Genesis 18-19

Now the Lord appeared to Abraham.  To Abraham, he looked up and saw 3 men.  Immediately, he asks them to stay and allow him to serve them.  They agree and he runs to get things prepared to serve them.  They ask about Sarah and tell about how she will bear a son.  Sarah, listening to the conversation, laughs at this thinking it impossible since she is very old.  Then, they ask why she laughed and Sarah denies that she laughed.

As they are leaving, the Lord wonders to himself whether or not he should tell Abraham of what he is about to do.  There is a great outcry in Sodom and Gomorrah and the Lord is going to go check it out.  Now, God knows everything and doesn't need to "check it out"; however, we read this progression of this story and how God chose to play out this story.

Abraham asks about the destruction of Sodom and Gomorrah and asks if he will spare the city for the sake of 50 righteous people.  The Lord says he will not.  Abraham continues to lower the number, asking whether or not he will spare the city for the sake of a certain number of righteous people in the city.  The last number is 10.  If you know how this turns out, you realize that he still destroys the city.  This means that there were not even 10 righteous people in the city.

The Lord arrives in the city and Lot "pressed them strongly" to stay with him instead of in the town square.  They do and eat with him, but they are soon surrounded by young and old men of the city.  They demand Lot hand over the men so that they may have sex with them.  Obviously, this is wrong and Lot refuses.  In a weird turn of events, Lot offers his daughters to them instead of his guests.  This is also wrong, but perhaps the sinfulness of the city had been rubbing off on him.  In any case, they turn on Lot but his guests save him and blind them men.

Lot is told that the city will be destroyed, so he goes to warn his to be sons-in-law, but they think he's joking.  The angels urge him to leave, but he lingers.  So, they take him by force to leave the city along with his daughters and wife.  He asks them to allow him to escape to a nearby city instead of the hills and they allow.  As they flee, they are told not to look back, but Lot's wife looks back and is turned into a pillar of salt.  They leave and Sodom and Gomorrah is destroyed.

I guess these men are angels, and they talk about how the Lord is to destroy the city.  In the previous chapter, Abraham speaks to the Lord and these men visit.  It's interesting that 3 men visit Abraham, but only 2 men visit Lot.  I'm not sure what to make of this, but we know that Abraham speaks to the Lord and Lot is visited by 2 men who are referred to angels.  Those angels also refer to the Lord as sending them to destroy the place, as well as saying that the Lord is about to destroy the city.  I'm not entirely sure...

Anyways, we read about how Lot's daughters get him drunk to sleep with him so that they can bear children.  The son of the firstborn becomes the father of the Moabites and the son of the younger becomes the father of the Ammonites.  This is important to note for later when we read about these people.  They are not well looked upon because of their dark beginnings.