Have You Lost Your Savour for Your Savior — E.A. Johnston

A Personal Loss of Passion for Christ

I remember a time, years ago, where I was red hot for Jesus Christ, and took my eyes off of Him, and placed them on the world and its allurements, its enjoyments, its pleasures. The game of golf became my primary enjoyment, that and traveling.

My love for Jesus cooled off pretty fast, and soon I was just like your average church member, for I became a Sunday Christian only, because the rest of the week I was full of the world. In the Gospel of Matthew, Jesus makes a comparison to a follower of His, to salt.

Jesus’ Diagnostic Word About Salt

You can turn in your Bibles there now friends, to the Gospel of Matthew. We will be in chapter 5, and our text will be taken from verse 13, and this is a diagnostic verse for believers, because it diagnoses our present condition, regarding our relationship to our Savior, and it measures our Christian influence in the world.

Let me read this text to us now. Ye are the salt of the earth, but if the salt have lost his savor, wherewith shall it be salted? It is thenceforth good for nothing but to be cast out, and to be trodden under the foot of men.

The title of my message this evening friends is, Have you lost your savor for the Savior? I am reminded of a sermon, in which the great British Evangelist George Whitefield took this very text, while he was preaching in New England in 1740.

When I was doing my research on his life, I found that in the archives of the Old South First Presbyterian Church in Newburyport, Massachusetts, where Whitefield often preached, and where his earthly remains now lie, I found this following document, which was delivered at the centennial anniversary of the death of George Whitefield, by one of the early pastors of that church.

Let me read it to you now. An immense crowd is hurrying at five or six o 'clock in the morning to the corner of high and federal streets, and some of them, men and women too, young and old, have come riding or afoot, even from Raleigh.

For what strange thing, of all other strange things, to hear a sermon? But the preacher is George Whitefield. He gives out his text, Ye are the salt of the earth, then his voice rolls over the assembly as he begins, and whom does the Savior mean, when he says, Ye are, why you, ye saints of Newbury, but I fear ye have lost your savor.

I like that, friends, because it's so often true about us. We cool off from Jesus from time to time. We lose our heat as believers. We cease being salt, like our master has said. Salt has two main functions.

Salt as Seasoning and Preservation

Number one, seasoning, and number two, preservation. It adds flavor to something, and it is a preservation against decay, and as believers, we are to be like salt in this sense, friends. We are to make others thirsty for Jesus with our seasoned lives of grace, and we are to be a preservation against evil in the society in which we live.

Just think, friends, how different our society today would be if the church still had an influence in the world. Imagine if the church members were all on fire for God and hungry for souls and thirsty for more Christ, how it would impact the world in which we live.

We as Christians are to live our lives so as to be a preservation against evil in society. Evil grows in society like a great plague when the church has lost her savor. When she has lost her influence.

Discouragement, Disappointment, and Spiritual Burnout

Ministry work is hard, demanding, at times frustrating at best. It seems little good is actually being accomplished by our efforts. I see burnout in Christian workers all the time, and the two main factors contributing to this burnout are the twin tools of the devil, which are discouragement and disappointment.

If the devil can get you discouraged, friend, then he will plant the other knockout punch on your chin, which is disappointment. These are his main weapons against the Christian. If he can get us down in the dumps, where we are feeling sorry for ourselves, then he has drained some of the salt out of us by his wicked devices.

And if we lose our salt, that which makes us a Christian influence in the world, then we become ineffectual in our testimony for Christ Jesus in the world. The world no longer takes us seriously. The world laughs at the impotent church of today, for the church, by and by, has lost her savor.

Where has her passion gone? Where is the fire that once burned so hot within us? Why are we not making others thirsty for Christ with our brand of Christianity? I believe the failure begins in the prayer closet.

Bible Study and Prayer as the Source of Christian Fire

It occurs in two main areas, our Bible study time and our prayer time. I'll never forget Stephen Olford sharing a story with me one day. He said he grew up in the bush in Africa, for he had missionary parents, and he related to me the following story.

I'll never forget it. He said in the evening by the campfire, he would hear the roar of the lions, and he learned to distinguish the different roars of these ferocious creatures. He said there was a particular roar which prevailed at a certain time of day.

It was when the female lions went out to hunt prey for the male lions, and when the female lion would bring back a leg of lamb or some animal in her jaw and drop it at the feet of the male lion, the male lion would turn that spoil over in his big paws, and he would yell out a certain kind of roar at this particular time, which was his dinner time.

And the roar would penetrate the darkness of the night, and all the other animals would be suddenly still and quiet as this male lion roared over his dinner. And Stephen Olford said the roar sounded like the lion was saying, with a look of satisfaction and anticipation over his meal, you're mine, you're mine.

And we should approach our Bible like that, friends. We should approach the word of God with anticipation and satisfaction and devour it and say like that lion, you're mine, you're mine. This promise from God is mine.

This truth in God's word is mine. I stand on it. I can't help but think of the verse in Psalm 119, 162, which declares, I rejoice at thy word as one that findeth great spoil. And that's what the lion did, friends.

He was rejoicing over his spoil, and we should react the same way to our approach to Bible study. I believe the breakdown in a believer's life begins here, a lack of time in God's word. How can we maintain a love relationship with Jesus Christ if we are not continually and regularly in his word, absorbing it, meditating upon it?

The second breakdown in a believer's life and his loss of salt is in our prayer life. When we neglect our daily tryst with our Lord and Savior, we lose our saltiness. We lose our fire, and we become less ignitable.

Thus, we lose our saltiness, and our Christian influence is diminished in our community. And this decay in our walk with God brings spiritual decay in our relationship with our fellow man, for we lose our authority.

The Need for Holy Spirit Anointing and Spiritual Authority

When we lose our saltiness for Christ Jesus, friends, oh brother pastor, how our pulpits need a fresh salting from on high, so that when we preach, we have an anointing of the Holy Spirit, and we can then cry out with divine authority, thus saith the Lord.

But if we have lost our savor, then we have diminished our influence for good to this lost and perishing generation of hell-bound sinners. Let me ask you a question, dear friend. Have you lost your savor for your Savior?

Let me repeat that. Have you lost your savor for your Savior? Oh, dear brother and sister, if you have, then go to your God and get it back. God declares in Malachi, return to me, and I will return to you.

Holy Fire in the Lives of Faithful Preachers

I always wondered how a man like Martin Lloyd-Jones kept the fire going in his life. He was a busy pastor in London. He had time constraints upon him, both in pastoral ministry and sermon preparation, yet he always maintained a holy glow for his Lord.

How did he do it? How did he keep the flame from burning out? How did Leonard Ravenhill maintain his holy fire for God? Leonard Ravenhill was a very salty man as a Christian. To be around him made you thirsty for Christ.

How did he keep the embers burning on the altar of his heart? I believe if you would examine both of these men's private lives, you would find integrity, conviction, and holiness unto the Lord. You would find a self-denial and sacrifice in their time in the Word of God and in their time with the God of the Word.

I can best describe them by the verses which come after our text in Matthew. Listen, friends, to verses 14 through 16, where Jesus then compares a believer to a candle of light. Ye are the light of the world, a city that is set on a hill cannot be hid.

Neither do men light a candle and put it under a bushel, but on a candlestick, and it giveth light unto all that are in the house. Let your light so shine before men that they may see your good works and glorify your Father which is in heaven.

Burning Out for Christ and Shining Before the World

Now friends, think of that burning candle as it relates to the Christian life. A candle is consumed as it gives light. It gradually burns out. It burns down. Like the little poem which states, Only one life, which will soon be past, only what's done for Christ will last, and as I lay dying, how good it shall be if the lamp of my life has been burned out for thee.

When I think of men like Martyn Lloyd-Jones and Leonard Ravenhill, I see men who were consumed with Christ in their generation, and they burned themselves out for God to reach the lost with the gospel of the Son of God.

They stayed ignitable. They stayed salty. They maintained a red-hot love relationship with Jesus Christ. You could tell it from their preaching. It seemed as if, when they entered the pulpit, they had just left the presence of Almighty God, and like Moses, their faces were still aglow, and God was all over them when they preached.

Oh friends, how desperately we need a touch of the Holy Spirit in our day, how we should be on our faces and begging God for a deeper burden for our nation, that we should be seeking his face for a touch from on high to give power to our anguished prayers, that we should spend more time with our Savior so we wouldn't lose our savor.

Personal Revival Through Desperate Prayer

Oh great God, give us more salt, give us a fire, oh Lord. I had lost my fire for a time. I was leaking salt, so to speak. My passion was waning from all my trial and adversity in my personal life. I was beat up and burned out.

A human frame can only take so much. I had lost my wife and was in the midst of both grief and trial. I could tell my savor was leaking for my Savior. So I got serious with him in desperate and anguished prayer.

I needed a personal revival, and I sought my God of the Bible for it. He says if we seek him, we shall find him. When we seek him with all our heart, and oh my poor heart was breaking, how I needed a fresh touch from my master and my Savior, Jesus Christ.

Well God granted me the grace of personal revival as I sought him for it, and from that experience of wrestling with my Lord in desperate prayer, I wrote a little poem. Here now is that poem, friends.

Let me read it to you. Give me a fire, oh Lord, give me a fire for thee. Give me your fire, oh Lord, let it burn brightly in me. Give me a fire, oh Lord, the wood of my life I give to thee. Consume my ashes, oh Lord, and let a revival begin with me.

Give me a fire, oh Lord, give me a glimpse of hell and eternity. Make me a fire, oh Lord, so my life may be burned out for thee. Give me a fire, oh Lord, increase my desire for thee. Make me a flame, oh Lord, that draws others to you through me.

Seeking Christ for Renewed Influence

Well friends, I can assure you that if you've been leaking salt lately and your savor is lacking in influence for God, that if you set your face heavenward, bend your knees downward and plant your faith on the Lord Jesus Christ and seek him earnestly, I promise you friends, he will permeate your life with a fresh supply of saltiness for him.

He will ignite you with a fire that will ignite others in your generation. Let us pray. Oh great God, keep us from mediocrity. Great God, keep us from an average Christianity. Oh great God, grant us a flame that won't burn out.

Ignite us, oh Lord, with your holy fire that we may be a flame that burns bright in our generation to bring in the lost. Lord Jesus, in your mercy, grant us the grace to pursue you in a deeper love relationship with thee.

Give us each a personal revival, oh Lord. How desperately we need a touch from you on our lives, great King. Give us consistency in our walk with thee, oh Lord, a glory burned brightly in us, great King.

Give each of us a greater burden for souls, stamp eternity on our eyelids, oh Lord. Let us be used of you in our generation to shake the very gates of hell. For that namesake and for that great glory, amen.