Book 3 of Musings Don't Look Back

When God is bringing you into a new place, don't look back to the old. If you resist change, remember Lot's wife.

I wonder why the Lord stressed that we not look back in the day of His coming.

It will be just like this on the day the Son of Man is revealed. On that day no one who is on the roof of his house, with his goods inside, should go down to get them. Likewise, no one in the field should go back for anything. Remember Lot's wife! Whoever tries to keep his life will lose it, and whoever loses his life will preserve it. (Luke 17:30-33)

I'll tell you what I think. Although it might not seem reasonable to us, I think the believers are going to have to make a decision when the Lord appears. I believe it will take faith to go to be with the Lord.

It seems like we would be so glad to see Him we would run to meet Him. But we may not be thinking clearly about this.

Perhaps the key to our understanding may be found in the statement; "Whoever tries to keep his life will lose it, and whoever loses his life will preserve it."

Why did Lot's wife look back? Because her heart was in Sodom with her sons-in-law and her neighbors. She did not want to leave Sodom. It was home to her.

We are to remember Lot's wife. She tried to keep her life, so to speak.

I think we have to make the decision today to lose our life. If we do not, when the Lord appears, we will cling to our life, just as Lot's wife did.

We may think it will be a simple matter to go to Jesus. It won't be.

Suppose you were away from your children. Let's say you were in the city shopping and your children were home. Then the Lord appeared. Would you be ready to go with Him, or would you be worried about your children?

Suppose you were away from home and you realized you had left the door unlocked, and there was a lot of money where someone could get to it. Would you be free in your heart to forget everything and go to be with the Lord?

Obviously this decision must be made now. If you wait until the Lord appears you might not be strong enough in faith to just go with the Lord.

Notice carefully:

"No one in the field should go back for anything."

"No one on the roof of his house should go down to get the goods inside the house."

In those days the roofs were flat and people did work there.

Drop everything and go to the Lord.

In order to do this you have to have given up your life in advance.

Lot's wife did not commit a great sin, as we would judge sin. She just wanted one last look at what had been home to her, perhaps for many years.

Is this action bad enough to warrant being turned to a pillar of salt?

We don't judge with the same judgment God does.

We would say, "It would be normal for a mother to rush home and take care of her children, or to lock the door of her house."

We would say that. But Christ says we should not do so.

Now we American believers are just like Mrs. Lot. We are accustomed to being disobedient. "Yea hath God said" but He really didn't mean it.

I think the Lord is making a point of this because He wants us to be ready at any moment to go with Him, and not put off being prepared to some unknown date in the future.

The Lord appears! There is not time for a decision! We go or we don't go-as simple as that.

The Apostle Paul spoke of forgetting the things that are behind. I believe Paul got that idea from a Psalm.

Listen, O daughter, consider and give ear: Forget your people and your father's house. (Psalms 45:10)

I guess one of the key principles of the victorious Christian life is to be able to forget the past.

All of our past life has been for the purpose of bringing us to the point where we are now. There have been so many mistakes, so many injustices given and received, so many pains, so much foolishness. All this if it is kept in our mind can hinder our pressing forward to the fullness of resurrection life.

The bitter-sweet pain of nostalgia is a primary characteristic of the adamic nature. The individual weeps over how wonderful the past was. When you and I were young, Mary. But all of this is a lie. The past was just like the present-filled with worries and grief of all sorts.

There are believers who still are chewing on the old bone of some past bitter experience. There are others who remember who wonderful it was when this or that was being experienced. Old relationships. Family mementoes. This is Adam.

We have to die to all this. We have to be looking eagerly upward at the heavenly scene that lies before us.

We may think we want the Lord to come. But that will mean our flesh and blood metabolism will change to Holy Spirit metabolism. Are you ready for your familiar body to disappear? Are you ready to release all that is familiar in order to enter a spiritual existence?

The saints are! They have died to the world and to all that is of Adam. They want to climb the rainbow staircase to that lovely land where Christ and the angels are. They already have forgotten their background, the old relationships. They know this life is passing away while we are living it. The entire adamic race was finished on the cross.

They are citizens of another world. They remember the future, not the past.

Enoch was translated by faith. We too are going to have to live in overcoming faith if we are to be ready to go with the Lord when He appears.

God is calling us to a new place today. There was a time when we passed from the life of the unsaved into Kingdom life. At a later time, perhaps, we received the Holy Spirit with speaking in tongues-another radical change in our life.

Now the Spirit is asking if we will move further into the plan of redemption by working with Him as He destroys from our personality the worldliness, the lusts and passions of our flesh and soul, and especially our self-will.

Are we willing to present our body a living sacrifice to God"

Are we willing to deny ourselves, perhaps go against the wishes of our loved ones on occasion, take up our cross, and follow Jesus every day?

Are we willing to count ourselves crucified with Christ?

Is it true of us that to live is Christ and to die is gain?

Is our one hope Christ will be magnified in us whether by our life or our death?

If the above is not true of us, then we need to get busy with our consecration. This is the normal Christian life.

Our nation is in grave danger in the present hour and we are going to need the help of every person who is willing to dedicate himself or herself to the Lord.

Let us without wavering one second forget that which is behind and reach forward to the elements of the Kingdom of God that are being presented to us today. If we do, we then will be completely prepared when the Lord appears in the clouds above us.

Brothers, I do not consider myself yet to have taken hold of it. But one thing I do: Forgetting what is behind and straining toward what is ahead, (Phil 3;13)