Throughout history God has had a people set apart for himself. These people were and are currently known as Israelites. God made a covenant with these people which is everlasting and unchanging. This covenant is known better as; “The Salt Covenant”. Few people have heard of this covenant but it is critical in understanding who we are and what God has promised to us throughout the ages and in the age to come. So, let’s take a deeper look at the symbolism of salt, the history of the Salt Covenant and in so doing, discover more of who we truly are!
Some Interesting Facts & Information About Salt
Salt is rich in Spiritual Metaphors…
Traditionally, salt was shared to seal a truce between former enemies or as a symbol of alliance between close friends. Treaties or friendships were often formalized by the partaking of a lick of salt to seal the deal or heal the difference between them.
Entering into a Covenant of Salt means binding oneself to another in utmost loyalty and truthfulness, even suffering death, rather than breaking the covenant. For this very reason a Covenant of Salt was never done lightly or haphazardly – it deserves serious respect. To the ancient Hebrews, salt represented purification, and was also symbolic of enduring friendship, honesty, and loyalty. In ancient times people would often carry little pouches of salt on their hip/belt. If they met someone on their travels and became friends, they would seal that bond of friendship with salt. Each person would take a pinch of salt from his pouch and then put it in the other persons pouch and shake his pouch. Thus, mixing his salt with the others, thus making it insuperable. The covenant could only be broken, if the person could take his own salt back from the others persons pouch, which of course, is impossible. (2Kin.2:19 -21; 2Chr.13:5). Today some Eastern people still use the phrase: “There is salt between us.” Having no salt, meant disloyalty and barrenness.
Salt is an important ingredient of life. The Biblical lore of salt begins in Leviticus 2:13; Numbers 18:19, where it becomes part of God’s Covenant with humanity and was directed to be part of all the grain offerings in the Temple.
Salt is a vital part of God’s Covenant Rite before Moses (2Chr.13:5), and its symbolism teaches many important spiritual lessons.
Salt is Divine - it is believed to be able to drive off demons. It is interesting to note only the dark side forbids its use, you will not find any salt on the table or in the food served at a black witch’s sabbath or in any pagan religious offering.
Salt historically symbolized hospitality - and God’s people should be the world’s most hospitable people.
Salt in a marriage ceremony represents faithfulness. Have you ever wondered why people throw salt at a marriage ceremony or why the bride and groom feed each other cake? Cake has salt in it. Salt is indicative of faithfulness, steadfastness, eternality, purity etc. These are symbols of what we are to be to our spouses forever. It is a marriage covenant.
Salt heals - if you settled a dispute with your neighbor then you would invite the person into your home to share a dish of salt. Each of you would lick your finger, dip it in the salt and then eat the salt together. This is the symbol of friendship that heals the rift.
Salt is pure - germs cannot live in it. By analogy, believers are to be pure and have salt in us (Mar.9:50), and at birth salt was rubbed on a new born baby's skin to purify it (Ezk.16:4).
Salt purifies - by analogy, the believers are the salt of the earth (Mat.5:13). They purify the world by not accepting false philosophies, dishonest ways of doing business, selfish desires, etc.
Salt, just a dash, adds to the taste and pleasure of a meal (Job 6:6). By analogy the believers should add - just a dash - of spiritual interest, hope, and excitement to other people’s lives. Too salty ruins the taste of the meal, and the spiritual message.
Salt produces thirst and the believers should produce spiritual thirst in those around them.
No salt in the diet leads you into an energy graveyard, and within a month you will die a slow agonizing death - you figure out the analogy! Sodium regulates the passage of nutrients into the cells. Without it, nutrients cannot enter your cells and you will have malnutrition and exhaustion no matter how good your diet. Without our CREATOR we would be spiritually starved and morally exhausted. Oxygen is transported to the brain and the heart etc on salt. Without enough salt in the body we would lack oxygen and die. So salt is LIFE giving!
Salt is in our blood. We all know already that our body is 75% water. But what most of us don’t know is that this water contained in all of our tissues, cells, blood, etc. is actually a salty water solution, very similar to seawater.
Salt-famine causes civilization to collapse. During Europe’s Dark Ages, due to glacial melting, the ocean levels rose flooding all the salt flats of Europe causing a salt famine. The daily average ration fell to less then two grams per person and caused many to die from dehydration and madness. To get salt, some who were stronger would assault the weak, cut their jugular vein and drink the victim’s salty blood, giving birth to the myth of the vampire.
The salt crystal is an enduring mineral. Large salt mine deposits, surviving thousands of years, and under great pressure, still hold their flavor and taste.
Salt can dissolve in water - but its quality remains. By analogy, believers are in this world but not of this world (Jam.6-13).
Salt can be subjected to extreme heat and it still retains its particular chemical composition. But we are warned, as the salt of the earth, we should not lose our flavor (Mat.5:13; Mar.9:49-50; Luk.14:34).
Salt can only be ruined if it reacts chemically with some other substance. By analogy, the believers should not be influenced by the deceitful riches and the material cares of this world.
Scripture Versus On salt & The salt Covenant
I have listed the main scripture versus found in the Bible including the word salt, salted and saltness, so as to give more clarity to this study as a whole.
Leviticus 2:13
And every offering of your grain offering you shall season with salt; you shall not allow the salt of the covenant of your God to be lacking from your grain offering. With all your offerings you shall offer salt.
“All the heave offerings of the holy things, which the children of Israel offer to the LORD, I have given to you and your sons and daughters with you as an ordinance forever; it is a covenant of salt forever before the LORD with you and your descendants with you.”
2 Kings 2 vs. 19-21
Then the men of the city said to Elisha, “Please notice, the situation of this city is pleasant, as my lord sees; but the water is bad, and the ground barren.” And he said, “Bring me a new bowl, and put salt in it.” So they brought it to him. Then he went out to the source of the water, and cast in the salt there, and said, “Thus says the LORD: ‘I have healed this water; from it there shall be no more death or barrenness.”
2 Chronicles 13:4-6
Then Abijah stood on Mount Zemaraim, which is in the mountains of Ephraim, and said, “Hear me, Jeroboam and all Israel: Should you not know that the LORD God of Israel gave the dominion over Israel to David forever, to him and his sons, by a covenant of salt? Yet Jeroboam the son of Nebat, the servant of Solomon the son of David, rose up and rebelled against his lord.
Ezra 6:8-10
Moreover I issue a decree as to what you shall do for the elders of these Jews, for the building of this house of God: Let the cost be paid at the king’s expense from taxes on the region beyond the River; this is to be given immediately to these men, so that they are not hindered. And whatever they need—young bulls, rams, and lambs for the burnt offerings of the God of heaven, wheat, salt, wine, and oil, according to the request of the priests who are in Jerusalem—let it be given them day by day without fail, that they may offer sacrifices of sweet aroma to the God of heaven, and pray for the life of the king and his sons.
Job 6:5-7
Does the wild donkey bray when it has grass, Or does the ox low over its fodder? Can flavorless food be eaten without salt? Or is there any taste in the white of an egg? My soul refuses to touch them; They are as loathsome food to me.
Jeremiah 17:5-7
Thus says the LORD:
“ Cursed is the man who trusts in man
And makes flesh his strength,
Whose heart departs from the LORD.
For he shall be like a shrub in the desert,
And shall not see when good comes,
But shall inhabit the parched places in the wilderness,
In a salt land which is not inhabited.
“ Blessed is the man who trusts in the LORD,
And whose hope is the LORD.
Ezekiel 16:3-5
and say, ‘Thus says the Lord GOD to Jerusalem: “Your birth and your nativity are from the land of Canaan; your father was an Amorite and your mother a Hittite. As for your nativity, on the day you were born your navel cord was not cut, nor were you washed in water to cleanse you; you were not rubbed with salt nor wrapped in swaddling cloths. No eye pitied you, to do any of these things for you, to have compassion on you; but you were thrown out into the open field, when you yourself were loathed on the day you were born.
Ezekiel 43:23-25
When you have finished cleansing it, you shall offer a young bull without blemish, and a ram from the flock without blemish. When you offer them before the LORD, the priests shall throw salt on them, and they will offer them up as a burnt offering to the LORD. Every day for seven days you shall prepare a goat for a sin offering; they shall also prepare a young bull and a ram from the flock, both without blemish.
Ezekiel 47:10-12
It shall be that fishermen will stand by it from En Gedi to En Eglaim; they will be places for spreading their nets. Their fish will be of the same kinds as the fish of the Great Sea, exceedingly many. But its swamps and marshes will not be healed; they will be given over to salt. Along the bank of the river, on this side and that, will grow all kinds of trees used for food; their leaves will not wither, and their fruit will not fail. They will bear fruit every month, because their water flows from the sanctuary. Their fruit will be for food, and their leaves for medicine.”
Matthew 5:13
“You are the salt of the earth; but if the salt loses its flavor, how shall it be seasoned? It is then good for nothing but to be thrown out and trampled underfoot by men.
Mark 9:48-50
Where their worm dieth not, and the fire is not quenched. For every one shall be salted with fire, and every sacrifice shall be salted with salt. Salt is good: but if the salt have lost his saltness, wherewith will ye season it? Have salt in ourselves, and have peace one with another.
Colossians 4:6
Let your speech always be with grace, seasoned with salt, that you may know how you ought to answer each one.
Here are the Hebrew and Greek equivalents for your further study:
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Hb/Gk Word |
Pronunciation |
English Equivalent |
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Old Testament (Hebrew) for "salt" |
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mĕlach (Aramaic) |
mel·akh' |
salt, maintenance |
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melach |
meh'·lakh |
salt, saltpits |
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mĕlechah |
mel·ā·khä' |
barren, barrenness, salt |
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`Iyr ham-Melach |
ēr ham·meh'·lakh |
city of Salt |
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New Testament (Greek) for "salt" |
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halas |
hä'-läs |
salt |
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halizō |
hä-lē'-zō |
to salt |
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hals |
hä'ls |
salt ** (KEY. Read It!!) |
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halykos |
hä-lü-ko's |
salt |
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A Salt Covenant Is Forever
In Numbers 18:19 it is stated that all of Israel's offerings offered to God must be offered seasoned with salt. This commadment makes perfect sense, as Israel's sons and daughters are to engage in an eternal covenant of salt with God when offering their personal sacrifices. The term "covenant of salt" is indicative of the everlasting nature of the relationship between the children of salt, and their God. When we hear the term salt, the understanding is that the things God addresses are; eternal, enduring, never changing, and abiding forever. All salt covenants then are eternal, and eternally binding on the sons and daughters of Israel, regardless where they are to be found and regardless of whether a physical temple stands on Mt. Moriyah or not.
Bring All Your Offerings Seasoned With Salt
In Leviticus 2:13 it is confirmed that all Israelite offerings must be seasoned with salt. We as Israel's children must make sure that our salt does not lack in any service, or act of obedience to or for God. This commandment has never been reneged, and has never been removed in the New Covenant. All of the offerings not only had to be seasoned with salt but had to be void of leaven, a type of sin, and of honey, a favorite appeasement tool offered in almost all pagan nations in their sacrifices. Pagan deities were known to have an appetite for honey, a sweet but false substitute to the sweetness that can only come from a close relationship with Israel's King and His Son. The honey was used to appease the false deities, as well as to humanize them by feeding them honey! By giving them sweet offerings, mankind thought that the deity would be more apt to respond favorably.
God cannot be bribed or convinced to do our desire by candy and honey offerings or by any other sacraments. Rather, we are called by Jesus TO OFFER OURSELVES to God, as His Israel because God is sweet and good in and of Himself, and not outside of Himself. He expects that same sweet spirit to be in us, as it is in Him. God makes it clear that neither sin nor wrong motive will get Him to move on our behalf. He Himself is the sweetness we need. He Himself is our great reward (Genesis 15:1). We should only approach God within the salt covenant, and not with honey and leaven. Honey is symbolic of manipulation by the worshipper towards the Heavenly Judge.
God is looking for sacrifices from our lives as returning Israel with eternal, long term, and abiding commitments in our doctrines and lifestyles. He does not want any offerings made out of the emotional need of a moment or a knee jerk action. An Israelite should approach Him with an understanding that any commitment and any offering cannot be revoked or made into any short-term arrangement.
Salt is a time proven and consistent preservative that prevents decay and corruption with enduring quality. The forefathers of Israel preserved their food with salt in place of the modern refrigerator. The important things of sustenance were preserved with salt. Israel's health was often preserved with baths in the Salt-Sea, which preserved their skin and appearance. Just as in the physical, so it is in the spiritual. All the important elements of Israelite worship must be preserved with salt. Salt typifies abiding, eternality, steadfastness, stability, and permanence and even the very character and reliability of father God Himself! Therefore every sacrifice and every ordinance in the Old Covenant by definition must be eternal, since Israel could only approach God with ordinances using salt offerings. These salt offerings were known to be everlasting due to the eternal and enduring nature of salt's preservation power along with what it implied in the spirit realm. From this understanding, we see that all of the first five books of Moses: Genesis, Exodus, Leviticus, Numbers and Deuteronomy) have been preserved by the eternal covenant of salt given to Israel. Israelite worship was to be characterized by steadfast eternal immutability, unlike the shifting sands of the "pleasure for the moment" motives of the surrounding nations.
Sealing & Renewing Friendships
Salt was also used to seal a bond of friendship forever. Brethren at an Israelite table would seal their friendship by the sharing of salt. Salt was a means in Israel by which friends solidified and preserved their commitment to each other by a covenant of shared salt at a table of shared community. In much the same way, Israelites were bonded with God with all the various approaches to Him being seasoned with the eternal salt covenant. It is Jesus’ desire to be sealed with us in an eternal covenant of friendship seasoned with salt. Now if His best friend and bride is Israel: (Revelations 21 vs. 9 One of the seven angels who had the seven bowls full of the seven last plagues came and said to me, Come, I will show you the bride, the wife of the Lamb. 10 And he carried me away in the Spirit to a mountain great and high, and showed me the Holy City, Jerusalem, coming down out of heaven from God) and if Israel has sealed that relationship with salt, then God cannot marry a "gentile church bride” and neither can He balance two brides through manmade, superimposed dispensationalism. He must remain eternally faithful to Israel alone, despite Israel's lack of faithfulness and despite all other considerations.
God, due to His own eternal covenant of salt, has just two options. He can renew Israel through the regeneration of Ephraim and Judah or He can do nothing. Thankfully as we know according to Jeremiah 31:31, He has chosen the better option for Israel, and has decided to renew both houses through Jesus, as well as invite others to join the new Commonwealth. Jesus’ salvation of Israel through His cleansing blood has been seasoned with the required salt of endurance and eternal commitment. He relates to us in salt covenant, and that's the way He expects us to relate to Him.
Without A Temple
The Israelite also subjects his human body and it's passions by self-control according to First Cor. 9:25-27, lest we should become castaways. So the very offering of our purity through set-apartness is a seasoning of salt. A Covenant Israelite is not able to keep the literal commandments of sundry offerings because the temple no longer stands but what we are about to see shortly is that ALL can be done by Israel, if and when an Israelite is willing to adopt the Hebraic understanding of scripture, which allows for a minimum of four basic and valid accepted methods of scriptural understanding for each commandment, in order to make the divine eternal and enduring connection required by God to His eternal bride Israel.
So in order for God not to be found to be a liar, He must still provide ways for all commandments to be performed, though one may have to dig four levels deep to get the method of approach. Since Jesus has fulfilled all requirements of the sacrificial system for blood, grain, and drink offerings, we must now go through Jesus, since they are all offerings seasoned with His salt to His Father God. God expects these salt offerings to continue, and to still be guarded but commands us to do them through Jesus, and through His tabernacle service in the tabernacle in heaven not pitched with man's hands. So on a sod/revelatory level, the sacrifices are eternal due to their being seasoned with salt, and under the eternal covenant of salt with eternal Israel. Only the realm of the offerings has changed, that’s what the book of Hebrews is all about!
The Israelite sees all of the eternal salt offerings of the Old Covenant tabernacle, as ongoing and as taking place literally through Jesus, who performs them all before Father God, albeit on a different and invisible plane. We will never understand the Old Covenant and adopt it as our constitution, until and unless we begin to see things in four dimensions applying all four levels of Hebraic interpretation.
Stuck On One Level Of Interpretation
According to Hebrews 13:15, we are to continue as Israel, to offer "slaughter offerings" to God continually, and forever through our lips. They no longer come from our hands but from our lips. So, it is still Israel that walks in the covenant of salt but we use our lips rather than our hands and feet. Notice in Hebrews 13:15, the principle of continuity regarding the offerings seasoned by salt. The question is who is "the us", in Hebrews 13:5? The answer is obvious; The Covenanted Israel.
If the Old Covenant commandments of God have been nailed to Calvary, as many claim, then why would the Apostle Paul admonish us to perform these commandments by usage of the term "LET US", (writing to both houses according to Hebrews 8:12) offer slaughter offerings...The only people ever to do so without the honey and leaven, and with salt alone as the preservative, were are and will be Israel alone from among the nations. Gods only and forever bride. So the obligation of salt offerings continues in the other levels of Hebraic truth rather than the literal temple.
Four Levels Of Understanding
Many today can often be puzzled as to why the four versions of the Good News of Jesus, seem to often contradict each other, when the truth is that they do not. They are written on all four levels of Hebraic understanding. Matthew in rash/parables/allegory, Mark in pashat or plain literal simplicity, Luke in remez or hinting style, and John in sod or on the mystery/revelatory level. Paul’s epistles feature all four styles, and the Book of Revelation is totally written on the fourth level of sod.
The Kingdom Of God Promised To The Children Of Salt, By A Covenant Of Salt
According to Second Chronicles 13:5, God has given the kingdom to David and to David's seed Israel forever. God says in this verse that He has done so by the guarantee and immutability of the Old Covenant principle of the salt covenant. Therefore the Kingdom of God both now, and in the millennium, will be to Israel's seed; (Ephraim and Judah plus their companions), as a bonded salt covenant between God and Israel, for God Himself has made that guarantee. Since we are heirs of David's physical Kingdom, (Romans 8:17) we are the children of David, and the heirs of this eternal friendship covenant of and by salt. All the enduring Old Covenant promises that are in Him and are yea and amen preserve us as Israel. None of the Old Covenant salt offerings have been overturned by Jesus. Jesus came from David's loins and thus His throne in Israel as the Savior, and the tabernacle in which He ministers in the heavens are both established by David's salt covenant with God, that has been established by Jesus Himself, as the "Greater David" over both houses of Israel. His lineage and throne are both established by a covenant of salt. If Jesus rules on David's throne, then the people He rules over must be the heirs of the salt covenant of all the children of Jacob both from the Jewish tribes and the non-Jewish ten tribes of Israel (Luke 1:33).
God’s covenant was, is and, always will be with Judah and Ephraim, and their companions. Jesus’ blood, along with His friendship covenant of salt, guarantees Israel's eternal security as Jesus’ bride.
A Covenant To The Children Of Salt
The children of salt are further identified in Jeremiah 33:20-21. A covenant of salt and friendship between God and Israel is as strong and secure as is the covenant God has with day and night. Reversing Israel's position as God's only bride is as impossible as breaking the laws of nature according to these verses. That's how powerful a covenant of salt is. It is as irreversible, as is God's bond with nature. When nature ceases then Israel will cease. The children of salt are as bonded to God as are the ordinances of salt. Salt covenants and ordinances cannot be altered, changed, done away with, repealed, broken or changed. The Old Covenant, the Throne of David, and the bond of love between God and Israel, are all seasoned with salt. Even the modern Judahite season of Passover finds all Passover foods adjacent to a literal bowl of salt, where all Passover items are dipped in a bowl of saltwater, reminding us of God's eternal promise of inheritance, and deliverance to both houses of Israel, even in bitter times.
Knowing Jesus Correctly
In Matthew 5:13 Jesus says, "You are the SALT OF THE EARTH, BUT IF THE SALT SHOULD LOSE ITS FLAVOR, WHEREWITH SHALL IT BE SALTED? IT IS HENCEFORTH GOOD FOR NOTHING BUT TO BE CAST OUT AND BE TRODDEN UNDER FOOT OF MEN."
Do you know of any "professing" believers in Jesus who have taken 3/4th of scriptures made up mostly of eternal ordinances, and because they are found to the left side of Matthew, have willfully discarded those eternal ordinances of salt? Do you know any "professing" believers who have taken salt and thrown out the eternal parts of salt that they either didn't like or didn't understand? Weren't the disciples the very ones called out to uphold all the eternal or salt ordinances of God? Was not Jesus Himself prophesying that His very own disciples who were called to be preservers of all things according to Matthew 5:19-29, would be the very ones that would lose their saltiness by discarding misunderstood portions of eternal salt covenants, and their statues? The only men and women that can lose their salt are the very ones who have had it all along, and the very ones that can lose it if they don't guard it.
Again by simple definition, one can only lose salt if they have the salt, and in correct biblical context it was the citizens of David's Kingdom that were the ones having the responsibility of preserving all things seasoned with salt. If Genesis to Revelation has been seasoned with salt.... And if Jesus’ disciples are only preserving and dispensing Matthew through Revelation by ignoring the salt of the First Covenant, they then have in fact LOST THEIR SALT AS CHILDREN OF ISRAEL. Thus the lost children of Israel!
In order for Israel's children to reclaim all their salt covenants, they must recommit to teaching and proclaiming the full counsel of God, that includes the Old Covenant and the New Covenant, as both being equally applicable and eternal for all believers in all generations.
Who Are The Children Of Israel?
Since the throne of Israel was established by a salt covenant, and since we are the sons and daughters of that Davidic Kingdom, then on the sod or the hidden fourth level of interpretation, Jesus is saying to us today that "you are the salt of the earth" (Matt. 5:13) or YOU ARE THE CHILDREN OF ISRAEL!!!!!! 'I have come to re-gather the children of salt back into their own kingdom', which never was a Jewish kingdom, since Jews did not leave Egypt nor receive the first five books of Moses. Israel did. If the children of Israel are the salt of the earth according to the Jesus, and His disciples are the salt of the earth, then all the TRUE law abiding disciples in all generations are the seed of Israel. For only Israel is the salt of the earth, and only Israel seasons their offerings without honey and leaven but with the preserving power of salt alone. The reason these disciples were listening and obeying Jesus by being drawn to Him, is because they were the children of salt, and Jesus is calling them back to take their rightful place in rightful understanding. Jesus reminds us in places such as Matthew 15:24, that He has only come for the lost sheep of the House of Israel, (all 12 tribes in this context) and as such by declaring his disciples to be the earth's salt, He directly correlates them back to their physical ancestors who stood at Mt. Sinai's base, as they received the living oracles of salt to be offered in worship back to God for all eternity.
As children of salt, we are to bring the salt of the Old Covenant and Jesus to all of Israel (Isaiah 8:14-16; 8:20). IF THE SALT LOSES ITS NEWFOUND IDENTITY AS THE SONS AND DAUGHTERS OF SALT, WE WLL LOSE OUR FOCUS AND DIRECTION, AS HAVE OUR BELIEVING FOREFATHERS, along with the true message of the kingdom.
LET ALL ISRAEL EXIT THE FALSE RELIGIOUS SYSTEM TODAY, WHILE IT IS CALLED TODAY, (2 COR. 6:2) AND ENTER ISRAEL'S COMMONWEALTH, IN ORDER TO INHERIT THEIR STATUS AS THE CHILDREN OF SALT, THE TRUE ISRAEL OF GOD (GAL.6: 16).
We Are Salt Shakers
When one loses their corporate identity as Israel, they are not only tossed to and fro by strange winds of doctrine, (Ephesians 4:14 &11) they are candidates to be trodden underfoot by men! And men's dogmas! This is further addressed in Hebrews 6:5-6, where God warned believers who have tasted the salt of all the good Word of God including the eternal Old Covenant commandments, if they [should] fall away from all salt ordinances, they cannot be used by God again. For God will not allow lawless iniquity filled "professing" believers to be salt to others, when they themselves are not salt any longer, having forfeited that calling as Israel, claiming that Israelite identity is no longer important or that it was never taught by Jesus.
If we as Israel lose the salt we have in us through this latter-day renewal of all 12 tribes, we not only lose our power, and authority as the bride of Jesus but we also put our Lord to open shame by doctrinally pitting him against His Father, as His Father seemingly loves the Old Commandments, while the Son seemingly desires to remove them, as He is often misunderstood by Greco-Roman believers. Since the antinomian anti-salt covenant Jesus is not the Jesus of scripture, who seasoned all His disciples with salt and, called us to teach all the salt ordinances of Israel, we must never put our loving and caring King to open ridicule and shame by being a false witness of God's eternality and immutability in teaching the false Jesus doctrine, rather than the faith of Jesus Himself! We as Israel are called to have both the faith of Jesus, as well as faith in Jesus!
Israelites Often Misunderstood
In addition to being a preservative, salt is an irritant. When put in an open wound it irritates, hurts and stings. When we are truly being Israelites in lifestyle not just in doctrine, we become stinging irritants to those around us who are wounded by false religion. Rather than hearing and seeing their need for medicine and healing, they act out against the salt, as if the salt is to blame. The salt when fully salted represents God, not themselves or their own doctrine or their own understanding. When the salt that's designed to create a strong thirst for true teaching in Israel, rubs folks the wrong way, they try and stifle and offset the salt by removing the saltiness rather than allowing the salt to be the cause for them to fill their hunger and thirst with His true and eternal ways not subject to the religious winds, doctrines and temporal solutions of this age.
The salt of Israelite truth always causes irritation in the religiously prideful and blind, along with those set in their manmade ways. Deceived people consider any salt truths that are found to the left of Matthew's Gospel in the "good book", to be an irritant. But any salt that does not include the ordinances of the Old Covenant is not true Israelite salt. True salt often brings out the worst in lawless people but can also bring out the best in you, and your personal return to God. The truth of the matter is that true salt in the hands of true children of salt is designed to preserve wayward Ephraim and Judah in the eternal paths, and not to hurt, sting or irritate them, as it does with the lost or deceived.
Jesus Talking To His Disciples
Mark 9:49 states that "for everyone shall [must] be seasoned with fire and EVERY OFFERING SHALL BE [FUTURE IMPERATIVE] SEASONED WITH SALT". In Mark 9:44-48, Jesus speaks of torment in the lake of fire for the unbelievers. Then He reiterates the Old Covenant principle that in order to avoid punishment and the second death, [not eternal torment, rather eternal death in the Lake of Fire Rev. 20:14; Ezekiel 18:4] EVERYONE [ALL TRUE BELIEVERS] MUST BE SEASONED WITH THE SALT OF TORAH, AND MUST OFFER ALL TORAH OFFERINGS CONTINUALLY in accordance with His word. So clearly we see Jesus making all eternal Old Covenant ordinances/rulings/commandments as necessities for all His disciples, not just for witnessing purposes but for the expressed purpose of offering Him true pleasing personal worship in order to ESCAPE DAMNATION. All of Old Covenant keeping, Jesus loving Israel, (Rev. 14:12) will escape His wrath (First Thess. 5:9) through deliverance during the Great Tribulation, either by martyrdom or preservation through God's salt pact with Israel.
Our Restoration
In Mark 9:50 Jesus warns us to have salt in ourselves, (Old Covenant commandment faith and lifestyles) and BE AT PEACE WITH ONE ANOTHER. ALL THE SALT ORDINANCES MUST BE FOUND IN ALL SALTED BELIEVERS, who claim to be sons and daughters of Israel, according to Jesus. The implication here on the sod/revelatory level of this saying, is that only Old Covenant teachings when accepted and re-instituted in all of Israel by both houses; Judah and Ephraim, can finally bring peace in equality between battling brethren. True peace among disciples cannot happen between the two houses until both houses realize that they are both equal Israelite heirs in our Jesus. Only those who have salt in themselves, and walk out scripture principles in their own lives, can walk with their Old Covenant honoring brethren in a joint and mutual return to the nation of Israel (Ezekiel 37:23-24). A disciple sees him or herself as a survivor of the Diaspora, and sees a return to the fullness of scriptural truth, Jesus and the land, as the ONLY road to travel. You will soon find others on the same road and will be able to walk together in peace and in confidence (Amos 3:3). Part of that salt awakening is the recognition that there are no longer Jews and Gentiles in the faith of our Jesus but that all are Israelites, and all are being summoned to a state of blessed return from spiritual and physical exile.
Recognize that in Christ YOU are now an ISRAELITE, a NEW CREATION! (Having an entirely new identity; in effect you are an entirely new species of being!)
GALATIANS 3 vs. 26-29
“YOU ARE ALL SONS OF GOD THROUGH FAITH IN JESUS CHRIST, FOR ALL OF YOU WHO WERE BAPTIZED INTO CHRIST HAVE CLOTHED YOURSELVES WITH CHRIST. THERE IS NEITHER JEW NOR GREEK, SLAVE NOR FREE, MALE NOR FEMALE, FOR YOU ARE ALL ONE IN JESUS CHRIST. IF YOU BELONG TO CHRIST THEN YOU ARE ABRAHAM’S SEED AND HEIRS ACCORDING TO THE PROMISE.”
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