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This is the case of the cities of the plain.

I. THE CAUSE OF THEIR PUNISHMENT. "Even as Sodom and Gomorrah, and the cities about them, having in like manner with these given themselves over to fornication, and gone after strange flesh."

1. God often assigns the most fertile places to the greatest sinners. Sodom is compared to "the garden of the Lord."

2. Prosperity often becomes an occasion for much wickedness and impiety.

3. The inhabitants of these cities of the plain were guilty of fornication and unnatural crimes.

(1) These were personal sins of a heinous character. They were sins against both soul and body. No whoremonger shall enter the kingdom of God (1 Corinthians 6:9), and fornication is a sin "against the body itself" (1 Corinthians 6:18).

(2) They were social sins. They affect the family and society.

(3) They were sacrilegious sins. The body, which is a temple of the Holy Ghost, allows its members to become those of a harlot (1 Corinthians 6:15).

(4) They were sins not to be named among saints (Ephesians 5:3).

4. The causes of these sins were

(1) fullness of bread (Ezekiel 16:49), and

(2) idleness.

II. THE SEVERITY OF THEIR PUNISHMENT. "Suffering the vengeance of eternal fire."

1. There may be allusion to the rain of fire that destroyed the cities, and to the volcanic nature of the soil which underlies their present site.

2. But that destruction is only a type of the worse destruction that overtook the guilty inhabitants.

(1) No "dogs" shall be admitted into the New Jerusalem (Revelation 22:15). "Our God is a consuming fire" (Hebrews 12:29). The justice of God is not abolished by his mercy.

(2) Yet the rejection of the gospel is a worse sin than that of the Sodomites. It will be more tolerable for Sodom and Gomorrah in the day of judgment than for Capernaum and Bethsaida (Matthew 10:15).

III. THESE SODOMITES WERE PUNISHED AS AN EXAMPLE.

1. God shows thus his hatred of sin.

2. His desire to prevent our ruin.

3. The inexcusableness of those who sin in the face of such examples.

4. We need under the gospel the restraints of fear as well as the allurements of love.

5. The same sins recur in every age, and therefore need to be very pointedly condemned.

6. The sins of the Sodomites are more heinous if committed in this dispensation of light and privilege.

7. Let us be thankful to God for such warnings against sin. - T.C.

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KJV: Even as Sodom and Gomorrha, and the cities about them in like manner, giving themselves over to fornication, and going after strange flesh, are set forth for an example, suffering the vengeance of eternal fire.

WEB: Even as Sodom and Gomorrah, and the cities around them, having, in the same way as these, given themselves over to sexual immorality and gone after strange flesh, are set forth as an example, suffering the punishment of eternal fire.