Latest / Reformed Thinking / Salt of the Earth: Christian Identity, Holiness, and Witness in a Decaying World (Matthew 5:13)

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Salt of the Earth: Christian Identity, Holiness, and Witness in a Decaying World (Matthew 5:13) · Reformed Thinking

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Welcome back to Reformed Thinking.
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We're doing another deep dive today, taking a look at a phrase
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from Scripture that you know, it feels so familiar on the
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surface, but when you really dig in, there's a a pretty radical
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assignment sitting underneath it.
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We're going to be in Matthew chapter 5, verse 13.
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You are the salt of the earth. It's one of those verses that
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gets quoted all the time, and I think it's lost a lot of its
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sting. You know, for a lot of people it
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just means something like be a good person, be nice.
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Generic uprightness, sure. But for the people who first
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heard it, this was not some light compliment.
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It was a really weighty, maybe even a dangerous declaration of
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who they were and what their job was.
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OK, so our mission for this deep dive is to get past that, that
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kind of superficial gloss of just being nice.
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Right. We want to pull out the real
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meaning of this assignment and and really face what it's
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calling us to, which is a kind of costly visible
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distinctiveness. And we'll be grounding all of
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this in the source material we put together.
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So let's do that. Let's unpack it by setting the
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ancient stage. First, I think we have to start
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with a really simple truth. When Jesus said these words, he
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wasn't talking to people who had refrigerators.
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No, not at all. Salt wasn't a luxury item you'd
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find in a fancy shaker. The sources are clear on this.
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It was an indispensable necessity.
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So what was its main role? You know, the day-to-day life of
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someone in the 1st century. Preservation.
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That was the number one overriding purpose.
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It's easy for us to forget, but historically salt was the
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difference between, say, surviving a winter and starving.
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Wow. It was just the ordinary,
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everyday way you stopped meat and fish from rotting.
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You know, the word salary actually comes from the Latin
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word solarium. I think I've heard that it was
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the money given to Roman soldiers to buy salt.
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That's how valuable it was, both economically and just
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practically. OK, so if salt is for
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preservation, the metaphor immediately tells you something
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about about the thing being preserved, in this case the
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earth. It's a pretty sobering idea
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right out of the gate. If you take the salt away or if
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the salt stops working like salt, what happens?
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Corruption spreads, rot sets in. What was good and wholesome
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becomes foul. So the metaphor just assumes
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that the world's natural state isn't good or even neutral.
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Exactly. The starting point is that its
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natural trajectory, without any divine intervention, is
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downward. It's heading toward corruption.
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The sources call this the world's natural drift.
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And we should probably define what that kind of decay looks
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like spiritually and morally. The sources we have point to
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some specific areas where this rot shows up in public, and our
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job here is just to report what they say.
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Yes, the sources do detail how you can see this downward spiral
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in modern society. For instance lying and
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manipulation becoming normalized in public life.
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It just erodes trust everywhere. Right in institutions, between
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people. Then there's the covenanted
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marriage. It's often treated as something
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disposable or maybe just irrelevant, which undermines the
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one institution God designed for social order and and for
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fruitfulness. And the sources also point to a
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a very specific and concerning observation.
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They do. They mention how sexual
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confusion is now celebrated as a form of progress.
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The materials identify this as a sign of a society that's losing
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its moral bearings, where what was once seen as dishonorable is
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now called honorable. And this whole picture seems to
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line up perfectly with the scriptural view of humanity
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apart from God, doesn't it? Absolutely.
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If you look at Romans 1, the apostle Paul describes fallen
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humanity as, you know, exchanging the truth of God for
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a lie. It talks about being given over
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to a debased mind and dishonorable passions.
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Darkened understanding. Darkened understanding, Yes.
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The idea isn't that humanity is on an upward March toward some
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kind of secular righteousness. The default spiritual condition
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is decay. First, John says the world lies
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in the power of the evil 1. So that's the environment,
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that's the context where Christ places his followers.
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He puts them right next to the meat that's already starting to
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go bad. That's a great way to put it.
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And that at that context is just so critical because it takes
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this assignment from being about simple self improvement to
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something of of cosmic necessity.
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It's not about being a good person in a good neighborhood.
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No, it's about actively restraining an inevitable rot in
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a world that is spiraling downward morally.
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And that's why we're calling it a radical assignment, because it
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demands a very specific and and costly posture toward this
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decaying world. You have to engage, but without
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compromise. Right, you can't just withdraw
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and fear and build a little holy bubble.
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No, because then the salt isn't touching the meat.
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But you also can't just blend in to be accepted, because then
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you've deluded your own nature. You've lost your saltiness.
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You have to be present in the decay while somehow maintaining
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this radical purity. OK, that frames the whole
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mission perfectly. So now let's let's make that
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transition. Let's place this declaration in
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its immediate setting, which you've called the King's
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Manifesto. We can't really get the weight
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of salt of the earth unless we see Jesus as the King who is
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speaking. This is where we have to begin
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with Matthew's whole agenda in his Gospel account.
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Matthew is He's unique among the gospel writers in his focus.
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His clear goal is to present Jesus not just as a great
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teacher or a healer. But as the king.
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As the long promised Messiah and King of Israel.
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And he signals that royal identity right from the very
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beginning, doesn't he? Oh yeah, the very first verse,
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Matthew 1.1 he calls Jesus the son of David.
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Which is a massive claim to me. The huge claim By linking Jesus
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to David right away, Matthew was telling you that Jesus is the
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climax of Israel's entire story. He's the fulfillment of the
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promises made to David about an everlasting throne and a
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righteous Kingdom. This isn't just a small detail.
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That rail authority shapes everything Jesus says and does.
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So when Jesus opens his mouth to speak on that mountain, we're
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not just listening to a wise rabbi offering some good advice.
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No, we're hearing the authoritative King laying out
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the non negotiable standards for life in his Kingdom.
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That is it, and that leads us straight into the structure of
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the Sermon on the Mount itself in Matthew 5 through 7.
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The sources we're using define it as the Kingdom Manifesto.
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It's the grand unveiling. It is.
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It's the unveiling of what it means to live under the saving
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rule of the Messiah. And the setting itself, as you
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said before, it's very deliberately chosen.
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It's meant to remind us of Moses.
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The parallel is just impossible to miss.
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Jesus goes up on a mountain, just like Moses went up on Sinai
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to get the Law. But the difference between them
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is just staggering. How so?
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Jesus doesn't go up to receive the Law.
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He goes up to expound it, to deepen it, and to fulfill it on
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his own authority. Right.
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He's the one who can say. You have heard it said, but I
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say to you. Yes, he's the sovereign
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lawmaker. He's not just interpreting the
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law that was given, He is embodying it and legislating the
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righteousness that's required for His Kingdom.
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And he says that righteousness has to go beyond what the
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scribes and Pharisees were doing.
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It has to surpass it, and that's because it demands an internal
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change, not just an external performance.
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The Pharisees were focused on visible actions, on ritual
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cleanliness. Jesus is demanding A transformed
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heart. He goes after anger.
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Lust are motives. So the manifesto isn't just a
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new, harder legalism. Not at all.
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It's about the righteousness that's granted by the King and
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then expressed in a new kind of life.
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OK, so we've established the speaker's authority as king.
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Now we have to get really specific about the audience.
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When the King says you are the salt of the earth, who is the
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you? Well, Matthew tells us in verses
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1 and 2 of chapter 5, it says seeing the crowds, he went up on
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the mountain and when he sat down, his disciples came to him
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and he opened his mouth and taught them.
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So it's aimed right at that inner circle of disciples, the
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ones who had already committed to following him.
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Squarely at them. And the original Greek actually
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adds even more weight to this. OK, the phrase is jaimes este,
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and it really puts the emphasis on the you.
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It's like saying you yourselves are.
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So it's not a general statement about all of humanity.
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No, it's very specific. It's a declaration made about
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those who belong to Jesus who have started to live under his
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rule. And this you connects directly
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back to the character traits he had just finished describing in
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the verses right before this one.
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Yes, in the Beatitudes right, The you who are the salt are the
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very same people he just described as blessed, the poor
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in spirit, the meek, those who hunger and thirst for
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righteousness, the merciful, the pure in heart.
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The Beatitudes, verses 3 to 12. They define that inward reality,
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the character of a Kingdom citizen.
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So the change in verse 13 is a really big one.
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He moves from defining who the disciple is before God.
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What they are by grace. To defining their public
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function, their influence before other people.
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That's right, their ability to be solved in the world flows
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directly from the grace that made them poor in spirit and
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meek in the 1st place. Your saltiness is the visible
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expression of that inner reality.
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If you lose the character described in the Beatitudes, you
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lose the ability to be salt. Which brings us to our third
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section, which is, I think you could argue, the theological key
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to this whole passage. Identity grounds, obligation.
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We really need to dig into why the grammar of the kin statement
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is so central to reformed thinking.
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This is where we need to spend some real time.
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Jesus speaks in what's called the indicative mood.
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He says you are the salt. He doesn't use the imperative
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mood. He doesn't say go out and try to
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be salt or work harder to become salty.
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And that difference is just, it's huge.
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If he had used the imperative, the command, then Christian
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Living would just be another self help project.
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It would be an attempt to achieve this quality of
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saltiness through your own effort, and that always ends in
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one of two places, either exhausting legalism or
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paralyzing despair. Because you can never do enough.
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Never. But by using the indicative, the
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statement of fact, he's affirming this consistent
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pattern you see all through the Bible.
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The identity that grace gives you comes before the ethical
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obligation, and it's the ground for.
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It so being salty isn't a natural human trait or some
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moral prize you win. No, it's a state that is
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declared over you by Christ because you're united to Him.
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It's a fruit of grace, not a precondition for getting grace.
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So that saltiness, that holiness, that moral
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distinctiveness that preserves and gives flavor, it's the
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necessary result of justification.
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It flows from what God has already made his people to be in
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Christ. This is a principle that's
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captured in our confessions. It connects justification and
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sanctification perfectly. We are counted as righteous.
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That's justification to declarative act, and therefore
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we are enabled and obligated to live righteously, which is
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sanctification, a process. So we don't live distinctly to
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earn the title of salt. We live distinctly because
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Christ has already declared us to be salt.
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The indicative always grounds the imperative.
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What we are is the basis for what we do.
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That clarity really helps correct a common tendency to see
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this assignment as being about, you know, grabbing cultural
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power or winning political battles.
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If our identity is a gift of grace, then where does our
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ultimate allegiance lie? Well, the identity is a
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celestial 1A heavenly 1, and that has to shape the methods
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and the goals of the assignment. We're placed in the middle of
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this decaying world, but our ultimate loyalty isn't to this
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decaying world. The sources remind us that our
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citizenship is in heaven. I think it's Philippians 3.20.
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Yes, and John 18.36 where Jesus tells Pilate that his Kingdom is
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not of this world, talking about its origin and its methods.
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The sources make a very clear point here.
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Being SALT is not mainly about seizing political power or
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cultural control through worldly means.
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If the church tries to give an influence by compromising its
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own holiness, you know by becoming caseless just to get a
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seat at the table, it gives up the very thing that makes it
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effective in the first place. So our methods of influence,
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holy living, witness, prayer, they have to be rooted in that
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heavenly citizenship. We can't just adopt the
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political machinery of the decaying world around us.
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Now, a key point of clarification is needed here.
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This doesn't mean that Christians just withdraw from
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culture or politics completely. It means that when they do
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engage, they have to do it with methods that are consistent with
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their King's rule. Methods that are focused on
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moral clarity and witness, not assimilation or or worldly power
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plays. The preservation comes from the
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moral presence, not from structural control.
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That makes the function so much clearer.
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It's about being a moral presence that's rooted in a
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supernatural identity. OK, let's move to section 4th
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and start to detail the multifaceted function of salt.
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Jesus chose this image for a reason.
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Salt does more than just one thing.
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Yes, and that's why the metaphor is so powerful.
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We can pull out three key functions from the ancient
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context, and they all speak to the kind of distinctiveness the
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disciple needs. There's preservation, seasoning
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and covenant. Let's start with the first one,
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preservation and restraint. We've already established that
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in the ancient world, salt was what you used to hold back
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decay. How does that translate
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spiritually? Spiritually, this is the
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function of common grace. Christ places his disciples in
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the world as a preserving presence, a tool that God uses
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to restrain the speed of evil in the broader society.
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Like a brake pedal. It's like a brake pedal on
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cosmic decay. Just the existence of a
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righteous remnant slows things down.
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How does that actually work though?
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I mean, in practice you're talking about a small minority
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of people restraining billions. The sources outline a few ways.
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First, just by their holy conduct, simply by being
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visible, it exposes and checks evil.
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When you see someone practice integrity and diligence in their
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work, it raises the bar for everyone, even for people who
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don't share their faith. It creates a standard.
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It does. And 2nd, the disciples witness
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to truth and clarity acts as a kind of moral reference point.
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It reminds society that objective standards exist even
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when society wants to reject those standards.
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And crucially, you mentioned their prayers.
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Yes. The collective prayers of the
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faithful are described in the sources as a way God can
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restrain divine judgment on a wicked society.
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You see this with Abraham praying for Sodom.
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If you remove the righteous completely, judgment often comes
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very quickly. So the Church, just by existing
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faithfully and praying, is a mercy to the civilization around
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it. It is, and the scale of this is
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massive, he says of the Earth. It's meant for the whole world.
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It's a quiet, almost unseen, but essential force that's slowing
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down the moral collapse. That's the nature of
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preservation, isn't it? You don't notice it's there
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until it's gone. And then it's a catastrophe.
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Now let's look at the second function, seasoning and making
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truth compelling. Salt is also for cooking.
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Right, it gives flavor and makes food palatable.
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And spiritually, this calls the disciple to live a life that
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makes the truth of Christ beautiful, attractive,
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compelling. How so?
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This seasoning is the visible demonstration of the Beatitudes
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in action. It's mercy, peacemaking,
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humility, joy even when you're suffering.
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It's the beauty of holiness that makes people look twice.
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No, this sounds like it's getting dangerously close to
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that dilution we weren't about. How do you season the world
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without just pandering to what it wants?
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And that is the essential tension.
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The seasoning can't be achieved by watering down doctrine or
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swapping out conviction for cultural appeasement.
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You can't just mix the salt with sugar to make it go down easier.
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Because then it's not salt anymore.
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It requires moral clarity and firm conviction, but it has to
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be coupled with an extraordinary graciousness in your manner.
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Paul says in Colossians that our speech should always be
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gracious, seasoned with salt. So the goal isn't to remove all
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the friction, because the truth itself will cause friction.
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The truth will always offend someone.
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The goal is to make sure that the offense comes from the truth
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itself, delivered with kindness, and not from our own pride or
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our own rudeness. When a disciple lives justly and
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loves mercy and walks humbly, that life is a stark contrast to
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the world's self-interest. But that very contrast, when
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it's delivered with grace, is what makes the gospel message
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accessible. It makes it worthy of being
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considered. The moment we compromise that
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moral clarity to make the message less offensive, we're in
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danger of losing our saltiness. That sets up the third function,
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which connects directly to the King's authority, covenant, and
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purity. This sends us back to the Old
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Testament, to the ritual use of salt.
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Right, in the Old Testament, every grain offering had to be
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seasoned with salt. That's in Leviticus.
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This ritual use tied salt directly to purity and to
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faithfulness to God's covenant. It was a symbol.
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It symbolized that the worshipper was bringing
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something pure, something unadulterated and dedicated only
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to the Lord. And there's an even stronger
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connection in the Book of Numbers.
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Yes, Numbers 18 talks about a covenant of salt.
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In the ancient world, a covenant of salt was a sign of absolute
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permanence and loyalty. It was a deal that could not be
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broken. Why salt specifically?
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Because it's chemically stable, it doesn't spoil, so it became a
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symbol for a loyalty that was meant to last forever.
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So when Jesus calls his disciples salt, he is
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identifying them as God's covenant people living in a
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corrupt and temporary world. That's it.
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He's declaring them to be distinct, pure, and enduring.
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Their loyalty is to the king, their character is to be pure,
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and their mission is permanent. They are the visible
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representatives of the King's promises in a culture that
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treats promises and loyalty as optional.
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Which is why it's a covenantal tragedy when the church loses
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that distinctiveness. It is OK.
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So we've laid out the identity and the function.
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This leads us right into the terrifying warning in the
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second-half of the verse. Section V.
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The peril, the folly of compromise.
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The first part is this amazing declaration you are the salt,
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but the second-half is this shocking warning.
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But if salt has lost its taste, how shall its saltiness be
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restored? And the sources really highlight
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a critical linguistic detail here.
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OK, this is about the Greek verb that's used for lost its taste.
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Yes, the verb is morancy, and this is a phenomenal detail
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because the word has a double meaning that Jesus almost
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certainly intended as a kind of striking word play for his
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listeners. So what are the 2 meanings?
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Well, the first one is obvious from the context to become
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tasteless or to become insipid for salt to lose its saltiness.
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But the second meaning is just a significant It also means to
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become foolish. From which we get our word
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moron. We do, and that completely
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changes the meaning, doesn't it? The question isn't just about a
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chemical failure, it's about moral and spiritual folly.
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If the salt becomes foolish. It is ceased to be what it was
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meant to be. It has made the utterly foolish
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choice to give up its distinctiveness and accommodate
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itself to the world. It shows that this loss of
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function isn't just an accident, it's a spiritual failure.
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It's the folly of chasing the world's approval instead of the
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King's command. And we can understand this loss
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of taste through a physical analogy with the kind of salt
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they had in Palestine. Right.
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The salt in that region often came from the Dead Sea or from
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salt marshes, so it wasn't pure sodium chloride like our table
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salt. It was mixed with other minerals
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like gypsum. If you left that block of salt
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out in the rain or it got damp, the very soluble sodium chloride
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would just leach out, and what you'd be left with was this
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powdery residue. It looked like salt.
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But it was useless. It retained the external form,
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the appearance of salt, but it had none of the essential inner
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reality. And that is the perfect
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spiritual equivalent of useless salt.
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A church or a professing Christian that keeps all the
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external forms of religion, the vocabulary, the rituals, the
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buildings, but has lost the inner reality of holiness and
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devotion and faithfulness to the truth.
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It's salt in name only. That's the tragedy of spiritual
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ineffectiveness. If you look like salt and you
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talk like salt, but you don't function as salt, you have
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become foolish. You have committed, Morante.
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And this loss of effectiveness leads directly to the terrible
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consequences that the king describes next, the final fate
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of this useless salt. It is no longer good for
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anything except to be thrown out and trampled under people's
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feet. I mean, that imagery is just
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incredibly degrading to be thrown out and trampled.
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It's a picture of public contempt, of scorn.
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This useless salt residue was literally thrown out onto the
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dirt paths where everyone's foot traffic would just crush it and
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grind it into the dust. The most useless fate
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imaginable. And spiritually, this pictures
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the church becoming an object of mockery.
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Yes, an object of mockery rather than a hated object of
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conviction. That is a really crucial
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distinction that's so often missed.
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The world might fight against true holiness, but it saves its
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sharpest mockery for hypocrisy. It does.
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If the Church has so accommodated itself to the
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world. If Christians are consuming the
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same moral filth, chasing the same idols of greed and status,
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excusing sins because, well, everybody does it, then the
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world looks at that and just scorns the whole thing.
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The Church loses all moral authority, All of it.
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It can't confront or preserve society because it's obviously
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part of the decay itself. If the world sees no real
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difference between a covenant community and just another
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secular club, the salt is useless.
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And the world already has plenty of secular clubs.
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A million of them. It's it's no need for a
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religious one that just parrots its own values.
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This accommodation, this dilution that leads not just to
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being ineffective, but to being held in total contempt.
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And Jesus really drives home how hard it is to get that
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distinctiveness back with that rhetorical question, how shall
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its saltiness be restored, that? Question is meant to deeply
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unsettle our complacency. It shows that a squandered
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reputation, a compromised witness, a church that's been
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emptied of moral clarity, these things are not easily regained.
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You can't just flip a switch and become salty again.
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No, the process of restoration is agonizingly difficult.
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It often involves long periods of repentance and trying to
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rebuild trust. And the imagery of being cast
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out, it carries a hint of divine judgement against that spiritual
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uselessness doesn't. It it does, it fits with
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Christ's other warnings, especially to the lukewarm
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church in Laodisha in the Book of Revelation.
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They think they're rich and effective, but they're
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spiritually useless and Christ warns he's ready to spit them
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out of his mouth. So the peril here isn't about
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losing your salvation. No, that's secured by Christ's
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finished work. But it's about forfeiting your
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usefulness, your credibility as Christ's appointed instrument in
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the world. And that is a terrifying
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prospect. So if the danger is that real,
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the conversation has to turn to practical application.
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How do we cultivate and maintain this distinctiveness?
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We have to move from the declaration of truth to the
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necessary action. And since saltiness is declared
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by grace, it has to be maintained by grace.
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It's not preserved by just gritting your teeth and trying
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harder. It's preserved by clinging to
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the Savior, by staying close to Him and relying completely on
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the strength His Spirit provides.
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What does that look like in the day-to-day life of a disciple?
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It requires daily repentance. It requires serious, humble self
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examination and light of the word.
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We have to constantly be asking ourselves, where have I
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compromised? Where have I let worldliness
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dull my moral senses? The sources remind us that we
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have to consciously submit our desires to Christ's lordship,
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turning from sin every moment. So the means of grace become
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absolutely central to this whole process.
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They are central, serious engagement with scripture,
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persistent prayer. These are non negotiable and the
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regular attentive hearing of the preach word is vital.
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We have to treat the sermon not as you know, religious
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background music, but is the authoritative voice of our King,
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explaining his manifesto and showing us the areas where our
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salt is becoming tasteless. And since being salty flows
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directly from that inner identity, we have to keep going
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back to the beginning of the sermon, back to the Beatitudes.
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Yes, maintaining saltiness means we are continually pleading with
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God to form those Beatitudes dispositions deep inside of us.
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If we're not poor in spirit, if we're not meek, if we're not
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pure in heart, then that moral distinctiveness just fades away.
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The internal source has to be there the.
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Humility and the brokenness described at the start of
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Matthew 5 are the necessary internal source of that
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preserving influence. Without that inner reality, the
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saltiness is lost, no matter how much external religious activity
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we do. And moving from the personal to
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the corporate, Jesus speaks in the plural.
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You all are the salt, so the health and the distinctiveness
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of the local church itself are critical here.
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The corporate dimension matters so much, churches stay salty
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when they insist that doctrine and discipline matter.
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When a church starts to embrace the surrounding cultures,
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shifting ideas about morality or truth, it loses its ability to
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restrain or season the world. What role does something like
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church discipline play in stopping this decay?
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Well, faithful church discipline is one of God's appointed ways
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to prevent decay inside the covenant community.
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If known unrepentant sin is just tolerated, the whole body gets
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affected. It's a preservative measure.
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How so? By calling a member to
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repentance, or if it comes to it, by casting them out, the
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Church is signaling to the world and to its own members that the
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King standard is real, that holiness is non negotiable.
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This visible act of purity helps maintain the saltiness of the
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whole body. And the sources connect this
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corporate maintenance to worship too, yes.
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The integrity of worship has to be maintained.
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Worship has to be God centered and Word governed, not shaped by
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entertainment culture or by a desire to appease the
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unchurched. And the preaching.
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The preaching has to expound scripture, confront sin, and
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call people to repentance. A church that starts avoiding
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the hard texts or softens the edge of God's requirements so it
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doesn't offend cultural norms. That church is on a fast track
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to becoming tasteless. OK.
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So finally, we need to clarify the right stance toward the
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world. We've said it's not withdrawal
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and it's not assimilation. The posture is so important,
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it's purity and engagement. The salt has to touch the thing
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it's preserving, but it has to remain chemically distinct from
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it. Separation is from sin, not from
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sinners, right? Jesus ate with tax collectors
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and sinners. He engaged them.
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He engaged them deeply, but he never once compromised the truth
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or his own holiness. So how do we demonstrate this
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distinction in the you know, the mundane, everyday interactions
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of life? This is where that costly
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distinctiveness becomes most visible.
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It looks like honesty and diligence at your job when other
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people are cutting corners or lying to get ahead.
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It looks like embodying biblical patterns of marriage and
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parenting at home, setting a countercultural example of
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faithfulness. It means refusing to endorse
26:30
what God calls sin, right? Maintaining moral clarity in
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public life. But, and it's a key doing it
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without hatred or self righteousness, without a spirit
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of condemnation. The goal, then, is to live such
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a visibly holy, merciful and joyful life that Christ's
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character is seen even in the small, ordinary moments.
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And that is how preservation works, small acts of obedience
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that resist the broader spiritual rot.
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This visible distinctiveness is the assignment, and it's costly
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because it will bring opposition.
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But the alternative, which is dilution, is far worse.
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It only leads to contempt. This has been a really necessary
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deep exploration of a text that's so often quoted but I
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think rarely understood. Let's try to summarize the key
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takeaways of this radical assignment.
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OK, first we established that Christian Identity is a
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declaration of grace. It's a gift from the King, not
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something we achieved through our own effort.
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The indicative mood governs it all.
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We are salt because Christ made us so.
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Second, the church is God's appointed instrument for
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restraint and for witness. In a world that's naturally
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decaying, our function is to preserve and to season.
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And third, being salty requires a visible, costly
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distinctiveness. And that distinctiveness isn't
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rooted in political maneuvering or cultural acceptance.
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It's rooted in a grace transformed heart that displays
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the humility and the purity we see in the Beatitudes.
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Which brings us to our final provocative thought for you to
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consider. The sources made a really
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searing observation that I think we need to close with The world
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might hate the church for its holiness, but it mocks the
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church for its hypocrisy. And that distinction should
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drive our daily choices. If the world rejects you for
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speaking Christ's truth with moral clarity, if they oppose
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you because your life and your church refused to compromise
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with sin, then in a sense, you're being hated for the right
28:22
reason. You're being hated because you
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are effective salt. But if?
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Your life is scorned because it's spiritually useless,
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because you're constantly making excuses for sin, and your moral
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life looks just like the world's.
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Then you're in danger of being that salt in name only.
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The goal isn't cultural approval, it's faithfulness to
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the King's word. And we should remember the
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encouragement here, that even small, hidden acts of ordinary
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obedience are seen and used by the King to preserve his people
28:46
and his world. Our ultimate hope isn't in our
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own ability to be salty. It's in the Savior, the truly
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pure One who was cast out and trampled under foot.
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He bore the judgement we deserved so that we might be
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purified and become his distinct preserving presence until His
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Kingdom comes and fall.