Today’s Scripture Reading (December
19, 2016): Isaiah 1
I am
convinced that we have missed the moral message out of the story of the
destruction of Sodom and Gomorrah. For us, the story of Sodom and Gomorrah
seems to have been all about the homosexual
behavior present in the two cities. Except that,
that isn’t quite right. The gay threat of
the story is really same-sex rape. And if you want to prove to
yourself that the “gay” part of the story
is irrelevant to the message, ask yourself this question – do I feel any better
about Lot’s offer of his virgin daughters to the mob rather than the two men
(Genesis 19:8). I think most of us find Lot’s solution to the problem as bad or
worse than the men of the town wanting to
have sex with the two male visitors. The transfer of the violence from the men
(we know that they were angels) to Lot’s daughters does nothing to satisfy our
sense of justice. And so we are left with a feeling
of outrage over the story, one that I believe has been mistakenly laid on the homosexual
threat.
This is not even
about same-sex desire. These men are not “desiring” the visitors. They seek to
punish them. Maybe it was an outgrowth of the conflicts and wars that the
cities had experienced. They had become isolationist in their policies. They
wished to keep the visitor, or the stranger, away. And if someone did stumble
upon them, they would punish them – and word would spread (it is evident that
that had already happened) and people would stay away.
The story of
Sodom and Gomorrah is a classic story of the exercise of power over the
oppressed. The men of the town had the military strength, the numbers, to do
whatever they wanted to the visitors who stumbled across their place of
dwelling. Even Lot, who had come to Sodom as a foreigner, was not immune. The
men threaten even worse with regard to
Lot than what they are about to do to the
two visitors. And it was this abuse of power that angered God and caused the
destruction of the cities.
So as Isaiah
opens up his prophecy, he reminds his
readers of the story of Sodom and Gomorrah (Isaiah 1:9). His solution is to do
what is right. And again, doing what is right has nothing to do with avoiding
homosexuality – homosexuality is not mentioned
by the prophet. It is that we would seek justice; that we would defend
the weak and the stranger and the visitor; and that we would plead the case of the widow and the fatherless wherever it
might be that we will find them. Wherever the abuse of power might exist, it is
the task of the follower of God to confront that abuse with every ounce of
force that we might have. We take the side of the weak and those who are unable
to take up the fight for themselves. We may have forgotten this at times, but
in every battle for the rights of the
oppressed, it is the believer in God who is
called into action.
And so our
cities and towns and villages will become places where the stranger is welcome,
even when we may not agree with them. There is safety around us because God is
in us. And this is what God desires.
Tomorrow’s Scripture Reading: Isaiah
2
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