Don’t Look Back: Trusting God in the Wilderness

My Art of Vision
Aug 8
4 min read

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Isaiah 43:18-19: A New Thing Is Coming

“Remember not the former things, nor consider the things of old. Behold, I am doing a new thing; now it springs forth, do you not perceive it? I will make a way in the wilderness and rivers in the desert." Isaiah 43:18–19 (ESV)

In this scripture, God is speaking to Israel through the prophet Isaiah to encourage them about the coming Messiah—assuring them that something new was on the horizon.

Early on in this difficult season of my life, this scripture kept showing up. With everything I was feeling and going through, the idea of something new didn’t make sense. I couldn't think of a new thing. My prayers at the beginning were focused on going back:

“Father God, please heal me so I can get back to my life and everything I used to do.”

I wasn’t working out. I wasn’t serving at church. I wasn’t leading family prayer. I was barely keeping up with household chores. So when you're feeling incapacitated, hearing about a new thing when all you want is the old thing can feel confusing—almost offensive.

“What If Going Back Isn’t God’s Plan?”

I remember my husband and a close friend both had this revelation at different times and gently told me:

“What if going back isn’t what God wants for you?”

I couldn’t wrap my head around it. I was thriving before—or so I thought. But as more and more began to rise to the surface, I started to realize that maybe I wasn’t thriving... I was masking.

Avoidance, disappointment, anger, distrust, pride, ego—it all bubbled up.

I had been so busy, I didn’t even realize what was underneath my hard exterior. It took a complete halt to reveal the “me” that God saw, not the one everyone else was used to.

I longed to go back to doing things for God, rather than being with God. I wanted distraction, not stillness. I wanted to feel normal not whatever this was.

So while I was crying out for healing, for salvation—I didn’t realize He was already doing it. And even now, I don’t always see it clearly. But I’m learning to trust that He is.

The Temptation of Familiarity

Familiar can feel safer than freedom.

Take the story of Lot’s wife. When angels came to destroy Sodom and Gomorrah, Lot’s family was spared. They were given a command:

“Escape for your life. Do not look back or stop anywhere in the valley. Escape to the hills, lest you be swept away.” Genesis 19:17 (ESV)

They escape to a small city called Zoar and in the midst of this Exodus Lot's wife looks back and turns to a pillar of salt.

But Lot’s wife couldn’t resist the pull of the past:

“But Lot’s wife, behind him, looked back, and she became a pillar of salt.” Genesis 19:26 (ESV)

I get it. She wanted one last look. That city held her memories—the good, the bad, the familiar. It was everything she knew and it was getting destroyed, though salvation and deliverance was ahead, the past still had her heart.

Why We Long for Egypt

The Israelites did the same thing. Bondage, immoral behavior, being stuck, slavery and mistreatment, all seem better than God's promise. After being freed they still longed for Egypt:

“Is not this what we said to you in Egypt: ‘Leave us alone that we may serve the Egyptians’? For it would have been better for us to serve the Egyptians than to die in the wilderness.” Exodus 14:12 (ESV)

We do this, too.

it's the unknown that we can't grapple with, it's nothing we can predict or plan for and it makes us uncomfortable. Lot's wife turned into salt, her longing, curiosity, and sadness preserved her in that feeling of regret.

I don't know if God wants us to mourn the past, though it is all knew, it isn't all he has for us, maybe God is so excited of the future for us that mourning the past leaves no room to accept the future of what is ahead.

The desert wilderness, with a peak has a light shining down a very important spot in the center

What Is God Doing in the Wilderness?

I started to realize... maybe I was like Lot’s wife. Stuck on what was, where I used to be, and the control I once had. This season of pruning felt painful, disorienting, and at times, unbearable.

How could I be excited about something I had never seen before?

The “new” can feel threatening when all you’ve known is survival.

I wanted to speed pass the wilderness that I put so much pressure on myself to get there. I romanticized the past, even if it was full of bondage. Why? Because the discomfort can make you prefer the dysfunction you understand over the freedom we don’t.

Keep Going

But Lot kept moving forward—wherever God led. So did the Israelites. God was their guide, and He’s ours, too. The ultimate GPS.

And yet, I complained. I cried. I questioned God. I misjudged His character. Why? Because His ways aren’t my ways, and His thoughts aren’t my thoughts.

I was experiencing a full-blown mental and emotional breakdown. I felt broken, weak, unbalanced. I didn’t know where God was leading me, and I wasn’t sure if I’d make it.

However I had to keep moving forward.