Genesis 19:1: Thirty miles and four thousand feet, done between a meal and nightfall
Read it →Commentary on Genesis 19:1
Genesis 19 opens with Abraham still interceding with God for the city. His nephew Lot is sitting in the gateway of that same city, and God is about to destroy it. That one detail — where Lot is sitting — raises the question commentators keep coming back to. What has this believer's chosen place cost him?
The Lord Does Not Come
In the chapter before, the Lord Himself was among the visitors who came to Abraham. Here the group is smaller. One writer sees every detail of the arrival marking a contrast:
How every circumstance seems designed to bring out the contrast! Two angels come, not men: there is distance, not familiarity; and the Lord Himself does not come near. So communion there is not and cannot be. Evening, too, has fallen; they come in gloom, and as if not to be seen.
Another writer links the hour to their errand:
While the Lord came to Abraham in the full light of day, the two angels come to Sodom "in the evening." They come, not to give a public witness to Sodom, but, as it were, in the secrecy of the evening gloom to pull a falling saint out of the fire of judgment (Gen. 18:1; Gen. 19:1).
What the Gate Means
In an ancient city the gate was where elders sat to judge and to govern. So the phrase is not describing a man resting by the roadside:
As they approached, Lot was sitting in the gate of Sodom. That means, of course, that he had accepted the office of a magistrate in that extremely wicked city. He not only saw and heard terrible evils as a private person, but came into contact with it all as a magistrate.
Reforming Sodom From Inside
More than one writer takes Lot's motive kindly. He settled in Sodom hoping to improve it. But one writer questions the method:
Lot was sitting in the gate, the place of a judge.
Courtesy Kept, Nearness Lost
Lot rises, bows, and urges his guests to come home with him. Yet they refuse at first, and one writer weighs both facts:
The Lord no longer stoops to accompany His messengers, nor visits Lot as He visited Abraham. At last they yield to his pressure, enter his house, and accept his unleavened bread.
A Warning Beyond Sodom
One writer opens this chapter by looking ahead:
The history that now opens before us is one of contrast, and it is full of instruction for us, who stand on the eve of a judgment far larger in scale. Our Lord Himself applies it, as He applies the disaster in the days of Noah, as a warning for the present… It will be a judgment of God… and as none of the wicked will understand, so none will escape.
Still Rescued
This is also where the visitors are first called angels. One writer links that name to the reason Lot is saved at all:
Those who appear in Genesis 18 as "men" to Abraham go on to Sodom as "angels" in Genesis 19. They go there to deliver Lot, but they cannot show him the closeness they show to Abraham. Righteous as he is, and "greatly distressed by the sensual conduct of the wicked," he is still one who is "saved, but only as through fire." He is found, not in his tent door at Mamre, but in the "gate of Sodom." He is one of those righteous men in an evil place, for whom Abraham intercedes with God. When he is delivered, it is said of him: "God remembered Abraham, and sent Lot out of the midst of the overthrow, when He overthrew the cities in which Lot lived." (Gen. 19:29.)
Summary
- Place decides everything. Abraham is at his tent door outside; Lot sits in the city gate. The same day brings one man communion and the other a warning.
- The gate is an office. Lot had taken a seat of authority in Sodom, so he met its evil not just as a neighbour but as a magistrate.
- Position replaced testimony. Settled in Sodom hoping to improve it, he made himself unable to warn it of the judgment coming.
- Distance shows in the details. Two angels came, not the Lord. Evening, not full daylight. They refused Lot's invitation before accepting it. Courtesy survived; nearness did not.
- Grace reaches even there. God pulled Lot out of the fire of judgment because He remembered Abraham, who was interceding while Lot sat in the gate. Jesus later used that day as a warning.
