p. 116 | REMEMBER LOT'S WIFE

Publishing Committee · Battle Creek, Mich. · Jan 10, 1856

REMEMBER LOT'S WIFE.

WHAT a volume of meaning in a single sentence.—Remember Lot's wife. But we inquire,

1. When should we remember Lot's wife? When we are living in days that correspond to the days of Lot. The grievous sins of the cities of the plain had come up before high heaven, and destruction was determined upon them. But there came a warning, as always in the dealings of God with men, the warning precedes the judgment. "Escape for thy life," said the angels to Lot; "look not behind thee, neither stay thou in all the plain; escape to the mountain lest thou be consumed." There was no time to be lost; the destruction threatened did not linger; there must be no dallying, no delaying; the whole soul must be bent on escaping and that only. But Lot's wife lingered, she hesitated, she looked back, she perished. Are our days like the days of Lot? Behold the picture—they are eating, they are drinking, they are buying, they are selling, they are planting, they are building; they refuse to know the times of their visitation; they are inquiring, Where is the promise of his coming? for, since the fathers fell asleep, say they, all things remain as they were from the beginning; they are willingly ignorant of the fact that the heavens and the earth which now are, are reserved unto fire against the day of judgment and perdition of ungodly men. But the warning has been given, and destruction is impending, and the admonition of every fulfilling sign is, Escape for thy life! And as we look back and remember that as it was in the days of Lot, even thus shall it be in the day when the Son of man is revealed, a voice comes up through the long ages of the past, from the flames of Sodom, "Escape for thy life!" If we look back we perish: therefore, "Remember Lot's wife!"

2. Why should we remember Lot's wife? "In that day," says the Saviour, "he which shall be upon the housetop, and his stuff in the house, let him not come down to take it away; and he that is in the field, let him likewise not return back." It is a time when all must be left. That soul which places his desire as much upon the things behind him, as on the things before him, will not be likely to make much progress. No one will enter the pearly gates of the New Jerusalem, with one lingering affection for the vanities of earth. If our affections bind us to the fleeting things of this world, when they perish we perish with them. Lest we therefore turn back, and be consumed in the iniquity of the wicked, let us "Remember Lot's wife!"

3. Who should remember Lot's wife? Whosoever would save his life. "Neither stay thou in all the plain; escape to the mountain lest thou be consumed." Now is the time when he, who would seek to save his life shall lose it. Now is the time when we should go forth not counting our own lives dear unto us, and we who see in our own times but the reflection of the days of Lot, are without excuse, if we take not heed to the examples set us, and—"Remember Lot's wife!"