Escape To the Hills

“And as they brought them out, one said, ‘Escape for your life. Do not look back or stop anywhere in the valley. Escape to the hills, lest you be swept away.’ And Lot said to them, ‘Oh, no, my lords. Behold, your servant has found favor in your sight, and you have shown me great kindness in saving my life. But I cannot escape to the hills, lest the disaster overtake me and I die. Behold, this city is near enough to flee to, and it is a little one. Let me escape there—is it not a little one?—and my life will be saved!’” (Ge 19:17-20)

Lot had chosen to live in Sodom, the lowest place on earth. It was not only a low place physically, but also spiritually. The people in Sodom were “great sinners against the LORD”. (Ge 13:13)

Abraham, on the other hand, lived up on the mountains of Israel in Hebron, high above Sodom. The distance between the two places is only about 20 miles (30 km). But the difference in altitude between Sodom and Hebron is almost 4,500 ft (1,400m)!

The angels who came to rescue Lot told him: “Do not look back or stop anywhere in the valley. Escape to the hills, lest you be swept away.” (v. 19) But Lot was so used to valley that he could not make it to the hills. He said: “I cannot escape to the hills.” (v. 19)

We also read today in the Book of Joshua that all of the cities of refuge that people who were innocent could flee to in order to save their lives, were all located in the hills.

“So they set apart Kedesh in Galilee in the hill country of Naphtali, and Shechem in the hill country of Ephraim, and Kiriath-arba (that is, Hebron) in the hill country of Judah. And beyond the Jordan east of Jericho, they appointed Bezer in the wilderness on the tableland, from the tribe of Reuben, and Ramoth in Gilead [meaning ‘Heights of Gilead’], from the tribe of Gad, and Golan in Bashan, from the tribe of Manasseh.” (Jos 20:7-8)

Yeshua said: “So when you see the abomination of desolation spoken of by the prophet Daniel, standing in the holy place (let the reader understand), then let those who are in Judea flee to the mountains.” (Mt 24:15-16)

There is of course a literal meaning to these words. But there is also a spiritual lesson to be learned here. Babylon where mankind rebelled against God was located on a low plain. Jerusalem, God’s city, is one of the highest capitols in the world and in the end it will be the highest. “…many peoples shall come, and say: ‘Come, let us go up to the mountain of the LORD, to the house of the God of Jacob, that he may teach us his ways and that we may walk in his paths.’ For out of Zion shall go the law, and the word of the LORD from Jerusalem.” (Is 2:2-3)

In these end times we need to overcome the pull of the world, the low temptations of the flesh, and the life of ease learning to live on the heights in the spirit, if we want to be overcomers. Paul wrote: “Brothers, I do not consider that I have made it my own. But one thing I do: forgetting what lies behind and straining forward to what lies ahead, I press on toward the goal for the prize of the upward call of God in Messiah Yeshua.” (Php 3:13-14)

Daily Bread