"Salt and Light" (Pt.2)

(Part 2)

“Is tasteless food eaten without salt, or is there flavor in the white of an egg?” 

Job 6:6

Salt makes tasteless food more palatable! Salt when applied to certain foods cuts through bitterness and provides balance to sweet and sour flavors. As the salt of the earth, we as Christians ought to make living in this corrupt and perverse world a little more palatable. Through encouragement, demonstrating God’s love by serving others, and sharing the Good News of Christ we can cut through the deep held bitterness in people’s hearts and help bring balance to those who are hurting.

Engaging others in this way will result in the same by-product we experience when we consume salt. Thirst! Contact with Christians ought to leave others thirsty for the things of God. However, you have to have contact to have influence. Meat isn’t preserved unless the salt comes in contact with the meat. Thirst doesn’t occur unless the salt comes in contact with the taste buds. Christians cannot have influence with unbelievers, unless we come in contact with them. Nevertheless, a lack of contact, isn’t the only way we can lose our influence and usefulness.  

“You are the salt of the earth. But if the salt loses its saltiness, how can it be made salty again? It is no longer good for anything, except to be thrown out and trampled underfoot.”

Matthew 5:13

Saltiness comes from being connected to Christ. As we remain in Him and live according to His Word we retain the saltiness (influence) needed to have a positive preserving influence on those around us. Jesus, however, cautioned that it is possible to lose our saltiness. How does this happen?

Our influence is diminished when we compromise our faith and embrace the immorality of this world, compromise our convictions, and attempt to blend-in with the culture. We lose influence when we develop selfish attitudes, walk in negativity, continuously take from others, and become complacent. In this way, we lose our potency (strength and effectiveness) and can actually become a deterrent to others. Jesus said that salt that is no longer salty is no longer good for anything, except to be thrown out and trampled on by men.

Although it has lost its usefulness to preserve and to make that which is bitter palatable, it still retains one devastating potency. Its ability to destroy plant life!

Some ancient texts discuss how conquering armies would sometimes take salt and spread it out to kill the vegetation around a defeated city. This was done for two reasons, one symbolic an one practical. Symbolically it was used to proclaim a curse over that city. Anyone who arrived would see the city devastated, the people killed or taken into captivity, and all the plant life dead. It would look like a place that was cursed and uninhabitable. Practically speaking, it would hinder the town’s viability for growth. It would not be easy to resettle and repopulate that area because crops would be difficult to grow.

If we fail to operate in righteousness, we can have the opposite effect we intend to have on those around us. We can actually hinder their desire to come to Christ or cripple their spiritual growth. We have a responsibility to maintain our saltiness. In this way, we remain a positive influence while at the same time keeping ourselves from potentially hindering others from coming to Christ, but just as important as our being agents of preservation is; the significance of us being agents of proclamation is equally important.  

                               

Pastor Scott Burr

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