January 8, 2018: Day 14 – Genesis 14

So this chapter falls under one of those stories in Scripture that make you say hmm.  Lot is taken captive as a result of his town, Sodom, being overrun in one of those very common territorial battles.  But those who were attacking Sodom made a mistake.  They allowed one of the men to escape.  As a result Abraham heard that Lot had been taken captive so he gathered up the hired hands around his house, 318 of them, and went out and conquered those who had conquered Sodom.  They were incredible warriors and Scripture doesn’t let you forget that.  It states that they routed their enemies and Abraham took back all that had been taken.  So think about that for a moment.  Abraham had 318 men who were working for him.  What does that tell you?

The king of Sodom said to Abram that he wanted to give him a large portion of the loot.  But Abram refused because he didn’t want the kind of Sodom to take any credit for the victory.  All the glory belonged to God.  I saw the College Football Playoff Championship Game last night.  It was great to see this young freshman who was the star of the show say: “People may not like it but I want to give all glory to God.”  I’m not a huge fan of public displays of faith in order to garner attention, but this was genuine.  

Don’t skip over King Melchizedek who is described as the priest of the Most High God.  Jesus is compared to this type of high priest in Hebrews 4 and following.  We also see the idea of the tithe starting to find its way into our way of thinking as Abraham offered 10% of what he had made.  But this also sets us up, again, for the recognition that when the men of Sodom come to Lot and want to do harm to his guests, there is a history there where we find that Lot’s Uncle has basically saved the city and the kingdom of Sodom and yet the people have absolutely no regard for it.  That is a big deal.  We get to that in a few more chapters.