Two Ways to Walk: The Choice of Abram and Lot Text: Genesis 13:1-13
Introduction: The Inevitable Crisis of Blessing
We come now to a fascinating and instructive moment in the life of Abram. God has called him out of Ur, promised him a land, a seed, and a blessing that would overflow to all nations. But Abram, in a moment of fear, took a detour through Egypt. That detour was a failure of faith, marked by deceit, and yet God in His inscrutable sovereignty brought him out, not only unharmed, but laden with wealth. This is a crucial point. God's grace can and does operate even in the midst of our foolishness. He can make the wrath of man, and even the cowardice of his own saints, praise Him.
But this brings us to a central reality of the Christian life: blessing brings its own set of challenges. Scarcity has its problems, to be sure, but so does abundance. We often pray for God to bless us, to increase our substance, to give us success. And when He does, we are often unprepared for the new set of temptations that arrive with the caravan. The very blessing of God, the sheer amount of livestock, silver, and gold, becomes the occasion for the first recorded conflict within the covenant family. The problem Abram and Lot face is not poverty, but prosperity. Their wealth is the source of the strife.
This passage is therefore intensely practical. It sets before us two men, Abram and Lot, who are brothers in the faith. They are both wealthy. They both serve the same God. But when faced with a crisis born of abundance, they reveal two fundamentally different ways of seeing the world, two different ways of making decisions, two different ways of walking. One walks by faith, and the other walks by sight. One builds his life on the promise of God, the other on the appearance of the moment. And the divergence that begins here will have catastrophic consequences down the road. This is a story about how small choices, guided by either faith or sight, set a man's trajectory toward either the City of God or the gates of Sodom.
The Text
So Abram went up from Egypt to the Negev, he and his wife and all that belonged to him, and Lot with him. Now Abram was very rich in livestock, in silver and in gold. And he went on his journeys from the Negev as far as Bethel, to the place where his tent had been at the beginning, between Bethel and Ai, to the place of the altar which he had made there formerly; and there Abram called upon the name of Yahweh. Now Lot, who was going with Abram, also had flocks and herds and tents. And the land could not sustain them while living together, for their possessions were so abundant that they were not able to live together. And there was strife between the herdsmen of Abram’s livestock and the herdsmen of Lot’s livestock. Now the Canaanite and the Perizzite were living then in the land. So Abram said to Lot, “Please let there be no strife between you and me, nor between my herdsmen and your herdsmen, for we are brothers. Is not the whole land before you? Please separate from me; if to the left, then I will go to the right; or if to the right, then I will go to the left.” Then Lot lifted up his eyes and saw all the valley of the Jordan, that it was well watered everywhere, this was before Yahweh destroyed Sodom and Gomorrah, like the garden of Yahweh, like the land of Egypt as you go to Zoar. So Lot chose for himself all the valley of the Jordan, and Lot journeyed eastward. Thus they separated from each other. Abram lived in the land of Canaan, while Lot lived in the cities of the valley and moved his tents as far as Sodom. Now the men of Sodom were evil and sinners, exceedingly so, against Yahweh.
(Genesis 13:1-13 LSB)
Restoration and Riches (vv. 1-4)
The first thing Abram does upon returning from his compromised sojourn in Egypt is to return to the place of worship.
"So Abram went up from Egypt...as far as Bethel, to the place where his tent had been at the beginning...to the place of the altar which he had made there formerly; and there Abram called upon the name of Yahweh." (Genesis 13:1, 3-4)
This is the picture of repentance. He doesn't just leave Egypt physically; he leaves it spiritually. He retraces his steps back to the point of his obedience. He goes back to the altar. An altar is a place of sacrifice, communion, and consecration. It is where you acknowledge your utter dependence on God. After a season of self-reliance and fear in Egypt, Abram returns to the place of God-reliance. This is what we must do when we have wandered. We must go back to the beginning, back to the altar, back to the simple act of calling on the name of the Lord.
But notice verse 2: "Now Abram was very rich in livestock, in silver and in gold." The Bible is not an ascetic book. It does not teach that poverty is piety or that wealth is inherently wicked. Abraham, Job, and David were all men of immense wealth and immense faith. The issue is not the possession of riches, but the posture of the heart toward them. Does the man have the riches, or do the riches have the man? Abram's first act upon returning with this great wealth is not to build a bigger barn or a more secure compound, but to build an altar. He consecrates his wealth to God. He places it all under the authority of the One who gave it. This is the key to handling blessing rightly: worship first. Acknowledge the Giver before you start counting the gifts.
The Crisis of Abundance (vv. 5-7)
The blessing itself creates the problem. The land cannot support both of their enterprises.
"Now Lot, who was going with Abram, also had flocks and herds and tents. And the land could not sustain them...for their possessions were so abundant...And there was strife between the herdsmen..." (Genesis 13:5-7)
Prosperity breeds strife. This is a recurring theme. Two men can be friends in a foxhole, but give them a winning lottery ticket and see what happens. The servants, who are a reflection of their masters' priorities, begin to quarrel over resources, over grazing rights and wells. This is the natural outworking of the flesh. When resources are tight, selfishness kicks in.
And there is an important contextual note added: "Now the Canaanite and the Perizzite were living then in the land." This is not just a geographical detail. It is a theological warning. The watching world is watching. The pagans are observing how these followers of Yahweh handle their internal disputes. Strife among the brethren is a terrible witness. When the church is fighting over money, or power, or personalities, the Canaanites take note. Our squabbles either commend the gospel or bring it into disrepute. Abram understands this. The honor of God's name is at stake.
The Walk of Faith (vv. 8-9)
Abram's response to the conflict is a master class in spiritual leadership and faith-filled peacemaking.
"So Abram said to Lot, 'Please let there be no strife between you and me...for we are brothers. Is not the whole land before you? Please separate from me; if to the left, then I will go to the right; or if to the right, then I will go to the left.'" (Genesis 13:8-9)
First, Abram takes the initiative. He doesn't let the conflict fester. He addresses it head-on. Second, he appeals to their covenant relationship: "we are brothers." Our unity in God is more important than any material possession. Third, and most remarkably, he gives Lot the choice. As the patriarch, the elder, the one to whom the promise was directly given, Abram had every right to claim the best land for himself. But he doesn't stand on his rights. He yields them. He is open-handed.
Why can he do this? Because he is walking by faith, not by sight. He knows that the promise of God is not tied to a particular patch of green grass. The promise is tied to God Himself. God has promised to bless him and give him the whole land. Therefore, Abram can afford to be generous. He is not grasping, because he knows his Father owns all the cattle on a thousand hills. He who has the promise of the whole inheritance can be magnanimous about a corner of the field. This is the freedom of faith. The man who trusts in God's sovereign promise is free from the anxiety and greed that drive the world.
The Walk of Sight (vv. 10-13)
Lot's response is a stark and tragic contrast. He is offered a choice, and his decision-making process is entirely carnal.
"Then Lot lifted up his eyes and saw all the valley of the Jordan, that it was well watered everywhere...like the garden of Yahweh, like the land of Egypt...So Lot chose for himself all the valley of the Jordan..." (Genesis 13:10-11)
Lot "lifted up his eyes and saw." There is no indication that he prayed. There is no indication he consulted Abram. There is no indication he considered the spiritual climate of the place. He made a purely pragmatic, economic decision based on what his eyes told him. He walked by sight.
And what he saw was deeply seductive. It was "like the garden of Yahweh," a deceptive echo of Eden. And it was "like the land of Egypt," the very place of compromise they had just left. The world will always offer you something that looks like Eden but is actually Egypt. It promises paradise but delivers bondage. Lot was drawn to the place that reminded him of the world's prosperity, not the place of Abram's altar.
So Lot "chose for himself." This is the motto of the flesh. Abram yielded his rights; Lot asserted his. Abram trusted God; Lot trusted his own evaluation. And notice the direction he went: "Lot journeyed eastward." To go east in Genesis is almost always to move away from the presence of God. Adam and Eve were exiled east of Eden. Cain went east to the land of Nod. Lot journeys east, and the next thing we are told is that he "moved his tents as far as Sodom."
This is how worldly compromise works. It is a gradual drift. He didn't move into a condo in downtown Sodom on day one. He just pitched his tent toward Sodom. He wanted the economic benefits of the well-watered plain without, he probably told himself, getting mixed up in the sin of the city. But you cannot pitch your tent toward Sodom and not expect to be drawn in. The gravitational pull of sin is too strong. The choice made by sight, the choice for himself, put him on a direct path to moral and spiritual catastrophe.
The final verse is a chilling divine commentary on Lot's choice. "Now the men of Sodom were evil and sinners, exceedingly so, against Yahweh." Lot looked at the grass. God looked at the hearts. Lot saw a good business opportunity. God saw a cesspool of rebellion ripe for judgment. When we walk by sight, we are blind to the most important realities.
Conclusion: The End of Two Paths
This chapter sets two men on two different paths. Abram, the man of faith, takes the less promising land, but he stays in Canaan, the land of the promise, near the altar of God. And immediately after Lot departs, God comes to Abram and reaffirms the covenant, telling him to lift up his eyes and see the whole land, north, south, east, and west, for it would all be his (Gen. 13:14-17). The man who gave up his choice in faith gets the whole thing confirmed by God. The man who walked by sight, Lot, chose what looked like a garden and ended up losing everything his wife, his wealth, his testimony in a storm of fire and brimstone. He chose for himself and ended up with nothing.
This is the choice before every one of us. We are all faced with decisions, big and small. The world tells you to do what Lot did. Lift up your eyes, run the numbers, do the cost-benefit analysis, and choose what looks best for you. Make your decision based on the well-watered plains of worldly success, comfort, and security.
But God calls us to walk as Abram walked. To make our decisions not based on the immediate appearance, but on the enduring promise of God. He calls us to be open-handed, generous, and willing to yield our rights because we trust that our Father is in control and His promise is secure. He calls us to prioritize the altar over the pasture, brotherhood over personal gain, and faith over sight.
The path of sight leads toward Sodom. It may look lush and prosperous for a season, but its end is destruction. The path of faith may lead through the rockier parts of Canaan, but it is the path that stays near the altar, the path that walks with God, and the path that inherits the promise. Which way are you walking? Whose report will you believe? That of your eyes, or that of your God?