Study in the Epistle of Jude # 32: Verse 7

by Chris McCann

EBible Fellowship (http://www.ebiblefellowship.com)

Welcome to the Electronic Bible Fellowship’s Bible study. We are currently going through the book of Jude. We have come to verse 7 of this Epistle, which speaks of the destruction of Sodom and Gomorrah. So far, we have seen that Sodom is used by God in the Bible to typify the church, and more than that, to describe the church during the time of the Great Tribulation when the two witnesses are lying dead in the street (Revelation 11).

That picture of the two witnesses is a very vivid picture of a lifeless church that God has forsaken because of their apostasy and continual rebellion against Him. He has given up the two witnesses to be destroyed by Satan, who has been loosed out of the bottomless pit. Therefore, their “dead bodies shall lie in the street of the great city” (Revelation 11:8).

God says that this city “spiritually is called Sodom and Egypt.” In using that kind of language, God is connecting Sodom with the church that will meet its fate at the time of the Great Tribulation. Once Satan has been loosed, the testimony of the churches and congregations of the world will be finished, and God will no longer use the church. God has identified this dead church with Sodom.

We have complete Biblical justification and validation for turning back to Genesis 19 and looking at the history of the destruction of Sodom. We can find that it is a historical parable that is teaching us truths about the period of Great Tribulation, which comes right before the end of the world. We have seen that God entered into the city in the form of two angels, who were most definitely a representation of the Lord Himself. He sought out the true believers in the city (who, since Sodom had become so wicked, were a very small number). He found only Lot and his family. In the form of two angels, He approached unto Lot, who took Him into his house.

The evil men of Sodom saw that some strangers had visited their city, and they wanted to do who-knows-what to them—all manner of evil things were happening in Sodom. They compassed Lot’s house round about. They were pressing upon him to enter into his house and to break the door, until these two angels, as they are called, pulled Lot back into the house and shut the door.

This language of these men rescuing Lot in this manner and pulling him into the safety of his house and shutting the door is very significant. It reminds us of the flood of Noah’s day. God had warned Noah that in seven days He would destroy the world with a flood (Genesis 7:4). Noah entered into the ark along with his family as well as all of the animals that God had prescribed to enter the ark. Then we read in Genesis 7:16 that “the Lord shut him in.”

This is very similar to what we read in Genesis 19, where the Lord, in the form of these two men, these two angels, pulls Lot into the house and shuts the door. After this, Genesis 19:11 says:

And they smote the men that were at the door of the house with blindness, both small and great: so that they wearied themselves to find the door.

This door is a representation, a type of salvation, just as the door to the ark was. The door of the ark pictured deliverance. It was the only way to escape the flood and not be drowned in the waters that would overtake the earth. Seeing that the entire world would be covered by those waters, there was only one way of escape, which was to enter through the door into the ark. There a man could find safety; there he would survive the devastating flood that God would bring upon the world. Then, God shut the door and locked it, so that none could open it.

This is similar to what we read concerning the Lord Jesus Christ. He has the keys of Heaven and Hell (Revelation 1:18). When He opens the door, none can shut it, and when He shuts the door, none can open it (Revelation 3:7).

The door is shut at Lot’s house in the city of Sodom. God is finished dealing with the city, and there will be no further deliverance for any of its inhabitants. That door is picturing the salvation plan of God. It is closed now, and God is no longer saving anyone from “Sodom.” He is no longer bringing a Gospel message of mercy and of blessing, but one of judgment. It is the time of “Sodom’s” visitation. It is the day of their visitation by God. Now God has seen first hand what He already knew. He has seen that “Sodom” is extremely wicked before Him and ripe for judgment. There is absolutely no reason whatsoever not to bring judgment upon “Sodom.” However, God did come to warn the righteous. He did come to warn Lot and his family to escape the city, as we will see later on.

As we have seen earlier, the door represents the Lord Jesus Christ. Let us look at this once again, because it helps us to be reminded of such things. We are called upon by God to keep these things in remembrance (Jude 1), as far as the Word of God is concerned. In John 10:7-9, we read:

Then said Jesus unto them again, Verily, verily, I say unto you, I am the door of the sheep. All that ever came before me are thieves and robbers: but the sheep did not hear them. I am the door: by me if any man enter in, he shall be saved, and shall go in and out, and find pasture.

Here we see the importance of “the door.” “The door” means that someone can enter into the Kingdom of God. The only way to go in, the only way to become saved, is to go through Christ to the Father. That is the only way of salvation, as we read in the book of Acts that there is none other name under Heaven given among men whereby we must be saved (Acts 4:12). It is only through Christ. Jesus says in John 14:6 that He is “the way, the truth, and the life.” There is no other way. There is only one door that leads to salvation.

How terrible and how awful it is once God shuts the door! Worse than that, to absolutely guarantee that no one will locate the door or stumble upon it by happenstance or chance or coincidence, God strikes the people of Sodom with blindness. We have to keep in mind that we are talking about the church here. Genesis 19 is spiritually speaking about the church. This is the spiritual meaning of God smiting the men of Sodom with blindness.

In most cases, if not all, blindness in the Bible points to spiritual blindness. These are blind men who cannot see, and they are wandering about looking for the door. They are looking to enter into Lot’s house where the Lord has come and taken up residence. Yet, they cannot find the door. They weary themselves to find it. They are laboring and working hard to find it. However, it is all in vain and it will not profit them. They will never find the door.

We do not read in the rest of the account that these men ever located the door. They were neutralized; they were no longer a threat to Lot and his family. They were struck with blindness, and that is where God leaves them.

This is the sad tale of the church today. It is the sad situation of our present-day congregations. God has struck them with spiritual blindness, and they cannot find “the door.”

That is definitely what we see today as we examine the gospels that are being presented by the various churches. It does not matter whatever denomination you choose to look at. Catholic or Protestant, Reformed or liberal, when you examine what they are teaching, you can tell that they have no idea where “the door” is. They have no idea of the way to salvation, nor of how to get right with God, as God has outlined in the Bible. They have developed gospels out of their own minds. They have designed doctrines that have the church’s blessing. They have produced teachings that have the blessing of theologians and pastors and deacons and elders. However, they lack the blessing of God. They are showing their ignorance and their spiritual blindness with the declarations that they are making regarding the Word of God. They are wearying themselves and working overtime, in many cases, to present their gospels.

Yet, this shows that they are stumbling about, wandering “to and fro” (Psalm 107:27) in blindness. They cannot find “the door.” There is no salvation in the churches that have added to and subtracted from the Word of God (Revelation 22:18-19). There is no salvation in the churches that have the “tongues” gospel, and there never has been. There is no salvation in the churches that dare to say that the church’s authority is above that of the Bible, and there never has been. On and on we could go, pointing to areas where the people of “Sodom,” the rulers of “Israel,” the authorities of the churches today, are spiritually blind.

God has sent them a “strong delusion that they should believe a lie” (2 Thessalonians 2:11). That is what spiritual blindness is—believing other gospels. Spiritual blindness is thinking that you have the Truth when you are far from it. Therefore, these men of Sodom who are being struck with blindness at the door of Lot’s house are a picture of what God is doing today as He is judging His church, as judgment is beginning at the house of God (1 Peter 4:17).

Then in Genesis 19:12, we go on to read:

And the men said unto Lot, Hast thou here any besides? son in law, and thy sons, and thy daughters, and whatsoever thou hast in the city, bring them out of this place:

God has taken it upon Himself to enter into Sodom. He did not send a prophet. He did not send someone like Jeremiah or Isaiah or Ezekiel. Rather, He took it upon Himself and went to Sodom in the person of these two angels. God did not take upon Himself a human nature as He would later when Christ would come to earth, but rather this is only an appearance of God. These two men, these two messengers, however, are indeed God. He is showing Himself at Sodom and visiting Lot and his family. God has come to the city to see first hand the evil there. He does see it—it is all around Him.

Then in verse 13, God’s plan is revealed. It says there:

For we will destroy this place, because the cry of them is waxen great before the face of the LORD; and the LORD hath sent us to destroy it.

God’s intention is to utterly destroy Sodom. Is He not right in doing so? Is He not just in doing so? Is God an evil God because when man rebels and sins against Him, as these men of Sodom have, and shake their puny hands towards Him, God brings judgment upon them? Is God unjust when He brings judgment upon fallen creatures who dare to raise themselves up in their arrogance and pride to exalt themselves above the knowledge of God (2 Corinthians 10:5)?

No, God is perfectly just. He is perfectly within His rights to visit someone, whether it be an individual as He takes them in death, or a whole city such as Sodom as He comes to them historically and sees their wickedness. God is very much within His rights as the Creator, the “King of Kings and Lord of Lords” (Revelation 19:16), the great God of the Bible, to visit a city, evaluate and examine it, and make a declaration to pass judgment against it. It is within His rights to say, “I will destroy this place.”

God will destroy “Sodom.” They are guilty of transgressing His Law, and how horribly they have done so! They have flaunted their evil deeds in His very face. Because of this, it is God’s plan to destroy them.

This is what their sin has brought about. It is not God’s fault that Sodom was so wicked and evil. It is not God’s fault that these men cared nothing for the Law of God—that they did not humble themselves under His Law, nor desire to be obedient to His Word. These men, if anything, were begging for destruction. They were crying out to the heavens that God might judge them and destroy their evil city.

Therefore, God responds. He is not unaware or ignorant of what is taking place in this world (Matthew 10:26). God knows exactly what is going on here, just as He knows exactly what is going on within the heart of each individual within the world. God has a “set time” (Exodus 9:5), and at that point in history, it was the time to visit Sodom and to bring about its destruction.

Once again, we have to keep in mind that Sodom is a picture and a type of the church. Therefore, we can relate what we are reading regarding Sodom to the New Testament church. God Himself relates the two in Revelation 11, where He speaks of the New Testament church at its end as “Sodom.”

Knowing this, we can see that God will visit the New Testament church. There will come a time, after a period of days after which God has demonstrated His longsuffering patience with the churches and congregations, when He will come to find out if what He has heard is true. Is it true that the church of the Lord Jesus Christ is involved in such wickedness as has been reported? Could it be that these evil deeds coming up unto His attention are accurate? Is it possible that the church, which is to be subservient to the Law of God, has so disregarded His Word? Can it be that they are acting as He hears? God has a set time when He will visit them to see if the reports are true. He will see if everything that He has heard regarding the wickedness of the church is so.

What will God find if He visits the church of our day? What will God see if He comes down as He did to Sodom? What will He behold as He looks around? Will He find a faithful church? Will He behold a church that is indeed founded upon such wonderful principles as the Word of God? Will He find a church extremely faithful in carrying out its task and its mission in bringing the Gospel to the world?

The church has accomplished its mission—that is true. Yet now, as we have entered into the final stage of earth’s history, into this period of Great Tribulation, we see that the church is very much pictured by Sodom. Those men compassing Lot’s house and seeking to do him and his family harm are a vivid picture of the wickedness in the church of our day.

Can you imagine God looking upon a church that speaks in “tongues,” claiming that these extra revelations are coming from God, when God has closed divine revelation? Can you imagine God looking upon a church that is involved in such evil deeds as falling over backward or holy laughter? Can you imagine God coming down to the “spiritual Sodom,” the church of our day, and beholding the ordination of women and homosexuals and men who are not married or who are divorced? Can you imagine God visiting the church of our day? On and on and on we could go. If we desired to list the sins of the church of our day, we could spend a great many hours discussing them.

Yet some people do not believe this. When they hear that God will judge His people, His church, they cannot fathom it. They cannot imagine God doing so. That, we could say, is because they just do not know the God of the Bible. They do not understand that God is “the same yesterday, and today, and forever” (Hebrews 13:8). They do not comprehend that God is a wrathful God who will always judge sin. They do not know that there has never been a people who could get away with their sins and their evil deeds by claiming to be the people of God. The Jews tried that, and God destroyed the ten tribes in the north and later Judah in the south.

There has never been a people who have so rebelled against God as the people in the church of our present day have, and there has never been a people who have escaped the judgment of God. Does the church today think that they will be the first? Do they think that they will be the ones who finally can escape the judgment of God because they continue performing the Lord’s Supper and baptizing people?

Ceremonial laws have never been a way out or an excuse whereby God would not bring judgment (Hebrews 10:4). The Jews would say, “We keep the fire continually burning, O Lord, as You have commanded us. You cannot bring judgment upon us.” Yet God did bring judgment upon them, and He sent them into captivity where it was an impossibility that the fire could be kept continually burning upon the altar (1 Chronicles 16:40). We see that God does command the church to observe the Lord’s Supper until He comes (1 Corinthians 11:26); yet, if the church has forsaken the Word of God, it cannot hide behind the keeping of ceremonial laws.

The significance of those ceremonial laws has long been lost upon the church of our day. Will a vain observance of these things prevent the judgment of God? No, it will not. God has said in 1 Peter 4:17 that judgment must begin at the house of God. During the days of the Great Tribulation, therefore, when the church becomes “Sodom,” God will visit them.

We are now in the days of Great Tribulation, and God is visiting the churches. He is striking the “men of Sodom” with blindness. We see this everywhere as we look around the church world, and we know, therefore, that soon, very soon, He will destroy this place.