"ESCAPE FOR THY LIFE; LOOK NOT BEHIND THEE." Lot's wife looked back, and she became a pillar of salt, a sad monument and a perpetual warning to doubters. She received the angels, and hospitably entertained them; she believed their message, and prepared to act upon it: she obeyed their command, and left Sodom and her children behind her. She forsook the ungodly, and went in company with the saints; yet her heart remained in the city, and she looked back. She was deprived of life, for too highly prizing its comforts. She was cut off by a visible display of God's judgment. The situation in which she died is instructive: it was not in Sodom but on the plain; she escaped one judgment but was overtaken by another. She was left as a sad monument and testimony of God's jealousy, and displeasure against sin. Here is a warning to the covetous whose hearts are set on things below; to the self-willed who trifle with God's commands; and to the undecided who stand between Sodom and Zoar. God will be honoured by our obedience or by our sufferings. It is dangerous to trifle with the least of God's commands. We may overcome one temptation and yet fall by another. Let us examine ourselves: are our hearts detached from the world? Be not high-minded but fear. Remember Lot's wife.

For Meditation:
Waiting for our Lord's returning,
Be it ours His word to keep;
Let our lamps be brightly burning;
Let us watch, while others sleep;
We're no longer of the night;
We are children of the light.