Monday, October 24

Salt

Sorry! Its not a review of the Angelina Jolie movie!

Someone mentioned the word 'salt' yesterday, and my mind went to the famous Lot's wife who became a pillar of salt!

…why did she look back? Was she expressly told not to? I had to go back and check to be sure and found that she was indeed told! In fact the whole episode was one of such urgency…hurry! Go! Don’t look back…get into the mountains, don’t remain on the plains…explicit, urgent instructions. What could have held such appeal for this woman in Sodom and Gomorrah that she risked dying for?

Look at the Israelites during the wilderness journey. They so tried the patience of God! Gosh! They wept and whined and cried for the leeks, the garlic, the cucumber in Egypt….we don’t want this ‘food’ coming from the sky jo! What?! Water from a rock?! Please! They couldn’t bear  this ‘hardship’, which is ridiculous and strange because they were slaves under hard labour, but it seem that as long as they could have garlic and cucumber and leeks and onions, they were content to remain slaves! (They conveniently forgot that they cried for freedom for 400 hundred years). Sigh. So typical of us too.

So, I came right down to me…and of course, you! What are those things in our past that we so long for? The things that hold us back, longings for the things we had, things that make us unable to have any (future) expectations?? What is so good in our yesterday that we can’t bear not to go back to? Didn’t God say the ‘glory of the latter house will be greater than the former?’ Is He a liar? Has He lied to you? What makes yesterday better than today? If you really want to be truthful an objective?? No matter how bad it is today, I never starve. I never go without food at anytime anymore. No matter how bad it gets today, I really do not want to go back to selling old newspaper and bournvita tins in order to feed! Oh yes! I honestly do not want to walk in pouring rain (in addition to getting sprayed by passing vehicles) at 5.30am on my way to work, where, on arrival I hide in the toilet to ‘re-wash’ and dry my clothes using the hand dryer! I really, really, do not want to end up with 4 other people, in the same house, and with 2  on the same bed! I do not even look forward to eating salad and chicken in a house full of strife, where there is no freedom. I, please and please, do not want to have to trek for miles to and fro school because I am too broke to take the bus. PLEASE.

So, why elect to ‘look back’ and die? You may presently have no job, you may be as broke as anything, you may long for a child, you may have experienced devastation in ways that no other person can understand, someone may have died, it may even be more horrible than these, still in the midst of it all, looking at The Situation really closely, tell me, isn’t there something you are truly grateful for? Ok, if you can’t find anything, may I put it to you that you are not responsible for the air you breath? As long as you have that, then you hope! Who knows whether your joblessness is an opportunity to do ‘something else?’ Who knows whether the delay in childbirth is to foster closeness with your husband (I said ‘who knows’ oh!) Who knows whether the delay in this husband is for me to learn patience (I pray this works oh! Lol) Who knows whether the death of that somebody is to deliver them from the terrible evil to come? To free them from pain? Who knows?? God does, and since in His sovereignty He has decided to take you and I through this Wilderness and says to eat manna, and quail, and drink water supplied from rock, and that in the midst of it all, however long the trip, our clothes and shoes will not wear, and what’s more, that we would come out of The Journey a better person, I think I had better cooperate, in my own interest. Oh, and did Job not say, in his own utter devastation (is your situation like Job’s?? *eyebrow raised*),though He slay me, yet I will trust in Him?’ Well, I guess it is a function of what/who you believe in. You may have options, I don’t.
I do not want to become a pillar of salt; dead and useless. #Fimisile.

I dare you to search your heart (and past) and present situation and see if today is not better, in some way, than yesterday!...and…

Be free oh.

4 comments:

  1. Zee, God bless you for this write up, just what I needed to read. Oh God please forgive my ingratitude. Kai I have been really selfish fa, not even thinking of what God's plans are; I just ignore Him because I am hurting.
    Oh Zainab, thanks for reminding me that His thoughts toward me are good....

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  2. very fantastic write up and i have been reading all your post but unfortunately i cant send a response through my phone.
    www.secretlilies.blogspot.com

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  3. Really nice Zee this could not come at a better time

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  4. We do have so much to be thankful for instead of complaining and you know what I personally learnt? That people with ungrateful hearts do NOT prosper. True!!!

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