In Genesis 19:19-26 and Luke 17:28-32, Lot’s wife was told not to look back. She disobeyed and was turned into a pillar of salt. There is incredible importance to this story for us today. No, we may not necessarily fear being turned into a pillar of salt, but there is an amazing story line that accompanies such a remarkable event.
Don’t look back. Why? When God has given His orders to move ahead in a certain direction, or He has opened doors, or He has answered certain prayers which create a chain of events to land you in a particular situation, your looking back can have disastrous consequences. Let’s examine two particular details that jump out of the story of Lot’s wife.
First, have you ever tried dumping a spoonful of salt onto your tongue? Salt in and of itself has a repugnant taste. It is one of those ingredients much like vanilla, which smells good and adds flavor to food once baked. Try a spoonful of vanilla by itself and the taste is repugnant, if not horrible.
When we look back, we become distasteful. We become bitter and perhaps even resentful over our circumstances. There may be a number of questions surrounding why you are where you are and looking back has the effect of ruminating over how things were so much better than now or why you ended up here. Looking back causes us to forget God’s providence leading up to the particular situation and to forget that this moment is one small part of a much larger plan and purpose that we are carrying out on God’s behalf in a broken world.
Much more than this, though, we become distasteful to other people. When we allow bitterness and resentment to creep in, eventually it will seep out and affect the people around us. Over time, we exhibit a salty-sour attitude that rubs people the wrong way.
The second detail we will examine is that Lot’s wife became utterly and completely unusable. She turned into a pillar which extinguished all human capabilities. She ceased all operation as a vessel for God’s love in the world and no longer had any affect on the world around her. She ceased all obedience to God and no longer had any relationship with God. His transforming power no longer had an affect in her life, and she stopped growing.
The extent to which we become unusable when looking back may not be as dramatic as the experience of Lot’s wife. However, the effect of our looking back is no less severe in its consequences. God can only work in us when all channels are clear, and He can only work through us to a broken world if He is first working in us. Nothing can come out of us which does not exist within. If God is not reigning supreme in our lives, then His characteristics cannot radiate from our lives. We become a stagnant pool that nothing flows into or out of and exude a stench that drives people away from us instead of attracts them to the Lord.
If God has answered prayer in your life and led you to a particular point, I encourage you to consider these points from the story of Lot’s wife. Discouragement often sets in, yes, even among followers of Christ. However, we should not dwell on such discouragement. The only looking back we should do is to trace the answers to prayer and careful leading of the Lord in our lives to be reminded of how we came into this situation only by faith and trust in the Lord. And it shall be only by that same faith and trust, yet strengthened by our continual remembering His providence and praying for our future direction, that we will be led into the next part of His plan.
If there is a reason for looking back, it is only to retrace the hand of God in directing your footsteps to this point. An example of this is God answering a prayer or opening a door for marriage, college, employment or a new direction in life. When times become difficult (and they will for a season from time to time), instead of looking back at what once was, look back at the work God performed in bringing you to this point, how He arranged and opened doors. Another example of this may be the Christian service worker who dedicates his or her life to the Lord and then endures persecution or hard financial times. If the Lord originally opened the doors for your ministry, He will not abandon you half way through the mission. The more probable explanation is that the difficult times are meant for your good in the strengthening of your faith and trust in the Lord and deepening your personal relationship with Him. Indeed, the more we come to know God and know of God, the more full and rich our lives will be and the less today’s difficulty will matter.
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