“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.” Leviticus 2:13 NKJV
God’s covenant mantra to His people is “You shall be holy, for I the Lord your God am holy.” Leviticus 19:1 NKJV
He enters into a covenant with Israel with this imperative and promise.
He considers the covenant ordinance utensils as being set apart to Him as holy objects, just as the people were set apart as holy vessels.
Why does God call His covenant a “Covenant of 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.” Numbers 18:19 NKJV
“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?” 2 Chronicles 13:5 NKJV
As God directs Moses in the sacrificial offerings and feasts he has given
to Israel to perform, He speaks of His covenant as a covenant of salt.
It is a perpetual covenant which He imposes and keeps with an oath.
He swears by His name for the benefit and assurance to Israel because He can swear by nothing greater.
Not only does salt preserve to prevent decay, but it purifies as well.
The people of God are to be purified by God’s sanctifying grace and walk before their God in holiness.
“For everyone will be seasoned with fire, and every sacrifice will be seasoned with salt.“ Mark 9:49 NKJV
Salt cannot be destroyed by fire. It survives the test of fire. So, we must be a people seasoned and purified by the salt of the Holy Spirit.
“Salt is good, but if the salt loses its flavor, how will you season it? Have salt in yourselves, and have peace with one another.” Mark 9:50 NKJV
We are to offer sacrifices with gratitude and alacrity, not out of formal duty. We must come to worship prepared to give God His due worship.
When we enter into God’s ordinances of the New Covenant, we are not to enter into them lightly. We are to seek communion with God in His Word and in prayer and sacraments.
When we read God’s Word and spend time in prayer we are to enter these means of grace with joy and delight, knowing that they are for our benefit.
God will preserve a remnant for His own purpose, but we must be the people He desires us to be. His covenant of salt is a perpetual covenant which no one can thwart.
But we are to be covenant-keepers as God’s vice-regents in a sinful world. This is a witness and a purifying effect upon the world about us.
Terry Miller
2 Chronicles 13:5