Don’t Look Back! Remembering Lot’s Wife
By Gary Cox
Premise: Faith responds to danger differently from how fear responds. Faith “sees” and responds to the greater danger: the loss of life (physical, spiritual, and eternal), not the loss of life’s comforts. Faith leads to Eternal Life.
Reflecting on Lot’s Wife
A little reflection is needed to understand Jesus’s warning, “Remember Lot’s wife” (Luke 17:32).
First of all, it is apparent that the people of faith in Jesus’s day knew the Old Testament Scriptures well enough to be familiar with His vernacular warning, “Remember Lot’s wife.” Obviously, the pillar of salt incident was well known and readily considered.
Secondly, the application that is made by Jesus focuses on an instantaneous trust that obeys, which is counterintuitive to the instinctive response of the wonderful, nurturing gifts of a wife and mother, who “rises while it is yet night and provides food for her household …Her lamp does not go out at night. She looks well to the ways of her household and does not eat the bread of idleness” (Proverbs 31:15, 18, 27 ESV).
Frankly, it can be rather painful to reflect on Lot’s wife who appears to be so severely judged when she “looked back behind” her husband (Genesis 19:26). Superficially speaking, what was so wrong with Lot’s wife just looking back? Based on the Proverbial description of a virtuous woman, Lot’s wife could possibly have been thinking, “Why did I sleep the night through? I should have gotten provisions ready for our escape!” The worry about “getting your goods” is what Jesus’s warning focuses on.
Why such severity?
In Romans 11:22, Paul declares, “Behold therefore the goodness and severity of God: on them which fell, severity; but toward thee, goodness, if you continue in [His] goodness: otherwise you also shall be cut off.” I believe that Paul’s warning is foundational for understanding what it means to, Fear the Lord!” God’s goodness has provided a wellspring of mercy but we must continuously abide in Him to partake of that goodness. Step outside that wellspring and you are outside of His protection and exposed to His wrath. That means we must not lean on our own understanding! Practically speaking then, how is it possible to have faith that will instantaneously trust God’s goodness in a life-threatening circumstance?
Danger triggers natural fears about our goods, only an abiding faith can process it counterintuitively and instantly trust in the goodness of God. We must build up our faith. “But ye, beloved, building up yourselves on your most holy faith, praying in the Holy Ghost, keep yourselves in the love of God” (Jude 1:20, 21). Don’t leave His place of goodness!!!
So, let’s take a deeper look at Genesis 19, and then we will look at the last-day teachings of Jesus in Luke 17 that warns us to, “Remember Lot’s wife.”
Why Did She Look Back?
Here are the details from the Genesis account:
“At dawn the angels hurried Lot along, saying, ‘Get going! Take your wife and your two daughters who are here, or else you will be destroyed when the city is judged!’ When Lot hesitated, the men grabbed his hand and the hands of his wife and two daughters because the Lord had compassion on them. They led them away and placed them outside the city. When they had brought them outside, they said, ‘Run for your lives! Don’t look behind you or stop anywhere in the valley! Escape to the mountains or you will be destroyed!’ …[Lot said,] ‘Look, this town over here is close enough to escape to, and it’s just a little one. Let me go there. It’s just a little place, isn’t it? Then I’ll survive.’ ‘Very well,’ he replied, ‘I will grant this request too and will not overthrow the town you mentioned. Run there quickly, for I cannot do anything until you arrive there.’ (This incident explains why the town was called Zoar.) But Lot’s wife looked back and was turned into a pillar of salt’” (Gen 19:15-17, 20-22, 26-27 NET) (emphasis added).
First, consider the goodness of God: “Because the Lord had compassion on them.” It is imperative to note that the goodness of God always comes before His severity – He wants us to trust in His goodness. God makes a way of escape for His people and He mercifully helps His people find that way of escape by their trusting obedience. Lot hesitated, and so always will the soul of the natural man. It was the compassion of the Lord that literally “grabbed his hand and the hands of his wife and two daughters” and dragged them out of the city. There was no time to pack anything! When God speaks, trust Him and respond immediately!
And that is the gravity of the situation that Jesus is addressing in Luke 17.“On that day, let the one who is on the housetop, with his goods in the house, not come down to take them away, and likewise let the one who is in the field not turn back. Remember Lot’s wife. Whoever seeks to preserve his life will lose it, but whoever loses his life will keep it.” (Luke 17:31-33 ESV)
The Hebrew word for “look”, nāḇaṭ, means to look with regard, to pay attention, to consider, and implies a longer, thoughtful look. The application given by Jesus suggests that her “looking back” was likely focused on the instinctive maternal consideration of providing goods for her family as refugees. It is a likely consideration that every wife and mother can feel. Gather the necessities for a refugee flight! A mother’s dangerous error can be to instinctively provide for the necessary needs of her family, with potentially less sensitivity to obeying a clear command from God. Instant obedience requires a faith that is awake and watchful to the spiritual dangers at hand.
This reality broadens the scope of the warning to include even the most pious of mothers and wives who will not instinctively be able to flee at a moment’s notice without a genuinely intact faith. A faith that hears with their spirit, trusts God from the heart, and obeys Him at a moment’s notice! “Remember Lot’s wife,” – a very severe warning indeed! We all need to practice instantaneous obedience to the leading of the Holy Spirit!
Abiding in the Goodness of God
The consequences of not continually abiding in the goodness of God will be as severe as the wrath He is unleashing outside of His goodness! Under His wings, we can safely abide and be protected from the storms of His wrath. Did not God protect every Israelite who abode in their home with the blood of the lamb splashed on their doorposts? Your goods cannot provide a safer haven than God’s goodness!
Reflect on this in Psalm 91.
He who dwells in the secret place of the Most High Shall abide under the shadow of the Almighty.
I will say of the LORD, “He is my refuge and my fortress; My God, in Him I will trust.”
Surely He shall deliver you from the snare of the fowler and from the perilous pestilence.
He shall cover you with His feathers, And under His wings you shall take refuge; His truth shall be your shield and buckler. You shall not be afraid of the terror by night, nor of the arrow that flies by day,
Nor of the pestilence that walks in darkness, nor of the destruction that lays waste at noonday.
A thousand may fall at your side, and ten thousand at your right hand; but it shall not come near you.
Only with your eyes shall you look, and see the reward of the wicked.
Because you have made the LORD, who is my refuge, even the Most High, your dwelling place,
No evil shall befall you, nor shall any plague come near your dwelling;
For He shall give His angels charge over you, to keep you in all your ways.
In their hands they shall bear you up, lest you dash your foot against a stone.
You shall tread upon the lion and the cobra, the young lion and the serpent you shall trample underfoot.
‘Because he has set his love upon Me, therefore I will deliver him; I will set him on high, because he has known My name. He shall call upon Me, and I will answer him; I will be with him in trouble; I will deliver him and honor him.
With long life I will satisfy him, And show him My salvation.’”
The days we are in are fraught with danger. Let us abide in confidence of faith in the goodness of God and be ready in our hearts to obey Him on a moment’s notice!
No turning back, no turning back!
By Gary Cox
