April 30, 2021 — How Well Do You Fit In?

You’ve heard of wolves in sheep’s clothing, but who would ever try to fit in by being sheep in wolves’ clothing? Baaaad idea!

I’ve often visited the south end of the Dead Sea area, where Sodom and Gomorrah used to be. For miles around, the barren landscape is covered with chunks of black lava-like rocks, called in the Bible “brimstone.” Everywhere it looks like a barren moonscape, with pillars of salt rising from the Sea, the lowest place on earth. Today called Har Sedom, or Mount Sodom, archeologist Sir George Adam Smith describes it: “The glare of Sodom and Gomorrah is flung down the whole length of Scripture history. In this awful hollow, this bit of the infernal regions come to the surface, this hell with the sun shining into it, primitive man laid the scene of God’s most terrible judgment on sin…We feel the flame scorch our own cheeks…Though the glare of this catastrophe burns still, the ruins of it have entirely disappeared, and there remains in the valley no authentic trace of the names it has torn and scattered to infamy across the world.” You can’t help but notice these salt pillars. And they bring before us the solemn words of the Lord Jesus, “Remember Lot’s wife.” What are we to remember? Unlike her husband who was grieved by the sin of Sodom, it seems she gave her heart to Sodom, and in the end couldn’t escape it. The sad record reads, “But his wife looked back behind him, and she became a pillar of salt” (Gen 19:26). She was so influenced by her environment, sadly, you couldn’t distinguish her any more from the salt pillars scattered there. “Do not be conformed to this world,” Paul warns, “but be transformed by the renewing of your mind, that you may prove what is that good and acceptable and perfect will of God” (Rom 12:2). Warning: If you treasure this world, you’ll end up being worldly. Remember Lot’s wife!

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