Genesis 19:1-3

"And the two angels came to Sodom at even; and Lot sat in the gate of Sodom: and Lot saw them, and he rose up to meet them; and he bowed himself with his face to the earth; and he said, Behold now, my lords, turn aside, I pray you, into your servant's house, and tarry all night, and wash your feet, and ye shall rise up early, and go on your way. And they said, Nay; but we will abide in the street all night. And he urged them greatly; and they turned in unto him, and entered into his house; and he made them a feast, and did bake unleavened bread, and they did eat."

"And the two angels came to Sodom at even ..." These are the same as the two angels of the previous chapter, showing that we were correct in understanding "the men" there to have been angels. Speiser tells us that the "normal traveling time from Abraham's tent to Sodom was about two days,"[5] that is, some thirty-five or forty miles. Although the sacred writer here does not unduly emphasize it, we are clearly dealing with the highest level of miraculous events. Some are tempted to forget this, giving all kinds of natural explanations of just what happened to Sodom; and, despite the fact of its doubtless being true that God used natural forces in the overthrow of the five wicked cities (Zoar being spared), the whole narrative abounds with the supernatural. The prophetic prediction of exactly what would occur, both to Abraham and to Lot, the Saviour's making this event a type of final Judgment, the perfect timing of the disaster, and the Lord's announcement of it as punishment of the excessive wickedness of Sodom and the sister cities - such things require us to understand that, "We have here to do not with what is natural, but with what is miraculous."[6]

"Lot sat in the gate of Sodom ..." We agree with Leupold that Lot's presence here in the gate of Sodom, "constitutes a reproach,"[7] to this otherwise good and "righteous" man. In fact, despite the fact of Peter's reference to the righteousness of Lot, we must definitely understand it in a relative, not an absolute, sense. Compared with Sodom he was righteous; or, as said of Noah earlier in Genesis, "He was righteous in his generation."

Note that Lot did not hesitate to extend hospitality to the strangers, much as Abraham had. Some have sought to make the unleavened bread that Lot served mean that he recognized the visitors as divine, but a better explanation would seem that it was too late for anything else.