Arguing with God

Genesis Chapter 18 reports a strange conversation between God and Abraham about the destruction of Sodom and Gomorrah. It appears that God is bent on destroying these two cities and Abraham is trying to talk Him out of it.

Abraham is more loving than God?

That question struck me while reading Genesis recently. I paused to think and learned something wonderful about God and the way He talks to people – to important people Like Abraham and to me, too.

I feel silly telling you about it – everybody else may have grasped this idea years ago – but I’m so grateful the Spirit finally has been able to teach it to me.

The Lord starts by telling Abraham that He is going to check out Sodom and Gomorrah to see if they are as bad as the outcry that has reached Him.

Then Abraham asks the Lord is He would consider not destroying the cities if He could find 50 righteous men there. When God consents to spare the cities if 50 righteous men can be found, Abraham lowers the number to 40, then 30, 20 and 10.

Did Abraham change God’s mind?

That’s what appears on the surface, but what I really think happened is that God changed Abraham’s understanding of His nature, of His justice and of His love.

Abraham had no trouble believing that God’s just nature could not abide the rampant sin in Sodom and Gomorrah, that His justice demanded punishment. But Abraham was not sure of the dimensions of God’s love. He did not know the greatness of that love or how far God would go to save man.

At the end of their meeting, God is the same as He was at the beginning. His justice still cannot stand sin. His love still desires to save.
Abraham has come to know God better. He knows that God would cover sin with righteousness if He could find any at all.

Sodom and Gomorrah perished.


But according to the Gospel of John, hundreds of years later Jesus told an audience of Jews that Abraham rejoiced at the thought of seeing His day.

I wonder if this was when Abraham first glimpsed it.

Was this when he began to understand the grand plan of salvation that God had devised, that one day the death of the only righteous man would atone for the sins of the world?

Was it here that he began to understand the scope of God’s love? As he probed to discover the strength of God’s desire to save, did Abraham begin to understand that God Himself would be that innocent sacrifice?

It’s more than possible. I believe that is exactly the sort of thing God intends to happen when someone talks to Him long enough.

He wants me to take my notions to Him in prayer. I can even imagine arguing with Him about them.

However dumb, however far from the Truth my ideas may be at the beginning, if I spend enough time trying to explain then to the Lord – and listening to His responses – He will eventually explain them to me and bring me around to His way of understanding.