GENESIS 13
In the beginning of this chapter we see Abram fully recovered. He returned to the point of departure, “the place where his tent had been at the beginning”, and “to the place of the altar that he had made there at the first”, and then “Abram called on the name of Jehovah”. He came back, in figure, to full privilege and blessing. God is the God of recovery; He never gives up His thought for us; and we need to have hearts established with grace. When believers get away from the path and joy of faith, they are often tempted to give up all as hopeless, but through the infinite and altogether unmerited favour of God there is a way back, through self-judgment, to all that has been enjoyed before. Even where there is no outward departure the heart often gets away from the true enjoyment of spiritual blessings. But this need not continue.
The Lord said to Peter, “I have prayed for thee”. When we are right He intercedes for us that we may have all needed grace and support in the path of God’s will. But if we get into a wrong place or condition His intercession may be answered by the discipline of God. We may come under dealings which are humbling to us, and which perhaps involve suffering for others, like Jehovah’s dealings with Pharaoh and his house. God is saying by it, I must have you back to your tent and altar, and to the spirit of dependence. Full restoration is always God’s thought. However far a saint may have wandered, God never departs from His thought; and He is always working to bring the saint back to it. Sometimes there is a little reviving without restoration to the point departed from, but we should be exercised to come back to the full height of our calling and privilege.
Lot was the companion of the man of faith, but he does not seem to have had any personal energy of faith for himself. He went with Abram from Mesopotamia to Canaan, and from Canaan to Egypt, and then back [p. 110] to Canaan. There are a good many Lots who hang upon others, but this is not enough, for some day a test will come. When Lot was tested he was found to be a man of sight; he was converted, but he was not a man of faith. And having been in Egypt had a serious effect upon him, for when he saw the plain of the Jordan, where Sodom was, it appealed to him as being “like the land of Egypt”!
It is much easier to lead people down to Egypt than to take the love of it out of their hearts when it has once come there. This was a solemn thing in Abram’s history. Many a believer who has gone down to Egypt, and got recovered afterwards himself, has been the means of leading another there who never got recovered. Lot never got true spiritual recovery; he never really had the pilgrim spirit or the priestly character, though God’s mercy cared for him. If it had not been for the New Testament we should not have known that he was a converted man. It is sad to get the influence of Egypt into the heart. The children of the saints, brought up in the nurture and admonition of the Lord, have the great privilege of never having the taste for Egyptian things developed; and then they have never to suffer from reminiscences of Egypt. The Israelites, having been in Egypt, could remember what they had there; they said, “We remember the fish that we ate in Egypt for nothing; the cucumbers, and the melons, and the leeks, and the onions, and the garlic”, Numbers 11: 5. If you have once tasted the things of Egypt you never forget, and when your soul declines spiritually there is ever the tendency to turn back to them. Another side to Abram’s act was that he got Hagar from Egypt, and she became a cause of difficulty later on. You [p. 111] never know what will be the fruit of any step of departure: you may have to reap the fruit all your life; and what is, in one sense, sadder still, others may have to reap the fruit also.
Then we find the difficulty about the flocks and herds, and strife between the herdsmen. The abundance of possessions only became a source of trouble, and strife came in. It is mentioned that “the Canaanite and the Perizzite were dwelling then in the land”, as though to mark the seriousness of strife in the presence of such lookers-on. There are enemies looking on, and ready to note what happens among the people of God; it is a poor testimony if there is seen to be strife between the servants. “A bondman of the Lord ought not to contend, but be gentle towards all; apt to teach; forbearing; in meekness setting right those who oppose”, 2 Timothy 2: 24. Contention is generally connected with something that pertains to us, or that we think pertains to us, in this world. If I want a place for myself it is very likely to lead to strife. But Abram was entirely apart from the spirit of strife. “Let there be no contention ... for we are brethren”. He met the spirit of strife by the spirit of surrender; there was no insistence on any rights for himself; if Lot would go to the left he would take the right, or if Lot preferred the right he would take the left. He did not grasp at anything here; he would leave all with God; a beautiful example. It was said even of Christ, “He shall not strive or cry out, nor shall any one hear his voice in the streets”. He was the chosen Servant, the beloved One of God, in whom His soul found its delight. He would leave everything in the hands of God, and not strive for any place, but go on with His [p. 112] service. I think we can see something of the Spirit of Christ in Abram.
All this became a test to Lot; he “lifted up his eyes and beheld all the plain of Jordan that it was thoroughly watered ... as the garden of Jehovah, like the land of Egypt”. It was all naturally beautiful and very attractive. The “garden of Jehovah” suggests to me that there was everything desirable providentially: he could not wish for a better place. There are times when Satan puts before us something like that to get us out of the path of faith, and people think it is divinely ordered, and such a providence. They say, I was exercised and this opened up; it is just what I wanted! The question is, Did we look at it with Lot’s eyes or with Abram’s? There was everything in the plain of the Jordan attractive for a man with cattle. We may be tested by circumstances that look like the perfection of God’s ordering, yet it may be just our own choice. There is nothing more deadly than the choice of the creature; Lot chose for himself. It is a contrast to what the Psalmist says, “He hath chosen our inheritance for us”. Let things be God’s choice! We need faith for that. If I look at things with the eye of sight I look at them as they appear to me, but faith looks at things as they are under the eye of God. When a thing looks as if providentially ordered, be careful about it! There never was a more remarkable providence than that which put Moses in Pharaoh’s palace; and yet when he came to faith’s maturity, he turned his back on the providence of God which put him there, and cast in his lot with the people of God.
We find Lot’s estimate rather mixed between the garden of the Lord and Egypt: he seemed to class [p. 113] both together; and he entirely failed to take account of moral conditions; so the Spirit of God adds, “And the people of Sodom were wicked, and great sinners before Jehovah”, verse 13. That is what the place was under God’s eye. It looked as though nothing could be better ordered for Lot and his cattle, but the moral conditions were very serious before God. If Lot had considered that, he would not have chosen such a place: there was no calling on the Name of the Lord there. The moral state of the place ought to have been a sufficient warning from God to prevent Lot from moving in that direction. I do not believe that the Lord suffers His people to enter on a disastrous course without warning; there is always a danger signal, but it may be disregarded with ruinous consequences.
Lot had no brethren in Sodom, a marked contrast to Abram, who dwelt in Hebron. Hebron means ‘company’; it is a fine place. You do not get the company of the saints in Sodom. Are you seeking company? An honoured servant of the Lord used to tell us that company was better than property. Lot was on the line of property, but it is better to dwell in Hebron and have company; there is no company like that of the saints. Lot was unhappy, and vexed his righteous soul every day. How many of the people of God are in circumstances where they are vexed every day!
Then “Jehovah said to Abram ... 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 will I give to thee, and to thy seed for ever”. Abram had something to look at as well as Lot, but it was a different kind of vision! He got a wonderful enlargement;
[p. 114] God told him to look northward, southward, eastward, westward. It is like Ephesians 3: 18. The man who surrendered here got in figure a heavenly portion. I have no doubt we should have a clearer vision of the heavenly inheritance if we were more marked by surrender here. In the last century those who came out for the Lord were men who had made surrender; they were men of position and parts who could have made their mark in the world; but in proportion as they surrendered they got great spiritual expansion. It is a great thing to surrender: there is something you might have in this world, and you give it up because it is not on the line of the Spirit. Then you see all God’s purpose in Christ. What an expansion! “The breadth and length and depth and height”.
The names of these places at the end of the chapter are full of suggestion. Mamre means ‘vigour’ and Hebron means ‘company’. They suggest spiritual vigour, and a circle where fellowship can be enjoyed. We ought to see to it that we are found spiritually in what answers to this.