19Genesis 19

The Evil City of Sodom

1That evening, while Lot was sitting near the city gate, the two angels arrived in Sodom. When Lot saw them, he got up, bowed down low,Select Genesis 19:1

2and said, “Gentlemen, I am your servant. Please come to my home. You can wash your feet, spend the night, and be on your way in the morning.” They told him, “No, we'll spend the night in the city square.”Select Genesis 19:2

3But Lot kept insisting, until they finally agreed and went home with him. He quickly baked some bread, cooked a meal, and they ate.Select Genesis 19:3

4Before Lot and his guests could go to bed, every man in Sodom, young and old, came and stood outside his houseSelect Genesis 19:4

5and started shouting, “Where are your visitors? Send them out, so we can have sex with them!”Select Genesis 19:5

6Lot went outside and shut the door behind him.Select Genesis 19:6

7Then he said, “Friends, please don't do such a terrible thing!Select Genesis 19:7

8I have two daughters who have never had sex. I'll bring them out, and you can do what you want with them. But don't harm these men. They are guests in my home.”Select Genesis 19:8

9“Don't get in our way,” the crowd answered. “You're a foreigner. What right do you have to order us around? We'll do worse things to you than we're going to do to them.” The crowd kept arguing with Lot. Finally, they rushed toward the door to break it down.Select Genesis 19:9

10But the two angels in the house reached out and pulled Lot safely inside.Select Genesis 19:10

11Then they struck blind everyone in the crowd, and none of them could even find the door.Select Genesis 19:11

13The two angels said to Lot, “The Lord has heard many terrible things about the people of Sodom, and he has sent us here to destroy the city. Take your family and leave. Take every relative you have in the city, as well as the men your daughters are going to marry.”Select Genesis 19:13

14Lot went to the men who were engaged to his daughters and said, “Hurry up and get out of here! The Lord is going to destroy this city.” But they thought he was joking, and they laughed at him.Select Genesis 19:14

15Early the next morning the two angels tried to make Lot hurry and leave. They said, “Take your wife and your two daughters and get away from here as fast as you can! If you don't, every one of you will be killed when the Lord destroys the city.”Select Genesis 19:15

16At first, Lot just stood there. But the Lord wanted to save him. So the angels took Lot, his wife, and his two daughters by the hand and led them out of the city.Select Genesis 19:16

17When they were outside, one of the angels said, “Run for your lives! Don't even look back. And don't stop in the valley. Run to the hills, where you'll be safe.”Select Genesis 19:17

19Lot answered, “You have done us a great favor, sir. You have saved our lives, but please don't make us go to the hills. That's too far away. The city will be destroyed before we can get there, and we will be killed when it happens.Select Genesis 19:19

20There's a town near here. It's only a small place, but my family and I will be safe, if you let us go there.”Select Genesis 19:20

21“All right, go there,” he answered. “I won't destroy that town.Select Genesis 19:21

22Hurry! Run! I can't do anything until you are safely there.” The town was later called Zoar because Lot had said it was small.Select Genesis 19:22

Sodom and Gomorrah Are Destroyed

23The sun was coming up as Lot reached the town of Zoar,Select Genesis 19:23

24and the Lord sent burning sulfur down like rain on Sodom and Gomorrah.Select Genesis 19:24

25He destroyed those cities and everyone who lived in them, as well as their land and the trees and grass that grew there.Select Genesis 19:25

26On the way, Lot's wife looked back and was turned into a block of salt.Select Genesis 19:26

27That same morning Abraham got up and went to the place where he had stood and spoken with the Lord.Select Genesis 19:27

28He looked down toward Sodom and Gomorrah and saw smoke rising from all over the land—it was like a flaming furnace.Select Genesis 19:28

29When God destroyed the cities of the valley where Lot lived, he remembered his promise to Abraham and saved Lot from the terrible destruction.Select Genesis 19:29

Moab and Ammon

30Lot was afraid to stay on in Zoar. So he took his two daughters and moved to a cave in the hill country.Select Genesis 19:30

31One day his older daughter said to her sister, “Our father is old, and there are no men anywhere for us to marry.Select Genesis 19:31

32Let's get our father drunk! Then we can sleep with him and have children.”Select Genesis 19:32

33That night they got their father drunk, and the older daughter got in bed with him, but he was too drunk even to know she was there.Select Genesis 19:33

34The next day the older daughter said to her sister, “I slept with my father last night. We'll get him drunk again tonight, so you can sleep with him, and we can each have a child.”Select Genesis 19:34

35That night they got their father drunk, and this time the younger sister slept with him. But once again he was too drunk even to know she was there.Select Genesis 19:35

36That's how Lot's two daughters had children.Select Genesis 19:36

37The older daughter named her son Moab, and he is the ancestor of the Moabites.Select Genesis 19:37

38The younger daughter named her son Benammi, and he is the ancestor of the Ammonites.Select Genesis 19:38