Genesis 19 vs 26 (NIV) – But his [Lot’s] wife looked back behind him, and she became a pillar of salt.
It is almost like a thin layer difference of reminiscing and wishing things were different. It has been a couple of days since I stepped out, and I can’t help but wonder, while I do know that it was all for the best, how do I now move-on from the inside-out? There are times of assured forgetfulness during which I know this new land of over-flowing milk and honey will be nothing but secured love and assuredness in His presence will bring me the greatest fulfillment… However, I still find myself looking back at times… looking back behind [Him] like Lot’s wife did.
I don’t want to be stuck like she was. She looked back and became fixated in the past, longing with desire. She looked back and wasn’t ever able to look forward again – she became a pillar of salt. That pillar of salt both literal and metaphorical is so symbolic of that instance when you and I know the new land we are venturing into is for our own good and yet, we stubbornly refuse to wholeheartedly do so, and in doubt we turn back and look in phlegmatic, nostalgic and drooping gazes at our past.
Grace I need. Faith I need even more. Trust as I tread unknown patterns in my mind – foreign patterns as I ask for more Mercy because I am suddenly realizing that all I thought I knew is gone. All I thought I understood is no more – the truth is that I don’t understand.
“So you just stepped out of something? I don’t know what it is you stepped out of: your it-Job? School – you just graduated, and that Job isn’t coming or you just had to leave the school you dreamt would be your alma mater? A relationship that you were so sure was it? Someone - because you lost him/her to death? A friendship that you’d have thought would last all of eternity? The dream house you swore your great-grand children would grow old in? It doesn’t matter what you stepped out of/are stepping out of… the most important thing is that you realize that God is the one who allowed that stepping out to occur in your life, and just like Abraham who didn’t know where he was being called to, He has called you out of your comfort zone into a zone where you are holding onto Him and only Him. He is calling you into a land of fulfilled purpose. And yes, it hurts to step-out… He knows that… He built you that way… and He built you even better to live through that stepping-out victoriously.”
Join me as I give you the verse a lady told me before I left my Father’s land 4 years ago, and has gotten me through doubting days:
Proverbs 3 vs 5-6: Trust in the Lord with all your heart and lean not on your own understanding. In all your ways acknowledge him, and he will direct your path.
