I read this for the first time in my Bible. I’m sure I’ve seen it before as I was reading, but my eyes and mind never comprehended it. It stopped me in my tracks. Mark 9:49 “Everyone will be salted with fire.”

I thought I would see what others have said about this verse. People have a lot to say and there is a lot of confusion. Some versions have actually added into the text a verse in Leviticus. My version just referenced it on the side. Most feel if you translate it literally into Hebrew, it is talking about being preserved in hell forever and makes more sense in the versus above it. But then, to me, the verse after it does not make sense. I’ve seen no one address the context of the verse after it.

So if you read both versus, it reads like this. “Everyone will be salted with fire. Salt is good, but if it loses its saltiness, how can you make it salty again? Have salt in yourselves, and be at peace with each other.” Mark 9:49-50

So my simple, uneducated thoughts regarding these two versus is this: Salt is what makes things good. If something is bland, you put salt on it and it perks it up and gives it flavor. It makes something stand out. When I read “Everyone will be salted by fire.” I immediately think of trials. Trials by fire gives us salt. I think of salt as wisdom and maturity. “Have salt in yourselves, and be at peace with each other.” It talks wisdom and maturity to be at peace with each other.

I also think of salt as what we can rub off onto each other as our lives meet. Today I will go to the coffee house with a very wise woman and a prophetic artist and I hope to rub off some of my God given salt, which I received by fire onto someone who needs it. We have a little sign and we offer them Dream interpretation, Tattoo interpretation and spirit blessings. People seek us out, they need to hear from God and they don’t know it.

I think salt can be sharing the love of God with people. Just letting someone know that God exist and he knows their name in a very real and tangible way. You can go up to someone and say, “God loves you.” They say okay and walk away. If you go to someone and say, “God knows you have been struggling with taking care of your ailing father and he wants you to know how proud he is of you for stepping up to do your duty.” This reaches their core. They now know, in one quick moment, there is a God, he know them intimately and he loves them.

To me that is salt. That flavors conversations. That brings people to Jesus.