Who was Lot in the Bible?
Lot appears in Genesis as the nephew who travelled with Abraham out of Ur, then parted from him and settled in Sodom. His story is short and sad, yet the New Testament calls him righteous — which raises the question this page has to answer: how can a genuinely saved man end so badly?
Family and starting point
The basic facts of his life are quickly told, and they already contain the turn that decided everything.
Morrish Bible DictionarySon of Haran the brother of Abraham. He seems to have accompanied Abraham without having a like faith in Abraham's God. When their flocks and herds had so increased that they could no longer dwell together, Abraham told his nephew to choose where he would turn. Lot looked on the well-watered plain of the Jordan, and went toward Sodom, even though the men of that city were exceedingly wicked.
His religion was borrowed. One writer puts the difference between the two men in a single line:
Scripture QuarterlyWith Abraham outwardly, he was not at heart what Abraham was; later with the men of Sodom outwardly, yet not a Sodomite either. He corresponds to a saint untrue to his saintship! His was a downward course. Lot merely followed Abram. Abram walked with God; Lot only with Abram. How easy it is to walk where another's faith leads without exercise of conscience!
The choice made by sight
Given first pick of the land, Lot looked at what was in front of him and never looked up.
Hamilton SmithWithout seeking direction from God, he chooses his path according to sight. "Lot lifted up his eyes and beheld the plain of Jordan." It was an alluring sight and had promise of present ease and plenty… Most significant of all, it was "like the land of Egypt." Lot, having followed Abraham into Egypt, had acquired a taste for Egypt's pleasures and so had strengthened the desire for worldly ease and plenty.
Nothing in the choice was scandalous. The danger lay elsewhere, and it worked slowly.
Hamilton SmithThere was nothing gross or wrong in choosing a well-watered plain; but it proves that the heart is not set on the unseen land of God's promise. Moreover, the real danger of the well-watered plains is that Satan had reared Sodom in their midst.
The slide, step by step
Scripture traces four stages, and each one follows naturally from the last.
J. N. DarbyFirst he chooses the well-watered plain — then pitches his tent towards Sodom — then lives in it — and then is driven out, with loss of all, by judgment of destruction.
Rescued once, and unchanged
Four kings looted Sodom and carried Lot off with it. Abraham armed his servants and got him back — and even that deliverance exposed how deep the problem lay.
Frederick W. GrantEven as to Lot it is once more solemnly made manifest that circumstances have not made him what he is, and that a change of circumstances does not change him. Freed by God's hand working through another, he is not really free; and soon we shall find him needing once more to be delivered from what, having escaped man's judgment, falls under God's.
Righteous — but only God said so
Read Genesis alone and you would never guess Lot's real standing. Peter supplies it.
Morrish Bible DictionaryFrom his history in the Old Testament it could not have been discovered that he was a righteous man; but this testimony is given of him in 2 Peter 2:7-8, where he is called "just Lot," who, as a righteous man, was daily vexed in his soul by the unlawful deeds of those among whom he dwelt. Though God delivered him, he is a solemn instance of a righteous man dwelling needlessly amid gross wickedness; his course being the strongest contrast to that of Abraham.
A voice nobody believed
Lot rose in Sodom's society — sitting in the gate meant public office — and paid for it when it mattered most.
F. B. HoleWhen Lot "sat in the gate of Sodom" (Gen. 19:1), which means that he acted as a magistrate, he, being a righteous man, must have earnestly desired to help improve its dreadful state of unrighteousness and immorality. He accomplished nothing except the wrecking of his own power to witness against it and the destruction of his family… He himself barely escaped at the last moment, without any power to deliver others.
Warned to flee, he still could not tear himself away.
Hamilton SmithEven while warning others, Lot is reluctant to leave Sodom; for when urged to hurry out of the doomed city, we read "he lingered." Nevertheless, the mercy of the LORD "brought him forth and set him outside the city." His wife and two daughters are brought out with him, but all his possessions are left behind. He is saved as through fire.
How it ended
The last scene is a cave above Zoar, and what Sodom had put into his daughters came out there.
F. B. HoleThe two daughters were saved physically but were lost morally, for we are permitted to know that they had become infected with the immoral ways of Sodom. They brought dishonour on themselves and on their father, and brought into the world both Moab and Ammon, both of whom gave their names to peoples who in later days became opponents of the people of God.
Summary
- Followed — Lot went with Abraham but not with Abraham's God; a faith leaned on someone else's holds nothing when the choice becomes your own.
- Looked — he lifted his eyes to the well-watered plain and never higher; a decision made by sight alone, with no prayer, set his whole course.
- Lived — plain, then tent toward Sodom, then inside it: each step reasonable, the direction always downward.
- Lingered — warned of judgment, he still had to be taken by the hand and pulled out; saved as through fire, with everything he had built left burning.
- Lost — his witness was a joke to his family, his wife perished, his daughters carried Sodom out with them, and Moab and Ammon became lasting enemies of God's people. Righteous, yet with nothing to show for it.