Genesis 19

Genesis 19 comprises not just one but two rather lurid stories that one might expect to find in some Canaanite pulp magazine. While not exactly salacious, they're also not exactly Sunday school material. The first story is more well-known; Lot invites two Heavenly messengers into his house in Sodom. A group of concupiscent men knock on Lot's door, wanting to, appropriately enough, sodomize the visitors. What a lovely city. Lot tells them to shoo (good), but then offers his daughters instead (not so good).

I understand that Lot wanted to protect his guests, but using his daughters as substitutes? I may not be a father (yet), but even I know that that's horrific parenting. Perhaps that leads to the rather odious events between him and his daughters later in the chapter. Even when the angels urge Lot and his family to leave to avoid Sodom's impending annihilation, Lot hangs back and even haggles a bit, asking to flee to the nearby city of Zoar (a site of more potential temptation and possibly lecherous men) instead of going to the mountains. His wife is not so lucky, transfigured into a mineral fit for sprinkling on French fries.

Despite showing hospitality to his guests, Lot makes at least three mistakes in this story, ranging from the morally dubious to the outright atrocious. And yet, as verse 16 says, God still mercifully spares him. I can disdain Lot for betraying his daughters, but I'm also similar to him in that I sometimes hesitate to do the right thing if it's inconvenient or uncomfortable. And though I'm still working on spiritual discernment, I can foresee myself haggling with God when I'm better able to perceive His voice. "Can I do it later?" Or, "Well, that's too hard. Can I do it halfway?" God does let Lot go to Zoar, but he ironically gets spooked and ends up going to the mountains anyway. If God wants us to do something, He'll end up getting His way. (Just ask Jonah.) Given my shy and introverted nature, I'd have never imagined that I'd have a job in which I basically have to talk for hours at a time. Yet God has a reason for placing me where He has, even if I don't know what that reason is yet (other than forcing me to develop my oral communication skills).

Then, we're treated to the unsavory story in which Lot's daughters get him as drunk as a skunk so they can know him in the Biblical sense. They want to "preserve their family line," but I do wonder if that's a pretense and that they're actually getting revenge on Lot for offering them to the dogs. That may be too modern a way of interpreting it, though; maybe in that society, daughters (sadly) thought it expected to be subservient to such a degree.

Anyway, this incident does raise a few questions. I admit I've never been drunk, but if Lot didn't know what was happening until it was a fait accompli, he must have been pretty hammered. And if he was so out of it, how was he able to…well, I'm sorely tempted to get a little colorful here, but suffice to say that his daughters ended up pregnant. Surely Lot would've noticed something was up.

So yes, Lot was spared, but he lost his wife and ended up performing an unspeakable act with both his daughters. It's a rather distasteful and inconclusive note to end on, but it's a reflection of the fallen world we live in. Beauty and horror both exist in this world, sometimes side by side. But, to paraphrase James 1:17, every good gift comes from God.