Salty Salt

"Suppose one of you wants to build a tower.

Will he not first sit down and estimate

the cost to see if he has enough money to complete it?

For if he lays the foundation

and is not able to finish it,

everyone who sees it will ridicule him,

saying,'This fellow began to build

and was not able to finish.'"

Luke 14:28-30

I have had the privilege of watching my daughters grow into young women of God.  Each one is masterfully crafted, gifted uniquely and tested distinctively.  Even though three of them were born at one time and came from one egg, they are shaped differently by the Master Craftsman.  All four are beautiful in their own way.

None of them decided their own fate.  Not one of them came up with their own gifts and talents. Each is at the mercy of a loving God who is making them into the young woman He wants them to be.  

They are not peculiar.  Each of us is fashioned in such an exclusive way.  None of us decides how, where or when God will use us.  Not one of us are in control of how God prepares us.  No one on earth determines his own fate.  God decides what I will give up; only He knows what the cost will be of following Him.

Following Jesus comes at a cost.  It is not a payment I am required to make in order to be able to receive salvation.  Rather, it is a price I will pay in terms of idols destroyed, loves lost, and rough edges chiseled away.  I will be asked to give up things that I think I can't live without, to release parts of me that are too big, and to hold on a little while longer when it seems like my fingers are slipping off the edge.   In order for Jesus to be my all, I will need to be less, certain thought patterns will need to be abandoned, and secret sins will need to be nailed to the cross.  

As a follower of Christ, Jesus told me that, "You are the salt of the earth.  But if the salt loses its saltiness, how can it be made salty again?  It is no longer good for anything, except to be thrown out and trampled by men."  Matthew 5:13  Unsalty salt is incapable of enhancing flavor or preserving foods.  It is completely useless.

In the same way, I am in danger of losing those qualities God has placed within me that are uniquely mine but entirely from Him.  But God is constantly honing and refining me so that I won't become impotent.  When I put myself in God's hands, giving Him the opportunity to transform me through His word, circumstances and encounters with other people,  He will keep my salt salty.  

Grace

Children love to cook and especially take great joy in seasoning food.  It is especially fun to add a pinch of this and a dab of that as the delicious aromas of their masterpiece simmers on the stove.  Food would simply not taste as good without seasonings.  

In the Old Testament, God instructed his people to season all of the offerings made to Him with salt.  This was not for seasoning, but as a symbol of God's activity and sovereignty in providing for, requiring and receiving the sacrifice.  We can do nothing of value, nothing that He would find acceptable, apart from Him. 

 Similarly, the Apostle Paul said to, "Let your conversation be always full of grace, seasoned with salt, so that you may know how to answer everyone." (Colossians 4:6) Everything I say must be generated from the inspiration of God.  When I go out on my own and speak from my own knowledge, common sense, or good judgment I will only serve to draw attention to myself or hurt others in the process.  But when I let God speak through me, the words that result are brimming with His grace, drawing all those who hear to the God of grace.


So when an acquaintance deserves a sharp reprimand she will instead receive a kind word of support.  Or if a server at my favorite restaurant gets my order wrong, spills soup in my lap and seems to not care, he will find an encouraging word of inspiration along with a tip on the table after I leave.   For the day when one bad thing happens after another and then the driver of the car next to me in a parking lot opens his door into my vehicle, leaving a nice little dent, I will be able to smile and tell him everything will be okay; it's just a car, after all!


Grace is when we get from God what we don't deserve.  Grace is also giving others what they don't deserve.  


My salt is salty when my words are liberally seasoned with the grace that comes from God.

Love

She sings on the praise team, leads the women's ministry, teaches children's Sunday School and still finds time to raise four children plus the two she and her husband adopted from the streets of India.  I often ask myself, Is there anything she can't do? We've all seen her; the "perfect" woman who makes the rest of us look bad.

Besides the fact that I set myself up for failure by comparing myself to this other woman, there may be something else wrong here.   I am not called to be a busy woman of God.  I am called to be a loving woman of God.  While some people are capable of doing many activities out of love for God and His people.  There are many others who are doing it out of a sense of obligation, or in an effort to look good to God or others, or to prove their worthiness.  Without love, all the hard work in the world means nothing.

"If I speak in the tongues of men and of angels, but have not love, I am only a resounding gong or a clanging cymbal.  If I have the gift of prophecy and can fathom all mysteries and all knowledge, and if I have a faith that can move mountains, but have not love, I am nothing.  If I give all I possess to the poor and surrender my body to the flames, but have not love, I gain nothing."  (1 Corinthians 13:1-3)

I can look like the most gifted Christian in the world, but if I can't love my family, I've failed. My resume could be enough to astound the CEO of a major corporation, but if I don't show compassion to those who depend on me for a job, I have failed.  It could be that women from all around come to me for godly advice and receive plenty of it, but if I exhibit a short fuse and little patience for my husband, I have failed.

My salt is salty when love is the hallmark of every part of my life.  

Humility

Oswald Chambers may have said it best:  "Profoundly speaking, we can never work for God.  Jesus takes us over for His enterprises, His building schemes entirely, and no soul has any right to claim where he shall be put."  (My Utmost for His Highest)    

For God to truly be able to work through me, I have to be okay with wherever He places me, whoever He places around me and whatever He calls me to do.  When I am caught up in my plans, my desires and my wants, I am living by my ways, not God's.  

In order for God to get the glory for the work done in my life, I must move out of the way!  I belong to Him; am created by Him, redeemed by Him, and made righteous by Him.  As such, I am nothing without Him.  Until I realize this, I will be useless to Him.

The Apostle Paul instructs me in Philippians 2:3 to, "Do nothing out of selfish ambition or vain conceit, but in humility consider others better than yourselves."  Or in the words of The Message version, "Don't push your way to the front; don't sweet-talk your way to the top.  Put yourself aside, and help others get ahead."

Humbling myself means to simply put myself in my rightful position; not in the place I think I deserve, or in the position I want to be, but in the place God has actually placed me: as one out of a million others just as important as me.  I am no more important than my neighbor.  I am a small fish in a big pond.  Or as C.K. Chesterton said, "All men are ordinary men; the extraordinary men are those who know it."

Knowing my place helps me to think of others more than I think of myself.  It makes it natural for me to think of ways I can help others or how I can encourage someone or when I can give to others what I want for myself.  

My salt is salty when I put others' needs above my own.  

The cost of following Christ is high: He is constantly at work molding me into His image.  When I put myself into His hands, He keeps my salt salty so my conversations are filled with grace, my actions are overshadowed by love and I think of others first.  God will be glorified when His seasoning liberally flows from my life.

As I begin this day it is my prayer that I will not hold anything back from the hands of my Master Potter.

When am I busy doing things for God but have forsaken His love?

How do I focus on my own needs and forget about the needs of those around me?