail, not He... The Lord answered in full everything that Abraham's faith and confidence in His grace attempted. But His grace went far beyond that. It came down after all to that one person who lay on the heart of Abraham, though Abraham had not the boldness to say so. The Lord knew it. He did not spare that wicked place. In His righteous government it was made an example of divine judgment. Yet He still rescued that righteous soul, despite his faults.
- Friendship first. God told Abraham His plans before Abraham said a word. Intercession grows out of being let into God's mind, not out of pressure put on Him.
- Grace answers. God answers a bold plea with agreement, not rebuke. His first "I will spare" sets the tone for every answer that follows.
- Few for many. Fifty would have covered a whole city. God's people are the salt that holds back judgment from the world around them.
- For their sake. On earth God delivers people because He delights in the godly. The atoning sufferings of Christ are another matter — they are necessary for any blessing at all.
- Faith stops first. Abraham ran out of boldness before God ran out of mercy, and grace still reached the one man he never named.
And Abraham answered and said, Behold now, I have ventured to speak unto the Lord; I, who am dust and ashes.
Abraham has just heard what God plans to do with Sodom, and he keeps pleading instead of falling silent. Here he says what he is while he speaks: a man who dares to address the Lord, and a man who is only dust and ashes.
Abraham has nothing left to ask for himself. Alone with God, his tone is confidence, not fear.
Abraham does not ask anything for himself here; he pleads for others. Indeed, what could he ask for? He was enjoying conversation with God, and the promises about the son were sure and already given. He is in the place of blessing, walking in the spirit of communion with the God he now knows. This began with the revelation of Himself by God. Now that Abraham is alone with Him all is boldness, though reverence, with one well known.
Abraham does not hang back at a distance. The Christian has the same access, and that raises a question about how we pray.
How precious is this access to Him who had come down! Abraham shows no shrinking behind the door. He has confidence in God. "Abraham drew near." The Christian can understand it all, now that redemption has been accomplished, and sin has been judged. God's word and the work of Christ have left us without a single spot or stain to catch the eye of the Judge. But is there always in us, as here in Abraham, a real readiness to draw near and speak to our God? Are we glad to make proper use of the privileges we have?
Abraham did not invent this phrase. Ashes already had a fixed use in the Bible, and Job used the same words of himself.
Ashes, mostly from burnt wood, were used as a sign of sorrow or mourning, either put on the head... or on the body with sackcloth... To eat ashes expresses great sorrow, Ps. 102:9; and to be reduced to them is a figure of complete destruction... "Dust and ashes" was the figure Abraham used of himself before Jehovah, Gen. 18:27; and Job said he had become like them by the hand of God. Job 30:19.
Being at ease about himself leaves Abraham free for other people. He spends the whole conversation on a city that is not his.
He had no confession to make and no requests to bring for himself, but as the Lord had spoken to him about Sodom, he now speaks to the Lord about it. He intercedes, as one near to God, as one who was at ease about himself, and so at leisure to attend to others.
Closeness to God does not puff a person up. It does the opposite, and Abraham stands first in a long line of people who prove it.
Abraham knew such liberty in the Lord's presence. Yet we find him deeply aware of his own sin and nothingness, like everyone else who has real dealings with God. We hear Job saying: "Behold, I am vile"; Isaiah saying: "I am undone"; Peter saying: "I am a sinful man, O Lord"; Paul saying: "I am chief" of sinners. Abraham says, "I am but dust and ashes," and, as far as the Scripture record goes, he heads the list, the first to condemn himself in the presence of God.
Calling yourself dust and ashes is a beggar's language, not a negotiator's. That is what lifts prayer.
A spiritual prayer is a humble prayer: "Lord, You have heard the desire of the humble" (Ps. 10:17, older translation). Prayer is asking for charity, which takes humility. It is fitting to see a poor nothing lie at the feet of its Maker... The lower the heart descends, the higher the prayer ascends. God accepts broken expressions, when they come from broken hearts.
- Draw near. Abraham does not shrink back but comes close; the question is whether we use the access we have.
- Speak boldly. Alone with God, Abraham is bold and reverent at once. He knows the One he speaks to.
- Own the dust. Ashes stood for mourning and total ruin. Abraham uses that word of himself, out loud, before God.
- Go lower, not higher. Nearness to God does not inflate a man. Abraham heads the list of those who condemned themselves in God's presence.
- Be heard. With nothing left to ask for himself, he is free to plead for others. The lower the heart descends, the higher the prayer ascends.
Perhaps there may want five of the fifty righteous wilt thou destroy all the city on account of the five? And he said, If I shall find forty-five there, I will not destroy [it].
Abraham has just called himself dust and ashes, and now he takes his first step down from fifty. His question tests two things: what God will do for the sake of a few righteous people, and how far a man may go in asking Him.
The drop from fifty to forty-five is small. But how Abraham asks matters as much as what he asks for.
When Abraham lowers the number to forty-five (v. 28), he takes the humble place. He recognizes that he is only a creature of dust speaking to his infinitely great Creator. Yet he asks out of confidence in the living God. Again God gives His word that He would not destroy the city if forty-five righteous were found there... Each time he shows that he feels unworthy to ask at all, but the Lord loves to encourage confidence in His grace.
Abraham speaks in numbers. But writers agree that one person stands behind every number: Lot, his nephew, who had settled in Sodom.
Notice how persistent Abraham is about Lot and Sodom. If only we Christians were half as persistent!... The Lord replies that if fifty righteous are found, the city will be saved. And if there are only forty, Lord? Yes! And if only thirty? Yes!... All the while he was thinking of Lot. The thought in his heart was — I believe Lot is a righteous man, though in a wrong position. And there are sure to be a few more like him to make up the necessary ten.
What makes this striking is who Lot had been to Abraham.
Abraham's conduct in this chapter gives us one of the most important results of a holy and separated walk. We see in it a man pleading with God in a most urgent way for one who had turned his back on him and chosen Sodom as the place to live. How completely Abraham's soul must have been lifted above "the things that are seen"! He could forget the quarrel and the parting, the worldliness and evil of Lot, and still plead for him as "a righteous soul."
Each time Abraham lowers the figure, God agrees. One writer sets the scene beside a miracle worked through the prophet Elisha.
For as long as the poor widow brought out her jars, the pot kept giving its oil. The oil waited on the jars. The jars were the measure of the oil. In other words, divine power waited on faith — faith measured the active resources of God on the occasion. This was like the Lord long ago, standing with Abraham. For as long as Abraham stood interceding, the Lord stood promising.
God's care for one righteous man shapes what happens to a whole city. One writer follows that pattern from Lot's rescue down to the world we live in now.
God had to provide for Lot before the fiery storm could fall. The Lord said He could do nothing until Lot had gone out of the city. And the little city of Zoar was spared for his sake, because he asked for it. For the sake of the righteous the wicked are spared. "You are the salt of the earth." Had there been ten righteous men found in those five cities, they would have been spared. And the world is now preserved because the children of God are in it.
The same mercy shows again in the next chapter — the small town of Zoar was spared because one righteous man ran into it.
Sodom would have been spared if only ten righteous persons had been in it. Zoar was spared because only one righteous man entered it. Such is the abounding mercy of our God, and His slowness to judge.
Abraham stops at ten and asks no more. One writer finds the limit in Abraham, not in God.
Alas! our faith never reaches up to the grace of God. We grow weary and fail, not He. We get enough, through His grace, for our blessing, but we rarely venture into its depths... The Lord answered in full everything Abraham's faith and confidence in His grace attempted. Yet His grace went far beyond it. It reached down at last to that one person who lay on Abraham's heart, though he had not the boldness to say so. But the Lord knew it. He did not spare that wicked place — His righteous government required it to be made an example of divine judgment. Even so, He rescued that righteous soul in spite of his faults.
- Ask. The step from fifty to forty-five is dust speaking to its Creator — and still asking. God welcomes that confidence.
- Ask for someone. Every number stands for Lot, the man who had walked out on Abraham. Abraham spends his nearness to God on someone else, not on himself.
- Keep asking. As long as Abraham kept interceding, the Lord kept promising. His asking, not God's supply, set the measure.
- A few can shelter many. God was ready to spare a whole city for the sake of ten; one righteous man saved Zoar. The presence of God's people holds back judgment.
- Grace outruns faith. Abraham stopped at ten, and Sodom still fell. But God reached below that number and rescued the one man Abraham never dared to name.
And he continued yet to speak with him, and said, Perhaps there may be forty found there. And he said, I will not do it for the forty's sake.
God has just told Abraham what He is about to do to Sodom. Abraham does not fall silent — he keeps asking: fifty, then forty-five, now forty. Two questions follow: what gives a man the right to press God like this, and who decides when the pressing stops?
This boldness is not a sudden burst of daring. It grows out of where Abraham already stands with God.
This was a happy and a holy use to make of his place of nearness to God. It is always so. Some souls can "draw near to God" in the assurance of faith, with heart and conscience fully at rest, resting in God about the past, the present and the future. Such a soul will be able and willing to intercede for others.
The tone is what makes this scene unusual.
We think this case stands alone among all the Old Testament records of men meeting God face to face. No other shows such closeness and such freedom, with no fear at all. Abraham, secure in his own standing before the Lord, took the place of an intercessor.
Each yes from God does not end the conversation. It fuels the next ask.
When God tells him what He is going to do, he says, "Will You spare the place for fifty righteous?" and God says, "I will." Then he says, "For forty-five?" God says that if there are forty-five He will not destroy it. This makes Abraham bolder, and he goes on until he is ashamed to trespass any more on God's power.
Abraham keeps owning how small he is, even as he asks for more.
Each time he shows that he feels unworthy to ask. But the Lord loves to encourage confidence in His grace.
Abraham never names Lot. But Lot is why the numbers keep falling.
All the while he was thinking of Lot. The thought in his heart was this: I believe Lot is a righteous man, though he is in a wrong position. There are sure to be a few more like him to make up the necessary ten.
Notice the shape of the exchange. Every lower number comes from Abraham, and each promise answers it.
Divine power waited on faith — faith measured the active resources of God on the occasion. It was the same when the Lord stood with Abraham long ago: as long as Abraham stood interceding, the Lord stood promising.
The dialogue stops at ten, and it stops because Abraham stops. The limit was never on God's side.
He said, "I will speak yet but this once," and there he stopped short, as if afraid of having presented too large a request at the treasury of infinite grace, or forgetting that faith's cheque was never yet refused at God's bank. God did not hold him back. By no means. There was abundance of grace and patience in Him to have listened to His dear servant, had he gone on even to three or one. But the servant was limited. He was afraid of overdrawing his account. He ceased to ask, and God ceased to give.
Faith runs out before grace does. Yet God still went past where Abraham stopped.
Why "I will speak yet but this once"? Our faith never reaches up to the grace of God. We weary and fail, He does not. Through His grace we get enough for our blessing, but we rarely venture into its depths. Although the Lord answered to the full all that Abraham's faith and confidence in His grace attempted, His grace far exceeded it, for it came down after all to that one person who lay on Abraham's heart, though he had not the boldness to say so. But the Lord knew it.
Abraham's whole plea rests on finding enough righteous people to save a city. God later set the number at one.
Later God could say to Jeremiah about the doomed city of Jerusalem, "See if you can find a man, one who does justice and seeks truth, that I may pardon her." We know that Man has been found. Christ is the "one mediator between God and men, the Man Christ Jesus, who gave Himself as a ransom for all." Through this Man we are told to intercede for all men.
- Nearness first. Rest in God about past, present and future, and you can plead for others. Intercession grows out of a settled place before God, not out of nerve.
- Nearness emboldens. Every answer God gave made Abraham braver. The Lord "loves to encourage confidence in His grace," so the humble tone and the rising boldness belong together.
- Nearness measures. As long as Abraham kept interceding, God kept promising; faith set the size of what came back.
- Nearness has a ceiling — ours. The pleading ended at ten because Abraham stopped, not because God did. He feared overdrawing an account that cannot be overdrawn.
- Christ has no ceiling. Abraham's forty was too small, yet God still reached the one man on his heart. God has provided the Man Jerusalem could not supply — Christ — and through Him we are told to pray for all.
And he said, Oh, let not the Lord be angry that I speak! Perhaps there may be thirty found there. And he said, I will not do it if I find thirty there.
Abraham has already asked God to spare Sodom for fifty righteous people, then forty-five, then forty. Now he lowers the number again, and he opens by apologising for daring to speak at all.
Abraham does not use the name Jehovah here. He uses "Adonai," a word that means Master. The ESV renders it "the Lord." One writer notes the title, and also where Abraham was standing when he used it:
The Lord shows His own most patient grace in judgment, both in verse 21 and in the intercession. Abraham never says "Jehovah," but "Adonai." When he pleaded with the Lord, Abraham was not in his own place, at home on earth. He was with Jehovah in the way of faith — we may say a heavenly way. Afterwards he returned to his place, the home of nature. There he had welcomed the Lord. But in his communing and intercession he stood before the Lord, where the Lord had taken him.
Abraham keeps lowering the figure, and God keeps agreeing. One writer sees that repeated yes as God's own encouragement:
When Abraham lowers the number to forty-five, he takes the humble place. He recognises that he is only a creature of dust speaking to his infinitely great Creator. Yet he asks out of confidence in the living God. Again God gives His word that He would not destroy the city if forty-five righteous were found there. Then Abraham reduces the number to forty, and receives the same gracious assurance… Then to thirty, and lower yet to twenty, and finally to ten. Each time he shows that he feels his own unworthiness in making these requests. But the Lord loves to encourage confidence in His grace, and declares that He would not destroy the city if even ten righteous were found there.
Abraham's "let not the Lord be angry" sounds nervous, yet he keeps speaking. And what he asks for has nothing to do with himself:
Notice how Abraham's remarkable pleadings blend deep reverence with simple familiarity. Then remember what he is pleading for. Nothing he says concerns himself or any personal interest of his own. His first concern is the reputation and glory of the great "Judge of all the earth." His second is the deliverance of Lot and his family, and the plight of the sinners of Sodom.
Why did God not state His terms at the start, instead of waiting for Abraham to ask again and again? One writer compares this scene with the widow whose oil kept flowing while she kept bringing jars:
As long as the poor widow kept bringing out her jars, the pot kept producing its oil. The oil waited on the jars. The jars were the measure of the oil. In other words, divine power waited on faith. Faith measured what God's power did that day. It was the same long ago when the Lord stood with Abraham. For as long as Abraham stood interceding, the Lord stood promising.
Two verses later Abraham says he will speak only once more, and then he stops. So how far could he have gone? One writer says the limit lay in the man, not in God:
We see in this scripture that Abraham's intercession, however blessed it may have been, had a limit. The intercessor was only a man. It did not reach the need. He said, "I will speak yet but this once," and there he stopped short. It was as if he feared he had drawn too large an amount on the treasury of infinite grace. Or he forgot that faith's cheque was never yet refused at God's bank. God was not the one who limited him. Far from it. There was plenty of grace and patience in Him to listen to His dear servant, even if he had gone down to three or one. But the servant had a limit. He was afraid of overdrawing his account. He ceased to ask, and God ceased to give. Not so our blessed Intercessor. Of Him we can say, "He is able to save to the uttermost… since he always lives to make intercession."
- Place — Abraham prays where God had brought him, not on his own home ground.
- Permission — he calls God Master and fears He may be angry. God's reply shows no anger at all.
- Pattern — every lower number meets the same yes. God loves to draw out confidence in His grace.
- Proportion — Abraham received what he asked for. Faith set the measure of what God's power did that day.
- Point — the prayer stopped because the man stopped asking, not because God's grace ran out. It sends us to the Intercessor who saves completely.
And he said, Behold now, I have ventured to speak with the Lord. Perhaps there may be twenty found there. And he said, I will not destroy [it] for the twenty's sake.
Abraham has already asked God to spare Sodom for fifty righteous people, then forty-five, forty and thirty. Now he steps down to twenty — a man who knows he has no standing to speak at all, and who keeps on speaking.
His pleading is not a stray impulse. It is what he does with the nearness he already has.
Intercession for others before the Lord. God enabled him to plead for those who were mixed up in Sodom's defilement, and in danger of sharing Sodom's judgment. This was a happy and a holy use to make of his place of nearness to God. So it always is. Think of the soul that can "draw near to God" in the assurance of faith. Its heart and conscience are at perfect rest, and it can rest in God about the past, the present and the future. That soul will be able and willing to intercede for others.
He speaks like a man who knows the gap between himself and the One he addresses. That is exactly the kind of person God hears.
A spiritual prayer is a humble prayer: "O LORD, you hear the desire of the afflicted" (Psalm 10:17; older translations read "the humble"). Prayer is the asking of alms, which requires humility. It is fitting to see a poor nothing lie at the feet of its Maker: "Behold, I have undertaken to speak to the Lord, I who am but dust and ashes" (Genesis 18:27). The lower the heart descends, the higher the prayer ascends. God accepts broken expressions, when they come from broken hearts.
Nothing in this conversation is about Abraham's own safety. He is outside the danger, asking on behalf of people inside it.
Abraham's prayer had no relation to Abraham's own wants. He was safe from the judgments about to fall on the wicked. Still he pleads earnestly for the righteous who were mixed in among them, in danger of sharing their judgment. … This is a high order of prayer. It is prayer where a servant of the Lord rises above private or personal needs and cares deeply about Christ's interests in His people.
Twenty is granted as readily as fifty was. The limit in this exchange never comes from God's side.
How great the intimacy, how strong the confidence — we might almost say, what familiarity he uses in his pleading! And how pleasing to God his anxiety that righteous men should not be caught up in the judgment — indeed more, that even the guilty cities should be spared if only ten righteous men should be found there! God goes as far as Abraham's faith. It was he that ceased to ask before God ceased to grant. What a mighty power with God is faith! He in grace would have gone further, if Abraham's faith had.
The falling numbers say something about God, not only about Abraham. He takes no pleasure in destroying.
The sins of the cities of the plain were great, and cried out for judgment. But judgment is God's strange work. He does not will the death of any, and in Abraham He found a man after His own heart. So Abraham pleaded. He had a care for God's honour, for he had no doubt that the Judge of all the earth would do right. His plea was that the cities might be spared for the sake of the righteous in them. How gladly God would have shown mercy if fifty righteous men had been found in them, or forty-five, or forty, or thirty, or twenty, or even ten. And as long as Abraham interceded, God answered and stayed the judgment.
Abraham stopped a few verses later, at ten. One person was on his heart the whole time, and he never dared to name him.
Alas! our faith never reaches up to the grace of God. We weary and fail, not He. We get enough, through His grace, for our blessing, but rarely do we venture into its depths. … The Lord answered to the full all that Abraham's faith and confidence in His grace attempted. Yet His grace far exceeded it. It came down after all to that one person who lay on the heart of Abraham, though Abraham had not the boldness to say so. But the Lord knew it. He did not spare that wicked place, yet He still rescued that righteous soul in spite of his faults.
Abraham's pleading ran out. There is an Intercessor whose pleading never does.
He said, "I will speak yet but this once," and there he stopped short. It was as if he feared he had presented too large a cheque at the treasury of infinite grace — or as if he forgot that faith's cheque was never yet refused at God's bank. It was not that God limited him. By no means. … But the servant was limited. He was afraid of overdrawing his account. He ceased to ask, and God ceased to give. Not so our blessed Intercessor. Of Him it can be said, "He is able to save to the uttermost … since He always lives to make intercession."
- Nearness first. Abraham prays from the place where he already stands with God. Intercession is the holy use of that nearness. It belongs to a heart at rest about itself.
- Lowness rises. He calls himself dust and ashes and keeps speaking. The lower the heart descends, the higher the prayer ascends.
- Others only. He is safe from the coming judgment, and he asks nothing for himself. That is a high order of prayer: it is all about someone else.
- God's yes. Fifty, forty, thirty, twenty — God grants each one. Judgment is His strange work, and He would gladly have spared the city. Abraham stopped asking before God stopped giving.
- Grace beyond. He never dared name the one man on his heart, yet God rescued him. Our pleading has limits. The Intercessor who "always lives" has none.
And he said, Oh, let not the Lord be angry, that I speak yet but this time! Perhaps there may be ten found there. And he said, I will not destroy [it] for the ten's sake.
Abraham's sixth and last request drops the number to ten, and he prefaces it with an apology for asking at all. God agrees again. Yet the next chapter shows there were not even ten. So why did Abraham stop here, and what became of the one man he had in mind all along?
Abraham feels his smallness at every step down, and the last step is the most careful. His hesitation never once slows God's answer.
When Abraham lowers the number to forty-five, he takes the humble place. He is only a creature of dust speaking to his infinitely great Creator. Yet he asks out of confidence in the living God... Then to thirty, and lower yet to twenty, and finally to ten. Each time he shows that he feels unworthy to ask. But the Lord loves to encourage confidence in His grace. He declares that He will not destroy the city if there are even ten righteous people in it.
The number is not random. Abraham had one household in view, and ten is likely what he counted in it.
He reasoned before the Lord in the assurance that the Judge of all the earth would do right, and in his pleadings he doubtless had Lot and his family in view. In the next chapter we read of Lot's sons-in-law. So he probably counted his wife, his unmarried daughters, his married daughters and their husbands. Together they might come to as many as ten in Sodom who could be counted righteous. So, starting at fifty, and going down to forty-five, forty, thirty, twenty, he stopped satisfied at ten. The next chapter shows that even ten were not there.
The man sets the limit here, not God. And what Abraham never dared to ask, God went on to do.
Why "this once"? Our faith never reaches up to the grace of God. We grow weary and fail; He does not. We get enough, through His grace, for our blessing, but we rarely venture into its depths. The Lord answered in full all that Abraham's faith dared to ask, yet His grace went far beyond it. It came down after all to that one person who lay on Abraham's heart, though Abraham did not have the boldness to say so. But the Lord knew it. He did not spare that wicked place, yet He still rescued that righteous soul despite his faults.
In the next chapter God rescues Lot — an answer to something Abraham never actually asked for.
Abraham had not definitely asked for this. Still, he kept pleading until he had the promise that God would spare the cities if only ten righteous people were inside. He surely had Lot and his family in mind. There were not ten righteous there. All the same, God answered the spirit of Abraham's prayer. He rescued the one man who could be called righteous.
Where Abraham's asking ended, the giving ended too. Christ's intercession has no such limit.
We see, in this scripture, that however blessed Abraham's intercession might be, it was limited, because the intercessor was only a man. It did not reach the need. He said, "I will speak again but this once," and there he stopped short. It was as if he feared he had asked too much from the treasury of infinite grace... There was plenty of grace and patience in God to have listened to His dear servant, had he gone on even to three or one. But the servant was limited... He stopped asking, and God stopped giving. Not so our blessed Intercessor. Of Him it can be said, "He is able to save to the uttermost... since He always lives to make intercession."
God would have spared a whole city for ten people. The same reason holds back judgment on the world today.
For the sake of the righteous the wicked are spared. "You are the salt of the earth." Had there been ten righteous men found in those five cities, they would have been spared. And the world is now preserved because the children of God are in it, for He is "not wishing that any should perish."
Judgment fell only when that margin was gone.
It is beautiful to see that the Lord does not judge Sodom until it has all become so bad that there were not even ten righteous persons there.
- Asking. Abraham comes as dust before his Creator, yet he keeps asking. Reverence and boldness belong together in prayer.
- Counting. Ten was likely Lot's household counted up. The next chapter shows even that number was too high.
- Stopping. "This once" was the limit of Abraham's faith, not of God's grace. God stopped giving because Abraham stopped asking.
- Exceeding. God answered the prayer's spirit rather than its letter, saving the one man Abraham never dared to name.
- Continuing. A human intercessor runs out. Christ never does. He saves to the uttermost, because He always lives to make intercession.
And Jehovah went away when he had ended speaking to Abraham; and Abraham returned to his place.
The chapter ends quietly: the pleading stops, God leaves, and Abraham walks home. The verse turns on who stopped the conversation, and on how much grace was still on offer when Abraham's words ran out.
God did not cut the exchange short. He kept answering as long as there was anything left to ask. He left only when Abraham had finished.
As long as Abraham stood interceding, the Lord stood promising.
Darby reads the ending as the close of a rare privilege.
It closed this wonderful conference. Abraham's words ran out, and the Lord had answered him to the end. Then He went His way, when He had finished speaking with Abraham. What a place for the child of faith to be in!
Abraham came down step by step: fifty, forty-five, forty, thirty, twenty. Then he said he would speak just once more. Kelly reads that "once more" as the point where the asking gave out, not the giving.
Why "this once"? Sadly, our faith never reaches up to the grace of God. We grow weary and fail; He does not. We get enough, through His grace, for our blessing, but we rarely venture into its depths. Measure it as we may, we certainly never reach the bottom.
The same limit is described as a failure to draw on what was on offer.
Each time God, in His grace, grants his request; until at last it is Abraham's faith that fails to draw upon that grace of God, that where sin abounds, grace abounds much more.
Abraham never got below ten. The next chapter shows what God did with what Abraham had asked.
Abraham is silent (v. 33): "And the LORD went his way, when he had finished speaking to Abraham." But He did more than Abraham asked. He withdrew Lot from Sodom and saved him. Nothing could be done until Lot was safe (Gen. 19:16, 22). God's eye was upon him. What blessedness to be able to count on His love for the righteous!
Kelly follows that grace past Abraham's last request, down to the man he never dared to name.
Jehovah answered in full everything Abraham's faith and confidence in His grace attempted. Yet His grace went far beyond that. It came down at last to the one person who lay on Abraham's heart, though he had not the boldness to say so. But Jehovah knew it. He did not spare that wicked place, for His righteous government made it an example of divine judgment. Even so, He rescued that righteous soul, in spite of his faults.
The pleading did not start with Abraham. It started when God told him what He was about to do, and treated him as someone worth telling.
When a soul is in this confidence, God shares His thoughts. Here He treats Abraham as a friend, telling him even what concerns the world. With a friend we do not speak of mere business, but of what we have on our heart. Intercession is the fruit of divine revelation and fellowship.
Losing that nearness shows up first in what we can no longer pray for.
If we cannot intercede for a person, the sin is stronger than our faith. When we are near God in practice, the Spirit which sees the sin intercedes for the sinner.
Darby reads the last clause as a step down — back to ordinary life, off the ground where Abraham had been praying.
Abraham was not in his own place, at home on earth, when he pleaded with the Lord. He was with Jehovah in the way of faith — we may say a heavenly way. He returned to his place, the home of nature. There he had received the Lord. But in his fellowship and intercession he was before the Lord, where the Lord had taken him.
Sodom had no ten righteous men. Later God narrowed the search to one.
Later God could say to Jeremiah about the doomed city of Jerusalem, "if you can find a man, one who does justice and seeks truth, that I may pardon her" (Jer. 5:1). We know that Man has been found. Christ is the "one mediator between God and men, the man Christ Jesus, who gave himself as a ransom for all." Through this Man we are told to intercede for all people (1 Tim. 2:1-6).
- Friendship first. God told Abraham what He was about to do, because He treated him as a friend. The praying grew out of that friendship, not the other way round.
- Faith measures. God kept answering as long as Abraham kept asking — the asking set the limit, not the supply.
- Faith stops early. Abraham reached ten and stopped. Our faith fails to reach the depth of grace; grace never fails us.
- Grace goes further. God went further than the asking. He spared no city, but pulled Lot out before judgment fell.
- One Man found. Sodom lacked ten righteous men, and God later looked in Jerusalem for a single man. That Man is Christ, and through Him we now pray for others.