What does "salt of the earth" have to do with a gymnasium?

Sardis, located in present day Turkey

My wife is always telling me that I use too much salt, and when I have my yearly visit to the doctor, this is also confirmed by elevated blood pressure numbers. Before there was refrigeration, salt was used as a preservative. Along these lines, Jesus said in Matthew 5:13, "You are the salt of the earth. If the salt loses its saltiness, it's no longer good for anything but to be thrown out and trampled on the ground by men."

In the book of Revelation, Jesus issues a strong warning to the church at Sardis which has lost its saltiness. "I know your deeds. You have a reputation of being alive but you are dead. Wake up! Strengthen what remains and is about to die, for I have not found your deeds complete in the sight of my God" (Revelation 3:1-2).

What led Jesus to say such strong words to this community of faith in Sardis? Was it because they were slowly compromising what they believed with the pagans among them? Or where there other reasons that Jesus' words became such a powerful teaching for those believers who chose to live at the crossroads of their world?

One of the most impressive ruins in Sardis (located in present day Turkey) is that of a Greek gymnasium and Roman bathhouse. The gymnasium was the center of Greek culture much as our fitness clubs, athletic centers and gyms are today. But for the Greeks, their gymnasium also served as the center for instruction in literature about the Greek gods, philosophy, math and medicine. They also enjoyed the pleasures and vices of the Roman baths.

The Sardis Gymnasium Synagogue

Here is the amazing thing--In one corner of that immoral, self-glorifying gymnasium, archaeologists have uncovered the largest synagogue of that time period ever found. They discovered defaced pagan symbols on the walls of the synagogue as well as images of the goddess Cybele.

I've always thought that it would be cool to have a church service within a gymnasium and then during the week, the gym would serve to benefit the community with basketball, volleyball, etc. But obviously, there was more going on in the Greek gymnasium than a simple pickup game of basketball.

Here's the question: Did the Jews in Sardis place their synagogue within the walls of the Greek gymnasium in order to influence the Greek citizens or did they adapt to the pagan way of life so much so that they saw no discrepancy between worshiping God and the pagan way of life? In other words, did the believers at Sardis lose their saltiness? Did they compromise with the culture of their day to such an extent that they would be seen by the Lord as asleep or dead? Are we making similar compromises? Are we losing our saltiness? Would the Lord utter similar words about our state of slumber or appearing to be dead? Just wondering?

Follow the Rabbi website

If you want to read more about Sardis and "The Salt of the Earth", go to one of my favorite sights: Follow the Rabbi.

 At Follow the Rabbi, you can learn about the world of Jesus, and journey in the footsteps of the disciples. You'll be able to study the Word in the original context, and explore the culture of Jesus' day. This website is a seminary education in itself since it opens your understanding to the Word of God and it's actual meaning to us through the context of the prophets and the apostles. 

Check it out. You won't be sorry. Follow the Rabbi will help you to better understand the Bible and bring you to a closer relationship with Jesus, the Rabbi of all rabbis, our Lord and Savior. 

When they opened the seventh seal of the sequester, there was a great earthquake....

From Wednesday’s Wall Street Journal:

And when the Republicans opened the seventh seal of the sequester, there was a great earthquake; and the sun became black and the stars fell unto the Earth; and our nation's ability to forecast severe weather, such as drought events, hurricanes and tornados, was seriously undermined.

Lo, and the children were not vaccinated, and all the beasts starved in the zoos, and the planes were grounded.

Or so President Obama and his Cabinet prophets have been preaching ahead of the automatic budget cuts due to begin Friday.

The Sequester, which by the time you read this will have gone into effect, is supposed to unleash all kinds of calamity on the American people, including longer lines at the airport and delays because of 5000 furloughed air traffic controllers, illegal criminals being released from prison, the closing of all national parks including the Washington Monument as well as forcing us to drive over unsafe bridges, and the list goes on and on.

As I mentioned in my last post—this is the typical liberal ploy to make you feel pain and suffering by closing, shutting down, or delaying those areas that affect the most people in order to make the Republicans look like the bad guys, when in reality, this is all Obama’s fault. He hasn’t produced a budget in 4 yrs and the Democrat-controlled senate has not produced a budget in 4 yrs either. 

If the President wanted to find some money to keep our parks open, to keep our bridges and meat safe, to keep our air traffic controllers on the job, and even fund some more aircraft carriers in our Pacific Fleet which he has said we now can’t afford--here’s where we could find some extra money, trimming away some of the government fat which would more than cover the  to make up for that 2.4% sequester cut:

• $72 million for Alaskan sight-seeing trains.
• $22 million for old-fashioned trolley’s in Missouri
• $2.2 billion for the FCC program which provides free cellphones (Obamaphones). This program is rampant with abuse and fraud.
• Millions being spent to train Chinese prostitutes to drink responsibly.
• $16-20 million helping students from Indonesia get master’s degrees.
• $175,587 to determine if cocaine makes Japanese quail engage in sexually risky behavior.
• $200,000 on a “tattoo removal program” in Mission Hills, California.
• $3 million to researchers at the Univ. of California at Irvine to fund their research on video games such as World of Warcraft.
• $500 million on a program that seeks to solve the problem of 5-yr. old children that “can’t sit still” in a kindergarten classroom.
• $4.6 billion bailout for Fannie Mae
• $30 million on a program designed to help Pakistani farmers produce more mangos.
• $700,000 to study methane gas emissions from daily cows at the Univ. of NH.
• $25 billion spent every year maintaining federal buildings that are either unused or totally vacant.
• $998,798 spent shipping two 19-cent washers from So. Carolina to Texas, and $293,451 sending an 89-cent washer from So. Carolina to Florida.
• $400,00 to find out why gay men in Argentina engage in risky sexual behavior when they are drunk.
• $800,000 in “stimulus funds” to study the impact of a “genital-washing program” on men in So. Africa.
• $141,450 grant from the Environmental Protection Agency to fund a Chinese study of swine manure.
• $121 million wasted on 1,832 Dept. of Justice conferences.
• $520,000 to fix a covered bridge to nowhere in Green County, Ohio—a bridge that was last used in 2003.
• 75,000 Dept. of Interior employees conserving the wilderness in Washington D.C.
• $130 million to study herbs and yoga.
• 105 different federal programs funded to encourage students in math and science. 

These are just a few examples of all the wasteful spending by our government. It’s estimated that 50-cents of every dollar given to our government is wasted or misspent.

Obviously, as you can see, before we cut vital government services, there are many other areas that we can stop funding. The real revelation is Obama’s choice and of course, he always opts for pain and misery if it will yield more spending, taxation and government control.

The Names of Jesus: A Great Light

In the midst of my political rants, it's good to get some perspective. Regardless of who wins the election, we will still be in darkness to a large extent as a nation. That is why I want to focus today on one of the names for God.

He is......A GREAT LIGHT (Isaiah 9:2)

 "There is not enough darkness in all the world to put out the light of even one small candle."  --Robert Alden

I am amazed that even in the darkest spots on earth, places like North Korea, evil dictators have not been able to stop the spread of the Good News of the Messiah Jesus. (North Korea is not just dark spiritually, but also physically immersed in darkness. I've included a satellite photo taken of both North & South Korea at night. Notice the contrast between the two nations. South Korea is lit up because of abundance of electricity. North Korea is total darkness because of very little electricity.)

North Korea has earned the distinction as the world's top persecutor of Christians. North Korean Christians aren't simply killed for their faith in Christ. They are pulverized with steamrollers, used to test biological weapons, shipped off to death camps or shot in front of children, while newborn babies have their brains pithed with forceps in front of their mothers. Crimes against humanity reminiscent of Auschwitz and Treblinka to which the world declared "Never Again!" more than 60 years ago are being perpetrated today against the North Korean Christians.

In North Korea, Christians meet secretly in small groups and read handwritten scriptures. Some use Bibles that their elders have secretly passed down to them. One man was jailed for a year because a Bible was found in his house. 

One man known as "Interviewee 14" told of his interrogation in the Onsong Gugkabowibu jail in 2001. The interrogators told the 68 persons being held in this small jail that all “followers of Jesus” were to stand up. Six did and were immediately taken away. The guards said that the six had been executed. However, the detainees later learned that the six had been taken to a gwalliso political penal labor colony at Jongsung. Interviewee 14 himself, after being deprived of food and sleep through seven long interrogations, finally gave up and confessed to belief. He was offered the opportunity to renounce his faith, pledge his loyalty to the Party, and be sent to a nodong danryeon dae labor training camp or mobile labor brigade."

We need to pray for those in North Korea, for Christians who are tortured and persecuted for their faith. But the good news is that no man, not even the leaders of North Korea can stamp out Christianity because the Spirit of God does not recognize nations' borders. The Spirit of Jesus goes wherever He wants all over the world and cannot be stopped by the feeble attempts of border guards at checkpoints. Even in the midst of the darkness in North Korea, there is the light of Jesus. He is the Great Light that is transforming lives in the darkest nation on earth.
 

What you need to know about this name, "A Great Light"

Isaiah, the Old Testament prophet captured the vision of the coming Messiah and gave us numerous titles. He said that the Messiah would be:

• God's anointed servant (Isaiah 42:1)
• The Redeemer (Isaiah 59:20)
• Wonderful Counselor (Isaiah 7:14)
• The Prince of Peace (Isaiah 9:6) 

But he gives us an important aspect of the Messiah when he prophesies in Isaiah 9:2 that he would be a Great Light.

We are all born with a spiritual birth defect... 
Jesus told those around him that he was the Light of the world. In John 12:46, Jesus says to the crowds, ⁴⁶ I have come as a light to shine in this dark world, so that all who put their trust in me will no longer remain in the dark. 

In John 9:5, Jesus said, "As long as I am in the world, I am the light of the world." 

We need to consider the setting where Jesus spoke these words. Jesus and his disciples are leaving the temple area where they encounter a man who had been blind from birth. To be blind from birth meant that you lived in hopeless poverty begging for your next meal. Also, it was thought that this man was blind either because he had sinned while in the womb or because of his parents' sin. Jack Hayford writes  that "We are all born with a spiritual "birth defect'—we cannot see dearly the will and way of God for our lives. And it is only by an encounter with Jesus Christ that dear vision becomes ours." It is only in the light of Christ--His presence in our lives that we receive the knowledge of God. The Psalmist said, "In your light, we see light." (Psalm 36:9).

Right there on the spot, Jesus heals this blind man. His eyes were opened for the first time. This is similar to what happens when we are "born-again" and have our spiritual eyesight and understanding opened. We see people and the world around us differently, and we begin to see and understand God's purpose and plan for our lives. The Bible takes on a whole new meaning because it now speaks to us. The Bible is no longer a compilation of dead, dry, dusty, ancient and irrelevant thoughts of a bunch of dead men, but it is NOW living and active, addressing our every need and revealing the thoughts and wisdom of Almighty God!

It is noteworthy that light always intrudes on darkness, and darkness never intrudes on light. If a door opens between a lighted room and a dark room, the light always flows into the dark room, never visa-versa.  John 1:5, and John 8:12 tell us that we can overcome evil, darkness, with the light of Christ. 

Jesus is the Great Light who can pierce the darkness that envelopes our lives on a daily basis. He can shatter the chains of discouragement, disappointment, disgrace, defeat, and hopelessness that seeks to smother us on a daily basis. The Evil One wants to convince us that we are worthless or unworthy of any good thing that God would want to give us. He would have us consider ourselves to be like rotten fruit fallen from a tree. The Evil One would have you encrusted with a despondency devoid of any life-giving purpose.

But into that void of darkness and despair, the testimony of Jesus, our Great Light shines forth. His brilliance, his radiance, His divine love, His truth and wisdom can transform any circumstance and restore our lives to one of new purpose, direction and joy!
 

It is our privilege as followers of Messiah Jesus to live in this Great Light daily.

PRAYING THIS NAME

Praying in Jesus' name, a Great Light, means focusing the radi­ance of His person on the aspects of my day for which I desire divine guidance. 

We can pray that God would reveal His will to us as we read His Word (the Bible). We pray that Jesus, our Great Light, would light the path for us this day so that we would not walk in darkness. We pray that we would do what He wills for us this very day. We also recognize that Jesus as our Great Light wants to expose the darkness in our lives, those things that need to be cleaned up or the rubbish that needs to be swept from our hearts and lives. We pray for His revelation, that His Light would purify our lives and cleanse us so that we are truly walking in new found freedom and living lives that glorify Our Lord and Savior.

We can pray in Jesus' name like the African child who prayed: 

O Great Chief, light a candle within my heart that I may see what is therein, and sweep the rubbish from Your dwelling place.