“But Lot’s wife looked back as she was following behind him, and she turned into a pillar of salt.”
~ Genesis 19:26
In a court of law, a person who is associated with a crime, but may not have directly committed it, will often receive the same prison sentence as the person who perpetrated the crime. The judgment of destruction that God handed to the cities of Sodom and Gomorrah can definitely be deemed as extreme; however, Lot’s wife essentially received the same punishment just for looking back at the cities when God told her not to. This narrative begs us to ask an important spiritual question: “Why did she have a need to look back?” Did Lot’s wife embody the same desires that the cities were ultimately destroyed for? Did she have a persistent yearning for practicing the ungodly and she coveted that more than holding on to God? Was she the undercover wife who carefully kept her mischievous and sinful activities outside the walls of her house, but made it a point to frequently tip-toe in and around the desires of her flesh? The fact remains that there was something that she felt she was losing that was far greater than the benefit of salvation that she was being extended when she left Sodom and Gomorrah.
The same can be said of those who are continuously being extended the salvation that comes from Calvary’s cross, but are unwilling to follow it because they feel they have a need to look back. Jesus wants to free so many from drug dealing, abuse, and addiction, but they still have a need to look back. The Holy Spirit desires to release people from the demons contained in pornography and give them a God-view of the subjectivity of his creation rather than an objective view that twisted and demented, but they still think it is necessary to look back. God himself has created routes of escape from alcoholism, domestic violence, and other forms of reckless living; however, many of us still crave the need to look back. And the danger that is tied into looking back is that you are pulled right back into the same consequence that your heart had never left.
Proverbs 4:23 says that “Out of the heart flows the issues of life” and this is the very reason why this same passage says that we have to guard our hearts. The consequences of sin are the same whether you are directly involved in it or just an accomplice to the activity of it. Directly participating in pornography carries the same penalty if you privately view it in your home. All sin leads to some form of death and God never intended for us to be destroyed because we could not suppress our flesh from going back to the least due to looking back at less. Go forth and walk away from the sin which God has destroyed behind you. Don’t look back!
~ Rev. E. Shon Hagwood, M.Div.
