Our Lord Jesus Christ was the
prince of preachers. Folks often refer to Spurgeon
as the prince of preachers. Well, that's a bit of a stretch.
Our Lord Jesus was indeed the prince of preachers. His preaching
was never scholarly, it was never eloquent, it was never entertaining. His preaching was always plain,
Powerful and persuasive. Simple, instructive, and enlightening. He didn't preach to entertain
men or to impress men, but rather to help them. And he found common,
ordinary, everyday things with which men were familiar and used
those things to illustrate and portray great spiritual heavenly
truths. by the use of the most common
things of ordinary life, our Savior taught eternity-bound
sinners the gospel of God. He would talk about sheep and
goats, and everybody around him knew just what he was saying.
He would talk about wheat and tares, things familiar with the
folks he talked to. He spoke to folks about fishing
nets and fishermen and used those as pictures of the preaching
of the gospel and the gathering of his elect. He spoke of shepherds
and sheep to speak of himself and the salvation of his people
and to speak of his servants and those who serve his people.
He used a lost coin, lost sheep, and a lost son. to portray his
marvelous free saving grace. And he set clearly before me
in the contrast of Pharisees and publicans. Pharisees that
everyone understood to be good and righteous and noble exemplary
people who portrayed what real religion ought to be and publicans. the basest, most vile, most despicable
of men. And he spoke of his mercy and
grace toward the publicans and his judgment against the Pharisees. I want to follow the Lord's example.
I want to preach with simplicity, with clarity to help your souls. So tonight I'm going to talk
to you about one of the most common things in the world. salt,
salt. If you open your Bibles to Leviticus
chapter 2, Leviticus chapter 2 and verse 13 you will have
both my text and my subject before you. The title of my message
is, The Salt of God. Leviticus 2 verse 13, And every oblation of thy meat
offering shalt thou season with salt. Neither shalt thou suffer
the salt of the covenant of thy God, to be lacking from thy meat
offering. With all thine offerings, thou
shalt offer salt. Now let's begin in 2 Kings 2. I wanna look at several passages
of scripture with you. 2 Kings 2. While you're turning,
hear this. The very things that by our God
are made blessings to his elect are stumbling blocks and snares
to the reprobate. The very gospel by which God
calls his elect is a gospel of judgment to the ungodly. The
very gospel by which God melts the hearts of his chosen is the
gospel by which God hardens the hearts of those who believe not.
Here in 2 Kings chapter two, I wanna read this chapter, and
let me give you here an illustration of Saul's usefulness. It came
to pass, when the Lord would take up Elijah into heaven by
a whirlwind, that Elijah went with Elisha from Gilgal. And
Elijah said unto Elisha, tarry here, I pray thee, for the Lord
hath sent me to Bethel. And Elisha said unto him, as
the Lord liveth, and as thy soul liveth, I will not leave thee. So they went down to Bethel.
And the sons of the prophets that were at Bethel came forth
to Elisha and said unto him, knowest thou that the Lord will
take away thy master from thy head today? And he said, yea,
I know it, hold ye your peace. And Elijah said unto him, Elisha,
tarry here, I pray thee, for the Lord has sent me to Jericho,
And he said, as the Lord liveth and as thy soul liveth, I will
not leave thee. So they came to Jericho. And
the sons of the prophets that were at Jericho came to Elisha
and said unto him, knowest thou that the Lord will take away
thy master from thy head today? And he answered, yea, I know
it. Hold ye your peace. And Elijah said unto him, tarry,
I pray thee here, for the Lord has sent me to Jordan. And he
said, as the Lord liveth, and as thy soul liveth, I will not
leave thee. And they too went on. What a
faithful man Elisha was. Elisha. He would not cease from
assisting Elijah until Elijah was taken by God into glory. Verse seven. And 50 men of the
sons of the prophets went and stood to view afar off. And they
too stood by Jordan. And Elijah took his mantle and
wrapped it together and smote the waters. And they were divided
hither and thither so that they too went over on dry ground.
And it came to pass when they were gone over that Elijah said
unto Elisha, ask what I shall do for thee before I be taken
away from thee. And Elisha said, I pray thee,
let a double portion of thy spirit be upon me. I think I read this
portion of scripture to you several weeks ago and probably made this
comment. Most folks reading this think
that Elijah was asking Elijah, oh, that I might be twice the
prophet you are. That's not it at all. A double
portion by law was the blessing that God required the father
to give to the firstborn. He said, Elijah, let me be as
your firstborn son. the double portion, giving the
firstborn son the headship of the house. And he said, verse
10, thou hast asked a hard thing. Nevertheless, if thou see me
when I am taken from thee, it shall be so unto thee. But if
not, it shall not be so. If you're still faithful to that
day, gotta do it. If not, he'll not do it. And it came to pass, as they
still went on and talked, that behold, there appeared a chariot
of fire, and horses of fire, and parted them both asunder,
and Elijah went up by whirlwind into heaven. And Elisha saw it,
and he cried, my father, my father, the chariot of Israel, and the
horsemen thereof. And he saw him no more, and he
took hold of his own clothes, and rent them in two pieces,
He took up also the mantle of Elijah that fell from him. And
he went back and stood by the bank of Jordan, and he took the
mantle of Elijah that fell from him and smote the waters and
said, where is the Lord God of Elijah? And when he had also
smitten the waters, they parted hither and thither, and Elisha
went over. And when the sons of the prophets,
which were to view at Jericho, saw him, They said, the spirit
of Elijah doth rest on Elisha. And they came to meet him and
bowed themselves to the ground before him. And they said unto
him, behold now, there be with thy servants 50 strong men. Let
them go, we pray thee, and seek thy master, lest peradventure
the spirit of the Lord hath taken him up and cast him upon some
mountain or into some valley. And he said, you shall not sin.
And when they urged him till he was ashamed, he said, sin. They sent there 450 men, and
they sought three days, but found him not. And when they came again
to him, for he tarried at Jericho, he sat there and waited on them.
He said to them, I not say unto you, go not. Verse 19. And the men of the city said
to Elisha, Behold, I pray thee, the situation of this city is
pleasant, as my Lord seeth, but the water is not, and the ground
barren. And he said, bring me a new cruise,
and put salt therein. And they brought it to him, and
he went forth unto the spring of the waters, and cast the salt
in there, and said, thus saith the Lord, I have healed these
waters. There shall not be from thence
any more death or barren land. So the waters were healed unto
this day, according to the saying of Elisha, which he spoke. Verse
23, and he went up from thence to Bethel. And as he was going
up, by the way, there came forth little children out of the city
and mocked him. and said unto him, go up thou
bald head, go up thou bald head. And he turned back and looked
on them and cursed them. Now watch what it says. Cursed
them in the name of the Lord. Cursed them for God's sake, for
God's honor, for the honor of the gospel of God himself. And
there came forth two she-bears out of the wood, and tare forty
and two children of them. And he went from thence to Mount
Carmel, and from thence he returned to Samaria. Now without question,
in healing these dead and deadly waters of Jericho, Elisha was
typical of our Savior, the Lord Jesus, the healer of all our
death. of all our barrenness, of all
our mauras, our bitter waters. Elisha healed these deadly waters
by casting salt in at the spring where the waters began. He threw
in a little salt and healed them. And when he had done that, Some
children from Bethel mocked God's prophet. Now, this passage has
long been a bit confusing to me. I've not been able to quite
grasp what's being said here. And I spent a little time studying
it. I got these ideas principally from John Gill. I think he had
stated things reasonably, stated them well. Children is a term
that was used among the Hebrews, not just for little babies, as
we would commonly use it, little children. But they use this term,
the word that is translated here, little children, for children
upwards of 30 years old. It's talking about the offspring.
Whatever the case is, however old these children were, they
were old enough to know right from wrong. They were old enough
to be out by themselves, unaccompanied by their parents in large groups. They were children who understood
that Elisha was a prophet. They recognized that he was a
bald-headed man, unlike probably most in his day around them.
But they had been taught by their idolatrous parents to mock God
and mock his prophets. You can read about it in 2 Chronicles
36 if you want to. And they, mocking God and mocking
his prophet, were cursed in the name of the Lord. The very gospel that you now
hear, if you refuse to believe it, will be a word of judgment,
of condemnation. to those who refuse to believe.
So that having heard the gospel and despised it is a greater
condemnation for men and women in hell in everlasting torment
than never to have heard the gospel. That makes it a solemn
thing to preach the word and a solemn thing to hear the word. two she bears came suddenly out
of the woods and tore 42 of these children. Elisha was undeterred
by the mockery of these children and he was undeterred by the
judgment of God that fell upon them and went right on doing
exactly what he was doing before, representing God to his generation. As I was preparing this message
again today, I thought of this passage here. And I've seen in my 50 years
preaching the gospel in many places across the country and
throughout the world, Exactly what transpired here with God's
servant, Elisha. Exactly what happened. I said,
Brother Mark Daniel, I hope I won't embarrass you and your wife using
you for an example. He pastored for just a little
while in Albany, Georgia, preaching the gospel of God's grace. And
I was with them in a meeting that had been arranged before
they ever called Mark as pastor. I was with them the weekend before
the folks in the church decided that they'd put Brother Mark
out. And Mom and Dad, in their table
conversation Sunday afternoon, Mom and Dad in conversation with
other folks in the church, they get done and take to task the
preacher and mock and deride him and the children hear it. Oh, what will hell be? What will
hell be for those men and women who by their mockery of God and
his servants have drug their children to everlasting damnation? What will hell be for them? Salt
is here set before us. as an emblem of the gospel of
the grace of God, the gospel proclaimed by our Savior and
by his servants. It is an emblem of Christ himself
and of all the grace of God in him. First, let me make this
statement. Salt is sometimes used in the
scripture as an instrument of divine judgment. Sometimes. That's not usually the case,
but sometimes. The first time you see the word
salt is in Genesis 14. There we read about the salt
sea, probably what's now called the Dead Sea. It was Siddam,
the place where Sodom and Gomorrah once stood. Then in chapter 19
of Genesis, we read about Lot's wife, who, cursed of God, was
turned into a pillar of salt. God turned her into a pillar
of bitter, barren, waste salt. Ezekiel, Jeremiah, and Zephaniah
all tell us of God's judgment upon lands, making them perpetually
barren, giving them over to salt. And David in Psalm 107 sings
and tells us that the Lord God turns the fruitful land into
barrenness. If you read the marginal reference
of that passage in Psalm 107, 34, he turns the fruitful land
into saltiness. Salt then is set before us as
an instrument of judgment. That certainly is a representation
of the gospel of God's grace. of the grace of God proclaimed
in the gospel of our Lord Jesus Christ who will soon come and
set in judgment over the earth and judge this world by the gospel
we preach. Listen to what Simeon said. Behold,
this child, the Lord Jesus, is set for the fall and rising again
of many in Israel. and for a sign which shall be
spoken against. Now, turn back to Leviticus 2.
In our text in verse 13. Salt is sometimes used as an
emblem of judgment. Here we are told that the Lord
God required that every sacrifice men offered to him under the
law must be offered with salt. And every oblation of thy meat
offering shalt thou season with salt. Neither shalt thou suffer
the salt of the covenant of thy God to be lacking from thy meat
offering. With all thine offerings thou
shalt offer salt. Now notice as you read this second
chapter of Leviticus, it is just taken for granted. that the people who knew God
would bring their oblations and their offerings of different
kind to his altar for his praise, for his worship. And they did. Moses writes this passage and
God speaks by Moses with what appears to be just the presumption
that all who knew God gladly brought their offerings and their
oblations to God. And they did. and true Israelites
still do. They bring their gifts, their
sacrifices, their offerings to God, and they bring them by faith
in Jesus Christ. Whatever the offering may be,
however it may be presented, brought to God by faith in Christ
with willing hearts. We make no constraint of any
kind upon anyone to get them to do anything. We don't ever
bring out laws and say, now this is what God requires. We don't
ever threaten folks with punishment or entice folks with the promise
of reward because God's people serve him and worship him with
willing hearts, with willing hearts. I have a very difficult
time understanding any lack of willingness. on the part of any
sinner saved by God's free grace to do anything he can in the
cause of Christ. We live in a generation of men
and women who have been taught since the days when most of us
were in school. The philosophy has been the world
exists for you. The world exists for you. Everything centers in me. Everything
centers in the individual. And we consider all things that
way. Oh, God keep us who he is from
thinking like that. We exist for the glory of God
and the benefit and blessing of others, not ourselves. People
talk, I hear what they say. And this is how they normally
speak. They don't use these words. This is what they say, what's
in it for me? What's in it for me? What's in
it for me? People, some who are watching
this right now on video could be sitting right here. But it's,
you know, I can stay at home and don't have to get dressed
and I don't have to make that drive and spend that time. And
I can get the same thing. I wonder what would happen if
everybody here behaved like that. Where would there be any place
to worship? Any place for God's people to
meet and worship Him from which the gospel is preached generation
after generation? If everybody decided, well, there's
nothing in it for me. I can profit just as much doing
what I'm doing. I don't know, I just don't get
anything out of that. I just don't get anything out
of that. I've had folks tell me with regard to their children,
they'll send them to the Bible class, they're not getting anything
out of that. Maybe somebody else is. Maybe somebody else will
benefit. I have the privilege and the
responsibility of doing what I can to maintain, to sustain,
and to promote the preaching of the gospel and the worship
of God here and everywhere where God gives me opportunity and
ability to do so. You do too. You do too. And Merle, it ought to be our
delight, shouldn't it? It ought to be our delight all
the time, all the time. I recognize folks get to the
place they can't do things they once did. I understand that.
I do not understand able people not willingly bringing their
offerings and oblations to God every day, every day. You men
take care of property around here. You ladies take care of
things that are needed. You just see it to do. And I
can't tell you how I thank God that you do. Make certain you
understand, this is a privilege. This is a privilege. How is it
that this was to be done? These offerings, these oblations.
We should all say with Paul, Lord, what wilt thou have me
to do? I could spend a little time with
that. I could spend a little time with that. I first started
preaching, I've told you many times, I wouldn't think about
putting a fella in the shape I was in at 17 years old into
the pulpit. I wouldn't think about doing
it. I wouldn't dream of doing it. But I couldn't say no when
somebody asked me to do it. How could I say no? How could
I refuse? If I have the ability and the
opportunity to speak a word for God, surely I can tell you what
God's done for me. I might not be able to instruct
you in profound, wondrous mysteries. Oh, but what a profound, wondrous
mystery this is. God saved me by his grace. That's
what you talked about in your prayer just a little bit ago. Then we ought to ask not only,
Lord, what would you have me to do? but how would you have
me to do it? You see, will worship is never
acceptable to God. If we bring God what he doesn't
ask, it'll not be received. We must only present to God,
our Savior, that which he requires, and we must present it to him
in his own way, for he is a jealous God. Here in Leviticus 2.13,
The Lord God three times in this one verse says expressly, in
all your offerings offer salt. Does the great God of heaven
talk about salt? What could be more insignificant?
Does he condescend to such minute details of service as to declare
that the lack of a little bit of salt made any sacrifice unacceptable. A man brings a bullock, a lamb,
a turtle dove, he brings his heave offerings, he brings his
ease offerings, he brings his wave offerings, but no matter
what he brings, no matter what it costs him, if he doesn't bring
just a little bit of salt, God says, I won't have it. I won't
have it. We must worship and serve God
in God's way or we don't worship and serve Him. Here again, salt
is an emblem of grace and of our Savior. Our only acceptance
with God is Christ. And we cannot worship God We
cannot serve God, we cannot do anything acceptable to God, except
as we do so, trusting the Lord Jesus. Trusting His blood and
His righteousness, His power and His grace. Trusting Him alone
for acceptance with God. As we read this second chapter
of Leviticus, you'll see that other things were required as
well. The Jews in the Old Testament had to have frankincense when
they offered the sacrifices. God didn't smell the sweet savor
of the bullock or the ram or the lamb unless sweet spices
were added. The fact is the best performance
of our hands must never appear before God's throne. without
the merit of Christ's blood and righteousness, without the sweets,
myrrh and aloes and cassia, the sweet smell of the garments of
our prince, God will not accept us. So we come to him and we
pray in his name. We worship in his name. We gather
in his name. We preach in his name. We hear
in his name. We read in his name. We sing
in his name. They also had to bring oil with
their sacrifices. The oil, as we've seen many times,
is typical of the blessed spirit of God. What is preaching without unction? The unction of the spirit. What
is praying without anointing? The anointing of the spirit.
What are our songs of praise unless God the Spirit is in the
song to give it life and cause it to rise to heaven? You see,
that which we offer to God, we offer in the name of Christ recognizing
that what we bring to God is only what God himself gives.
What we bring to God, whatever it is, is only what God himself
gives and he accepts it through his son. There was a third requisite,
salt. Salt. The Lord forbids the children
of Israel in this chapter to bring any honey when they brought
their sacrifices. Look at verses 11 and 12. They
could not bring anything with leaven or honey. Leaven isn't
hard to understand. Leaven commonly represents sin
and evil and ungodliness. But why no honey? Look at verse
11. No meat offering which ye shall bring unto the Lord shall
be made with leaven, for ye shall burn no leaven nor any honey
in an offering of the Lord made by fire. As for the oblation
of the firstfruits, ye shall offer them unto the Lord, but
they shall not be burnt on the altar for a sweet savor. God
doesn't ask for sweetness, he requires salt. He doesn't call
for honey, but for salt to be added to all the sacrifices.
Because if we would come to God, we must come to God with sincerity,
with honesty, serving Him truthfully, from our spirits, with the Spirit. And God will not accept honey
at His altar. But He requires salt. bitter salt of a broken spirit,
a broken and contrite heart. That's what David read to us
in Psalm 34 just a little bit ago. This is what God requires. Third, salt in Scripture speaks
of God's covenant. It is called here, the salt of
the covenant of God. God's covenant with Aaron, we're
told in Numbers 18, was the covenant of salt. God's covenant with
David was a covenant of salt, we're told in 2 Chronicles 13.
And you and I have acceptance with God in Christ by a covenant
of salt. An everlasting, immutable covenant
of salt. What does that mean? We come
to God not on the footing of works, but of grace. everlasting
covenant. Salt, the salt of the covenant
is purified so that by the work of Christ in this covenant we're
justified, we're sanctified, we're made righteous before God.
We are in Jesus Christ made holy before God and the salt of the
covenant is preserving. as we are justified and sanctified,
as he is made of God unto us, wisdom, righteousness, sanctification,
and redemption. Our Lord Jesus Christ is our
preservation and we are kept in him. Salt, you may remember
from last week, speaks of communion. In ancient times, if two men
ate one another's salt, They were obliged as friends to do
one another no harm. They walked together permanently
as friends. And you and I, being reconciled
to God by this covenant of salt, by the doing and dying of the
Son of God, have been brought into union with one another. God with us and us with God in
perfect reconciliation. So that God is friend with his
people. And we being reconciled to God
have been made friends of God. So that God speaks to us as he
did to Abraham and to Moses as to his own familiar friends. And we, being one in Christ,
serve our God in union with one another, being one, in fellowship
with Him, seeking His will and His glory. We serve Him in fellowship
with His people, and we serve our God in the Spirit. by the
spirit of grace in harmony with God himself as friends committed
to God and committed to one another. Salt like grace is God's provision,
not man's. God only accepts what God provides. And this is what God accepts,
Jesus Christ, his son. his blood, his righteousness,
his obedience, his holiness, his perfection. My son Abraham
said to Isaac, God will provide himself a lamb for a burnt offering
and Jesus Christ is that lamb. Salt heals, preserves, saves
from corruption, cleanses and purifies. Salt was never to be
obedient from the offering of God, and grace is the salt of
the covenant of thy God. Figuratively, the salt sets forth
our Savior and the free grace of God in Him. God's requirement
of salt was intended to show by type, by symbol, the importance
and preeminence of Christ, His person, His blood, His righteousness. Oh, would to God. In every place
like this, that's supposed to be dedicated to the worship of
God and the preaching of the gospel, salt was always on the
table. Always on the table. And my wife
doesn't like the looks of our salt and pepper shaker. I like
salt shakers that pour salt. I don't like to have to shake
it very much. And pepper shakers that pour pepper, I don't like
to shake it very much. But when she sets the table,
sometimes she'll actually sit down and just jump up, goes and
gets the salt and pepper. Because at every meal, salt is
on the table. Now, I realize that In these days, that's kind of
frowned on, and folks think it's not healthy to eat salt, but
ugh. I've tried, not very hard, but
I've tried a few times eating green beans without salt. I'd
just as soon chew on grass. I've tried a few times eating
potatoes without salt. I'd just as soon chew paper.
I've tried a few times eating eggs, and I love eggs without
salt, but I'd just as soon chew on that leather. Salt makes things
tasty. Job asked, can that which is
unsavory be eaten without salt? Our poor souls can never be satisfied
except by eating the bread of life. with the salt of the God
of heaven, our God, making all things savory to our souls, the
salt by which we're healed, the salt that cures our woes, the
salt that heals our bitter waters, the salt that purifies. Christ Jesus and Him crucified,
that makes everything tasty and savory. Everything, everything. Christ crucified makes all the
doctrine revealed in scripture tasty and savory. Christ crucified
makes all the revelation of God tasty and savory. Thank God for
the salt of God. Our souls can't be cured and
preserved from everlasting corruption but by him. So take the salt
of God, Christ Jesus crucified, and come to God. Take the salt
and say, Lord, here I am. I offer you myself, all of myself. through Jesus Christ crucified. And the Lord God will take you,
broken, contrite, and bitter, and receive you as his son. Amen.