Let’s look at one more use for salt in the times of the biblical period. When a city was destroyed it was sown with salt as a token that it would not be inhabited again. When a land has been saturated with salt it becomes sterile and a product of barrenness. When it comes to our lives have we sown salt on the fields of sin in our soul to make it barren to the reaches of sin? Think to yourselves about that one sin that so easily entangles. How can you soak it with the salt of God’s Word to destroy sins reach upon you? For when sin reigns, it not only enslaves the sinner but also places shackles of pain on the loved ones. How many of us have said that our sin affects no one else but ourselves. Have we filled our own ears with this bitter deception that we have become fools to believe it? Think back to the last section in which you thought of those who have been a warning to us. Do you think that no one was hurt except the one who had fallen? If we believe that then we will fall for even more deceptions that chain our soul to sin. How many men and women in scripture sinned against God and no one else was affected? But does not scripture states that it will visit the third and fourth generations? It does more than visit; it comes to stay as it did for Lot’s wife. She disobeyed God and her whole family paid the price. Do you think that the family was not affected by sin? Let’s see what happened to the family after her absence. “Come, let us make our father drink wine, and we will lie with him, that we may preserve offspring from our father." So they made their father drink wine that night. And the firstborn went in and lay with her father. He did not know when she lay down or when she arose. The next day, the firstborn said to the younger, "Behold, I lay last night with my father. Let us make him drink wine tonight also. Then you go in and lie with him, that we may preserve offspring from our father." So they made their father drink wine that night also. And the younger arose and lay with him, and he did not know when she lay down or when she arose. Thus both the daughters of Lot became pregnant by their father. The firstborn bore a son and called his name Moab. He is the father of the Moabites to this day. The younger also bore a son and called his name Ben-ammi. He is the father of the Ammonites to this day.” [Genesis 19:32-38 (ESV)] The sin of incest committed by the two daughters of Lot created a long history of trouble between the children of Abraham and the children of Lot.
Has your family been ravaged by alcoholism, drug addiction, or other forms of dysfunction? Maybe your family has not discovered those in past generations but maybe something smaller as a degree of separation between relatives. The effects of slander, malice, anger, strife and jealousy can even destroy a family just as much as an addiction can. Seen and unseen sins destroy the character of a family if left unchecked. So look at your own family’s history, has there been a sin that has entangled the generations of your family? Or has there been a consequence of your own sin that has brought deep division in your own relationships. I don’t think that there is one family in this world that sin has not affected down the line of the generations. But the idea is not to point the finger and blame others for our lot in life. The idea is to take a look at how sin does affect our lives and the lives of those who we deeply love. How it has cut off the true nature of love within our own families. And how we need to take responsibility for our actions and look to God to help us to change. We can be a godly influence to bring God’s blessing upon our family instead of a curse that will entwine our loved ones into a deeper life of regret. We need to look at the consequences, not just in our immediate lives but in those that we will hurt by what we do and don’t do for them. Just as love covers a multitude of sin, sin can cover a multitude of love by separation, hurt and a growing sense of despair. Don’t listen to the whispers of the deceiver that says, “no one else will get hurt.” Because if that were true then why are there so many broken families and relationships in the world today. We are called to love one another, to be tender hearted and to forgive one another as God does for Christ sake. Maybe it’s time that we also remember the ripples in the water that one-drop makes. And know that each life, whether good or bad effects those around them. If we truly love those around us we will treat them as we say we do. Looking before we leap into the den of sin, what will you pass onto the next generation, your salvation or your sin? Are you ready to Salt you fields of Sin?
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