15 At dawn the next morning the angels became insistent. “Hurry,” they said to Lot. “Take your wife and your two daughters who are here. Get out right now, or you will be swept away in the destruction of the city!”
16 When Lot still hesitated, the angels seized his hand and the hands of his wife and two daughters and rushed them to safety outside the city, for the Lord was merciful. 17 When they were safely out of the city, one of the angels ordered, “Run for your lives! And don’t look back or stop anywhere in the valley! Escape to the mountains, or you will be swept away!”
18 “Oh no, my lord!” Lot begged. 19 “You have been so gracious to me and saved my life, and you have shown such great kindness. But I cannot go to the mountains. Disaster would catch up to me there, and I would soon die. 20 See, there is a small village nearby. Please let me go there instead; don’t you see how small it is? Then my life will be saved.”
21 “All right,” the angel said, “I will grant your request. I will not destroy the little village. 22 But hurry! Escape to it, for I can do nothing until you arrive there.” (This explains why that village was known as Zoar, which means “little place.”)
23 Lot reached the village just as the sun was rising over the horizon. 24 Then the Lord rained down fire and burning sulfur from the sky on Sodom and Gomorrah. 25 He utterly destroyed them, along with the other cities and villages of the plain, wiping out all the people and every bit of vegetation. 26 But Lot’s wife looked back as she was following behind him, and she turned into a pillar of salt.
27 Abraham got up early that morning and hurried out to the place where he had stood in the Lord’s presence. 28 He looked out across the plain toward Sodom and Gomorrah and watched as columns of smoke rose from the cities like smoke from a furnace.
29 But God had listened to Abraham’s request and kept Lot safe, removing him from the disaster that engulfed the cities on the plain.
I'm not even sure where to start here... I could go on for pages and pages, but promised my husband I would be to bed soon. So I will simply say this: humankind is flawed, broken, selfish, and sick. We are in need of a Savior and always have been. So often we miss that savior and seek instead wealth or fame, power or acclaim. Instead, we need our Creator to reach down and take our hand and truly lead us out of sin before we, too, are engulfed in the destruction.
This entire story parallels the story of Noah and the flood in so many ways. A God who cannot allow the horrific sin to continue. A very small remnant saved. A disaster brought on by nature. A people wiped off the face of the earth. A fresh start for others. A drunken binge and more sin is birthed.
If this isn't a reminder that our God is pure and we are not, I don't know what is. Yes, we need to be saved. Yes, I need to be saved. So many poor choices, so many wrong turns. So many ignorant acts that tear the innocence out of others we love and so much selfishness and debauchery that entire communities and even generations have a false sense of what humanity even means.
Save us, Oh Lord. Please, please, save us from ourselves.
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