Daily Updates

NEVER LOOK BACK
Tim Gunnells

Perhaps the first thought some of you have as you read this is “remember Lot’s wife” (Luke 17:32). Here, Jesus is recalling the plight of Lot and his family as they fled from Sodom (a place they never should have been). The original story is recorded in Genesis 19. Lot and his family were told to flee Sodom before it was destroyed. They were told not to look back, but Lot’s wife did, and she was turned into a pillar of salt.

Looking back to an old way of life, and even worse, turning back to an old way of life can be disastrous. “Remember Lot’s wife.” Never look back!

There is someone else in the Bible who talked about never looking back in a different light. The Apostle Paul in Philippians 3 told of his previous life in Judaism. He told of his former status and notoriety, but not with great pride because he counted his past accomplishments as “rubbish”.

Here is some of what he had to say: “But whatever things were gain to me, those things I have counted as loss for the sake of Christ. More than that, I count all things to be loss in view of the surpassing value of knowing Christ Jesus my Lord, for whom I have suffered the loss of all things, and count them but rubbish so that I may gain Christ, and may be found in Him, not having a righteousness of my own derived from the Law, but that which is through faith in Christ, the righteousness which comes from God on the basis of faith, that I may know Him and the power of His resurrection and the fellowship of His sufferings, being conformed to His death; in order that I may attain to the resurrection from the dead. Not that I have already obtained it or have already become perfect, but I press on so that I may lay hold of that for which also I was laid hold of by Christ Jesus. Brethren, I do not regard myself as having laid hold of it yet; but one thing I do: forgetting what lies behind and reaching forward to what lies ahead, I press on toward the goal for the prize of the upward call of God in Christ Jesus.”

Looking back with fondness on our life is fine, but spiritually speaking, we must always look ahead, if we hope to grow in our faith. So I say, never look back! Always reach forward!