Powering UP AMerica! 22

Key Scripture.   “You are the salt of the earth.  But what good is salt if it has lost its flavor?  Can you make it salty again?”  Matthew 5:13

Power Point:

      I like salt.  I grew up with LOTS of salt being added to everything. My daughter in law makes eggs without salt. NO!  It’s just wrong, don’t you think?

     At any rate, I’ve learned over the years, to add less salt but I still like it.

Sigh.  Do NOT send me emails telling me about the health risks. I’m too old. 
     Jesus likes salt too. He likes adding it to everything and He says that we are the “salt-seasoning that brings out the God-flavors of this earth.” (Matthew 5:13).  Have you ever met someone who may have just become a Christian? Frequently, they are “salty”. I know I was. I tried to bring Jesus into every conversation and every activity. My phone stopped ringing after awhile. Over time I began to learn how to add the right amount of salt instead of smothering everything with it. Jesus knew exactly how much salt to add didn't He? He always added just enough to make things tasty.

     As a country, it seems that we’ve lost our flavor haven’t we?  Instead of being the salt-seasoning that brings out the God-flavors, we’ve put our salt shakers on the back shelf and we’ve been eating bland, tasteless, worthless things. We’ve allowed the tasteless things to rob us of the life that we’ve experienced in the past.  

     In Nehemiah the people had inherited a kingdom that was definitely tasteless. Ezra, the prophet, comes before them on the day the walls are rebuilt in Jerusalem. He assembles them and begins to read the Book of the Law. As they listened they began to shout  “Amen!” when they realized the Covenant they had with God. Then they began to weep at what they had lost and at how far short they had fallen from that Covenant.  The Lord tells them to feast on the joy of the words they are eating.  They took Him at His Word and feasted for eight days.  (It probably included some kosher salt.) And there was “a very great gladness.” Things began to taste good again.

     My friends, we have a Divine Covenant. We have the author and signer of that covenant living within us.  If we would only remember His faithfulness, trust Him for His goodness, and start seasoning our lives with more and more of the salty Truth that transforms us, we would become living proof of the goodness of God for every person; black/white. Muslim/Jew, liberal/conservative, Baptist/Pentecostal, Democrat or Republican. Yes. Even them.

     The reason people loved Jesus so much when He walked among them was that He was always more thoughtful for their needs than His own. He was kind. He healed them. He was fun to be with and most of all He loved them. He never dishonored anyone.  He’s given us a good model to follow hasn’t He?  Would today be a good day to find that salt shaker?

     Would it be a good day to throw yourself on the mercy of the court, ask forgiveness and then ask Him how to add just the right amount of God-flavors to your life so that everyone’s life is well seasoned? Look at how Jesus walked through the opposition forces and then ask Holy Spirit to help you do the same.  

     Teddy Roosevelt once said:  “The teachings of the Bible are so interwoven and entwined with our whole civic and social life that it would be literally…impossible for us to figure to ourselves what life would be if these teachings were removed. ...Almost every man who has by his life-work added to the sum of human achievement of which the race is proud…has based his life-work largely on the teachings of the Bible.”

     Abraham Lincoln put it this way:

It is the best gift God has given to men.  All the good the Savior gave to the world was communicated through this Book. But for it, we could not know right from wrong.”     

     These men took a stand for the Bible. They were not ashamed of it.  Will you fight for it to become the standard in our nation again? Where are you going to add your seasoning?

Powering UP Prayer For America:

Father, I am so sorry that I’ve lost my flavor. Forgive me for being apathetic and passive and thinking I’ve been a victim of my circumstances. Holy Spirit, I am so thankful that You are IN me to bring out the God-flavors in my life. Thank You Father that because of You I can bring heaven to earth. And I’m supposed to. In Mark 16 it says that wherever I go and whatever I do You would go with me, validating Your Message with indisputable evidence. I am the living proof that You are alive and well and ready for action. Let’s GO Jesus, and bring the taste of the goodness of God back into America.

Let Your Truth keep marching on!

In Jesus Name.  Amen!