Remember Lot’s wife

For the last two mornings, I've been studying Jeffrey R. Holland's article “The Best Is Yet to Be.” It was the subject of much pondering yesterday. In the article, President Holland relates a bit of the story of Lot's family's flight from Sodom and Gomorrah found in Genesis 19. Of course Lot's wife disobeyed God's specific command “look not behind thee”, but her real sin was that she longed to return to her home. She resented God's command that they leave their home even in the midst of a fire storm. She lacked faith in the God's promised future.

"As a new year begins and we try to benefit from a proper view of what has gone before, I plead with you not to dwell on days now gone nor to yearn vainly for yesterdays, however good those yesterdays may have been. The past is to be learned from but not lived in. We look back to claim the embers from glowing experiences but not the ashes. And when we have learned what we need to learn and have brought with us the best that we have experienced, then we look ahead and remember that faith is always pointed toward the future. Faith always has to do with blessings and truths and events that will yet be efficacious in our lives." Holland

Too bad Lot's wife didn't have the privilege of learning from Paul. “This one thing I do, forgetting those things which are behind, and reaching forth unto those things which are before, I press toward the mark for the prize of the high calling of God in Christ Jesus” Philippians 3:13–14

This brings me to the part that gave me deep reason to think. "There is something in many of us that particularly fails to forgive and forget earlier mistakes in life—either our mistakes or the mistakes of others. It is not good. It is not Christian. It stands in terrible opposition to the grandeur and majesty of the Atonement of Christ. To be tied to earlier mistakes is the worst kind of wallowing in the past from which we are called to cease and desist." Holland

So do we let others live for the future after their Pauline efforts to change and grow, or do we continually push them down to prove that we are justified in our anger towards them?

"Let people repent. Let people grow. Believe that people can change and improve. Is that faith? Yes! Is that hope? Yes! Is that charity? Yes! Above all, it is charity, the pure love of Christ. If something is buried in the past, leave it buried. Don’t keep going back with your little sand pail and beach shovel to dig it up, wave it around, and then throw it at someone, saying, 'Hey! Do you remember this?' Splat!...Such dwelling on past lives, including past mistakes, is just not right! It is not the gospel of Jesus Christ. In some ways it is worse than Lot’s wife because at least she destroyed only herself. In cases of marriage and family...and neighborhoods, we can end up destroying so many others...bury your weapons of war and leave them buried (see Alma 24). Forgive and do that which is sometimes harder than to forgive: forget. And when it comes to mind again, forget it again." Holland

I guess this topic is so much on my mind, because of the time I spent in "counseling" years ago. The technique then was to drag up all the terrible things anybody ever did to you. It seemed that I ended up hating my parents, teachers, siblings, or anyone else that had anything to do with my childhood and youth. I would start with one counselor and move on, because of this "dragging up garbage" technique. I wanted concrete answers on how to change my behavior to help me be happy. Finally, I found a little old doctor that was also an ecclesiastical leader, who guided me to forgive, to love, and to gain a better relationship with my Savior. This worked, while all the rest didn't. He helped me understand that I would never get free of my demons until I learned to forgive those who had hurt me and love them as God loves them. He told me to get up early and spend an hour with God. His advice was worth much more than I paid him, while the others were just spouting the "wisdom" of men.

"You can remember just enough to avoid repeating the mistake, but then put the rest of it all on the dung heap Paul spoke of to the Philippians. Dismiss the destructive, and keep dismissing it until the beauty of the Atonement of Christ has revealed to you your bright future and the bright future of your family, your friends, and your neighbors. God doesn’t care nearly as much about where you have been as He does about where you are and, with His help, where you are willing to go. That is the thing Lot’s wife didn’t get...Some of you may wonder: Is there any future for me? What does a new year...hold for me? Will I be safe? Will life be sound? Can I trust in the Lord and in the future? Or would it be better to look back, to go back, to stay in the past?...I call out, “Remember Lot’s wife.” Faith is for the future. Faith builds on the past but never longs to stay there. Faith trusts that God has great things in store for each of us and that Christ truly is the “high priest of good things to come” (Hebrews 9:11). Keep your eyes on your dreams, however distant and far away. Live to see the miracles of repentance and forgiveness, of trust and divine love that will transform your life today, tomorrow, and forever." Holland

This is what I want to do; live for things to come.