Over the past few years, I have become certain that we have read the story of Sodom
and Gomorrah, as well as the partner story of Gibeah (Judges 19), wrong. I am
not saying that whatever you might believe about same-sex sexual activity is
necessarily wrong. On that issue, I choose to withhold my judgment. But we
cannot use the story of Sodom and Gomorrah, and the story of Gibeah, as proof
to the wickedness of a same-sex
lifestyle. That is reading into the story
facts that simply are not there, no matter how much we might want them to be.
The twin stories of Sodom and Gomorrah,
and Gibeah, are about hospitality, not
same-sex sexual interaction. The crisis present in the story is that two
visitors come to Sodom, and later to Gibeah, in search of a place to sleep. In
both stories, the people of the towns are xenophobic; they fear the stranger. The threatened same-sex rape in both
stories is instituted as ways to keep
unwanted strangers from stopping by their towns. Sodom was not populated by same-sex attracted males. It was
populated by men who wanted to punish any visitors who chose to visit the town.
In the case of the story of Sodom and Gomorrah, the story of the destruction of
the cities is preceded by a wonderful
example of hospitality extended to these same visitors by Abraham. The opposition
of these two stories is purposeful. Abraham extended the proper hospitality
that was required by the situation. The men of Sodom did not.
In the ancient world, hospitality was
incredibly important. There were no hotels in which to stop. If one had to
travel, for whatever reason, they did so only with the help of the strangers
that they would meet along the way. The practice was understood. I will help
you on your travels because one day I might need the help of a stranger to assist me.
Abraham had sent his servant to find a wife
for his son. The servant did not want to find just any woman but needed to know that the child possessed the necessary
characteristics to make a good wife for Isaac. One of those characteristics
would have been that she was trained in
the practice of hospitality. When Rebekah gave him water and offered to water
his animals, she passed one of the first tests of hospitality. When the servant
asked her if there might be a room in her father’s house for him stay, it was
the second hospitality test. The servant understood that how Rebekah reacted to
a stranger is important, especially if Abraham was going to become the father
of a mighty nation.
Hospitality has become an awkward behavior in
a world dominated by social media, and one where we seem to want to live in an echo chamber of our own closely held beliefs.
We have not reached the evil levels of Sodom, Gomorrah, and Gibeah, but a quick
glance at how we treat the stranger in our midst, the immigrant, or the Sikh,
Muslim, and Buddhist, should tell us that we have taken the first steps toward
their evil behavior. We no longer need to depend on the hospitality of
strangers to travel, but the practice of
welcoming the stranger into our midst is still important, at least it is if we
want to follow in the steps of Jesus.
Tomorrow’s Scripture Reading: Genesis 25
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