On at least three different occasions, Jesus used the metaphor of salt or the example of salt in his teaching. I suspect he used it much more frequently than that. It's interesting because in all three instances, his words are almost exactly the same, but if you read the comment in context, it comes out meaning quite different things. And one begins to suspect that he had this phrase almost rolling off his tongue and used it for a whole variety of different kinds of points that he might make. Let's turn to Matthew's Gospel.

The first time we find him speaking about this is in the middle of the Sermon on the Mount.

Chapter 5, and the reference is verse 13.

He says, you are the salt of the earth, but if the salt has lost its taste, how shall its saltness be restored? It's no longer good for anything except to be thrown out and trodden underfoot by men. Fairly clear and straightforward. The context in which that comment comes, it immediately follows the Beatitudes. And he's been saying, blessed are you when, or blessed are you if. that you are blessed if you're poor in spirit.

You are very happy, supremely blessed by God if you're one of those who mourns for the right things. You are blessed if you're amongst the meek and so on. Blessed are you if. It seems to me that in the light of that, this first comment would be, Blessed are you if you are salty.

That's the context of the comment. Blessed are you if you really are salty in the sense of being flavorful, tangy, adding the spice to life. This first use of the comment has altogether to do with flavor. We add salt to food in order to spice it up or to bring out the true taste of what's already there. And there's a very strong sense of the if hidden in it because he's saying, if you're not that, you're no good.

doesn't say you're not salt. You may still be salt, but if you're not salty, you're useless.

There is a type of salt very common around the Dead Sea. It's a fossilized chemical material, and it was fairly common to find that the top layer was tasteless, useless. It had absolutely no purpose they'd throw it out. And that's Jesus' reference here. You may be salt, but if you're not salty, you're no good. You're no good for the world.

And your purpose in the world is to add zest to it. Add flavor to it. Be the spice of life. You may be so heavenly minded that you're no earthly good. It's not to deny that you are salt. You may still belong to the Father, but as far as your use here on earth, trodden underfoot. That's the first time that we hear him speaking, the emphasis on flavor or on taste.

Second is in Mark's Gospel, chapter 9.

And verse 50.

Notice, the words, as I said, are almost identical. salt is good, but if the salt has lost its saltness, how will you season it? He says, have salt in yourselves and be at peace with one another. But if you read the context of this comment, you'll find that rather than the emphasis being on taste and flavor, it's in a very different area.

It's salt used as a cleansing agent or a purgative agent. Look at what he's just been saying. start up with verse 42. Very strong warning. Whoever causes one of these little ones who believe in me to sin, it would be better for him if a great millstone were hung around his neck and he were thrown into the sea. And then he says, if your hand causes you to sin, cut it off. If your eye causes you to sin, pluck it out.

If your foot causes you to sin, chop it off. Better, better to enter hell, Better to enter heaven, to enter life, handless, eyeless, or footless, than to go to hell with your whole body. That's the context of this comment. And then he makes this fascinating comment. Verse 48, Hell is a place where their worm does not die, and the fire is not quenched, for everyone will be salted with fire.

salted with fire. Clearly it's being used here in a sense of purging or cleansing. And you may know that if you had nothing better to clean a wound, you might take a handful of salt and rub it in the wound. It's not terribly efficient, but it's a lot better than nothing. It would burn. It would be like fire, but it would cleanse that wound, and it was used in that fashion.

And clearly what he's talking about in this instance is burning out, cutting off, throwing away, getting rid of whatever is not worthy of the kingdom of heaven, whatever is not committed to Christ. Get rid of it. And everyone, he says, will be salted with fire. Every one of us will receive a cleansing. Better to accept that willingly, joyfully, gratefully, than to have it imposed on you.

Better to cut off your own hand than to be cast into hell because you hung on to it. Everyone will be salted with fire. And then the reflection, salt is good, but if it's lost its saltness, how will you season it? It's saltness in this instance, then, not a matter of flavor, but a matter of its cleansing power. If it's lost its ability to cleanse, to purge, once again, it's good for nothing.

Over in Luke, chapter 14, we get the third instance.

Verse 34.

and again the words almost identical salt is good but if salt has lost its taste how shall its saltness be restored it's fit neither for the land nor for the dunghill men throw it away he who has ears to hear let him hear very similar point to the first one but again the context makes it slightly different the emphasis here is not just on being flavorful but on continuing to be flavorful.

Slight difference there, isn't there? Continuing to be flavorful. Look again at what he's been teaching about. He's been talking about the cost of discipleship and he's been pressing the issue in a variety of directions. Verse 26, If anyone comes to me and doesn't hate his own father and mother and wife and children, brother, sister, yes, even his own life, he cannot be my disciple.

He's not saying that we're to literally hate them, but if our love for him isn't so much vastly beyond our commitment to them or even to ourselves as to be like the difference between love and hatred, then we're not worthy of being his disciple. Have you counted the cost? A lot of people are ready to respond to follow Jesus until it begins to get in the way of personal relationships or family relationships or my very great concern for myself, my own life, then I'm not so sure if I want to continue in following him.

He says, verse 27, who doesn't bear his own cross and come after me cannot be my disciple. And then he illustrates with a couple of very choice parables. Which of you desiring to build a tower doesn't first sit down and count the cost, whether or not he has enough to complete it? Otherwise, when he's laid a foundation and isn't able to finish, all who see it begin to mock him, saying, this man began to build and wasn't able to finish.

I remember a few years ago being on the West Coast, and Dwayne Tebow was driving me around through Oceanside, California, and we went past this tremendous development that was half finished. Foundations had been laid, and the outer framing had been put up on about 350 houses that they were building simultaneously. I don't know why they did it that way. I would have thought you'd do one and then do the next, but they were doing them simultaneously, and there they were, foundation-laid, external sticks in place, stopped.

You look a little bit more closely, and you see the wood is already quite weather-beaten. And Dwayne said the folks that were building that building project ran out of money halfway through. And because the interest rates were so high, they couldn't get any more. And nobody wanted to pick up the option. He said, it's the laughingstock of Oceanside. 350 half-finished houses.

Nobody wants them. Nobody will buy them. Just sit in there. Jesus says, count the cost. See whether you're prepared to finish the job. There's no place in the kingdom of heaven for the one-day wonder.

If you're going to follow Jesus, see what it entails. Are you prepared to pay the cost of absolute commitment to him, to give him your all, to go all the way till the job is finished? And if you didn't get the point, he goes into another example. What king, going to encounter another king in war, will not sit down first and take counsel whether he's able to meet with 10,000, and him who comes against him with 20,000?

A little point of humor. If not, while the other is yet a great way off, He sends an embassy and asks terms of peace. Let's see. One, two, three, four. We've got 10,000 men.

That's a pretty good army. How many did you say they had? 20,000. Time for an embassy. Send out a runner. Are there any terms of peace? The Ayatollah is beginning to get that message.

So therefore, verse 33, whoever of you does not renounce all that he has cannot be my disciple. You see, the teaching is absolutely consistent, and in the light of that comment, when he speaks about salt, it's not just a matter of being flavorful, but of continuing to be flavorful. It does no good to start out salty if you end up bland.

Okay? Salt is good, but if it loses its taste, how shall its saltness be restored? Last year when we were in Israel, Money Yates took a picture of me with his Polaroid camera leaning against two pillars looking like Samson. He had it blown up into this tremendous, huge mural for the wall which he presented to me at Shrinemont.

Very thoughtful of you, Money.

And I hung it on my wall down at the lake, and I went down a couple weeks ago, and it has so completely faded away, the only thing that's left is the tip of my beard.

the mural was good but if it loses its picture what good is it see that's the point so jesus is making three related points here one we're to be flavorful we're to be those who add the zest to life whoever whoever sold the idea that christianity was to be dull we're to be the ones having the most excitement, the most fun of anybody. We're in fact to be adding fun even to the lives of those who don't yet know Christ. People ought to be bumping into us and say, wow, what has he got? What has she got?

Flavorful. Number two, cleansing. We're to be those who would willfully cleanse ourselves of all unrighteousness and look to God to complete the process. Salt will be salted with salt to cleanse ourselves. And thirdly, to continue, continue in our commitment to pay the price, count the price and be willing to pay it for full-fledged discipleship.

Initial enthusiasm has to give way to a lifestyle of commitment. So, as I say, Jesus used the same language, the almost exactly same comment, to make at least these three interrelated points. What struck me in my quiet time not too long ago was the fact that there's a background to all of this, which I had completely missed, and perhaps some of you have missed it as well.

At least I make that assumption. That shows you the sinfulness of, if I missed it, you certainly had to, right?

Look at the book of Leviticus.

Genesis, Exodus, Leviticus, right?

That's the Old Testament.

Gert Behana said, I've been a Christian 27 years and I still don't know who Leviticus was.

Chapter 2.

This is talking about the cereal offering.

The cereal offering was made for thanksgiving or as an expression of commitment.

never as a sacrifice for sin because sin was clearly we were told both Old and New Testament without the shedding of blood there's no remission for sin so the sin offering was always the blood of an innocent animal who stood in my stead and eventually in the New Testament it becomes Jesus himself who gives his life a ransom for many that's the sin offering but a thanksgiving offering or a commitment offering might be an offering of cereal, of grain.

And we're told here that when anyone brings a cereal offering as an offering to the Lord, his offering shall be of fine flour. He shall pour oil upon it and put frankincense on it, and bring it to Aaron's sons, the priests. And he shall take from it a handful of the fine flour and oil, with all of the frankincense, and the priests shall burn this as a memorial portion on the altar, an offering by fire, a pleasing odor to the Lord. And what is left of the cereal offering shall be for Aaron and his sons.

It's a most holy part of the offerings by fire to the Lord. So part of it was to be consumed by fire. You catch that. Consumed, purged by fire. And some of it then was to be enjoyed and eaten.

It's a very interesting comment in verse 4, which has absolutely nothing to do with what we're studying tonight, but which I just have to share with you in passing. When you bring a cereal offering baked in the oven as an offering, it shall be unleavened cakes of fine flour mixed with oil,

or unleavened wafers spread with oil. You're aware, of course, that the Holy Spirit is always pictured in the Scripture under the symbolism of oil. and one of the great raging theological battles in our generation is between those who say that when you become a Christian you get the Holy Spirit in his entirety that's all there is, there ain't no more and the rest of your life you live releasing the Holy Spirit then there's another group that would tell you no, you certainly are born again of the Spirit but at a later date as a separate event there is an anointing by the Holy Spirit

sometimes they're called the evangelicals and the charismatics who enjoy that particular battle but if there's anything to the symbolism here it would seem to me that God is suggesting it doesn't matter when you get it so long as you get it doesn't matter if it's mixed in when you're mixing the flour or spread on top afterwards so long as you get it that's just for free

Note verse 11.

No cereal offering which you bring to the Lord shall be made with leaven. You know what leaven is. It's just yeast.

And they were commanded never to mix yeast into the cereal offerings. They might make little pancakes or they might make little loaves of bread. They might make any number of kinds of foodstuffs, but they weren't to add yeast into it. Why? Because yeast is a symbol of corruption. It's a symbol of decay. And it's always, in the Old Testament, a symbol of being infiltrated by alien evil influence from those who don't walk with God.

We know that there's a process of fermentation that takes place when you add yeast to things. And up to a point, that may make foods flavorful. But if it goes on, they go sour.

Wine may be fermented up to a certain point, but then it turns to vinegar. It's a corruption. It's a dying process. It's an introduction of death into your offering. And so no cereal offering shall be made with leaven. But contrast that with verse 13.

You shall season all your cereal offerings with salt. You thought we'd never get back to salt, didn't you? You shall season all your cereal offerings with salt. You shall not let the salt of the covenant with your God be lacking from your cereal offering. With all your offerings you shall offer salt.

So never leaven, but always salt. If leaven is a symbol of corruption, of death and decay and compromise, salt is a symbol of preservation.

And once again, I'm sure you're aware of the fact that it may not be as effective as some of the more modern chemicals that we've developed, but we used to salt down our meat to keep it from decaying. And that's still done very widely. So here's an additional use of salt. And the word of God was, you shall not offer any. of your offerings except with salt. Over in Numbers, the next book, 18,

you have a lengthy discussion of the promises, the guarantee to Aaron, the high priest, and the Levites, the whole group of priests and helpers, that they were to have no property of their own, land, stock, etc., but they were to attend the worship and live off the offerings of the people. And in verse 19 we read this,

All the holy offerings which the people of Israel present to the Lord I give to you, and to your sons and daughters with you, as a perpetual do.

It is a covenant of salt.

forever before the Lord, for you and your offspring with you. There's the phrase that caught my attention, a covenant of salt. I said, what in the world is a covenant of salt? And I began to do some research. And I began to see that salt, as God had instructed in the giving of the cereal offering, salt became almost a sacrament of promise.

that when salt was used in the binding of a commitment between one man and another they would seal it with salt there would be some kind of a passing of salt or they would sow salt into an offering that they'd make together before the Lord and it was a symbol just as we've seen of preservation or of endurance it was a symbol of eternality as if to say this promise is binding the salt will preserve it We look over into 2 Chronicles, and you'll see a fascinating reference.

2 Chronicles chapter 13.

Keep going to the right.

Here we find Abijah, the rightful successor of David and Solomon and Rehoboam, arguing with Jeroboam, who usurped the northern kingdom.

And Abijah is arguing that it properly belongs to him rather than to Jeroboam. And in verse 5, 2 Chronicles 13 and verse 5, he says this, Ought you not to know that the Lord God of Israel gave the kingship over Israel forever and ever to David and his sons by a covenant of salt? Now, I defy you to go back and show me anywhere in all of the language that's used from the Lord to David, from Nathan to David, from Samuel to David, anywhere where it talks about salt. It doesn't. But you see what's being said.

Salt has by this time become so identified with promise that he can refer to a covenant of salt. Meaning, God gave an eternal promise. He meant it. It's binding. It will last. It's preserved because God said it.

A promise then could be called a covenant of salt, or, turn it around, a covenant of salt is the guarantee of a promise. This then is God's salt treaty. Alright? When God says it, he means it. And he means it will endure. It will go on. in contrast to the salt treaties that we hear about today.

When God says it, it's forever. It will last. Look at Jeremiah chapter 33. You get a sense of God's standing on His promise.

Jeremiah 33 and verse 19.

The word of the Lord came to Jeremiah, Thus says the Lord, If you can break my covenant with the day and my covenant with the night, so that the day and night will not come at their appointed time, then also my covenant with David my servant may be broken. When it stops having night and day and day and night, then we'll set my covenant aside, so that he shall not have a son to reign on his throne. And my covenant with the Levitical priests, my ministers, As the host of heaven cannot be numbered and the sands of the sea cannot be measured, so I will multiply the descendants of David my servant and the Levitical priests who minister to me.

The word of the Lord came to Jeremiah. Have you not observed what these people are saying? The Lord has rejected the two families which he chose. Thus they have despised my people so that they are no longer a nation in their sight. Thus says the Lord. If I have not established my covenant with day and night and the ordinances of heaven and earth, then will I reject the descendants of Jacob and David my servant and will not choose one of his descendants to rule over the seat of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob. For I will restore their fortunes and will have mercy upon them.

That's our God speaking. He says, when I give my word, I mean it. It will last. It will endure. It's a covenant of salt.

Now the odd thing about all of that is that in addition to all of those uses, salt also becomes a symbol of desolation in the scriptures. Look just right here in Jeremiah, back a few pages to chapter 17.

And verse 6.

Well, let's start with verse 5. thus says the Lord cursed is the man who trusts in man

contrast to the way he says blessed is the man who walks with God cursed is the man who trusts in man and makes flesh his arm whose heart turns away from the Lord he's like a shrub in the desert and shall not see any good come he shall dwell in the parched places of the wilderness in an uninhabited

salt land and salt becomes a symbol of desolation of destruction and devastation when you really wanted to punish your enemies you sowed salt in their fields as Abimelech did in Judges 9 or as the Babylonians did to the people of Judah when they took them off into captivity Zephaniah predicted that Moab shall become like Sodom and the Amorites like Gomorrah a land possessed by nettles and salt pits and a waste forever.

So I want to draw all this to some sort of a conclusion.

It seems to me that what God would teach us under the imagery of salt is this. A little salt preserves,

a lot of salt can destroy.

one lonely Christian usually isn't enough you can take him with a grain of salt

that's why Jesus sent him out two by two one all by himself usually isn't enough

but it isn't God's will either to pile them all up in one place and leave them there

he wants to spread them around

having a marvelous ministry in Jerusalem 3,000 converted on the day of Pentecost churches being built up it's tremendous

until God sent persecution

do you object to what I just said? that God sent persecution

well Satan sent it God used it

to scatter those apostles. It was only when persecution came that they began to move out to fulfill the commission throughout all Jerusalem, all Samaria, to the uttermost parts of the earth. God wants us to be spread around. Too many Christians in one place are... reminds me of what John Guest used to say about too many clergy in one place.

He said, clergy are like manure.

He said, spread them around, they do a lot of good. Pile them up in one place, they just smell.

Doesn't apply only to clergy.

We're to be out there in the world, but not of it.

Flavoring, purging,

preserving.

Making men thirsty,

but never choking them to death.

And all of that, it seems to me, would be summed up in that little tiny verse,

Remember Lot's wife.

Remember Lot's wife.

Lot and his family were salty enough to be saved,

but not salty enough to preserve Sodom and Gomorrah. God had to send the salt of desolation to that corrupt city.

It's the saltiest place on the face of the earth. It's absolutely dead. As far as we can tell, it's somewhere down there underneath the Dead Sea. Nothing grows in the Dead Sea. Nothing grows around it. Birds don't even fly over it. Lot and his family were salty enough to be saved, but not salty enough to preserve the city. Do you remember Abraham's argument with God?

Talked him down.

If I can find ten righteous men there, will you save the city? God says, yes, for ten. I'll spare the city. Couldn't find ten.

The city had to be destroyed. His command to Lot was, don't look back.

Don't long for the corruption that must be destroyed, or you'll share in it.

And Lot and his wife and their daughters left the city,

but she looked back.

She was turned into a pillar of salt.

Seems to me that the message still speaks today.

If you don't share in the salt of salvation,

you will surely share in the salt of destruction.

Remember Lot's wife.

This concludes this teaching.