Lucas 14
William Barclay · Citado em PreceptAustin
Lucas 14
Barclay adds that "All food had to be cooked on the Friday; and, if it was necessary to keep it hot, it must be kept hot in such a way that it was not cooked any more! So it is laid down that food to be kept warm for the Sabbath must not be put into 'oil dregs, manure, salt, chalk or sand, whether moist or dry, nor into straw, grape-skins, flock or vegetables, if these are damp, though it may be if they are dry. It may be, however, put into clothes, amid fruits, pigeons' feathers and flax tow.' (Ed: See writing from Sabbot 4:1-2 below) It was the observance of regulations like this that the Pharisees and scribes regarded as religion. No wonder they could not understand Jesus! (Daily Study Bible) Cleon Rogers - Normally there were two main meals in the day, but on the Sabbath there were three. The Sabbath meal, which was prepared the day before and kept warm (M, Shab. 3:1-6; 4:1-2), was around noon (Jos., Life, 279), after the synagogue service, and it was common to invite guests to the Sabbath meal On the Sabbath (sabbaton) - Luke records five of Jesus' seven miracles on the Sabbath and Luke depicts His Sabbath healings more than any other Gospel. While Jesus knew He was inciting confrontation, what better day than the Sabbath to show divine compassion. Sadly every Sabbath miracle only made the religious leaders more convinced that they must do whatever it took to get rid of this Man! Spiritual blindness is an amazing thing -- miracles right in front of their eyes and yet the eyes of their heart were absolutely blind! We all know some folks like that and it makes us very sad, because many are our close relatives or friends. Of course the religious legalists considered Jesus to be a law-breaker because He was doing miraculous work on the Sabbath. Legalism blinds one to grace. It even has that effect in believers, so make sure you cast off any and all legalistic tends that otherwise will blunt grace and grieve the Spirit. This was the last Sabbath in the Lord's ministry (of which we have record) before His arrival at His destination of Jerusalem. Jesus was fully aware of how the religious leaders had added many burdensome rules not commanded by God and in a sense made an idol out of the Sabbath. What should have been a day of rest was a day of burden, which is exactly what legalism will do to one's soul. Legalism traps, while grace sets free. They were watching Him closely (paratereo) - The present tense indicates they watched him continually "like a hawk" would watch its prey. He was continually being "monitored" by their evil eyes! The middle voice (reflexive) emphasizes that they themselves did this insidiously, with evil intent to catch Him! Jesus was under scrutiny." As we would say today "They were out to get Him!" The use of paratereo in Mark 3:2 explains the motive of these legalistic leaders "They were watching Him to see if He would heal him on the Sabbath, so that they might accuse Him." Of course Jesus was fully aware of their wicked intentions. Remember that Jesus had "steadfastly set his face to go to Jerusalem, (Lk 9:51KJV) and Sabbath confrontations were part of His journey. John
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Barclay adds that "the word used for watching is the word used for 'interested and sinister espionage'. Paratereo - 6v - observe(1), watched(1), watching(2), watching...closely(2). Mk. 3:2; Lk. 6:7; Lk. 14:1; Lk. 20:20; Acts 9:24; Gal. 4:10 Croft Pentz - BEING HELPFUL Luke 14:1–15 Man needs help! Without Christ man is not only helpless, but hopeless. God needs those who will help do His work. Before anyone can help with His work, they must be fitted for this service. Man must rely on Christ. His helpers must be humble, knowing that without the help of the Lord, they can do nothing. God works only through such people. I. THE HEALING—vv. 1–6 1. Skeptics—vv. 1–2. The Jewish leaders and followers watch to see if Christ will heal the man with dropsy on the sabbath. They were always critical of Christ. 2. Silence—vv. 3–4. When the Jewish leaders do not respond to Christ’s questions, He takes the sick man by the hand and leads him away. 3. Sabbath—v. 5. If an ox falls into the ditch on the sabbath, do you leave it there? Of course not! Then, why is it wrong to do good by healing the sick on the sabbath? 4. Speechless—v. 6. They cannot answer the Lord. Really, they had no just answer. By taking the ox out of the ditch on the sabbath, they were breaking their own man-made law. Why should they oppose Christ when He healed on the sabbath? II. THE HUMILITY—vv. 7–11 1. Selfishness—vv. 7–8. Don’t seek the best seats when asked to a party. Someone more important than you may be present and require your seat. Always think of others as better than yourself. 2. Shame—v. 9. An important person may come, and the host will give your seat to him. This would mean shame and embarrassment to you before the people. 3. Sincere—v. 10. Be yourself. Never seek to be above or better than others. Be humble and meek. 4. Spiritual—v. 11. Note the spiritual law here. If you exalt yourself, you will be humbled. If you humble yourself, you will be exalted. III. THE HELPFULNESS—vv. 12–15 1. Plan—v. 12. When you have a dinner, don’t invite your relatives and friends since they will invite you to their home for a meal later. 2. People—v. 13. Invite the poor, crippled, blind, and lame. Do it to help the people, expecting nothing in return. 3. Pleasure—vv. 14–15. Pleasure will be one result, but also at the judgment the Lord will reward you for your kindness. We should never help people with the object that some day we may need help and they will owe us a favor. We should help people expecting nothing in return—not even a word of thanks. The good feeling that results from helping people should be ample pay and reward. However, God, who keeps good records, will reward us. (Expository Outlines from Luke ) JESUS' SEVEN SABBATH MIRACLES 1 Jesus sends a demon out of a man Lk 4:31-37+ 2 Jesus heals Peter's mother-in-law Lk 4:38-39+ 3 Jesus heals a lame man by the pool of Bethesda 4 Jesus heals a man with a "withered" hand (cf Lk 6:1-5+ - allowing disciples to pluck grain on Sabbath) Lk 6:6-11+ 5 Jesus restores a crippled woman Lk 13:10-17+ 6 Jesus heals a man with dropsy (edema) Lk 14:1-6+ 7 Jesus heals a man born blind A With what do they cover [up food to keep it hot], and with what do they not cover up [food to keep it hot]? B They do not cover with (1) peat, (2) compost, (3) salt, (4) lime, or (5) sand, C whether wet or dry. D or with (6) straw, (7) grape skins, (8) flocking [rags], or (9) grass, E when wet. F But they do cover up [food to keep it hot] with them when they are dry. G They cover up [food to keep it hot] with (1) cloth, (2) produce, (3) the wings of a dove, (4) carpenters’ sawdust, H and (5) soft hackled flax. I R. Judah prohibits in the case of soft [hackled flax] and permits in the case of coarse [hackled flax]. 4:2 A They cover up [food to keep it hot] with fresh hides, and they carry [handle] them; B with wool shearings, but they do not carry them. C What does one do? D He [simply] takes off the cover, and [the wool shearings] fall off [on their own]. E R. Eleazar b. Azariah says, “A basket [holding a pot and shearings] does he turn onto its side, and he removes (the food], F “lest he should take it and not be able to put it back.” G And sages say, “He takes [out the food] and puts it back.” H [If] he did not cover up [the food] while it is still day, he should not cover it up after dark. I [But if] he covered it up and it became uncovered, it is permitted to cover it up again. J One fills a jug [on the Sabbath with cold food or liquid] and puts it under a pillow or a blanket [to keep it cool]. Luke 14:2 And there in front of Him was a man suffering from dropsy. Luke 14 Resources - Multiple Sermons and Commentaries Luke 14:1-14 Jesus the Confronter - Steven Cole Luke 14:1-6 The Healing Savior vs the Hypocritical System - John MacArthur A MAN WITH DROPSY JUST HAPPENS TO DROP IN FOR DINNER! And there - ("And behold" = ESV, KJV) The NAS unfortunately fails to translate the interjection idou ("behold" a command in aorist imperative to "Look!") and as noted elsewhere is clearly used to prompt attention or arouse interest. And this is certainly an attention grabbing moment for this is the only mention of a man with dropsy in the entire Bible! The trap was sprung! And there in front of Him was a man suffering from dropsy (hudropikós) - Note the phrase there in front of Him! A man with dropsy (which could cause him to be shunned by the religious leaders) does not just "drop in" (pun intended)! The Pharisees were not even subtle in setting this trap! An unhealed man in front of the Healer par excellence on a Sabbath day on which no healing was allowed (per their man made rules)! Now remember that we are in the Pharisees house, and these religious bigots made a practice of associating only with the elite and not the social outcasts, so it is surprising to find this man at the lunch. The Pharisees were well aware that Jesus had performed healings on the Sabbath. And so here we are on the Sabbath with a man who is obviously in great need of healing. It sounds like a classic setup! Now think about their twisted logic -- Jesus performance of a miracle would point to His divinity, but these hard-hearted, spiritually blind legalists could not see that sign, and to the contrary earlier they interpreted similar miracles as a sign that He was not from God! Their spirituality was so "upside down" that they reasoned that surely a man from God would not break their Sabbath regulations! God's law said nothing that prohibited healing a person on the Sabbath. Adam
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Barclay - Open wells were quite common in Palestine, and were not infrequently the cause of accidents (cf. Ex 21:33 = "If a man opens a pit, or digs a pit and does not cover it over, and an ox or a donkey falls into it [and dies]." ). It was perfectly allowable to rescue an animal which had fallen in. Jesus, with searing contempt, demands how, if it is right to help an animal on the Sabbath, it can be wrong to help a human being. Rod Mattoon - The Lord again uses the illustration of an ox or ass to make His point. In chapter 13, he spoke about feeding these animals on the Sabbath, which everyone did. Here He talks about pulling them out of a pit on the Sabbath which was done by the owners of those animals. The Lord is trying to expose their inconsistent teachings about working on the Sabbath day. (Treasures from the Scriptures) Norman Crawford on will not immediately pull him out on a Sabbath day - This was not so much out of pity for the hapless beast, but out of an unwillingness to suffer material loss. The point, pressed home, must have pierced deeply. They had a care for their material gain, but no real feeling for a man suffering from dropsy. Stephen's words not long after cut the Jewish leaders to the heart, but their response was to gnash on him with their teeth and condemn him to be stoned. (What the Bible Teaches - Luke) G Campbell Morgan is kind in his comment - Thus, while our Lord rebuked the wrong attitude and temper of these men, He did so by appealing to the best within them and calling them to be true to it. His purpose is not that of shaming men, but that of saving them. Notice that while there was a Mosaic command not to work, there is not a stipulation not to show mercy and perform an emergency rescue if needed. In other words, a day of rest never precluded that it could also be a day of rescue! Deuteronomy 5:12-14 ‘Observe the sabbath day to keep it holy, as the LORD your God commanded you. 13‘Six days you shall labor and do all your work, 14but the seventh day is a sabbath of the LORD your God; in it you shall not do any work, you or your son or your daughter or your male servant or your female servant or your ox or your donkey or any of your cattle or your sojourner who stays with you, so that your male servant and your female servant may rest as well as you. Life Application Bible Commentary – Jesus did no more than touch the man. The Pharisees' rules and regulations did not ban touching another person. In fact, Jesus explained that when it served their purposes, they did work on the Sabbath. They could go pull a son or a cow out of a pit if need be, but they were ready to condemn Jesus for touching a man and healing him from a disease. Jesus pointed this out to them, but they had no answer. Immediately (2112)(eutheos from euthus = straight, immediate) is an adverb which generally means at once, right away, forthwith, straightaway, without an interval of time or a point of time subsequent to a previous point of time. Note that the actual interval of time depends on the nature of the events and the manner in which the sequence is interpreted by the writer. Eutheos is a "time sensitive" word (see expression of time) and should prompt questions like "To what time does it refer?" or "What happens in this time?" Pull out (385)(anaspaō from aná = up or back again + spáō = to draw) means to draw up or back again. In classical literature, as in the New Testament, it means “to haul or pull up. Only other NT use is in Acts 11:10 “This happened three times, and everything was drawn back up into the sky." Crawford adds that "The word for "he will pull him out" () is only used elsewhere in the NT in Peter's description of the vision of the great sheet let down from heaven; "all were drawn up again into heaven" (Acts 11:10). The Lord Jesus chose a word that graphically pictures the labour involved, even on a Sabbath day, in drawing up out of a pit a large animal. In the case of the woman "whom Satan had bound" (13:16), the Lord used an illustration suitable to her need: an ox or ass bound in a stall that was unable to go to drink. In this case He used the figure of an animal in a pit because He was speaking of a man who was literally drowning in his own fluids. He was a master in the use of apt illustrations. (What the Bible Teaches - Luke) Anaspao - 3x in the Septuagint - Da 6:16; Amos 9:2 ("My hand will [drag them] take them"); Hab. 1:15 ("bring all [anaspao - brought up] of them up with a hook") Luke 14:6 And they could make no reply to this. KJV Luke 14:6 And they could not answer him again to these things. Lk 13:17; 20:26,40; 21:15; Acts 6:10 Luke 14 Resources - Multiple Sermons and Commentaries Luke 14:1-14 Jesus the Confronter - Steven Cole Luke 14:1-6 The Healing Savior vs the Hypocritical System - John MacArthur THEIR NEFARIOUS PLAN BACKFIRED: SILENCED A SECOND TIME And they could make no reply (antapokrinomai) to this - They could not answer back. The Greek particle for "no" is ouk signifying that their mouths were ABSOLUTELY shut by the words and deeds of the Lord Jesus. A dilemma also silences a group of Jewish leaders in Lk 20:3-7. They will have the same response at the Great White Throne judgment (Rev 20:11-15-note) when they are condemned for their words and deeds and sent to the place where there will be weeping and gnashing of teeth (Matt. 8:12; Matt. 13:42; Matt. 13:50; Matt. 22:13; Matt. 24:51; Matt. 25:30; Lk. 13:28-note). Notice in Lk 14:4 they did not want to answer and here in Lk 14:6 they were not able to answer. They did not want to admit they were wrong. Has God ever allowed you to be enclosed a "corner" and yet because of your pride, you steadfastly refused to admit that you were wrong? If so, you were a lot like the Pharisees!
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Barclay on Salt - When Jesus said this, he provided men with an expression which has become the greatest compliment that can be paid to any man. When we wish to stress someone's solid worth and usefulness, we say of him, "People like that are the salt of the earth." In the ancient world salt was highly valued. The Greeks called salt divine (theion, Greek #2303). In a phrase, which in Latin is a kind of jingle, the Romans said, "There is nothing more useful than sun and salt." (Nil utilius sole et sale.) In the time of Jesus salt was connected in people's minds with three special qualities. (i) Salt was connected with purity. No doubt its glistening whiteness made the connection easy. The Romans said that salt was the purest of all things, because it came from the purest of all things, the sun and the sea. Salt was indeed the most primitive of all offerings to the gods, and to the end of the day the Jewish sacrifices were offered with salt. So then, if the Christian is to be the salt of the earth he must be an example of purity. One of the characteristics of the world in which we live is the lowering of standards. Standards of honesty, standards of diligence in work, standards of conscientiousness, moral standards, all tend to be lowered. The Christian must be the person who holds aloft the standard of absolute purity in speech, in conduct, and even in thought. A certain writer dedicated a book to J. Y. Simpson "who makes the best seem easily credible." No Christian can depart from the standards of strict honesty. No Christian can think lightly of the lowering of moral standards in a world where the streets of every great city provide their deliberate enticements to sin. No Christian can allow himself the tarnished and suggestive jests which are so often part of social conversation. The Christian cannot withdraw from the world, but he must, as James said, keep himself "unstained from the world" (James 1:27). (ii) In the ancient world salt was the commonest of all preservatives. It was used to keep things from going bad, and to hold putrefaction at bay. Plutarch has a strange way of putting that. He says that meat is a dead body and part of a dead body, and will, if left to itself, go bad; but salt preserves it and keeps it fresh, and is therefore like a new soul inserted into a dead body. So then salt preserves from corruption. If the Christian is to be the salt of the earth, he must have a certain antiseptic influence on life. We all know that there are certain people in whose company it is easy to be good; and that also there are certain people in whose company it is easy for standards to be relaxed. There are certain people in whose presence a soiled story would be readily told, and there are other people to whom no one would dream of telling such a tale. The Christian must be the cleansing antiseptic in any society in which he happens to be; he must be the person who by his presence defeats corruption and makes it easier for others to be good. (iii) But the greatest and the most obvious quality of salt is that salt lends flavour to things. Food without salt is a sadly insipid and even a sickening thing. Christianity is to life what salt is to food. Christianity lends flavour to life. The tragedy is that so often people have connected Christianity with precisely the opposite. They have connected Christianity with that which takes the flavour out of life. Swinburne had it: "Thou hast conquered, O pale Galilaean; the world has grown gray from Thy breath." Even after Constantine had made Christianity the religion of the Roman Empire, there came to the throne another Emperor called Julian, who wished to put the clock back and to bring back the old gods. His complaint, as Ibsen puts it, was: "Have you looked at these Christians closely? Hollow-eyed, pale-cheeked, flat-breasted all; they brood their lives away, unspurred by ambition: the sun shines for them, but they do not see it: the earth offers them its fulness, but they desire it not; all their desire is to renounce and to suffer that they may come to die." As Julian saw it, Christianity took the vividness out of life. Oliver Wendell Holmes once said, "I might have entered the ministry if certain clergymen I knew had not looked and acted so much like undertakers." Robert Louis Stevenson once entered in his diary, as if he was recording an extraordinary phenomenon, "I have been to Church to-day, and am not depressed." Men need to discover the lost radiance of the Christian faith. In a worried world, the Christian should be the only man who remains serene. In a depressed world, the Christian should be the only man who remains full of the joy of life. There should be a sheer sparkle about the Christian but too often he dresses like a mourner at a funeral, and talks like a specter at a feast. Wherever he is, if he is to be the salt of the earth, the Christian must be the diffuser of joy. Jesus went on to say that, if the salt had become insipid, it was fit only to be thrown out and trodden on by men. This is difficult, because salt does no lose its flavour and its saltness. E. F. F. Bishop in his book Jesus of Palestine cites a very likely explanation given by Miss F. E. Newton. In Palestine the ordinary oven is out of doors and is built of stone on a base of tiles. In such ovens "in order to retain the heat a thick bed of salt is laid under the tiled floor. After a certain length of time the salt perishes. The tiles are taken up, the salt removed and thrown on the road outside the door of the oven … It has lost its power to heat the tiles and it is thrown out." That may well be the picture here. But the essential point remains whatever the picture, and it is a point which the New Testament makes and remakes again and again--uselessness invites disaster. If a Christian is not fulfilling his purpose as a Christian, then he is on the way to disaster. We are meant to be the salt of the earth, and if we do not bring to life the purity, the antiseptic power, the radiance that we ought, then we invite disaster. It remains to be noted that sometimes the early Church made a very strange use of this text. In the synagogue, among the Jews, there was a custom that, if a Jew became an apostate and then returned to the faith, before he was received back into the synagogue, he must in penitence lie across the door of the synagogue and invite people to trample upon him as they entered. In certain places the Christian Church took over that custom, and a Christian who had been ejected by discipline from the Church, was compelled, before he was received back, to lie at the door of the Church and to invite people as they entered, "Trample upon me who am the salt which has lost its savour." (William Barclay's Daily Study Bible - Matthew 5) Torrey's Topic "Salt" Characterized as good and useful Mark 9:50 Used For Seasoning sacrifices Leviticus 2:13; Ezekiel 43:24 Ratifying covenants Numbers 18:19; 2 Chronicles 13:5 Strengthening new-born infants Ezekiel 16:4 Partaking of another’s a bond of friendship Ezra 4:14 Lost its savour when exposed to the air Matthew 5:13; Mark 9:50 OFTEN FOUND In pits Joshua 11:8; Zephaniah 2:9 Near the Dead Sea Numbers 34:12; Deuteronomy 3:17 Places where it abounded barren and unfruitful Jeremiah 17:6; Ezekiel 47:11 The valley of, celebrated for victories 2Samuel 8:13; 2Kings 14:7; 1Chronicles 18:12 MIRACLES CONNECTED WITH Lot’s wife turned into a pillar of Genesis 19:26 Elisha healed the bad water with 2Kings 2:21 Places sown with, to denote perpetual desolation Judges 9:45 Liberally afforded to the Jews after the captivity Ezra 6:9; 7:22 ILLUSTRATIVE (Without savour,) of graceless professors Matthew 5:13; Mark 9:50 (Pits of,) of desolation Zephaniah 2:9 (Salted with fire,) of preparation of the wicked for Destruction Mark 9:49 Warren Wiersbe in his preface to "Be Holy", an exposition of Leviticus writes "Whatever else the professing Christian church may be known for today—great crowds, expensive buildings, big budgets, political clout—it’s not distinguished for its holiness. Bible-believing evangelical Christians make up a sizable minority in the United States, but our presence isn’t making much of an impact on society. The salt seems to have lost its saltiness, and the light is so well hidden that the marketplace is quite dark. (Wiersbe, W. W. Be Holy. Wheaton, Ill.: Victor Books) Phil Newton illustrates becoming tasteless relating that he knew of "two men, one a theologian and another a pastor that was arrested in two different parts of the country for perverted, immoral behavior. That is the extreme, I grant you, yet it is not something that we can take lightly or think we are immune to in our own lives. Our propensity for sin is great; so we must constantly be anchored in the cross of Christ and His gospel. They have lost their saltiness in the world. But many more do that without ever being arrested for a crime. Complaining Christians are tasteless Christians. Those that are lazy, undisciplined, arrogant, prideful, critical, mean-spirited have lost their pungent influence upon the world about them. How about your pungency? Are you salty where God has put you? Or have you so given in to the world that you are in danger of becoming tasteless to a world that desperately needs your saltiness in Christ? (Problem of Tasteless Christianity)
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Barclay explains that "In the ancient world salt was highly valued. The Greeks called salt divine (theion). (Daily Study Bible) The domestic and medicinal value of salt both as condiment and preservative was as universal in the ancient world as it is today. Pliny declared that "salt has something of the nature of fire", and he quotes a current saying, "To the whole body nothing is better than sun and salt" Lasting alliances or covenants were made by eating bread and salt, or salt alone (Aristotle). (Ed: See Trumbull's book = Covenant of Salt) See also What is a salt covenant? Cato, Virgil, and Pliny all refer to the ability of salt to improve the productivity of the soil. Dwight Pentecost gives an excellent summary of some of the Biblical uses of salt… Salt has been valued from time immemorial. Roman soldiers were paid in salt and, if one were derelict in his duties, he was said to be "not worth his salt." Salt was used throughout ancient societies as a sign of friendship, (Ed note: see The Oneness of Covenant: Friend) a concept that continues to the present day. In the Arab world, if one man partakes of the salt of another man, that is, eats a meal with him, he is under his protection and care. If a man's worst enemy came into his tent and ate of his salt, he would be obliged to protect and to provide for him as though he were his dearest friend. Out of that idea grew the concept of a salt covenant, referred to in 2 Chronicles 13:5 (cf Nu 18:19), where God speaks of a covenant of salt made with David. Before the days of a notary public who could authenticate the legality of a document, when two men entered into a business agreement, they would haggle over terms until they had settled on the agreement. Then they would eat salt or portions of food together; eating salt bound them together in what they called a salt covenant. This covenant established a contract that was not to be broken. God prescribed salt as a necessary part of the sacrifices. "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" (Lev 2:13, cf Ezekiel 43:23, 24, Ezra 9:9, 10). God said that if they left salt out of their offering to God, it was an unacceptable offering. The offering demanded the whole, and the offering was incomplete without salt. Job refers to salt as a necessary ingredient of food as he asked the question, "Can that which is unsavory be eaten without salt? or is there any taste in the white of an egg?" (Job 6:6). As early as Job's time, men recognized the importance of salt, and attached special significance to it. (Pentecost, J. D. Design for living: Lessons in Holiness from the Sermon on the Mount. Kregel Publications) (Bolding added) SALT PRESERVES Someone has said that there are some 14,000 industrial uses for salt! And frankly, this is where we must sound a note of caution… interpretation of metaphors can be "tricky" especially if the expositor has a vivid imagination. Unfortunately, such interpretations may not be what God really intended by using a given metaphor like "salt". For example, some say salt was white and then reason that this whiteness pictures purity (and even compare it with purity of heart in Mt 5:8). Now while there may be some element of truth in such an interpretation, that is probably not the primary message Jesus intended to convey to His audience. Let's think for a moment about the context. Jesus is speaking in a time when there were no ice makers or refrigerators. There was need for a simple method of preservation of foodstuffs from decay and corruption and this was the primary function of salt. In fact the only way to preserve meat in the hot climate of Palestine was to salt it or soak it in a salt solution. This practice is still common in many remote areas of the world. It follows that the primary interpretation of the meaning of the metaphor of salt is that it speaks of a preservative agent which impedes corruption, decomposition and decay. The world, in contrast to what many "enlightened" members teach, is not evolving but devolving. The world is not going toward order but disorder. It is slowly decomposing and rotting away. What happened when God left the world to itself after the fall of Adam? Several centuries passed until we come to Genesis 6… Then the LORD saw that the wickedness of man was great on the earth, and that every intent of the thoughts of his heart was only evil continually. (Genesis 6:5) Even the "salty effect" of Noah was not enough to preserve the world and impede the moral decay and spiritual rot, Peter recording that as a result God… and did not spare the ancient world, but preserved Noah, a preacher of righteousness, with seven others, when He brought a flood upon the world of the ungodly; (2Pe 2:5-note) Even with another chance man fell into total debauchery leading to the wickedness of Sodom and Gomorrah which God again condemned to destruction by reducing them to ashes, having made them an example to those who would live ungodly thereafter (2Pe 2:6-note) So history proves the point that our world continually tends toward decay not divinity. Enter the citizens of the Kingdom of heaven who are the decay retardants and preservatives of a disintegrating world. Thus even as salt arrests decay in meat or fish, the influence of Christian character can halt the downward spiral of the world and help to stem the natural degeneration that occurs in the world’s rebellion against God. Christians have a moral influence on the world around them, affecting every part of society. If you are not having a moral influence on those around you then something is gravely amiss in regarding your morality, for as Alan Redpath once said… If it is possible for your closest contacts to be neutral about Christ then there is something wrong with your Christianity. Sinclair Ferguson explains the preservative effect of salt noting that… it calls for radical and costly application. Christians whose lives exhibit the qualities of the 'blessed' will have a preserving impact upon a society that, if left to itself, will rot and deteriorate. Without the influence of the gospel, society will suffer moral decay and become putrid, unfit for the consumption of good men and women… It is all too easy for us to despair as Christians because of our frailty and insignificance, personally or numerically. However, we must never give in to Satan's lie that we can be effective only when we have large numbers and a show of strength. Jesus' illustration of salt is an encouraging reminder that the apparently cheap and insignificant can influence its environment out of all proportion to our expectation. Sometimes this happens on a national scale. It is said, with some justification, that the only thing that saved England from a revolution as horrible and bloody as the French Revolution was the evangelical revival under the preaching and teaching of men like John Wesley and George Whitefield during the eighteenth century. More frequently it will happen on a small scale: your companions will moderate their language; the name of Jesus will not be so easily blasphemed; those with whom you work will develop something of a conscience about the standard of their work; the conversations of men or women will be brought under control; respect for others will be more common. Your life will save others from yielding to the immoral pressures by which our contemporary world is characterised. When you are the salt of the earth, you preserve society. (Ferguson, Sinclair: Sermon on the Mount :Banner of Truth) Christians make plenty of negative comments and vent tons of frustration over the putrefaction of our society. But our culture is simply doing what comes natural, rotting because it has no preservative. As hard as it is to admit, we should quit leveling the blame of decadence on pagans and start asking why the Church is not more effectively preventing decay (especially of our ethical and moral values) from accelerating and exerting an ever increasing negative influence in our society. A Christian should be in the world and yet not of the world. How can this be? Consider the fish who, though he lives in the salty sea, does not taste salty. As John Stott points out, “And when society does go bad, we Christians tend to throw up our hands in pious horror and reproach the non-Christian world; but should we not rather reproach ourselves? One can hardly blame unsalted meat for going bad. It cannot do anything else. The real question to ask is: where is the salt?” (Stott, John: The Message of the Sermon on the Mount: 1978, Intervarsity Press) The impact of salty Christians has effected entire countries. Consider impact of the First Great Awakening (revival) on England at a time when the rest of Europe was embroiled in political upheavals. Even secular writers acknowledge that it was because of the impact of salty Christians like John Wesley and George Whitefield that England was spared the effects of the horribly bloody revolution that swept through France (see French Revolution) in the late 1700's. Salty believers really do prevent from corruption and decay! ILLUSTRATION - Phil Newton tells an encouraging story about the "after taste" left by "salty" missionaries relating that "Pastor Paul Ndungu from Kenya, told us of a missionary couple that served for fifteen years among a particular people group in Kenya without seeing any outward response. He said they labored faithfully, serving the people, teaching the gospel, and doing all they could to set Christ before these people. But none responded until a couple of days after their departure. The missionary family’s maid, two gardeners, and milkman converged upon the empty house, related how they now missed these Christians. All wept about this sense of loss, and reflected upon what they saw in them and what they had taught them. One by one they called upon the Lord, coming to faith in Christ. The church among that people group was born without a missionary but not without the salt and light influence of that Christian family that lived among these people for fifteen years, faithfully living unto the Lord. What they did not accomplish with their missiological approach they accomplished by being Christians in a decaying world. (Matthew 5:13: Problem of Tasteless Christianity) Barclay writes that "The individual Christian must be the conscience of his fellows; and the church the conscience of the nation. The Christian must be such that in his presence no doubtful language will be used, no questionable stories told, no dishonorable action suggested. He must be like a cleansing antiseptic in the circle in which he moves. (Daily Study Bible)