Lot was delivered; but it was with the utter loss of all that had led him to choose the fertile plain of Sodom. Flocks, herds, and friends, died in the destruction of the city. If, as many have imagined, Lot had two daughters, not merely betrothed but actually married, they died with their unbelieving husbands, who took his earnest call for pleasantry, and God's awful voice, uttered by him, as a jest; for two unmarried ones only followed him to Zoar. Here was a sad and fearful breach in the patriarch's family, to testify against the marriage of believers with unbelievers. Here was a woe fallen upon him, where he was most vulnerable; and, when launched from this bow, Christian parents deeply feel the arrows of the Almighty in their hearts. O strive, ye, with whom it may be thus, to pluck these wanderers, as brands from the burning. Like an eminent saint of God, himself a father, charge your children to flee from their iniquities, to salvation in the Son of God, and bid them beware, that they meet you not, at the great tribunal, in sin and unbelief." 1

And ye who appear to have left the city of

Robert Bolton, see his Life, prefixed to his "Four Last Things."

your former transgressions,-ye whom some conviction of sin have led to fear lest you should be consumed, look not behind you. Take an everlasting leave of iniquity. Institute an immediate divorce of every thought and every affection of your hearts from that state, wherein the call of God's ministers has found you. Remember Lot's wife. She walked not steadfastly, and side by side with her husband and her children. If all her daughters were with her, yet was her heart bent upon the substance, and wealth, and friends left behind. If two daughters had perished in the general ruin, she was perhaps bewailing them. It is plain, at least, that her heart was still in Sodom: she looked back in desire, as did the mixed multitude afterwards from the camp of God in the wilderness; and she became a pillar of salt,— a monument of the wrath of heaven, against a hollow-hearted profession of religion. "He that putteth his hand to the plough, and looketh back, is unfit for the kingdom of God." Had she remained near her husband, had she leaned on his hand, and listened to his counsels, she might and would have been saved. But she

1 Luke ix. 62.

looked from behind him, she lingered, and she died. Never follow the Head and Captain of your salvation afar off; never halt behind those who are following the Lord fully, if you are earnest in professing to seek the salvation that is in Christ Jesus, with eternal glory. Strive to keep up with those who are foremost in the blessed way. Gird up the loins of your minds: be diligent, zealous, and unwearied in the might of the Holy Spirit: and "so an entrance shall be ministered unto you abundantly, into the everlasting kingdom of our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ." '

And ye who sin against God, and all his goodness, and not least his long-suffering, with a high and daring hand, think not that ye shall be safe from the hour of his wrath, if ye continue to neglect and mock the hour of his mercy. Think not that ye shall escape the coming woe. "It shall be more tolerable for Sodom and Gomorrah in the day of judgment than for you.” If ye will declare your sin, as Sodom, and publish it at Gomorrah,-if ye will contemn the messengers of life and mercy, ye are not far from the day when the Judge shall appear

1 2 Peter i. 11.

2 Luke x. 12.

against you. "He that being often reproved hardeneth his neck, shall suddenly be destroyed, and that without remedy.'

II. But while Sodom and all its guilty indwellers thus perished in the gainsaying of their sins, WHAT WAS THE CONDUCT OF ABRAHAM? He had interceded for the city,-wrestled with God earnestly on its behalf; and had he dared to hold fast by God for another supplication, would have prevailed for its deliverance. His example, the parables of our Lord, the new and living Way into the holiest by the blood of Jesus, the mercy-seat sprinkled with that blood, and all the ready help of the throne of grace, whither the Father invites those who have learned, and who love to pray, all unite to bid them to be importunate to pray and not to faint; and especially not to faint in intercessory supplication for friends yet without the fold of salvation, and for the land wherein they dwell. While many around you, who might have communion. with God, and the interest of a gracious unity with the Great Intercessor, are thoughtless and impenitent, will ye not pour out your hearts

1 Prov. xxix. 1.

unto your heavenly Father, in their behalf, that so Israel may be a blessing in the land of Assyria?

Abram's heart was deeply affected towards Sodom; and he dreaded its ruin. He gat up therefore early in the morning to the place where, the preceding day, he had stood before the Lord, probably to renew his supplication, if yet there were hope: and he looked toward Sodom and Gomorrah, and toward all the land of the plain; and beheld, and lo the smoke of the country went up as the smoke of a furnace." 1 His intercession therefore failed, as to the full extent of its object: but it failed not, in one dear and especial part of his desire. "It came to pass, when God destroyed the cities of the plain, that God remembered Abraham, aud sent Lot out of the midst of the overthrow, when He overthrew the cities in the which Lot dwelt."3 Bless God for this encouragement, if any of you are bearing impenitent relations upon your hearts before Him. Pray in fervency, and pray in faith. Put God in remembrance concerning them-pray for them, as the woman of Canaan clung to her Redeemer in behalf of

1 Gen. xix. 28.

2 Gen. xix. 29.