1. The War of The Kings (8-16)
An ‘Iraqi’ Invasion (8-12)
When the first gulf war was fought, Saddam Hussein sent his Iraqi armies into Kuwait, plundering and pillaging. Around four thousand years ago, another army emerged from the same area with the same purpose in mind. The four invading kings named in this account in Genesis 14, were from the area that we now know as Iraq. They went out, bent on conquering another alliance of kings, the kings of Sodom, Gomorrah, Zeboiim, Admah and Zoar, Canaanite city-states along the Jordan valley in what would now be the West Bank and Jordan. Except for their names appearing in lists of trading cities on ancient clay tablets, we know nothing whatever about these places and their kings, apart from what we find here in Genesis. And we only know that much because their fate was tied up with the story of Abram. When the four kings beat the five kings in battle, and subsequently looted Sodom and Gomorrah, verse twelve tells us “They also carried off Abram’s nephew Lot and his possessions, since he was living in Sodom.”

Last week we saw how Abram trusted God by giving Lot first choice of where he would take his flocks and herds to graze. Lot chose the best pastures, based solely on what was good for him, in the lands around the city of Sodom. We see here, and later when Sodom is destroyed, that Lot had now actually moved out of his tents and into town and was living amongst the Canaanites. If he had continued to keep himself separate and live with his herdsmen in tents, he would not have been carried off with the people of Sodom.

Abram’s ‘Desert Storm’ (13-16)
Well, Abram took a dim view of this nephew-napping, and in verses 13 to 16 we see him wage his own ancient version of operation Desert Storm. He pursues the invaders for the whole length of the Promised Land before catching up with them and defeating them, and then to make sure they are properly sent on their way and won’t regroup and come back, he pursues them even further, beyond Damascus. It was a major exercise, and would have cost Abram dearly.

Now in many ways Abram’s life mirrors that of Christ, and points to him. He is what bible scholars like to call a Type of Christ. That is, one who points forward to Christ, and whose life sets the pattern that Christ fulfils and completes. But at this point Abram is just as much a contrast with what Jesus is like as he is a comparison. His brave rescue of Lot is commendable, but we mustn’t over rate it. I doubt he would have set out to rescue the people of Sodom if his relative Lot had not been amongst them. Blood is thicker than water as the old saying goes. Abram rescued Lot because he was his own flesh and blood. But Jesus rescues those who were his enemies. Jesus always goes a magnitude further than his Old Testament fore runners.

Nevertheless, Abram is here acting in faith and acting decisively and courageously. He must have been a born leader of men, and skilled in warfare. He had learned a lot about the land by walking all over it with his flocks and herds, as God had told him to do, and no doubt this enabled him to pursue the foreign kings successfully, overtake them, and ambush them. The invaders had already travelled about the distance from here to Devonport when Abram’s men caught up with them, so he displayed considerable tenacity – he could easily have given up, but instead he trusted God and persevered. 

Abram had many natural advantages. He knew the quickest routes to take, and the best place to engage them in battle. These four kings had come from a major battle with the armies of the five kings they defeated. They probably suffered many casualties, they were a long way from home, and they were traveling through hostile territory with a large amount of plundered goods, livestock, and captives. They were wounded, weary, and burdened, whereas Abram’s elite trained desert commandos were fresh, fast-moving, and had the support of the people of the land. Perhaps the invading Mesopotamian army were also complacent and taking it easy, drinking and feasting on the spoils of war. More than once throughout history conquering armies have met their end when caught engaging in post-victory celebrations. On top of all that, Abram’s little army knew that theirs was a just war, and that they were in the right – that always boosts morale.

But, what decided the outcome was not natural, but spiritual. They knew that God would keep his promises to bless those who blessed Abram and to curse those who cursed him. These foreigners who worshipped other gods, the very gods that Abram’s ancestors had worshipped beyond the river Euphrates, were under the curse of the Lord of heaven and earth, the God who had appeared to Abram and made an eternal covenant with him. The Lord was with them and would give them the victory. This is one of many outworkings of the promise to Abram back in chapter 12.

I could say more about this, but I want to focus this morning on what happened after Abram’s successful return. We read in verse seventeen:
“After Abram returned from defeating Kedorlaomer and the kings allied with him, the king of Sodom came out to meet him in the Valley of Shaveh (that is, the King’s Valley).”

2. The King of Sodom (17-24)
King of Unrighteousness
The bible doesn’t say what happened to the other four defeated Canaanite kings. Perhaps the King of Sodom was the only survivor. But he comes out to meet Abram on his triumphant return with all the rescued captives and re-plundered plunder. He seems at first rather magnanimous, telling Abram to give him back just his subjects and keep the goods himself. But, as the conqueror of his conquerors, Abram was perfectly entitled to be lord over the king of Sodom himself, let alone the people he had rescued. He is trying to ingratiate himself with Abram, and weasel out of his situation.
But Abram acts like Jesus does many centuries later. The New Testament says that Jesus did not entrust himself to any man, because he knew what was in the hearts of men. That is, he knew when anyone was trying to pull a swifty, or to get him to become part of their own unrighteous agendas. Like Jesus, Abram can see straight through this man. And he answers his offer accordingly. “But Abram said to the king of Sodom, “I have raised my hand to the LORD, God Most High, Creator of heaven and earth, and have taken an oath that I will accept nothing belonging to you, not even a thread or the thong of a sandal, so that you will never be able to say, ‘I made Abram rich.’ I will accept nothing but what my men have eaten and the share that belongs to the men who went with me…” Once again, as we saw last week, when he allowed Lot to take the best land, Abram is acting in faith, resting on God’s promises to bless him.

Unlike Lot, Abram maintains his distinct identity as a worshipper of the Lord. He does not allow himself to enter into any obligations or common ties with this unrighteous king that he may later regret. He is exercising here a similar principle to the one that God gives us in the New Testament. Listen to what the apostle Paul writes to the Corinthians, “Do not be yoked together with unbelievers. For what do righteousness and wickedness have in common? Or what fellowship can light have with darkness? What harmony is there between Christ and Belial? What does a believer have in common with an unbeliever? What agreement is there between the temple of God and idols? For we are the temple of the living God. As God has said, “I will live with them and walk among them, and I will be their God, and they will be my people.”

That is why Abram rejects the offer of the king of Sodom. He knows that he does not need the generosity of any idolatrous pagan king to make him rich. Now there is a lesson for us here. In the Old Testament, God promised a physical land with physical blessings. God made Abram rich as a sign of his blessing. Under the New Covenant, despite what those who teach the so-called Prosperity Gospel teach, God does not promise us material blessings for faithfulness to him. But he does promise spiritual blessings and spiritual riches. The New Testament says that in Christ we have been made rich in every way and we have every spiritual blessing in the heavenly realm. So, just as Abram did not look for material blessing from one who worshipped other gods, so we should not seek spiritual blessing anywhere else but from the Word of God. You won’t get it from yoga or Eastern meditation. You certainly won’t get it from Western materialism. It’s not in the tarot cards or horoscopes. It’s not in psychology or self-esteem. Look to God alone, through the Lord Jesus, for your spiritual wealth. 

A Tale of Two Cities
Now one of the clear contrasts in this story reflects a common theme that scripture develops. This is a tale of two cities. Here we have the city of Sodom, which Genesis says was a totally degenerate and wicked society. But now another city is mentioned, the city of Salem, which means peace. And these two cities, with their respective rulers, point forward to the very end of the bible, where in the book of Revelation we see the earthly city of Babylon destroyed, and the heavenly New Jerusalem coming down from above. Right back in Genesis this theme begins – here is the city of peace, Salem, with its godly priest king, which will later be exalted under King David as the capitol of the Kingdom and the centre of the worship of God. And we have the city of Sodom, which will soon be destroyed by earthquake and fire, in judgement for its wickedness.

3. The King of Salem (17-24)
Without Beginning or End
And so, in complete contrast to the wicked king of Sodom, we see another king in verses 17 to 24, one whom Abram responds to very differently. “This Melchizedek”, as the book of Hebrews calls him, is one of the strangest, most mysterious persons in the whole of the bible. He just suddenly appears in the story out of nowhere, and disappears just as quickly. His city of Salem did not take part in the War of the Nine Kings. He has not been mentioned at all in Genesis up to this point, and he is only ever mentioned once again in the Old Testament, in Psalm 110. Genesis is full of genealogies. Yet, though Melchizedek is such an important person that even Abram pays him homage, his ancestry is unknown. The writer to the Hebrews puts it this way:
“Without father or mother, without genealogy, without beginning of days or end of life, like the Son of God he remains a priest forever…” 

Now Jesus did have a mother, and a step-father, Joseph, through whom his genealogy was reckoned, so in what sense is Melchizedek like the Son of God? Well, it’s talking about Jesus in his eternal being as the second person of the Trinity. He did become man and take on our human nature, but he existed as God with the Father and the Holy Spirit, before and after his time on earth. The eternal Son of God doesn’t HAVE a beginning or end, he IS the beginning and end of all things. In Revelation he says, “I am the Alpha and the Omega, the Beginning and the End.” He is eternal, without beginning or end of days, just like the character Melchizedek appears in Genesis.

Because Melchizedek is such a mysterious person, there has been no end to the theories that people have come up with to fill in the gaps for us. As I was doing some research for this sermon, I was amazed at the variety of these ingenious speculations, from ancient times right up to now. Some say he was a pagan Canaanite priest. Others that he was Shem, the son of Noah, who was still alive when Abraham walked the earth. Or, that Melchizedek was a pre-incarnate appearance of Jesus himself. Or, Melchizedek was an angel, perhaps the archangel Michael.

There are dozens and dozens of websites on the internet full of absolute garbage about this man. Many are those who claim to have secret knowledge of who Melchizedek really was, or even claim that they are priests after the order of Melchizedek themselves. These range from witchcraft and theosophical groups to Masonic lodges and secret societies, to the Mormons. The story of Melchizedek is probably second only to the book of Revelation as a happy hunting ground for heresies of the most exotic kind.

So, let’s stick to what we can safely say about Melchizedek. Who was he, and why does he appear in this story?

King of Righteousness; King of Peace
Well, first of all, he is a king. The New Testament makes a lot of this fact. The writer to the Hebrews points us first of all to the significance of his kingly titles. He is King of Righteousness and King of Peace. The name Melchi-Zedek can mean either “My righteousness” or “King of righteousness,” and this King of Righteousness is also the King of Salem. Salem means Peace. So he is called both king of righteousness and king of peace. And as such, he becomes a type, a forerunner, a sign, a pointer to the true King who is to come.

He is not a pre-incarnate appearance of Jesus himself. For Jesus to become flesh more than once seems to me to be rather a strange idea. Why become a man and live for a while as king and priest of a Canaanite city for a few years and then go back to heaven? Furthermore, Hebrews says that he is like the Son of God, not that he is the Son of God.

No, Melchizedek was a real historical king-priest who became an example, a type, a living prophecy of the Christ to come. This is how both Psalm 110 and the book of Hebrews treat him. His presence in Canaan shows that other people besides Abram had retained the true worship of God as creator of the whole earth. We know from archaeological sources that the name by which he calls God, God Most High, or in Hebrew “El Elyon”, really was used at that time in Canaan. This is not something that was just made up by Jewish scribes centuries later. El Elyon was at this time the name for the highest of the Canaanite deities. Now the Canaanites we know from ancient tablets that have been dug up, believed that El Elyon was the father of all their other gods, and the husband of the goddess Asherah. But that doesn’t mean Melchizedek believed that. Canaanites like the king of Sodom had corrupted the original monotheism of the sons of Noah. It seems quite clear that Melchizedek on the other hand worshipped the same God as Abram did – the one true God, who created the whole world. Melchizedek was priest of El Elyon, God Most High. And Abram calls the Lord, God Most High, creator of heaven and earth. He connects the name “The Lord,” that is, Yahweh, with the name God Most High. Yahweh is the one Melchizedek worships as God Most High. Abram’s fathers had worshipped false gods before they moved from Mesopotamia, but the One True God had made himself known to Abram, and this was the same God that Melchizedek worshipped.

Priest of God Most High
Now as well as being a king, he is also a priest. He is a Priest-King, and his priesthood is not like that of Aaron, which came later under the law of Moses. His is a greater order than that of Aaron. He is an eternal priest, without beginning or end.

Greater Than Abraham
And he is greater even than the greatest of the great in Israel’s spiritual history. The Jews looked back to Abraham as their great patriarch, the founder of their nation. And yet Abraham paid a tithe to this Melchizedek, honoring him as one greater than he.

Melchizedek, Jesus, and Us
The mysterious Melchizedek leads our minds to the truth about the one who was to come. Here is a king of righteousness, who is also king of peace, and an eternal priest of God Most High, who meets Abram, blesses him, and brings out bread and wine. 
Jesus is our King , the King of Peace, and the New Testament calls him our righteousness. He is the true priest of God, our Eternal High Priest, who offers his own life on the altar of the cross. He is the one who takes the bread and wine of the Lord’s Supper and says, take, and eat, this is my body broken for you and my blood shed for you. 

The New Testament sees Melchizedek as foreshadowing the gospel of Jesus. His priesthood is not like the priesthood of Aaron which came later and was tied up with the Law of Moses, but is of the order of Melchizedek. We are not saved by keeping the law, but by faith alone in the Son of God. His High Priesthood stretches back beyond the Law of Moses to the faith of Abraham. And, unlike the priesthood of Aaron and his descendants, which ended with the destruction of the Second Temple in AD 70, it goes on forever. Therefore, says the book of Hebrews, “he is able to save completely those who come to God through him, because he always lives to intercede for them.”

There is only one way to be right with God and to remain right with him for all eternity. And that is if you have the Son of God as your eternal high priest, standing between you and God, interceding for you with God, and pronouncing God’s blessing upon you. Make sure that he is your high priest, and that you are trusting in no other, because without him you will not inherit the blessing given to Abraham, and will never know the eternal life of peace with God that the king of righteousness, the king of peace, will bring. And if Jesus is your great high priest, and no other, then honour him as Abraham honoured Melchizedek. Abraham gave him a tenth of everything. But the New Testament equivalent of tithing is not the giving of ten percent of our wealth, but the giving up of our very selves to the service of God through faith in Jesus Christ. Give your life to the king of peace.
2


1