No Turning Back

“As soon as [the angels] had brought them out, one of them said, ‘Flee for your lives! Don’t look back, and don’t stop anywhere in the plain! Flee to the mountains or you will be swept away!’” Genesis 19:17 NIV

The angels God sent to Sodom saved Lot and his family before He rained burning sulfur on it. One of the angels warned Lot’s family not to look back. Unfortunately, Lot’s wife didn’t heed the warning. She looked back and became a pillar of salt.
      God leads us out of the sinful places in our lives and commands us not to look back, but many of us fail to fight the temptation to. I don’t want to be like Lot’s wife. She was saved and headed toward the destination God agreed upon, but she forgot to keep looking ahead in the direction God had already blessed.
      There was nothing good about Sodom, her sinful place. God was giving her family a new and better start, but instead of looking forward to the promise, she considered the life she left behind.
      We need to stop thinking that anything good could have come out of the sinful areas in our lives (whether it be a relationship, job, or other area) that God saves us and leads us away from. Let’s trust God’s plan for our future.
      What I find saddest about what happened to Lot’s wife is that God would have used her to do great things. Jesus said that we “are the salt of the earth” (Matthew 5:13). Salt can be used to purify. God calls us to be pure and to be an example to the world around us.
      Instead of being the blessing that God intended for her to be and leaving behind sprinkles of salt wherever she went and in all her interactions, she died a pillar of it. Because she looked back, she died without fulfilling God’s plan for her to help purify the world around her.