Genesis 19

₁That night Lot was sitting near the gate of the city of Sodom. The 2 angels came to the city that evening. When Lot saw the angels, he got up and went to them. He bowed down with his face to the ground. ₂Lot said to them: ‘Sirs, I am here to serve you. Please come to my home. You can wash your feet, and sleep in my house, and tomorrow morning you can go again.’

The angels said: ‘No, we will sleep near the gate of the town.’

₃Lot asked them again and again to come to his home and later they said yes. They went with Lot to his house. Lot prepared food for them. He baked bread with no yeast in it and they ate the food.

₄It was late. Lot and the 2 angels wanted to go and sleep but a group of men came to the house, men from all over the city of Sodom, young and old men. They came and stood outside his house. ₅They started shouting to Lot and they said: ‘Where are the 2 men who came to your house? Tell them to come out of the house. We want to have sex with them.’

₆Lot went outside his house and he closed the door behind him. ₇Then Lot said to them: ‘No, please don't do something bad like this. ₈I have 2 daughters. They have never had sex before. I will bring them to you and you can do with them what you want to do. But please don't do something bad to these 2 men. They are visitors in my house.’

₉But the men around the house shouted: ‘Get out of our way. You are not one of our people. You are a stranger. Don't tell us what to do, or we will do something worse to you.’

The men came nearer. They wanted to break open the door of the house. ₁₀Then the 2 angels in the house opened the door and they pulled Lot safely inside the house and locked the door. ₁₁Then the 2 angels made all the men who were outside the house blind. The bad men could not see and they could not find the door.

₁₂The 2 angels asked Lot: ‘Do you have any other family in this city? Go and get all of them now. Go and get your sons and daughters and their husbands and everyone in your family. ₁₃We are going to destroy this city. The Lord knows of all the bad things and sins that the people of this city have done. He has sent us to come and destroy the city and all the people.’

₁₄Lot went to the men who wanted to marry his daughters and he told them: ‘You must come quickly. The Lord is going to destroy this city.’

But they did not believe him. They laughed at him.

₁₅Early the next morning the 2 angels told Lot to hurry and leave quickly. The angels said: ‘Take your wife and your 2 daughters and go away from here. If you don't hurry, you will also die when the Lord destroys the city.’

₁₆Lot did not move fast. He wanted to wait. Then the 2 angels grabbed his hand and they also took the hands of his wife and his 2 daughters. The 2 men took Lot and his family safely out of the city. The Lord was good to Lot and his family. ₁₇When they were outside the city, one of the angels said to Lot: ‘You must run away quickly, and then you will be safe and you will not die. You must not look back and you must not stop in the valley. Run to the mountains. You will be safe there.’

₁₈But Lot said to the angel: ‘No, I can not run so far. ₁₉You were very good to us, and you have saved our lives. But I can not run all the way to the mountains. It is too far away and I will die when God destroys the city. ₂₀There is a small town not far from here. May we please go to that town? We will be safe there.’

₂₁The angel said: ‘Yes, you may go to that small town. I will not destroy it. ₂₂But you must hurry. You must run. I will wait and when you get to the town safely, I will destroy the city of Sodom.’

The town's name where Lot went to was Zoar because it was very small.

₂₃When Lot got to the town of Zoar, the sun came up. ₂₄The Lord sent fire and burning sulphur down like rain onto the cities of Sodom and Gomorrah. ₂₅The Lord destroyed those 2 cities and the whole valley and all the people who stayed in the cities, and all the trees and plants.

₂₆While Lot and his family were running away, Lot's wife turned her head and she looked back, and she became a pillar of salt.

₂₇The next morning Abraham got up and went to the place where he had been standing when he talked to the Lord. ₂₈He looked down to the place where the cities of Sodom and Gomorrah were and he saw clouds of smoke coming up all over the land. It was like smoke from a big furnace.

₂₉God destroyed the cities of Sodom and Gomorrah and the valley where Lot stayed, but God did not forget his promise that He had made to Abraham. God saved Lot, and He sent Lot away before He destroyed the cities.

₃₀Lot was afraid to stay in the town of Zoar, so he took his 2 daughters and they went away and they stayed in a cave in the mountains.

₃₁One day his older daughter said to her sister: ‘Our father is old and there are no men here who can sleep with us. ₃₂We must give our father wine and make him drunk. Then we can have sex with him and we can have children.’

₃₃That night they made their father drunk and the older daughter had sex with their father. He was so drunk that he did not know that she was there in his bed.

₃₄The next day the older daughter said to her sister: ‘I had sex with our father last night. We must make him drunk again tonight, then you can also have sex with him. Then we will have children from our father.’

₃₅That night they made their father drunk again and the younger sister also had sex with him. Again he was so drunk that he did not know that she was there with him.

₃₆That is how the 2 daughters of Lot got children. ₃₇The name of the older daughter's son was Moab. He was the forefather of the Moabite people. ₃₈The name of the younger daughter's son was Ben-Ammi. He was the forefather of the Ammonites.