IS THE GRASS REALLY GREENER?

I have heard the story of Abraham and Lot many times in my life. I heard it in Sunday School when I was a child and I still hear it preached about in church today. One of the things I love about reading God's Word is that no matter how many times you've read it, or heard something taught, you can learn something or see something new every time. I was reading in Genesis 13 this week and I got to the part where Abram and Lot's herdsman are arguing (v.7-9). You may know the story of how they decide that it is best to part company and Abram gives Lot his choice of which direction to go. Basically, Abram tells Lot that whatever direction he chooses, then Abram will go the other way. When you get to verse ten it says, "And Lot lifted up his eyes, and beheld all the plain of Jordan, that it was well watered every where, before the LORD destroyed Sodom and Gomorrah, even as the garden of the LORD, like the land of Egypt, as thou comest unto Zoar." When I read this verse an old phrase popped in to my head... "The grass is always greener on the other side of the fence." As humans, we tend to look at others and think that they have it way better than we do. Or we might look at what others have and think that if we follow in their footsteps then we will have that too. The phrase that stuck out to me this time though was, "like the land of Egypt." In the Bible, Egypt is always a picture of the world. I wonder what Lot saw in Egypt that affected his thinking? Back in Genesis 12, you'll remember, the family sojourns in Egypt for a while to escape a famine and Lot was with them. He must have liked whatever he saw because this land that he was looking at in Genesis 13:10 reminds him of it. So, he chooses it. He goes a step farther in pitching his tent toward Sodom. A decision we all know has affected his family for generation after generation. The Bible says that "the men of Sodom were wicked AND sinners before the LORD exceedingly." When you get to chapter 19, the LORD has had enough of Sodom & Gomorrah and sends angels to tell Lot to get out of there because he is ready to destroy it. I don't know the span of time between chapter 10 and chapter 19 but however long or short, Lot was a full-fledged resident of Sodom by that time. He's no longer living in a tent that is pitched toward Sodom, he is in the gate. Sadly, Lot had forgotten all the blessings that he was given while growing up. He had forgotten all the faith that he was taught by his Uncle Abram. In chapter 19, these angels have to rescue Lot several times. They pulled him in. (v.10) They persisted in telling him to get out. (v.12) They pushed. (v.15) They picked him up and put him out. (v.16) It would seem that Lot had gotten a bit to attached to the lifestyle of Sodom. So much that even his own family would not listen to him (v.14) They got so weary of trying to tell him that he needed to get out of there that they finally picked him up and carried him out of the place. Sadly, he did not leave with as many as he came in with. In fact, even though they came out of Sodom, they still had Sodom "in" them. By the end of chapter 19 he has lost all his children, his wife, and has two daughter left that are pregnant BY HIM!  We best be careful the place we take our children to, or the things we allow them to get involved in, or see or hear, or taste, or touch, or smell. It may be that Egypt stayed in Lot's heart, and then Sodom was instilled in his children. You never come out of sin smelling or looking like you did when you went in. As my father-in-law, Dr. Larry Groves, always says..."It's a lot easier to take your family into Sodom, than it is to get them out." Was the grass really greener for Lot by the time it was all said and done?