Put some salt on it.

Steve Brown:
Put some salt on it. I’ll explain on Key Life.

Matthew Porter:
This is Key Life dedicated to the message that the only people who get any better are those who know that if they don’t get any better, God will still love them, anyway. That teaching raises a lot of questions, so here’s author and seminary professor Steve Brown, along with Pete Alwinson from ForgeBibleStudy.com with answers to the Bible that’ll make you free.

Steve Brown:
Thank you Matthew. Hello Pete.

Pete Alwinson:
Hey man. How you doing?

Steve Brown:
How are you?

Pete Alwinson:
Pass the french fries and put some salt on it. Come on. Let’s go.

Steve Brown:
Well, we got a question on salt that we’ve never gotten before. And, I’m going to explain that. No, we’re going to listen to it and hear it. And then I’m going to be quiet and you’re going to answer it, cause you, cause that’s what you’re here for. Okay? That’s Pete Alwinson by the way. And you got to go to ForgeTruth.com. I’ve told you that over and over again, and you never listen to me, but those who did listen. Rose up and called me, blessed. At any rate, Pete’s been coming in for a hundred years on Fridays, and we spend this time answering some of the many questions that we get from you guys, we get thousands and you can ask a question anytime and we’ll take you seriously. 1-800-KEY-LIFE, you can call that, that’s open 24 seven, record your question, and sometimes we put it on the air. Or you can send your question to

Key Life Network
P.O. Box 5000
Maitland, Florida 32794

In Canada, it’s

Key Life Canada
P.O. Box 28060
Waterloo, Ontario N2L 6J8

And you can email us it’s [email protected]. And all of those places are places where we hope you’ll send money. That’s listen. I would, could say it in the spiritual and fancy way, but send money. Okay? No, I’m kidding. If you can help us out, if you can’t, we understand, pray for the ministry. If you are able to help us financially, we promise we’ll be as faithful with your gift as you were in giving it. Pete why don’t you pray for us and then we’ll get to some of these questions.

Pete Alwinson:
Alright, let’s pray together. Our father, how thankful we are that we belong to you. How thankful we are that you, the triune God, Father, Son, and Holy Spirit have called us to be your daughters and sons and brought us into your forever family and that you’ve removed the sin, the stain of sin and the curse of sin in our own lives. Thank you, that shame is no longer. our name and guilt is no longer the anchor that pulls us down. Thank you, that we are are free and alive in you. And we just pray that this weekend you would allow our pastors, teachers, priests, worship directors, all of our leaders to bring us, call us into your presence and to drop grace on us in such a powerful way that we leave more energized and more open to whatever you want to do in our life and through our lives. Lord, we need you in so many ways, in our relationships, in our health and work. And so we commit all of that to you, as well as this time now in Q & A, we pray. In Jesus’ strong name. Amen.

Steve Brown:
Amen. Let’s get to the salt question. And, let’s do that first.

Caller 1:
Question is how many times does the word salt appear in a Bible?

Steve Brown:
Well, that was quick, short and sweet.

Pete Alwinson:
Yeah man. I know.

Steve Brown:
I’m an old guy and I’ve often said, there’s no question you can ask that I haven’t heard. And there’s no testimony you can give, I can’t track. There is no sin you confess that I haven’t either done or am aware of, and I’m not shocked anymore,

Pete Alwinson:
That’s right.

Steve Brown:
because I’ve been doing this a long time,

Pete Alwinson:
Yeah.

Steve Brown:
but I’ve never heard that question before.

Pete Alwinson:
I know. Well, we have in full disclosure, we had to look that one up, but over 40 times in the Bible. Right?

Steve Brown:
The words salt.

Pete Alwinson:
Yeah. And back in numbers is the first use of it, covenant of salt and things like that. There’s a nuance to that. Get a good study Bible and read some of the footnotes on that in the Old Testament. The most famous of course is Jesus in Matthew 5:17. You, 15.

You are the salt of the earth, if the salt has become tasteless, how can it be made salty again? It is no longer for anything, except to be thrown out and trampled under foot by men.
So that’s the classic use of it by our Lord.

Steve Brown:
And what do you think he meant?

Pete Alwinson:
Well, he’s really talking about our life, isn’t he?

Steve Brown:
Yeah, he really is.

Pete Alwinson:
And in the Sermon on the Mount, he’s talking about what the Jews should have been and what Christians can be by his grace.

Steve Brown:
That’s true. And salt that, you know, can you imagine salt that isn’t salty?

Pete Alwinson:
I know.

Steve Brown:
I mean, you talk about bland, nothing.

Pete Alwinson:
That’s right.

Steve Brown:
That’s what it is. And I think it, at least partially what you said, but there’s also that kind of liveliness and zest that adds flavor,

Pete Alwinson:
Right.

Steve Brown:
and Christians who are boring, they violate that.

Pete Alwinson:
I know.

Steve Brown:
And they’re usually the ones who criticize us, who are out of the box.

Pete Alwinson:
I know, right?

Steve Brown:
And they’re the ones sinning. I want to say that, do you know?

Pete Alwinson:
Leo Buscaglia, you remember him?

Steve Brown:
Yeah, I do.

Pete Alwinson:
The love doctor from UCLA. He said,

If you’re bored, you’re boring.

And, I think you’re right. I think there are a lot of Christians who try to just be so legalistically in line with everything that they lose

Steve Brown:
The zest,

Pete Alwinson:
The zest.

Steve Brown:
the freedom and the excitement and the joy, that’s a part of it.

Pete Alwinson:
Yeah.

Steve Brown:
But at any rate, you now have the answer.

Pete Alwinson:
That’s right.

Steve Brown:
You could have gotten it nowhere else, except from us, 40 times. If anybody ever, now I’ve heard that question. If anybody ever asks me that question again and they won’t, but if they should, I will have a perfect answer for that. This is an email. I often hear that God loves us unconditionally and that there’s nothing to do to get him to love us more. But what about John 14:21, He who has my commandments and keeps them, he it is who loves me and my father will love him, and I will love him and reveal myself to him. I think that is far less a commandment than it is a description. And I think if we make it into a commandment, you do this or you lose it all. I don’t think you’ve gotten the flavor of the context of what Jesus is talking about. As a matter of fact, you can’t love until you’ve been loved. And that’s what he’s talking about. It’s in the context of disciples, loving each other, you can’t love until you’ve been loved, and then you can only love to the degree to which you have been loved. And so I think Jesus is talking about his own love. For them.

Greater love hath no man than this, that a man gave his life for his friends.

And your my friends. So as he moves into this passage, which can be troubling if you make it stand alone. If you take it out of context of the chapter and the context of the entirety of Scripture, you can get it to say that you do right, or you’re going to hell. And that’s not what Jesus is saying. It’s not what the Bible is saying.

Pete Alwinson:
Yeah.

Steve Brown:
I, you know, it wasn’t something I did or planned. I can’t, if I don’t love somebody, how am I going to love them?

Pete Alwinson:
Yeah.

Steve Brown:
I mean, I, so if you command me and say, I’m going to kill you, if you don’t love this person, I can’t do it.

Pete Alwinson:
Yeah.

Steve Brown:
It just doesn’t work that way.

Pete Alwinson:
Yeah.

Steve Brown:
But something happens to a Christian and Jesus is describing it in the context of his own Christian community,

Pete Alwinson:
Right. Right. Right. Right.

Steve Brown:
about what happens to a Christian, they do follow that commandment about love, which is what Jesus is talking about. He’s not saying, you know, I’ve given you 800 different commandments and if you don’t do them, you’re going to hell. He’s talking about love and the context of love and the reality of love. And it’s descriptive more than it is a commandment.

Pete Alwinson:
I love that. And I think that that summarizes it perfectly, based on what you just said. Maybe we could put in parentheses, he who has my commandments and keeps them, he it is who loves me and my father will continue. to love him.

Steve Brown:
Yeah. That would work. I don’t know why John didn’t do that?

Pete Alwinson:
I know. But that is the point you’ve made.

Steve Brown:
Sure it is.

Pete Alwinson:
And he loved us first. And there’s a sense in which, as we enter in and respond back that love just simply continues. But even if we didn’t respond back, it would continue.

Steve Brown:
Yeah. And eventually it would continue.

Pete Alwinson:
Yeah.

Steve Brown:
Because you just can’t stand in a rain. I have a guy come into work on something at our house this afternoon, a friend that you and I, Alan Botts,

Pete Alwinson:
Yeah.

Steve Brown:
and he’s coming over to do some work. And, as we record this, we’re facing a tropical storm that’s supposed to come in, and Alan struggles with some physical issues. And I said to him, look, if it’s pouring down rain, the winds blowing and you could die by going out in this, stay home, okay? He said, no, no, no, I’ll work between the rain drops. Well, you can’t work, but the rain drops, you’re in a shower, you’re out in the rain, you’re going to get wet. And if you’ve been loved, you’re going to get wet, and you can’t help it. It’s just a description. I love, read that again, the way you would put it.

Pete Alwinson:
He who has my commandments and keeps them, he it is who loves me and my father will continue to love him.

Steve Brown:
Oh, that’s so good. I’m going to steal that and give you credit the first time.

Pete Alwinson:
One time. Yeah.

Steve Brown:
But after that, it’s mine. This is interesting, we could probably. When I praise God, I wonder if I’m doing it the right way. I acknowledge God’s attributes his sovereignty and such, but I don’t get emotional as others. I sing and follow along with praise songs. I just wonder if I’m doing it right or enough.

Pete Alwinson:
I really,

Steve Brown:
I love that question.

Pete Alwinson:
I love that. And I think you and I, maybe, are like this, I don’t wanna put words in your mouth, but we love truth and we love knowledge. Right?

Steve Brown:
That’s right.

Pete Alwinson:
And, we can get excited about learning something new. And, so hearing a great sermon, could make us,

Steve Brown:
Yeah.

Pete Alwinson:
just so fulfilled. Whereas maybe worship songs, being emotional, it’s not as much. And I have some friends where it’s the opposite. And, and so I can get emotional about God, sometimes thinking through theological concepts,

Steve Brown:
More than the music.

Pete Alwinson:
more than even the music. People are all different.

Steve Brown:
Now I didn’t say that. Pete said that, you make, you write letters to him, those of you who are into the worship. I don’t need any more criticism. Tell Pete, he’s probably not saved.

Pete Alwinson:
I’m open to it. Gary Thomas wrote a great, he wrote a great book years ago about the, and I can’t remember the title, Gary Thomas on the how we worship and that we were seven, eight, nine different ways that people worship God. And it’s not all the same. We’re not all the same.

Steve Brown:
Yeah. That’s so good. And by the way, let me say to the person who wrote this, nobody does it right.

Pete Alwinson:
Yeah.

Steve Brown:
How can a finite human being properly worship an infinite God. So he likes it when you say, I like you.

Pete Alwinson:
Yeah.

Steve Brown:
I mean, he really does. And he makes up for the lack, so don’t stay awake worrying about it, but we got to go. Key Life is a listener supported production of Key Life Network.