In 1970, when I was on a tour of Israel, we visited the western shore of the Dead Sea. The tour guide pointed to the south end of the Dead Sea and proclaimed “that is where the city of Sodom was”. This was the general consensus of most Bible scholars for many years because that area was seen as a terrible waste land.
But in 1996, an archeologist, Dr. Steven Collins, was reading the thirteenth chapter of Genesis and noticed something that had escaped the attention of Bible scholars. He noticed that from where Abraham and Lot were located between Bethany and Ai, a spot that is about seventeen miles northeast of Jerusalem, Lot left Abraham and traveled east to the well watered plain in the vicinity of the city of Sodom. Dr. Collins went to that spot and looked around. He could not see anything in a southernly direction by the lower end of the Dead Sea because it was blocked off by some peaks. However, looking east, he saw a circular plain on the north east end of the Sea. This area, which is currently in Jordan, contains many sites of ruins. He, with a team, began a series of archeological digs in Tall-Hammon, the largest of the ruins, and ultimately found the ruins of Sodom under a layer of ash confirming that the Bible was “spot on true” in what it said... But in spite of all the evidence showing that the ruins under Tall-Hammon had been the city of Sodom many, even Bible scholars, refused to believe it and are still looking in the wrong direction.
This is very typical of the times in which we live. The majority of humans do not, or will not look to the Bible for all of life’s answers, but are looking in all of the wrong directions. And that is why we as believers should be persistent in pointing out to individuals “the way, the truth and the life” while we are “ looking for the blessed hope and the appearing of the glory of our great God and Saviour, Christ Jesus.”